Not So Famous…

I know, I just wrote a rant two days ago, but I’ve been kicking this “rants” idea around in my head for quite awhile so right now, topics are coming to me rather quickly. I think I’m going to pull a Lord of the Rings on you all and release these rants somewhat far apart so you get a more even frequency of rants. J This is a very broad rant that has very specific application to my life, and while my point of view has been discussed many times on other websites, I’m going to post it here as well.

Many times, when Christians do stuff that bothers other Christians, the bothered Christians will say, “You know, by doing this thing that bothers me, you could cause a weaker brother to stumble.” This is a lame argument, derived from a very non-lame source, quite incorrectly as it turns out. The source is the passage in Romans, Chapter 14, v 1-23, where Paul discusses a situation among the Christians in Rome. Some new Christians were Jews, and some were Gentiles, and the Jews felt tied to ceremonial Jewish law regarding kosher food, (No eating of bloody meat, or of pork are the situations discussed in this passage, but there are MANY, as any Jewish person can tell you) and the law regarding religious days. (The feast days, etc.) The new Christians who were Gentiles regarded every day as equal, excepting the Lord’s day. And they had no problem eating everything that was set before them.

Those who felt restrained by Jewish Law despised and looked down upon those who were not restrained, and vice versa. This is what Paul was addressing in this chapter. Look at verse 5: “One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.” i.e. Judge for yourselves what is right, and let each man live according to that judgment. (This is assuming that the Christians who are judging for themselves are in the Word and praying for God’s guidance in these matters, of course.)

But there is the matter of the stumbling block. “Let us not therefore judge one another any more: but judge this rather, that no man put a stumblingblock or an occasion to fall in his brother’s way.” (Romans 14:13) This, we must consider, but in so doing, consider this true story which happened to a man named Mark J. Young when he had a Christian Radio ministry call-in show:

He was talking with a man who had a fetish concerned with people’s unshod feet. Mark says that it would be safe to say that he should not ever take off his shoes in front of this man, for in so doing, Mark would have placed a stumbling block, or an occasion to fall, in front of this man, and this we are expressly prohibited from doing. But would it be prudent or wise to say that Mark, nor any of us, should never take off our shoes?? Of course not. That would be silly. In the same way must we apply this passage. If the drinking of beer or wine offends the “weaker brother”, then we should not drink these things in front of them, for though we may be persuaded of our liberty in Christ, and know that these things are not unclean in themselves, we should not give occasion to a recovering alcoholic to fall into it again. This is not to say that if he hears of you having a glass of wine with dinner, or a beer with friends, that he can confront you and say that he has heard of your sinful exploits behind his back. This passage is written to him as well. He is not to despise you for your liberty in Christ either.

The other aspect to this is when this argument is used wholly incorrectly, as I’ll detail here. If you participate in a certain activity, and a Christian approaches you and says that the activity could cause a weaker brother to stumble, but admits that he or she is not that weaker brother, then they are discussing a fictional weaker brother. Someone who might see you doing this, and might be tempted to stumble, or fall. This is completely wrong, as the Christian who created this “weaker brother” has no place in this equation whatsoever. The passage talks not at all about a Christian who might be worried about a weaker brother. This weaker brother who may or may not exist is who must speak with you about it. What this becomes, then, is a chance for a “Christian” to exert control over someone else’s life. A very unchristian attitude this is, and one that must not be tolerated.

I said this rant had very specific application, and it does. I play role-playing games. (Like Dungeons and Dragons, though I don’t play that specific one.) I live with a family right now where the parents think that the fantasy genre of role-playing games is Satanic. The weaker brother argument has been used here saying that I might cause a Christian who has come out of Satanism and the use of witchcraft might be made to stumble by hearing that I play role-playing games. The entire argument here is faulty. First, this imaginary weaker brother will never be present at a role-playing session. We don’t play role-playing games with strangers because our group is a close-knit group of friends. Second, the entire argument hinges upon whether role-playing games are Satanic, which they aren’t, which is how I know that a “weaker brother” will not surface and accuse us of causing him to return to witchcraft. If he were to actually sit in on a session, he would probably laugh at how lame the representation of magic is in role-playing games. I do not denegrate the family I live with…They have been amazing, and I love them dearly. But in this, they are wrong.

Another way this applies to me is that I like to drink beer. I drink it for the taste…not to get drunk. I tend to like beers that are darker in color. They have more character and flavor. I have been told that this might cause someone else to stumble, therefore I should not do it. No. This is again, very lame. I should not let weaker brothers see me drinking, and I have no problem with that. I generally only drink at home, or when friends and I go to a pub, or brewing company/restaurant. If I were to go out to eat with a brother that thought drinking alcohol was wrong, I would go to a restaurant that didn’t serve beer, or more accurately, one that wasn’t a pub or brewing company! Problem solved. But at any rate, the person who confronted me with this wasn’t the weaker brother. She was a friend who thought there might somewhere be some weaker brother who might hear of me drinking through a friend of a friend of a friend and have a problem with that. So it was an incorrect application of the verses. “But, Chris,” you might say. “Shouldn’t you refrain from drinking just in case this weaker brother does hear about your drunken exploits?” Well, the answer is no. Why? Simple. If a friend tells a friend who then tells a friend, who then tells a friend that I had a pint at a pub, and this final friend is offended, then that is 2 people who have sinned once, and 2 people who have sinned twice. (It is a sin to gossip, so we have the first 3 friends. AND, it is a sin to listen to gossip, which covers the last three friends. That’s 6 sins, which is supposed to somehow tell me that I should stop doing something which isn’t even a sin in the first place. Pretty DARN lame, if you ask me.

I realize that this is more of a Bible Study than a rant, but it was important to explain why this really annoys me, and to do that, for a Christian, inevitably requires the use of the Scriptures! Another thing that annoys me, though I’ll get into this in another rant, is Christians who do not understand what they believe, but are very adamant on what they believe. Problems such as the misapplication of the weaker brother argument arise because of an improper understanding of God and Scripture, and I’ll definitely be writing an article on this later. A correct understanding of Biblical Doctrine is essential to your faith. As a precursor to another article, I’d like to ask you a few questions.

1. Are you a Christian? (If no, never mind, these questions aren’t for you.)

2. Do you know what being a Christian means regarding what you believe about God and Jesus?

3. And finally, do you know what a doctrine is? If you don’t, please e-mail me. As a Christian, doctrine is something that you really need to know about.

One word, (and I use the loosest definition of the word, “word” that I possibly can)…ebonics.