The Preacher's Bible

Now accept one who is weak in faith, but not for disputes over opinions. ²One man has faith to eat all things, but he who is weak eats only vegetables. ³Don’t let him who eats despise him who doesn’t eat. Don’t let him who doesn’t eat judge him who eats, for God has accepted him. ⁴Who are you who judge another’s servant? To his own lord he stands or falls. Yes, he will be made to stand, for God has power to make him stand.

⁵One man esteems one day as more important. Another esteems every day alike. Let each man be fully assured in his own mind. ⁶He who observes the day, observes it to the Lord; and he who does not observe the day, to the Lord he does not observe it. He who eats, eats to the Lord, for he gives God thanks. He who doesn’t eat, to the Lord he doesn’t eat, and gives God thanks. ⁷For none of us lives to himself, and none dies to himself. ⁸For if we live, we live to the Lord. Or if we die, we die to the Lord. If therefore we live or die, we are the Lord’s. ⁹For to this end Christ died, rose, and lived again, that he might be Lord of both the dead and the living.

¹⁰But you, why do you judge your brother? Or you again, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of Christ.

¹¹For it is written, “‘As I live,’ says the Lord, ‘to me every knee will bow. Every tongue will confess to God.’” ¹²So then each one of us will give account of himself to God.

¹³Therefore let’s not judge one another any more, but judge this rather, that no man put a stumbling block in his brother’s way, or an occasion for falling. ¹⁴I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean of itself; except that to him who considers anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean. ¹⁵Yet if because of food your brother is grieved, you walk no longer in love. Don’t destroy with your food him for whom Christ died. ¹⁶Then don’t let your good be slandered, ¹⁷for God’s Kingdom is not eating and drinking, but righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. ¹⁸For he who serves Christ in these things is acceptable to God and approved by men. ¹⁹So then, let’s follow after things which make for peace, and things by which we may build one another up. ²⁰Don’t overthrow God’s work for food’s sake. All things indeed are clean, however it is evil for that man who creates a stumbling block by eating. ²¹It is good to not eat meat, drink wine, nor do anything by which your brother stumbles, is offended, or is made weak.

²²Do you have faith? Have it to yourself before God. Happy is he who doesn’t judge himself in that which he approves. ²³But he who doubts is condemned if he eats, because it isn’t of faith; and whatever is not of faith is sin.