Thursday, January 29

I Corinthians 8:10-13
For if others see you, who possess knowledge, eating in the temple of an idol, might they not, since their conscience is weak, be encouraged to the point of eating food sacrificed to idols? So by your knowledge those weak believers for whom Christ died are destroyed. But when you thus sin against members of your family, and wound their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ. Therefore, if food is a cause of their falling, I will never eat meat, so that I may not cause one of them to fall.
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The problem was whether or not it was good for followers of Jesus to eat food that had been sold in marketplace by the staff of temples to false gods.  I wonder if the Apostle Paul rolled his eyes.  God made food. Food is good. God is always telling us to eat.  Jesus loved to eat.  Jesus fed his disciples on the night he was betrayed.  He ate fish on a beach with them after he rose from the dead.  We have turned food into a problem.  Paul tells us, if it is really that big a problem then love the person with the problem more than you insist on enjoying the food.  The food produced in temples to false gods today is just about anything that you need a chemist to explain the ingredients.  In this case, we should all love ourselves, plant a garden and invite people to help us eat it.
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Holy God, help us love one another with the food we eat.  Amen.