Today’s reading is Romans 13:1-14:23.

Although I’m not sure I fully understand exactly how to apply Romans 14 in all situations, I do understand its context. I understand when Paul says, “For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit” (Romans 14:17), he is explaining that we should not stake our souls on what we eat. Rather, we should be willing to give up certain foods if it makes our brother stumble. 

However, I can’t help but see an overarching principle here that is increasingly being missed by today’s up and coming churches. Whether it is home churches or emergent churches or whatever kind of churches, I see some of them (the more vocal, though not all in any category) that seem to be missing this principle. This happens with their handling of the Lord’s Supper. It starts with the innocent position that many Christians take claiming the Lord’s Supper is the center of what we do as Christians. In Acts 20:7, the church at Troas assembled on the first day of the week in order to partake in the Supper. We have taken that and claimed it is the reason we get together every Sunday. I say, yes and no. Certainly, if we will be like our New Testament counterparts, when we gather on the first day of the week, we’ll partake and on the first day of the week, we’ll gather to partake. However, that doesn’t mean the central purpose of the church’s assembling is to take the Lord’s Supper. The church assembles to edify and build up its members. The church assembles to praise, honor, and glorify God together. One of the things we do in our assemblies is the Lord’s Supper. It is extremely important. Yet, we assemble to sing, pray, teach and be taught. These are not secondary to the Supper. They are just as important because they are all part of Christian assembling.

The next step some take is claiming the Lord’s Supper is more than the memorial meal Jesus established after partaking in the Passover. Now we are told it is an actual meal to satisfy our hunger (that is said despite Paul’s teaching in I Corinthians 11:22, 34 that if we are hungry we should eat at home). It is a fellowship meal. Or they co-opt the unexplained verse about love feasts, add in some historical information from post New Testament churches and call it the Agape. We hear stories about how these early Christians gathered for what was the most important part of their Christianity–they gathered to eat together. Then in the middle of that, they remembered the death of Jesus.

I guess I just keep coming back to Romans 14:17. Again, I know this verse is not written about the Lord’s Supper, “fellowship meals” or love feasts. Yet, Romans 14:17 is not merely about the Romans 14 context. Rather, Paul brings in a general principle and discusses how it applies to his Romans 14 discussion. I can’t get past his general principle. If the kingdom is not eating and drinking, how can the most important aspect of my Christianity be eating and drinking? If the kingdom is not eating and drinking, how can the most important part of serving God be having some kind of “fellowship meal” with my brethren? Further, if that is the most important part of Christianity, as some seem to be suggesting, why isn’t there more about it in the New Testament?

Don’t get me wrong. I’m all for Christians eating together (cf. Acts 2:46). However, I just can’t help but think this idea stems more from our modern ideas of get togethers and the necessary nature of food to them than it does from the Bible. For instance, I can hardly see this concept coming out of churches in Zimbabwe and Ethiopia. I’m not surprised it is coming out of American churches. But in either case, Romans 14:17 says it isn’t coming out of the Bible.

Keep the faith and keep reading,

ELC

P.S. What did you get out of today’s reading?