Unashamed Reading Plan
Check out all the previous Unashamed readings here.
Unashamed Reading Plan | Week 16 | Day 1
Prayer
As you come to spend time with Jesus, calm your mind and body until you feel fully present. Ask Him to teach you more about Himself today.
Bible Reading: Romans 14:1-9
Read these verses three times slowly.
Accept the one whose faith is weak, without quarreling over disputable matters. One person’s faith allows them to eat anything, but another, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. The one who eats everything must not treat with contempt the one who does not, and the one who does not eat everything must not judge the one who does, for God has accepted them. Who are you to judge someone else’s servant? To their own master, servants stand or fall. And they will stand, for the Lord is able to make them stand.
One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind. Whoever regards one day as special does so to the Lord. Whoever eats meat does so to the Lord, for they give thanks to God; and whoever abstains does so to the Lord and gives thanks to God. For none of us lives for ourselves alone, and none of us dies for ourselves alone. If we live, we live for the Lord; and if we die, we die for the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord. For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord of both the dead and the living.
Reflection & Questions
Have you ever noticed that the Bible isn’t clear on everything in the Christian life? That it leaves plenty of room for disagreement. To the point that even here in this verse, Paul can say there are such things as “disputable matters.” Disputable matters are the gray areas of the Christian life. These can be frustrating at times for the Christian. Why didn’t God just spell it all out? Afterall, He could have made it clear and very precise. So He intentionally didn’t.
In these verses, Paul perhaps reveals one of the reasons God allowed there to be gray areas; because He wants to teach us how to put relationship and love for one another first as followers of Jesus. And what’s the best way to test and strengthen love? Introduce friction and help people put aside their preferences and pet-beliefs and put loving each other central. Maturing as believers is learning to discern what is ‘disputable’ and how to put love above those things. We learn to realize that who are we to “judge someone else’s servant” and that if they are doing things “for the Lord” is what matters. There are times with Christians to divide over beliefs or practices, but much more often those differences should allow us to learn to love another, realizing that we are following Jesus the best way we know how.
- What are some examples of differences of beliefs or practices for Christians that are gray areas ?
- Is there a person you need to learn to put love above your differences in beliefs or practices? Talk to God about that.
Prayer
Pray in response to today’s reading.
Worship Song
You might use this song today to worship Jesus today:
Bible Reading: Romans 14:2-3
Read these verses three times slowly.
One person’s faith allows them to eat anything, but another, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. The one who eats everything must not treat with contempt the one who does not, and the one who does not eat everything must not judge the one who does, for God has accepted them.
Reflection & Questions
Have you ever met someone who thinks the exact same way as you, has the exact same opinions as you do, and believes everything the same as you do? Probably not! We are each so different, even in our relationship with God and how we understand the Bible.
Wouldn’t it have been nice if God had just made everything very clear in the Bible? He could have told us each how to live, exactly what we should do, and what we shouldn’t do. But He didn’t do that. There are some things that we just don’t have a perfectly clear answer to. Maybe you know someone who is a vegetarian – they don’t eat any meat. But your family enjoys eating meat. Is one of you right and one of you wrong? If you look in the Bible for the answer, it is difficult to know for sure. These types of differences are called gray areas – this means that the answers are not perfectly clear like black and white but are a bit more muddled together, like the color gray.
Paul perhaps reveals one of the reasons God allowed there to be gray areas: because he wants to teach us how to put relationships and love for one another first as followers of Jesus. When you disagree with someone, do you let it completely ruin your relationship with them? Jesus has made it very clear that we are to love first, even if we don’t agree with someone. That can seem hard to do sometimes, but that’s how Jesus loves so that’s how we are to try to love too.
- Can you think of someone who thinks differently than you do? How can you show them love?
Pray
Ask God to help you love people that you don’t agree with and to make love more important than your differences.
Check out more Bible Reading Plans here.
Questions?
Ed Applegate
