We're going to deal tonight with a subject that has been on our hearts a number of meetings thus far, known as the conscience. Tonight we want to deal with the weak conscience, and there's an outline that we've been using, and there are a few pages back in the vestibule in case you don't have one, and you would like to use it and follow it. and we want to read beginning in Romans chapter fourteen and verse one now you read about the weak conscience in first Corinthians chapter eight and again in first Corinthians chapter ten and he's dealing with the same subject as he is in Romans fourteen I feel that Romans fourteen is more specific in giving directions to the child of God as the how to live in relationship to one who has a weak conscience and how we must view as God's people the great subject of meat or things that you eat and days. Okay, Romans verse one. Him that is weak in the faith receive ye. but not to doubtful disputations. For one believeth that he may eat all things, another who is weak eateth herbs. Let him that eateth despise him, let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not, and let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth. For God hath received him. Who art thou that judgest another man's servant? To his own master he stands or follows, yea he shall beholden up, for God is able to make him stand. One man esteemeth one day above another, another esteemeth every day alike, let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind. He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord. And he that regardeth not the day, to the Lord he does not regard it, He that eateth, eateth to the Lord, for he giveth God thanks, and he that eateth not, to the Lord he eateth not, and giveth God thanks. For none of us liveth to himself, and no man dith to himself. For whether we live, we live unto the Lord. And whether we die, we die unto the Lord. Whether we live therefore, or die, we are the Lord. For to this end Christ both died and rose and revived, that he might be Lord both of the dead and living. But why does thou judge thy brother? Or why does thou set it not thy brother? For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. For it is written, As I live saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God. So then every one of us shall give an account of himself. to God. Let us not therefore judge one another anymore, but judge this rather, that no man put a stumbling block or an occasion to fall in his brother's way. I know and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus that there is nothing unclean of itself, but to him that esteemeth anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean. What if thy brother be grieved with thy meat? Now walkest thou not charitably. Destroy not him with thy meat, for whom Christ died. Let not then your good be evil spoken of, because, for the kingdom of God is not meat and drink. That's negative. But notice the positive. But righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost. For he that in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God and approved to men. Let us therefore follow after the things which make for peace, and things wherewith one may edify another. For meat destroy not the work of God. All things indeed are pure, but it is evil for that man who eateth with offense. It is good neither to eat flesh nor to drink wine, nor anything whereby thy brother stumbleth or is offended or is made weak. Hest thou faith, have it to thyself before God. Happy is he that condemeth not himself in the thing which he alloweth. And he that doubteth is damned if he eat, because he eateth not of faith, for whatsoever is not a faith is sin. We then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselves. Let every one of us please his neighbor for his good to edification, for even Christ pleased not himself. But as it is written, the reproaches of them that reproached thee, fellow me, For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we, through patience and comfort of the Scriptures, might have hoped. Now the God of patience and consolation, grant you to be like-minded, one toward another, according to Christ Jesus, that ye may with one mind and one mouth glorify God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. wherefore receive ye one another as Christ also received us to the glory of God may the Lord bless the reading of his word let's pray together our father we read this what we would call a lengthy portion of your word and we pray for enlightenment now as we would speak and discuss the things contained herein. And we ask you now for thy special help, that we may grow in the grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. Remember, again we pray for those who are laid aside, and we ask for thy gracious comfort, for you are the God of all comfort, and cause thy name to be glorified and in our bodies and in their bodies for Jesus' sake. Amen. We've been examining the great subject of conscience as outlined in that outline that I've given to you a number of words days ago. Man is indeed a complex creature. He is spirit, soul, and body. He has a tripartite nature. But the word of God says, thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy mind, and with all thy strength. And when we examine this, we find that man, while he is tripartite in his being, spirit, soul, and body, he also has mind. He has memory. He has conscience. And you'll notice what I have to say about that on the bottom of that page of notes that we have. Now for the child of God, the child of God by virtue of the fact that he is a child of God, he's been saved by grace. He has a purged conscience. He has a conscience that has been purged because the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son, has delivered him from the penalty of sin. And the purpose of the child of God is the soul walk to the Lord. That is, you'll notice the ascending scale on the page of notes that you can get all the way to the top. As the Apostle spoke of himself, that he seeks and he exercises himself daily to have a conscience void of offense toward God and toward man. Now, this calls for genuine exercise. And the reason it calls for exercise is because when you'll go down the page and the far right, you'll notice there's such a thing as an emboldened conscience that's spoken of in First Corinthians eight and verse ten. A swerving conscience that's spoken of in First Timothy chapter one and verse six. There's a wounded conscience that the Word of God speaks of in First Corinthians eight and verse two. and there is a weak conscience that is is found also in first Corinthians chapter eight and verse seven and we want to deal with a weak conscience because the weak conscience is the one that is the wounded conscience as well and it's in the context of the wounded conscience and it's found in the context of the emboldened conscience also and we want to link them all together and talk to you tonight and again next Lord's Day and night on the subject of the weak conscience. Now, as we've been studying the subject of conscience from various ways from the Word of God, we saw last Lord's Day morning that the conscience becomes a curse to man. The conscience within us is a wonderful thing. It either accuses us or it excuses us. It is wonderful, however, that conscience operates according to the baggage that a person is carrying. And that baggage can cause it to accuse or either excuse. And the reason I say that conscience is a curse For Satan said to Adam and Eve, when they had a good conscience, no evil in the Garden of Eden, in the day you eat thereof, you'll be like God, you'll know good and evil. And when they had a conscience and they knew good and evil, what did their conscience cause them to do? The first thing that their conscience caused them to do. It caused them, friends, to hide from God among the trees of the garden. And while the sinner has an accusing conscience, because he has an evil conscience, it causes him to hide from God. And the conscience becomes a curse because the choices that man now must make is not a choice between God in the one hand, and the gods of this world on the other, as we notice from Joshua twenty-four. But the child of God, not the child of God, but men have to make a choice not between God and gods, but between gods only. Whether it's this God, we can call it General Electric, or that God, we can call Burlington Industries. Or that God we can call AT&T. Who is going to rule our life as a child of God? And we may say, well, we have to work somewhere. That's true. That's true. But my life is not made. And as a child of God, I am not in bondage. to the people to whom I work. I am while I accept the pay. While I'm there, I'm expected to work as unto the Lord. But when it comes to that which is right and wrong, those people who have us employed, if we're in employment in that category, must be secondary to the Lord of glory. And we must keep that ever before us. A good friend of mine, and you all know who I'm talking about, is Brother McNeil. During the Depression, he worked in a drugstore in Scotland as a drugist. And I took him with me to get a prescription, and we went out where this druggist is a friend of mine, and to hear these two fellows talk about how they made drugs and filled a prescription years ago, how they had to make the pills and everything else right in the drugstore. It was quite interesting to listen to Mr. McNeil and my friend the druggist. And he said to me, when are you going to bring that Scotsman back? That I'd like to talk with him some more about making pills. But Mr. McNeil, he worked for someone else. And jobs were hard to come by. And he was told that he has to sell condoms to anyone who asked. And he said to him, you either sell them or else. No, he said it'll have to be the or else. And he walked the streets for weeks without a job. I'm asking you tonight, where do we really stand when it comes to making the hard choices of life? We are living in a wicked day. And we can look back. And here's an example that we can look at. God has blessed his life. And he's become a blessing to many others. Now, we also saw concerning conscience that the conscience of an individual, and we all have one, it is exercised according to the instruction that it has received by the individual and also by the desires of that individual. Our conscience will swerve according to the baggage that we carry. And if we carry the wrong baggage, we could call darkness light, and we can call light darkness. And the Word of God tells us in the eighth chapter, I think it is, of Isaiah, woe unto them that call darkness light and light darkness. But tonight... we want to deal especially with a weak conscience as it's outlined the weak conscience is a conscience that is the possession of what is known in scripture as a weak believer a weak believer now we'd all like to think that we're strong believers wouldn't we but a lot of times these things become real tricky because the weak believer always appears to be real strong because the weak believer makes known his scruples and he makes known his scruples in order that the other person squirms. And we'll take a look at that in just a moment. Now, you find a weak believer mentioned in First Corinthians eight and in First Corinthians ten, as well as Romans fourteen that we read. And you noticed in Romans fourteen two things that are mentioned concerning the weak believer. There are foods and days. And the foods and days made up the real problem in the early church. Now, our problem today, primarily, is not food and days. It may be other things. And I'll point that out in a moment. Now, our desire, as believers, should be to have a conscience void of offense, both toward God and toward man. And I believe that that position is found in Romans fourteen, verses seventeen and eighteen. It is an understanding of what the kingdom of God really is. Notice Romans fourteen, verse seventeen. For the kingdom of God is not need and drink. These things do not make up the kingdom of God. No matter how much he's talked about, They do not make up the kingdom of God. It's not meat and drink. But it is something. It is righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. And the next verse says, For he that in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God and approved to men. And that becomes the most important thing to us as a children of God. Now, when you deal with this subject of the weak brother, whether it's in First Corinthians eight and First Corinthians ten, you have believers from different backgrounds. And whether we like it or not, the background from which we came has an influence upon us. In the Corinthian church, many of these were Gentiles. Their religious background was pagan. They were pagans. They had left all behind and embraced Christ. Now, what about the food that he's offered to an idol? and then sold the next day in the shambles in the butcher shop you see if it was offered to an idol you could get hamburger for ten cents a pound the next day or eighty cents a pound if you got it fresh you follow what I'm saying and here what about and the person had a conscience because it was offered to an idol And because an idol doesn't eat, it was then sold in the shambles. You see. And there are those who had a we are conscious about it. So the background had a lot to do with it. So you have the Gentile who has come from a pagan background. On the other hand, you have the Jew. The Jew. who embraced Christianity, he came from another background. He came from the background of Judaism. He had a tendency to cling to the laws and to the ceremonies of the Old Testament. They're eating of meats, and a lot of meats were forbidden under the Old Testament economy. You couldn't eat a rabbit. You couldn't eat pork. No barbecue in those days, you see. Couldn't eat pork. And you couldn't eat clams. You couldn't eat oysters. And you couldn't eat shrimp. The seafood that you ate had to come from a fish that had both scales and fins. So if you like catfish, you couldn't eat catfish. You see. So this was the background that the Old Testament or the Jewish believer at Corinth faced and also in Rome over the whole of the Roman Empire where the gospel of Jesus Christ had spread. Now we ask ourselves a question. What about today? Do we have weak believers today who... have a conscience in certain areas. Yes, we have weak believers today. We have believers today who will not eat pork on religious grounds. You do. Then, of course, there are believers today who will only eat fruit and vegetables. And that on religious grounds and they had their papers written on the subject of why Christians should only eat fruit and vegetables. And ha, that by having a vegetarian diet, it has drawn them closer to the Lord. You see, this is what is known as a weak conscience. Then there are those. today who will not participate at the Lord's Supper unless the bread is unleavened bread. Then there are those who will not participate at the Lord's Supper unless the cup contains fermented wine. You see, we have scruples about that. Then there are those who will not participate of the Lord's Supper unless there's only one cup. You see, they say the Scripture only speaks of one cup. And we've become so modern, we talk about cups. You see, there are many cups, individual cups. Now I know an assembly that just about split over this issue. They wanted to go to cuts as we have at the Lord's Supper. Oh, no, some of the brethren said. Oh, no, it's one cut. One cut. But they, as an assembly, were becoming an island of white folks who drove in on a Sunday morning in a black sea. And black believers got saved, and they started to come to the Lord's Supper. Then those same people who insist, yeah, you're starting to smile, who insisted on one cup, now insisted on individual cups. You see what kind of baggage we can carry? You see, this matter of a weak believer... It is a real thing, especially for a preacher if he's going to maintain a balance, if he visits various places and people ask questions. Now we have to answer another question. Who are the strong? Who are the strong? Well, there are the people referred to in chapter fifteen. Did you notice the first verse of chapter fifteen? We then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak and not to please ourselves. Well, if you're living to please yourself, you can put down right away you're not strong. The strong believer doesn't live to please himself. That's what it says. And of course, it says so on the basis of what is written in the fourteenth chapter. Who is the strong believer? The strong believer is the man who has grasped the wondrous truth concerning the person and work of our Lord Jesus Christ. They know that justification, that they have been declared righteous before God apart from works. They've learned the truth of grace, in other words. That's the first thing. We're justified by grace through faith plus nothing. We are declared righteous by God alone. to the work of Christ alone, apart from works. Furthermore, the strong believer is one who finds his complete rest in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ, knowing that he is complete in Christ. My completeness is not in how I perform a particular religious function. My completeness in Christ is because I'm in Christ. I went to hear David Morris on Friday night. He preached in Greensboro, and he preached for well over an hour, close to an hour and a half. and it was a black church and most of you know that I'm not a great hugger especially being hugged by women I got more hugs on Friday night from black women than I ever did in my life and I told my wife later about it I said you know that I'm not a hugger. And, boy, I tell you, I said, I didn't know quite what to do on Friday night. And that's how it is. But you see, how they conduct their religious ceremonies. didn't bother me one bit. I shouldn't say it didn't bother me one bit. It might be going just a wee bit too far. But that is their culture, and I can understand their culture. And I believe, by the way, that they were genuine sincere, genuinely sincere, and their love for Christ was very real. Now, if I were to, one of two of the reasons why I'm not a hugger, I'll be honest with you. I don't believe that we should show partiality. And I had a lot of fellowship in time past with Mennonites. If you were to go to a Mennonite church, you'll find that they practiced what is called, quote, the Holy Kiss, unquote. where it says greet one another with a holy kiss in Scripture. But it becomes a sect kiss. I've never been kissed in a Mennonite church as often as I've been there. They only kissed their own, even though they knew that I was a child of God. Now, I didn't want to be kissed primarily. I'm not, I wasn't looking for it. But it's men kiss men and women kiss women, by the way. But the thing is, I'm just trying to point this out. We have to be so careful that we receive all God's people. And I believe those dear people in that church on Friday night wanted to be sure that they received all God's people. Who is a strong believer? The strong believer is a man who has learned that we have liberty in Christ and we are completely done with legalism and ceremonialism forever. We are complete in Christ. There's somebody here in the audience who can't get over the fact that I was hugged. There's more than one, and I have to look at you. It gets funny because I had a Bible class a number of years ago in a certain home, and this woman that had the class in her home sure loved to see me get read and blushed. But nevertheless, that's my position. That's my position. Now, we come to the weak believer. The weak believer. Who is a weak believer? The weak believer is a man who has scruples about a lot of things. And I pointed out the things that they can raise questions about and have a conscience about it. And when they have a conscience about it, they throw themselves into the closing verses of the fourteenth chapter. And when they throw themselves into that position, it says, Happy is a man that condemns not himself. Verse twenty-two, in the thing that he alloweth. They allow something that they have a conscience about. Instead of being free before God, their conscience has become weak. and they're quibbling about questions. And then, of course, verse twenty-three says, And he that dotheth is damned if he eat. In other words, if he has a conscience about eating that food, and he eats it, and the person that he's eating with knows that he has a conscience about it, Then he condemns himself because he doesn't eat in faith. For whatsoever is not a faith is sin. That's what the Word of God says. So there's a lot of room here in this portion of the Word of God for receiving one another and not to quibble about things that a hundred years from the day won't make any difference. Now the question must be raised, which of these groups are right? The strong or the weak? Well, let me say this. Doctor in a way, the strong is right, because they understand the significance of the faith. But the issues here in Romans fourteen and in first Corinthians eight and first Corinthians ten are stronger and broader than merely a correct doctrinal view. They're broader than that. And if we're just going to be doctrinally strict, we can become very legalistic and laying down the rules. We're only going to have one cup at the Lord's Supper. Because I have a quibbling conscience about it. Now, I may sound real strong and say, we're only going to have one cup. That one cup is going to have real wine in it. Because if you read First Corinthians, how could any man get drunk at the Lord's Supper on grape juice? You see, you can have all kinds of arguments from the Word of God. You see what I mean? And I can appear to be a strong believer when I'm nothing but a weak believer. I'm satisfying what? A weak conscience. And I'm trying to get other people on my side so that I can have what? My own way. And you see... And when you get to the close of First Corinthians ten, it says, And whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God. Why does it say that? Because Philip can do things for the glory of Philip. And you can do things for the glory of whatever your name is. But the glory of God is a lot broader than Philip's narrow mind. or you're in our mind. You see. And if I'm going to grow in the Lord, I'm going to have to examine myself in the light of this. Now, from the Word of God, both of these views, the weak brother and the strong brother, needs correcting. Notice the weak. The weak brother needs correcting because his position is wrong. They condemn other people who don't agree with him. And they engage in censorous judgment of other believers. But what about the strong? The strong, rather, principle is right. They have used or misused it in their attitude toward the weaker brother. So that brings us to the importance of verses seven through nine in chapter fourteen. Let us read those verses again. Now I notice the clock is getting away with me tonight. Verse seven. It says, For none of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself. For whether we live, we live unto the Lord. And whether we die, we die unto the Lord. whether we live therefore or die, we are the Lord's. For to this end, Christ both died and rose and revived, that he might be Lord both of the dead and living. I want you to notice the first thing that we hear in the text. We are talking about believers only. The weak brother is saved. The strong brother is saved. is saved. We are talking about believers. This text does not apply to all humanity. This text only applies to those who have been saved by grace. Now that word man, no man liveth unto himself. In the New Testament, often it does not refer to man universally, but it refers to the believer. And we can say no believer lives to himself, and no believer dies to himself. Let me give you an illustration. In First Corinthians, verse three, we read, The head of every man is Christ. And there he's talking about those who are in the church, those who have been saved by divine grace. In First Corinthians twelve, verse seven, we read the expression, the Spirit is given to every man to profit with all. Now we know that the ungodly do not have the Holy Spirit. He's only speaking and using the word man in a prescribed way, having reference to those who are born of God. Furthermore, in First Corinthians chapter three, verse three, where he's speaking of man building. if any man build upon this foundation and the foundation is the person and work of Christ you see it is the foundation that the apostle laid in the early church in the word of God and an ungodly man a person who's not saved is not able to build so you see it is in this framework of believers only that this text can be understood. And if you try to mix this with the ungodly, with the unsaved, you're going to come up with all kinds of interpretations. Now, what does it say? It says no believer lives to himself and no believer dies to himself. Now, the unregenerate child, he gets his own way by having a temper tantrum. And that a delinquent, he'll take whatever belongs to him or whatever he wants, regardless of who is its owner. That's a delinquent. But the saved person is not living to himself. You see, the saved person is now Christ-centered. Once before we were saved, all things centered around us. But since we're saved by grace, now all things center around Christ. And that is something that I have to keep before me. I am no longer what I once was. I am not any longer in Adam. I am in Christ. Now there's a new horizon. Now there is a new life. Christ. is the new center. That's what he's meant in Second Corinthians five, seventeen, that we are in Christ, therefore we are a new creation. Now an ethical man may look very good. It's like having an excellent racing engine for an automobile. But he has, but a racing engine highly honed without oil. will not last long. The Christian does not run without oil. The oil of the Spirit of God has come in. And we have an R, a new creation in Christ. A man may be an ethical man. His life may be superb as you look at it from the outside, but there is no oil. And an engine run without oil will not go too far. Now, this text is a call to holy living. It says we do not live unto ourselves. And this is what is forgotten by both the weak and the strong. When you get people arguing, are we going to have one cup or are we going to have a number of cups at the Lord's Supper? You get a number of brethren arguing over it. Each one is right in their own eyes.