Grace in the Gray

Ever been in a spot where there was no clear answer? I know you poured over God’s word to find out exactly what God said about this! But…what you found is there’s nowhere in scripture to tell you if you should buy the 2025 Ford or the 2020 BMW. God just didn’t reveal will to you on if you should be a Pitt Panther or a Duquesne Duke. Or you’re like Jacob, and you’re standing in Giant Eagle mulling over if you should buy the store brand lasagna sheets or the Delallo’s? Sign up for Hinge or see if God ordains your true love to walk into church the next Sunday? You just made the best decision you could based on the information you had. Maybe the best question is have you ever over-spirutalized a practical decision? I know many of your hearts, so many of you want to do the right thing, but there aren't clear directions…there’s no definitive YES or NO that you can find in scripture. Does God even care?!?!

Today, we’ll see a similar problem in 1 Corinthians 8. Now about food sacrificed to idols: Paul is responding to a letter from the church in Corinth. This church was functioning in a wild time in a wild place. One of the many things that made it so crazy was that sacrifice was a common form of worship. Greek religious sacrifices involved killing, destroying, burning, cutting, consecrating, and other sacred acts, often followed by a banquet for participants or specific groups. Surplus meat was then sold in butcher shops for anyone to buy.

Did anyone here go to the grocery store this week and struggle between the more expensive organic meat and the cheaper meat from the section titled “Sacrificed to Idols”? Did anyone stand there and judge those that grabbed the idol meat? NO! No one had this issue. Again, this is another week where if we’re not careful we’ll fall into the trap of prescribing what Paul is describing. Don’t be the guy that takes the analogy literally. “I’m out like a fat kid in dodge ball”. Not the point!

Paul in this chapter is using a scalpel to cut to the root of some confusion within the Corinth Church to bring collective clarity. We too need this clarity! We don’t have an issue with idol meat, per se, but we do have an issue with dabbling with idols. We either want a solid “yes/no” legal mandate OR we want the license to do what we want. If you’re on either side of this street, come join us playing in the traffic of gray areas (not literally).

So if idol meat doesn’t fit into 21st century American Christianity, what does? Well a lot because most of life is in the gray. After 1400 years after a complete canon of scripture, there are a lot of things that good people who love Jesus and love the scriptures really disagree over. I'll give you a few examples of what I'm talking about.

What about relational gray areas: There's a lot of gray in the relational part of life. Should I date this guy?” Nowhere in the Bible is it gonna tell you the name of the person to date. It's a gray area. Should I break up with this girl? Should I get married? Should I remain single? We spent the last two weeks looking at the value of both marriage and singleness as valid and beautiful ways of life.

What about churchy gray areas: Some of you are church shopping right now, and you're like, man, I'm in between three churches that love the Bible, love Jesus, and love their neighbors well. Should I go to this church or that church? It’s gray! Should you serve in YinzKidz? THE ANSWER IS YES!!!! Or connections or worship? Gray! Should I do missions, support missions or what? Gray!

What about vocational gray areas: should I take this job or that job? Should I major in this degree? Should I work on a master's degree? Should I go into construction or become a worship leader? Should I quit my job? Should I shift careers? Should I start a business? Should I drink more coffee and do less work (man.. I’m throwing all kinds of shots at Jacob today)? Should I retire?

What about recreational gray areas: Should I watch this show on HBO that everyone loves? Should I spend my Saturday going to the Bucs game or serving the poor? Now, some of us have strong opinions on this. Sounds biblical, but it's gray. Can I even watch sports? What about violent sports like MMA or football? Should I consume alcohol responsibly or not drink at all? It’s gray.

What about financial gray areas: Should I wanna make more money? Beyond a tithe, how much should I give? Is that house too expensive that I'm looking at buying right now? Can I buy a vacation home? Can I buy a nicer car? Should I put, how much should I put in my 401k? How much should we spend on vacation? How much should we save? Is it okay for me to gamble a little bit as long as I'm not addicted? Gray.

What about family gray areas: We’re having a baby boom in this church! Welcome to the gray! Public or private school? How many activities is too many? How many kids should we have? How should we grow our family? Adoption or biologically? What can they watch on TV, Disney Plus or PBS Kids or no TV or what? AHHHHHH GRAY! So much of life is gray.

Are you overwhelmed, because I am definitely overwhelmed. Let me tell you something, this feeling of being overwhelmed is a blessed invitation into opening out hands and hearts and trusting God with the outcome. In all of this craziness, I want you to see that we give grace in gray areas with love over knowledge!

1. Love: The Greatest Knowledge

1 Corinthians 8:1-3

We know that “we all have knowledge.” In the Corinth culture at large, knowledge was very important. The great philosophers of Athens had an incredible influence over culture. The expressing and exchanging of ideas in the public square was commonplace. Those with “more knowledge” were revered. For clarity though, the knowledge Paul is referring to here more relates to the knowledge of our freedom in Christ. This is one of the most important things I want you to learn here at Steel City Church! John 8:31-32 Then Jesus said…“If you continue in my word, you really are my disciples. You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” Or 2 Corinthians 3:17 - Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. Or Galatians 5:1 For freedom, Christ set us free. But knowledge puffs up. What happens when a 3yo learns a new fact about dinosaurs? They recite it at family dinners like it’s a party trick. Everyone claps and cheers. Grandma says, “my baby is the smartest in the world!” Ever been in a bible study with someone like that? Everything is questioned. You want to watch a d-group implode? Have someone in there that orients everything toward their knowledge. But love builds up. The love mentioned here is agape. Sacrificial love. The type of love that pours out from a source. It’s what builds up others. Sacrificial love is “the mortar between the bricks of the Christian building.” 2 If anyone thinks he knows anything, he does not yet know it as he ought to know it. Paul is poking holes in the “knowledge” argument. You might think you know, but there’s a lot more to know about what you know. 3 But look how Paul shifts gears from knowing to love. If anyone loves God, he is known by him. Let me ask you a question, what’s more important, knowing something about God or God knowing you? Now this “knowing” is much deeper than just a cognitive thought. This is God knowing us intimately, inside and out. It’s what we talked about last week in being fully known AND deeply loved! When we actively love God knowing that we’re known by Him, we look not to fulfill our personal convictions but prioritize the community's growth. This demonstrates what? LOVE! So our greatest knowledge is knowing how to love!

2. Knowledge Needs Grace

1 Corinthians 8:4-7

4 About eating food sacrificed to idols, then, we know that “an idol is nothing in the world,”and that “there is no God but one.” This gray area of eating meat that was sacrificed to idols was a big enough deal in the church that the people doing it started throwing around churchy vernacular to justify it. Truthful statements that lose their true meaning. “An idol is nothing in the world” is true. In classical Greek culture, and even polytheistic cultures of today craft a representative of their god or lord. Yes, you’re right it’s just gold or paper mache or wood, but it negates the evil that’s behind it. [Kumartuli “Potters Corner” in Kolkata, India] And “there is no God but one” is as true of a statement as it can be, but can become as hollow as the idols if you’re not careful. [Phil 4:13, cast the first stone, etc.] 5 For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth—as there are many “gods” and many “lords”— 6 yet for us so in the midst of the argument Paul does something for every follower of Jesus that is insane. He takes the “Shema,” which is the most central Jewish statement of monotheism, of the uniqueness and exclusivity of Israel's God, and inserts Christ right into the middle of it. There is one God, the Father. All things are from him, and we exist for him. And there is one Lord, Jesus Christ. All things are through him, and we exist through him. In the middle of an argument about gray areas, Paul gives us this gem. This is one of those verses that if you memorized it and meditated on it daily, it would NEVER lose its beauty. 7 However, not everyone has this knowledge. Not everyone in the church has had ample time to sit in the deep truths of the Word. Not everyone here that is a follower of Jesus has had the chance to explore their rich and endless freedom in Christ. Some have been so used to idolatry or the ways of the world, understanding more about the ways of being formed to culture rather than counterformed to Christ, up until now that when they eat food sacrificed to an idol, their conscience, being weak, is defiled. We in the church have to be very careful how we express our freedom, in the midst of the gray areas of life. Our knowledge must be accompanied by grace. Unmerited favor freely poured out by lovingly choosing to not do something. If you notice, Paul doesn’t chastise the weak, to get right, act better, know more. Where is his argument building towards? He’s challenging the mature followers of Jesus to dish out some grace to their weaker brothers & sisters. Have you ever used your knowledge of your freedom in Christ as an excuse to do what you wanted, no matter what? If we sit in v6 There is one God, the Father. All things are from him, and we exist for him. And there is one Lord, Jesus Christ. All things are through him, and we exist through him, what starts to bubble up, but GRACE! We see the highly exalted Jesus, sitting on the throne of grace, with nail pierced hands, scars upon his back, whispering to our souls, “come to me” and I’ll give you grace upon grace upon grace to give grace upon grace upon grace!

3. Sacrificial Love in Action

1 Corinthians 8:8-13

8 Food will not bring us close to God. We are not worse off if we don’t eat, and we are not better if we do eat. How much can that be said about so many of the gray areas of life? [insert examples] 9 But be careful that this right of yours, this theologically correct freedom that you have in Christ, in no way becomes a stumbling block to the weak. 10 For if someone sees you, the one who has knowledge, dining in an idol’s temple, won’t his weak conscience be encouraged to eat food offered to idols? Won’t your weaker brother or sister make the connection, not to blood bought freedom in Christ, but the connection that my old life was okay? 11 So the weak person, the brother or sister for whom Christ died, is ruined by your knowledge. 12 Now when you sin like this against brothers and sisters and wound their weak conscience, you are sinning against Christ. 13 But check out Paul’s posture here. Therefore, if food causes my brother or sister to fall, I will never again eat meat, so that I won’t cause my brother or sister to fall. Paul used the qualifier IF, which makes us have to pause and think. Why? Because we can be theologically right, and wrong in our actions. We can know all the right answers to the bible trivia questions, and still sin against our brother and sister. Just as we can freely choose to do something, we can also freely choose to not to do something. Freely choosing to not do something that you are technically free to do, and doing it for someone else is one of the greatest examples of love. It’s an incredible offering of grace in the gray areas of life.

Oh Lawd Pastor, so what do we do? Private school or public school? Do I date this person? Can I retire? Can I drink pickle beer at Picklesburgh (No…that’s gross)? Should I serve in YinzKidz? YES! These are gray areas…hard decisions. Maybe it’s not the decision that matters but how we give grace in gray areas with love over knowledge!

Maybe the gray area calls us to walk humbly with someone who has a misconception. Maybe it takes us asking for clarity with grace and love. Maybe it invites us to slow down and process it together with other followers of Jesus!

I want to draw you back to 1 Corinthians 1:10 the frame verse for pretty much the entire letter: Now I urge you, brothers and sisters, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree in what you say, that there be no divisions among you, and that you be united with the same understanding and the same conviction.

Church, as we navigate gray areas, giving grace in abundance, our divisions will decrease! Our understanding will grow. Our convictions will merge. We’ll probably become less “right” but amazingly more righteous.

Prayer Card & COMMUNION

Citations:

Corbin Hobbs, The Heights Church (Denver, CO) “1 Corinthians 8 - Our Messy Life Together” 1/25/23

1 Corinthians CSB

BECNT 1 Corinthians by David Garland

Christ-Centered Exposition - 1 Corinthians by Akin & Merritt

1 Corinthians For You by Andrew Wilson