Good morning to everyone. Good to see you all again. I was gone last week and I'm always amazed it feels like I've been down in Indiana country, but I always feel like I've been gone for months when I miss a week. It's kind of strange coming back as weird as that sounds, so I'm a little nervous this morning. 

We're gonna be looking in Romans 15, verses 1 to 7, and we're kind of coming to the end of this great epistle, the book of Romans. As Pastor talked about in Colossians 3 this morning, that promise that Christ is our life, I think the message of these chapters we've been studying in Romans 14 and 15 is really about Paul exhorting us to get our focus right. To get our focus on the things that matter as opposed to convictions or preferential issues, doubtful things that we might hold that can cause division. 

So as I studied this again—and it's a very similar passage to what we studied in Romans 14—my thoughts were really around trying to understand how it is in my life daily that I can focus on the Gospel, that I can focus on Jesus Christ, that I can focus on leading people to faith, ministering to my brethren, loving my brethren as opposed to all the other things that tend to get in the way. 

So I’d like you to think about those things. I think the pastor's comments were appropriate this morning for our message that Christ is our life; that He is what matters. He is what brings unity in the body and He's what brings fruit for God's glory.

Well, beginning in chapter 12, Paul’s been teaching us concerning the implications of this Gospel of grace in our lives. In light of all that God has done in Christ—in light of the fact that we have been saved, that we've been justified, that we've been regenerated—we've been made new men, with new hearts, new spirits and the Holy Spirit living in us. The question really is: What manner of persons ought we to be? What should characterize our life in Christ? How does God intend that we should live?

Paul says our lives should be one of worship, of total sacrifice to the will and purposes of God, living sacrifices presented to God. Our outward lives should manifest the truth of who we are inwardly because of our salvation in Jesus Christ. We should stop being conformed to this world, he says, and we should be being transformed by the renewing of our minds—a continual renewing by God's Word, His truth and a choice on our part to reckon what He says is the truth, to believe Him, to trust Him, to depend on Him and obey Him, abiding in Christ one day at a time. 

Paul's message throughout these chapters is that this new life will result in new relationships. We have a new relationship with God; we have been reconciled to God. We are now His children; we are co-heirs with Christ. He is our Daddy, our Papa, our Father. We can crawl up into His lap, as it were, to seek help in time of need. We’ve been made right with God and we’ve also been made right with men, and this should result in unity in the body—the church. Our vertical relationship with God should result in new horizontal relationships with men.

Christ has torn down the middle wall of separation, making peace between God and men. Now those relationships with men, which were divided and characterized by selfishness, sin, division, hate, and malice, as we see all around our world, are now in Christ characterized by lowliness, gentleness, peace, joy, and love. In Christ, we now owe no one anything but love, and this impacts our relationships in the home, in the church, in the workplace, with government and those in authority over us in the world. 

We’ve seen these truths in chapters 12 to 15. In chapters 14 to 15, Paul really honed in on the unity in the church and the danger of division over doubtful things. These are not areas concerning doctrine; these are not issues of sin. As we have discussed before, these exhortations are all about convictions or preferences that we hold in our different areas of life. 

You see, if the world does not see love, if it does not see unity, does not see a willingness to receive one another and to focus on Christ and the things that bring edification and growth and joy and peace in the church, in the body of believers, then where will it see these things? How will the world know the power of the Gospel of Jesus Christ? How will the world know the difference between the wisdom and the religions of men in the world and the power of the Gospel of God if it's not seen in the church?

The danger is division. And having laid down doctrine through chapters 1 to 11, Paul wants us to know about the danger of division over doubtful things in chapters 14 to 15 and how this can destroy the witness of the true church. He wants us to focus on the right things, pursue the things which make for peace and bring edification, and show the love of Christ to a lost and dying world. And that is the important message of our text this morning.

Let's look at verses 1 to 7 in Romans 15. Paul writes: “We then who are strong ought to bear with the scruples of the weak and not to please ourselves. Let each of us please his neighbor for his good, leading to edification. For even Christ did not please Himself, but as it is written, ‘The reproaches of those who reproached You fell on Me.’ For whatever things were written before were written for our learning, that we, through the patience and comfort of the Scriptures, might have hope. Now may the God of patience and comfort grant you to be like-minded toward one another according to Christ Jesus, that you may with one mind and one mouth glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, receive one another just as Christ also received us to the glory of God.”

Well, I want to outline the text this morning with four points that you have on your outlines. First, we're going to see: please one another. Second, pursue edification. Third, pattern of Christ. And fourth, purpose to glorify God. 

I’d like to begin by having you turn to Ephesians chapter 4 with me, please. This has been an instrumental passage for our messages—there are several like it in the New Testament. Ephesians 4, verse 1: “I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called.” We’ve talked before about how these words mean equal weight; that our living out, our working out in our lives should be of equal weight, should be equal to who we are inwardly because of our salvation. With all lowliness and gentleness, with long-suffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling. One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all who is above all and through all, and in you all.

Now look down to verse 28; we’ll see a kind of application of this. Paul says, “Let him who stole steal no longer, but rather let him labor, working with his hands what is good, that he may have something to give him who has need. Let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice. And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you.”

Over the last several weeks, we’ve seen these types of exhortations in many different Scriptures throughout the New Testament. Paul says over and over in his epistles, “You have been changed. You are new men. You are new creations in Christ. You have put off the old man. You have put on the new man. You're now being renewed in the spirit of your mind. Now live a new life; live a new kind of life by the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit in you, as you abide in Christ and you look to Him and you believe Him.” 

You should no longer walk as you once walked. You should no longer live in selfishness and drunkenness and seeking the things of this world. And the practical exhortations that we see again and again are that we should pursue the good of our brothers. We should seek the edification of others. Therefore, we should not do the things that divide, that corrupt, that tear down, but we should do the things which build up. We should be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, receiving one another, and bearing one another’s burdens. 

We should be actively, agonizingly pursuing these things, seeking after these things, and this kind of life of self-sacrificial love toward one another and a focus on Christ will bring unity in the body, power, and fruit, and it will be a witness to this world.

In verse 1, we see Paul tell us, “We then who are strong ought to bear with the scruples of the weak and not to please ourselves. Let each of us please his neighbor for his good, leading to edification.” First, in our text, we see Paul exhort us to please one another—do those things which please our brother. The words here speak of a moral obligation of the strong believer, the one who understands his freedom in Christ from some religious scruple. He is here to bear the burden of restricting his freedom in order to please his weaker brother. 

We’ve used examples of dietary restrictions. I am free to eat pork; I’m free to have a pork chop. But if my brother has a conviction about eating pork, then I should get under that restriction as well. I should bear that burden as well for his benefit so that I do not cause him to stumble. I should not encourage my brother to work on a Sunday afternoon or ask him to help me to do some project if I know that he holds the conviction of resting on the Lord’s Day. 

I should be willing to forego my liberty in order to please him concerning these convictions. I should bear that burden as well with him in order to edify him rather than cause him to stumble by exercising my freedom. I should seek to please my brother, and I think practically this means that I know my brother. I spend time with him. I think about him and his needs. I pray for him and seek ways to minister to him. I willingly take the focus off of myself and seek actively to serve others. 

This is very practical, my friends, and it’s not that complicated. How often do I live outside of my own little bubble, in my thoughts, prayers, actions? Am I continually focused on myself—my concerns, my problems, my struggles—so self-focused that I don’t even know the struggles, the needs, the burdens of my brethren, those close to me in the body, in the church? 

What if I just chose to pray for some of my brothers or sisters in Christ? What if I pursued getting to know them, spending time with them, encouraging them, ministering to their needs? What if I actually pursued edification? Wouldn’t this take the emphasis off of myself? Wouldn’t this make it much easier for me to love them, to sacrifice myself for them, to allow me to bear their burdens and facilitate growth in edification? 

I’m always amazed at how much God will do with so little from me. I find this in the study of God’s Word. I fail; I neglect my personal study. I spend little time in the Word at times, but when I dig in, when I study just a little, God shows me oh so much. He encourages me so and produces fruit a hundredfold. 

It’s the same with loving our brothers—actively pursuing edification. How encouraging it is to receive a note of encouragement from a brother, a word of edification, and how timely these things often are. A kind act, a gesture that shows that someone knows us, someone knows our need, is praying for us, is thinking about us, loves us, goes a long way toward our encouragement. 

As we do these things, as we seek to please our brothers rather than to tear them down or separate from them, we see that God produces amazing fruit. He produces unity in the body and strength and fruit. We should seek to please one another, and we should pursue edification. Paul says we should do the things that are necessary. We should speak to one another the words that are necessary for edification. 

We should tell each other how we feel, how much we love one another. We should point each other to Christ and keep our minds focused on the things that matter. Christ is our life, and this is especially true because there's a great danger of division in the body over doubtful things.

The great danger of division in Paul's time, in the context of this letter to the church in Rome, was concerning the different scruples of the Jews and the Gentiles. Remember, the Jews had come out of a very religious system where observance of the Sabbath and feast days and new moons and festivals were of utmost importance, where dietary restrictions were at the core of their identity and religious practices for thousands of years. 

It was exceedingly difficult for them to let go of these things. But for the Gentile, these things didn’t matter one bit. They saw their freedom in Christ quite clearly. But the Jews were weak in these areas, and they couldn’t really grasp the implications of the Gospel concerning these freedoms. 

What Paul is saying is, don’t let these inconsequential things—eating and drinking—become a point of division that rips apart and divides the church of Christ. Because the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. Likewise, some of the Gentiles were having issues concerning those things associated with their old pagan worship, such as meat that was sacrificed to idols. 

This meat was cheaper and sometimes better, and those who understood their liberty in Christ would buy this meat at the market, and they had no problem eating it. But for many who had come out of the vile pagan worship of these Gentile religions, eating that meat brought back all the debauchery and sin that went on in those temples, and thus they could not bring themselves to eat it. 

Paul says, “Listen, love your brother. Do those things which edify. Don’t do that which causes your brother to stumble, because you are now one in Christ, Jew and Gentile. You need to focus on Christ and your salvation and your mission, not your differences and doubtful, divisive things.”

I’d like for you to turn over to Ephesians 2 with me, please, and look at this important Scripture that Paul wrote concerning this. Ephesians 2, verse 11: “Therefore remember that you, once Gentiles in the flesh, who are called uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision made in the flesh by hands, that at that time you were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now—”

In Christ Jesus, “you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For He Himself is our peace, who has made both one and has broken down the middle wall of separation, having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two, thus making peace. And that He might reconcile them both to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity. And He came and preached peace to you who were far off and to those who were near. For through Him we both have access by one Spirit to the Father.”

Now therefore you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone, in whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In Him, you also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.

These are the truths that the church needs to focus on: unity in Christ, oneness in Spirit, in salvation, in purpose. And we need to work toward the purpose for which God has saved us—to bring Him glory and to be a witness in this world. I'm not focusing on the preferential, doubtful things that can bring division. 

For the Jew and the Gentile in Paul's day, this was food and drink and observance of days. I've struggled to try to think about how this applies to us. What are the issues today in our world? I think, as I've tried to think of what brings division in our time and culture and context, one of the examples I thought of was preferences or convictions concerning appearance or social class. 

James came to mind in James 2. In James 2, he describes exercising partiality based on these external things. Unfortunately, in the Christian realm, and conservative Christian churches, this has been an issue where everything is external—how we look, how we dress, where we live, what we drive—that people define themselves by.

And I think that’s the essence of what I'm trying to get to here: What is it that defines us as a church, as a people, as Christians? In James 2:1, he said, “My brethren, do not hold the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with partiality. For if there should come into your assembly a man with gold rings and fine apparel, and there should also come in a poor man in filthy clothes, and you pay attention to the one wearing the fine clothes and say to him, ‘You sit here in a good place’ and say to the poor man, ‘You stand there or sit here at my footstool,’ have you not shown partiality among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?”

Listen, my beloved brethren: Has God not chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom, which He promised to those who love Him? But you have dishonored the poor man. Do not the rich oppress you and drag you into the courts? Do not blaspheme that noble name by which you are called? If you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. You do well.

We each have in the church, and in our culture and our time, many cases have had an idea of what church people should look like, how they should appear, how they should act, and what they should think. And this many times concerns doubtful or preferential things. 

You may have heard this story before, but I think it bears repeating. It goes like this. His name is Bill. He has wild hair and wears a t-shirt filled with holes, jeans, and no shoes. This was literally his wardrobe for his entire four years of college. He is kind of esoteric and very, very bright. He became a Christian while attending college. 

Across the street from the campus is a church, the members of which are well-dressed and very conservative. They want to develop a ministry to the students but are not sure how to go about it. One day Bill decides to visit that church, and he walks in wearing his jeans and t-shirt, wild hair, and no shoes, and starts down the center aisle looking for a place to sit. 

The church is completely packed, and he can’t find a seat. The members look a bit uncomfortable, but no one says anything. As Bill gets closer and closer to the pulpit, and when he realizes that there are no seats left, he just sits down on the carpet in front of the pulpit. By now, the members are really uptight and tension fills the air. 

Then from the back of the church, a deacon slowly makes his way toward Bill. Now, in his eighties, the deacon has silver gray hair, a three-piece suit, and a pocket watch. He’s a godly man, very elegant, very dignified, very courtly. He walks with a cane. And as he heads toward Bill, all the members are saying to themselves, “You can’t blame him for what he’s going to do. How can you expect a man of his age and background to understand a college kid sitting on the floor?” 

It takes a long time for the old man to get down the aisle. All eyes are focused on him. The church is utterly silent. The minister can’t even begin preaching until the deacon does what he has to do. When he reaches the front, the congregation watches as he, with great difficulty, lowers himself and sits down next to Bill so he won’t be alone. 

When the minister gains control of himself, he says, “What I am about to preach, you will never remember, but what you have just seen, you will never forget.” 

I am afraid that many times what has defined the church in our time is a short haircut and a three-piece suit when what should define the church is a great love for one another and for all men for whom Christ died. I may hold sincere and great convictions about how I dress or how I appear, or especially when I come to worship or to preach, and that’s good and that’s fine. But that’s not really what the Gospel and the church and the body of believers is all about. 

It's about being willing to receive one another, to bear with one another, to love one another, encouraging and pursuing edification so that we might have unity in purpose. I’m so thankful that Living Hope Church is a church that’s known by its love. We have that testimony from visitors quite often, and I’m so thankful for that. 

Paul says in order to have this attitude and to have this practice worked out in our lives, we must follow the pattern of Christ. Look at verse 3 in our text with me, please. Romans 15:3: “For even Christ did not please Himself, but as it is written, ‘The reproaches of those who reproached You fell on Me.’” 

For whatever things were written before were written for our learning, that we, through the patience and comfort of the Scriptures, might have hope. Now may the God of patience and comfort grant you to be like-minded toward one another according to Christ Jesus, that you may with one mind and one mouth glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, receive one another just as Christ also received us to the glory of God. 

Christ is our example in how He sought to please the Father and not Himself, how He sought to save us, giving Himself as the ultimate sacrifice, how He purposed to glorify God and bore our burdens on the cross. He did this willingly. He did it self-sacrificially, manifesting His great love for us. And Paul says we are to please others in this way. We are to be like-minded toward one another according to Christ Jesus. 

We are to receive one another just as Christ also received us to the glory of God. We’ve looked at the exhortation that we should seek to please one another rather than ourselves as Christ did. 

I'd like to look at the following two admonitions concerning Christ as our pattern in our text that we should be like-minded toward one another according to Christ and that we should receive one another as Christ also received us. 

My friends, one thing the world is not is like-minded. There is amazing division in the world right now. Even in our own country, like we've never seen before. The other day, a Christian man said to me, “I wouldn’t even ever talk to a liberal.” I thought about that for a while, you know. And then, several times more, feeding the cows, pitching some hay, pouring some water, I thought, “I would never even talk to a liberal.” 

The conclusion that I came to was that it is a very difficult thing to preach the Gospel, to share the good news of Christ, to bring the word of reconciliation that has been committed to me as an ambassador of Christ to a lost man in Adam if I won't even talk to him because I don't like his politics. 

Division is easy, my friends. It is natural. It is in us. But being like-minded, how can we do that? Even in the church, even among fellow believers. I mean, I can be like-minded with those who are like me. That’s not quite so hard. But everyone is not like me. There’s a great diversity in the church. People hold many different convictions outside the area of clear doctrine. How can we be like-minded? 

I think Paul gives us the answer in verse 5 when he says, “according to Christ.” We have unity in one thing, my brothers and sisters—in Christ. We may have diverse backgrounds. We may have diverse style choices and haircuts and culinary choices and hobbies and all kinds of things. We may never have even considered talking to each other or spending time with each other if it was not for Christ because we're so different in our interests. 

But what we have in common as believers in Jesus Christ—our belief, our salvation, our mission and our purpose—deep down in our hearts, our greatest desire is to glorify God and to live for Him and to bring others to Him. And this is how we can be like-minded—by focusing on these things, by focusing on the Gospel, on our salvation, on our unity in the body and our like-mindedness according to Christ.

Turn over to Philippians 2 with me, please. Philippians 2, we’ll look at verse 1. Paul says, “Therefore, if there is any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and mercy, fulfill my joy by being like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of heart, let each esteem others better than himself. Let each of you look out not only for his own interests but also for the interests of others. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.”

Be like-minded toward one another according to Christ Jesus. Paul also tells us that we should follow the pattern of Christ concerning receiving one another. This has been the central point of Paul's message concerning division over doubtful things in the body. He said over and over, “Receive one another.” The word means to draw in close. It's the same word that was used in Matthew 16 when Simon Peter took Jesus aside and rebuked Him. Remember that? It means to draw Him close, to receive Him, to bring Him in.

Jesus came to seek and to save the lost. He gave everything. He sacrificed Himself on the cross so that men might come to God. And it is His desire that all men come to Him, come to the knowledge of the truth, and receive Him as Savior by faith. In John 6, verse 37, He said, “All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out. For I have come down from Heaven not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me. This is the will of the Father who sent Me, that of all He has given Me, I should lose nothing but should raise it up at the last day. And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him may have everlasting life, and I will raise him up at the last day.”

How is it that Christ set the example for us here? How does Christ receive men who believe? Turn over to Luke 15. Let's look at a good passage there. A pastor and I are reading through the Gospel of Luke, and we read this passage on Wednesday. Luke 15, verse 11.

Listen to this story about how God receives sinful men: “A certain man had two sons, and the younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the portion of goods that falls to me.’ So he divided to them his livelihood. And not many days after, the younger son gathered all together, journeyed to a far country, and there wasted his possessions with prodigal living. But when he had spent all, there arose a severe famine in that land, and he began to be in want. Then he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country, and he sent him into his fields to feed swine. And he would gladly have filled his stomach with the pods that the swine ate, and no one gave him anything. 

But when he came to himself, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired servants have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger. I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you, and I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Make me like one of your hired servants.”’ And he arose and he came to his father. But when he was still a great way off, his father saw him and had compassion, and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him. 

And the son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight, and I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’ But the father said to his servants, ‘Bring out the best robe and put on him, and put a ring on his hand, and sandals on his feet, and bring the fatted calf here and kill it, and let us eat and be merry. For this my son was dead and is alive again. He was lost and is found,’ and they began to be merry.”

We do not have church membership here at Living Hope Church. We do not have a lengthy constitution or rules and regulations to come here, and that's on purpose. It comes with certain risks. We are often advised against this type of organizational philosophy that we have. But this is done on purpose for several reasons. One primary reason is that we do not believe in requiring more than God requires for being received into His church. 

Christ receives men willingly, graciously, eagerly. He does not require them to clean themselves up, to live up to a standard, to come into His family. He receives them on the basis of faith—faith in Jesus Christ. When a man believes Jesus, God receives him. And so we should receive one another—not because a man meets our standards, not because he passes our test or thinks like we do or looks like we do, but because he believes Jesus and wants to fellowship and worship and grow together with us in holiness and righteousness and be a force for the Gospel in the world so that others might come in by faith as well. 

Receive one another. Forgive one another. Love one another even as Christ has received us, forgiven us, and loved us. It’s important that we receive one another, that we draw in close and that we focus on the things that unite us, that matter, that are important.

Our last point is that this should all be done with one great purpose in mind: to bring glory to God. Look at verse 7 again in our text: “Therefore, receive one another, just as Christ also received us to the glory of God.” 

How do we bring glory to God? How do we make this the very purpose and aim of our lives, even as Christ set this as the sole purpose of His life and ministry, His death, burial, and resurrection? I think in two primary ways: First, by showing the transforming power of the Gospel of Jesus Christ in the way that we live. Second, by bringing this great, good news message to lost men that they might be saved. 

This is what our lives should be focused on and about. And this can only happen as we focus on Christ, on the Gospel, on those things that we share—a passion, a love for—deep down in our hearts as believers in Jesus Christ. 

The opposite of this is a focus on those preferential, relatively inconsequential things that present a danger to divide us—being unwilling to sacrifice our liberty for the sake of a brother. My friends, the whole message that we've been studying throughout the book of Romans and into this application section in chapters 12-16 is that the Gospel of Christ is a transforming power in the life of the one who believes, who comes to faith. 

It transforms us. It makes us new men. The salvation that God provides in Christ wholly changes, transforms the man in Adam by placing him into Christ, by uniting him to the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ—raising him to new life. He's a new man. He’s a new creation. He’s made alive in His Spirit. He’s given a new heart, and the Holy Spirit and the very power that raised Jesus from the dead works in him. 

The implications of this Gospel are great and many, but Paul's point in all of this is that our life now in Christ should be drastically different than the life that we had in Adam. We should be wholly different than the world. It seems in this time much of the church is just trying to be like the world—trying to be relevant, trying to be contemporary. Well, I'll tell you what's relevant in people's lives today: People who are hurting, who are dominated by sin, who have nowhere to turn, who have no answers, who have come to the end of themselves. 

What’s relevant is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It’s the only thing that can deliver a man from sin and death and law. My friends, our difference from the world is primarily made manifest in that we now love one another. We can now manifest self-sacrificial love for one another and for the lost in our lives, and this we could not do in Adam. 

We receive one another. We bear one another’s burdens. We love. We seek edification. We live for the very purpose of the glory of God. And this is done by a changed life—giving thanks, praising God in all things, and being a witness. 

I listened to, when I was a child growing up and into my teenage years, there was a Christian comedian named Jerry Clower. Maybe some of you have heard of him. I didn’t know anything about the Gospel then, but I liked his stories. He talked about coon hunting down in Mississippi and all kinds of lead-betters and all these people—just good, down-home, clean country humor. And I ran across a video the other day that he gave his testimony. He was a Southern Baptist, and he talked about the need to be saved and the need to not be a nitpicker. 

It’s just what we're talking about in Romans 15: Don’t be a nitpicker and the need to act like a Christian when tragedy comes rather than acting like a pagan. My friends, this life that God has given us inside has to have an impact in how we live on the outside. And that can only happen as we understand our salvation, as we focus on the Gospel, as we abide in Christ and look to Him and depend on Him to produce that fruit out through us.

These have to be the things that we focus on. We receive one another. We bear one another’s burdens. We look to edify, to please one another. We give thanks. We praise God in all things. And we have a life that's a witness to the world, and men are saved through that witness. That’s God's plan. 

The power of the Gospel is shown through our lives, changed lives. Paul said in 2 Corinthians 3 to that church in Corinth, he said, “You are our epistle, written in our hearts, known and read by all men. Clearly, you are an epistle of Christ, ministered by us, written not with ink but by the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone, but on tablets of flesh—that is, of the heart. And we have such trust through Christ toward God, not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think of anything as being from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God, who also made us sufficient as ministers of the new covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.”

Aren’t you thankful to be living in the new covenant—the covenant of grace? The covenant where Jesus promised to live in us and empower us and produce fruit through us. What a privilege to be an ambassador for Christ, to be a Christian. 

My brothers and sisters, this new covenant life in Christ, this life by God's transforming grace and power in us as we believe Jesus and as we love one another, should be our goal. It should be our passion. It should be our purpose. Receiving, bearing, pleasing, seeking others' goods and growth and doing what is necessary for edification. 

And in this way God will be praised; God will be thanked every moment, every day, as we live by His grace through faith. God will be glorified as we please one another, as we pursue edification, as we follow the pattern of Christ, and as we purpose to glorify Him in everything we do—whether we eat or drink or, in this case, whether we don't eat or don't drink for the sake of our brother. Whatever we do, let us do it to the glory of God. That’s what matters.

Let's close in prayer. 

Father, we're so thankful for Your Word, thankful for these challenging passages to apply our salvation, to apply the doctrine that we know and love and rest on. Help us, Lord, by Your grace and power to live for You, to live a life worthy of our calling, to be a witness. And help us to love one another. Help us to focus on the Gospel, on Jesus, on the need of lost men and the need of our brothers for encouragement and edification. Help us to be a church that is defined by the love of Christ. In Jesus' name, we pray. Amen.