Blow It Up or Build It Up?
This may be a short chapter, but it is chock full of things we need to understand as believers. Paul begins the chapter by addressing food offered to idols, but he takes a slightly different approach than one would expect. Earlier in his letter he said, “Everything is permissible for me, but not everything is helpful. Everything is permissible for me,” but I will not be brought under the control of anything. (6:12) With this in mind, let’s look at what Paul has to say about eating food offered to idols.
Vs 1-3 About food offered to idols: We know that “we all have knowledge.” Knowledge inflates with pride, but love builds up. If anyone thinks he knows anything, he does not yet know it as he ought to know it. But if anyone loves God, he is known by Him.
He begins this chapter with a statement – about food offered to idols. Then he seems to go off on a tangent – or does he? In the first part of this letter, if you remember, Paul dealt with the issue of the Corinthian churches “wisdom”. Here he continues this subject by talking about their “knowledge”. The Greek word for knowledge is gnósis, which means having a personal kind of knowledge. We know the word Gnosticism which is a belief system based on having a special personal knowledge. Paul notes that knowledge inflates with pride. The Greek word for inflates is is phusioó, which literally means to puff up or blow up. Contrast that with love. Paul uses the Greek word agape for love. This is the word for love which describes the love of God. Finally the Greek word for builds up is oikodomeó, which is the word used for building a house. I wanted to do this little Greek word study to show the great distinction Paul is showing us here. Having knowledge without love just leads to pride which blows everything up, but having the love of God in our lives leads to building something worthwhile – like a house. So Paul takes his time to explain all of this before seemingly getting back to the question at hand – eating food offered to idols. Why the build up? Let’s find out.
Vs. 4-6 About eating food offered to idols, then, we know that “an idol is nothing in the world,” and that “there is no God but one.” For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth, as there are many “gods” and many “lords”, yet for us 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 is the knowledge that we know? It is that an idol is nothing. It is a piece of carved stone without any knowledge or power. It can’t do anything for us or against us. It is nothing. There is only one God and he is the Creator of all things – including that stone someone carved. Even if so called “gods” did exist – there are a lot of them, along with a lot of “lords”. The other knowledge that we know – there is one God, and one Lord who is Jesus Christ. All things are from Him and we exist through Him. So the answer about meat and idols – since we have the knowledge that idols are nothing and God is everything, it means nothing to us to eat the meat. BUT… having knowledge isn’t the point. Having knowledge is just that – we have a personal understanding of something, but knowledge isn’t everything. Having the knowledge of something doesn’t save us, it doesn’t move us to action, and it doesn’t do anything for the community around us. It is just something we know. That is where love comes in. Knowledge can serves to blow it up but loves serves to build it up. Through God’s love we can see salvation come about. We are spurred on by our love for God to action. Through love, changes can be made in the community around us. And this is why Paul says: However!
Vs 7-13 However, not everyone has this knowledge. In fact, some have been so used to idolatry up until now that when they eat food offered to an idol, their conscience, being weak, is defiled. Food will not make us acceptable to God. We are not inferior if we don’t eat, and we are not better if we do eat. But be careful that this right of yours in no way becomes a stumbling block to the weak. For if someone sees you, the one who has this knowledge, dining in an idol’s temple, won’t his weak conscience be encouraged to eat food offered to idols? Then the weak person, the brother for whom Christ died, is ruined by your knowledge. Now when you sin like this against the brothers and wound their weak conscience, you are sinning against Christ. Therefore, if food causes my brother to fall, I will never again eat meat, so that I won’t cause my brother to fall.
However, he says, not everyone has the same knowledge we do. You know that special knowledge we have because we are now God’s children? Not everyone around us has that same knowledge. Paul says, some people have been so used to idolatry they can’t separate the meat offered to the idol from the idol itself. They see it as one and the same. He then goes on to say – just because you know the food is offered to nothing isn’t enough. It’s not about the knowledge, it’s about the love. To go and eat the food with your knowledge without looking around at your brother who may not have the same “knowledge” and understanding you do, might cause them to stumble. We are to be about building it up not blowing it up. This is what Paul means when he says, the weak person then can be ruined by your puffed up knowledge. This kind of behavior is sin – not just against the person you have caused to stumble, but against Christ Himself. Therefore – the answer to the question is – just don’t eat it.
Everything is permissible, but not everything is helpful. It is the love of God (agape) that separates the Gnostic (those with special knowledge) from the true believers in Jesus Christ. We abstain from something, not because it is inherently wrong, but because we love as God loves. We are more concerned about our brother than we are about our rights. I hear a lot about our rights these days. We have the right to do this or that. Don’t take away my rights…me, me me! But what if your rights cause a brother or sister to stumble? What then? Do you have knowledge or do you have love? Are you going to blow it up or build it up? Several years ago I was attending a Messianic Synagogue. For those who do not know what this is, it is a group of believers in Jesus who incorporate some elements of Judaism and Jewish tradition in their services and lives. One of the questions we had to ask was do we keep kosher at our oneg’s (after service dinners)? Several Gentiles were involved in the church, but it was decided that we would keep kosher anyway, lest we turn away people who would otherwise come to know Christ as Savior. Our “right” to eat bacon or shrimp “died” so that others would not stumble in their faith. We wanted to build it up, not blow it up. While not everyone in today’s world deals with food issues (although several cultures do deal with food and idols), we do have other so called rights we must decide on. Things as simple as the movies we see or the books we read. Do they cause others to stumble? Do we blow it up or do we build it up. In the U.S. it could be something like our right to free speech. Do the words that come out of my mouth blow it up, or do they build it up. We’ve become so angry around the world with political issues and both sides seem to want to cancel each other out. We hold things done decades ago against people and get uncomfortable when people cry out that their lives matter. I believe as we continue to navigate this life we will have much more success and see more people come to faith if we make the decision to build it up rather than blow it up.
The movie Field of Dreams had the right idea – if you build it they will come. Okay, yes, they were talking about a baseball field, but the concept is still solid. Sure, everyone comes to watch the building being blown up – it is a fascinating process to watch something implode. But once it’s over, all that’s left is rubble, and no one wants to hang around to watch them cart it off. On the other hand, watching a building go up may not be as fascinating, but, when we see the finished product, we are able to enjoy it’s benefits for years to come. Showing off our knowledge might get a lot of attention, but in the end, no one wants to hang around to watch the rubble. But when we love others and our desire is to encourage one another and lift each other up, even at the sacrifice of our “rights”, the impact lasts for eternity. I can guarantee the small sacrifices we make out of love for God are all worth it in the end.
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