Lesson Helps 7

Lesson 7 Helps

February 8 - 14

Food for Thought About Idols

Memory Text: (1 Cor 8:9 NIV) Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak.

"Scripture taken from the HOLY BIBLE: NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION.
Copyright © 1973,1978 & 1984 by the International Bible Society: Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House."

Sabbath Afternoon

Sunday

Read 1^st Corinthians 8:1 - 11:1

(1 Cor 8:1-8 NIV) Now about food sacrificed to idols: We know that we all possess knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. {2} The man who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought to know. {3} But the man who loves God is known by God. {4} So then, about eating food sacrificed to idols: We know that an idol is nothing at all in the world and that there is no God but one. {5} For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as indeed there are many "gods" and many "lords"), {6} yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live. {7} But not everyone knows this. Some people are still so accustomed to idols that when they eat such food they think of it as having been sacrificed to an idol, and since their conscience is weak, it is defiled. {8} But food does not bring us near to God; we are no worse if we do not eat, and no better if we do.

(1 Cor 8:9-13 NIV) Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak. {10} For if anyone with a weak conscience sees you who have this knowledge eating in an idol's temple, won't he be emboldened to eat what has been sacrificed to idols? {11} So this weak brother, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. {12} When you sin against your brothers in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. {13} Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause him to fall.

Read 1^st Corinthians chapter 9

(1 Cor 10:31-33 NIV) So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God. {32} Do not cause anyone to stumble, whether Jews, Greeks or the church of God-- {33} even as I try to please everybody in every way. For I am not seeking my own good but the good of many, so that they may be saved.

(1 Cor 11:1 NIV) Follow my example, as I follow the example of Christ.

(1 Cor 10:1-13 NIV) For I do not want you to be ignorant of the fact, brothers, that our forefathers were all under the cloud and that they all passed through the sea. {2} They were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. {3} They all ate the same spiritual food {4} and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ. {5} Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them; their bodies were scattered over the desert. {6} Now these things occurred as examples to keep us from setting our hearts on evil things as they did. {7} Do not be idolaters, as some of them were; as it is written: "The people sat down to eat and drink and got up to indulge in pagan revelry." {8} We should not commit sexual immorality, as some of them did--and in one day twenty-three thousand of them died. {9} We should not test the Lord, as some of them did--and were killed by snakes. {10} And do not grumble, as some of them did--and were killed by the destroying angel. {11} These things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us, on whom the fulfillment of the ages has come. {12} So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don't fall! {13} No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.

(1 Cor 10:14-22 NIV) Therefore, my dear friends, flee from idolatry. {15} I speak to sensible people; judge for yourselves what I say. {16} Is not the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation in the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ? {17} Because there is one loaf, we, who are many, are one body, for we all partake of the one loaf. {18} Consider the people of Israel: Do not those who eat the sacrifices participate in the altar? {19} Do I mean then that a sacrifice offered to an idol is anything, or that an idol is anything? {20} No, but the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons. {21} You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons too; you cannot have a part in both the Lord's table and the table of demons. {22} Are we trying to arouse the Lord's jealousy? Are we stronger than he?

(1 Cor 10:23-33 NIV) "Everything is permissible"--but not everything is beneficial. "Everything is permissible"--but not everything is constructive. {24} Nobody should seek his own good, but the good of others. {25} Eat anything sold in the meat market without raising questions of conscience, {26} for, "The earth is the Lord's, and everything in it." {27} If some unbeliever invites you to a meal and you want to go, eat whatever is put before you without raising questions of conscience. {28} But if anyone says to you, "This has been offered in sacrifice," then do not eat it, both for the sake of the man who told you and for conscience' sake-- {29} the other man's conscience, I mean, not yours. For why should my freedom be judged by another's conscience? {30} If I take part in the meal with thankfulness, why am I denounced because of something I thank God for? {31} So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God. {32} Do not cause anyone to stumble, whether Jews, Greeks or the church of God-- {33} even as I try to please everybody in every way. For I am not seeking my own good but the good of many, so that they may be saved.

(1 Cor 11:1 NIV) Follow my example, as I follow the example of Christ.

(1 Cor 8 NIV) Now about food sacrificed to idols: We know that we all possess knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. {2} The man who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought to know. {3} But the man who loves God is known by God. {4} So then, about eating food sacrificed to idols: We know that an idol is nothing at all in the world and that there is no God but one. {5} For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as indeed there are many "gods" and many "lords"),

{1 Cor 8:6-13} yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live. {7} But not everyone knows this. Some people are still so accustomed to idols that when they eat such food they think of it as having been sacrificed to an idol, and since their conscience is weak, it is defiled. {8} But food does not bring us near to God; we are no worse if we do not eat, and no better if we do. {9} Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak. {10} For if anyone with a weak conscience sees you who have this knowledge eating in an idol's temple, won't he be emboldened to eat what has been sacrificed to idols? {11} So this weak brother, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. {12} When you sin against your brothers in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. {13} Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause him to fall.

(1 Cor 10:14-30 NIV) Therefore, my dear friends, flee from idolatry. {15} I speak to sensible people; judge for yourselves what I say. {16} Is not the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation in the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ? {17} Because there is one loaf, we, who are many, are one body, for we all partake of the one loaf. {18} Consider the people of Israel: Do not those who eat the sacrifices participate in the altar? {19} Do I mean then that a sacrifice offered to an idol is anything, or that an idol is anything? {20} No, but the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons. {21} You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons too; you cannot have a part in both the Lord's table and the table of demons. {22} Are we trying to arouse the Lord's jealousy? Are we stronger than he? {23} "Everything is permissible"--but not everything is beneficial. "Everything is permissible"--but not everything is constructive. {24} Nobody should seek his own good, but the good of others. {25} Eat anything sold in the meat market without raising questions of conscience, {26} for, "The earth is the Lord's, and everything in it." {27} If some unbeliever invites you to a meal and you want to go, eat whatever is put before you without raising questions of conscience. {28} But if anyone says to you, "This has been offered in sacrifice," then do not eat it, both for the sake of the man who told you and for conscience' sake-- {29} the other man's conscience, I mean, not yours. For why should my freedom be judged by another's conscience? {30} If I take part in the meal with thankfulness, why am I denounced because of something I thank God for?

(1 Cor 10:25 NIV) Eat anything sold in the meat market without raising questions of conscience,

Monday

(1 Cor 10:25 NIV) Eat anything sold in the meat market without raising questions of conscience,

(1 Cor 10:27 NIV) If some unbeliever invites you to a meal and you want to go, eat whatever is put before you without raising questions of conscience.

(1 Cor 8:1-9 NIV) Now about food sacrificed to idols: We know that we all possess knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. {2} The man who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought to know. {3} But the man who loves God is known by God. {4} So then, about eating food sacrificed to idols: We know that an idol is nothing at all in the world and that there is no God but one.

{1 Cor 8:5-9} For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as indeed there are many "gods" and many "lords"), {6} yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live. {7} But not everyone knows this. Some people are still so accustomed to idols that when they eat such food they think of it as having been sacrificed to an idol, and since their conscience is weak, it is defiled. {8} But food does not bring us near to God; we are no worse if we do not eat, and no better if we do. {9} Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak.

(1 Cor 10:23-30 NIV) "Everything is permissible"--but not everything is beneficial. "Everything is permissible"--but not everything is constructive. {24} Nobody should seek his own good, but the good of others. {25} Eat anything sold in the meat market without raising questions of conscience, {26} for, "The earth is the Lord's, and everything in it." {27} If some unbeliever invites you to a meal and you want to go, eat whatever is put before you without raising questions of conscience. {28} But if anyone says to you, "This has been offered in sacrifice," then do not eat it, both for the sake of the man who told you and for conscience' sake-- {29} the other man's conscience, I mean, not yours. For why should my freedom be judged by another's conscience? {30} If I take part in the meal with thankfulness, why am I denounced because of something I thank God for?

(Rom 14:13-23 NIV) Therefore let us stop passing judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in your brother's way. {14} As one who is in the Lord Jesus, I am fully convinced that no food is unclean in itself. But if anyone regards something as unclean, then for him it is unclean. {15} If your brother is distressed because of what you eat, you are no longer acting in love. Do not by your eating destroy your brother for whom Christ died. {16} Do not allow what you consider good to be spoken of as evil. {17} For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, {18} because anyone who serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and approved by men. {19} Let us therefore make every effort to do what leads to peace and to mutual edification. {20} Do not destroy the work of God for the sake of food. All food is clean, but it is wrong for a man to eat anything that causes someone else to stumble. {21} It is better not to eat meat or drink wine or to do anything else that will cause your brother to fall. {22} So whatever you believe about these things keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the man who does not condemn himself by what he approves. {23} But the man who has doubts is condemned if he eats, because his eating is not from faith; and everything that does not come from faith is sin.

(1 Cor 8:4 KJV) As concerning therefore the eating of those things that are offered in sacrifice unto idols, we know that an idol is nothing in the world, and that there is none other God but one.

(1 Cor 8:4 NIV) So then, about eating food sacrificed to idols: We know that an idol is nothing at all in the world and that there is no God but one.

Tuesday

(1 Cor 8:10 NIV) For if anyone with a weak conscience sees you who have this knowledge eating in an idol's temple, won't he be emboldened to eat what has been sacrificed to idols?

(1 Cor 8:11-12 NIV) So this weak brother, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. {12} When you sin against your brothers in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ.

Wednesday

(Isa 44:9-21 NIV) All who make idols are nothing, and the things they treasure are worthless. Those who would speak up for them are blind; they are ignorant, to their own shame. {10} Who shapes a god and casts an idol, which can profit him nothing? {11} He and his kind will be put to shame; craftsmen are nothing but men. Let them all come together and take their stand; they will be brought down to terror and infamy. {12} The blacksmith takes a tool and works with it in the coals; he shapes an idol with hammers, he forges it with the might of his arm. He gets hungry and loses his strength; he drinks no water and grows faint. {13} The carpenter measures with a line and makes an outline with a marker; he roughs it out with chisels and marks it with compasses. He shapes it in the form of man, of man in all his glory, that it may dwell in a shrine. {14} He cut down cedars, or perhaps took a cypress or oak. He let it grow among the trees of the forest, or planted a pine, and the rain made it grow. {15} It is man's fuel for burning; some of it he takes and warms himself, he kindles a fire and bakes bread. But he also fashions a god and worships it; he makes an idol and bows down to it. {16} Half of the wood he burns in the fire; over it he prepares his meal, he roasts his meat and eats his fill. He also warms himself and says, "Ah! I am warm; I see the fire." {17} From the rest he makes a god, his idol; he bows down to it and worships. He prays to it and says, "Save me; you are my god." {18} They know nothing, they understand nothing; their eyes are plastered over so they cannot see, and their minds closed so they cannot understand. {19} No one stops to think, no one has the knowledge or understanding to say, "Half of it I used for fuel; I even baked bread over its coals, I roasted meat and I ate. Shall I make a detestable thing from what is left? Shall I bow down to a block of wood?" {20} He feeds on ashes, a deluded heart misleads him; he cannot save himself, or say, "Is not this thing in my right hand a lie?" {21} "Remember these things, O Jacob, for you are my servant, O Israel. I have made you, you are my servant; O Israel, I will not forget you.

(Isa 44:20 NIV) He feeds on ashes, a deluded heart misleads him; he cannot save himself, or say, "Is not this thing in my right hand a lie?"

(1 Cor 10:14-22 NIV) Therefore, my dear friends, flee from idolatry. {15} I speak to sensible people; judge for yourselves what I say.

{1 Cor 10:16-22} Is not the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation in the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ? {17} Because there is one loaf, we, who are many, are one body, for we all partake of the one loaf. {18} Consider the people of Israel: Do not those who eat the sacrifices participate in the altar? {19} Do I mean then that a sacrifice offered to an idol is anything, or that an idol is anything? {20} No, but the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons. {21} You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons too; you cannot have a part in both the Lord's table and the table of demons. {22} Are we trying to arouse the Lord's jealousy? Are we stronger than he?

(1 Cor 10:18 NRSV) Consider the people of Israel; are not those who eat the sacrifices partners in the altar?

(1 Cor 10:18 NIV) Consider the people of Israel: Do not those who eat the sacrifices participate in the altar?

(1 Cor 10:20 NRSV) No, I imply that what pagans sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons and not to God. I do not want you to be partners with demons.

(1 Cor 10:20 NIV) No, but the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons.

(Col 3:5 NIV) Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry.

(Rev 2:14 NIV) Nevertheless, I have a few things against you: You have people there who hold to the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to entice the Israelites to sin by eating food sacrificed to idols and by committing sexual immorality.

(Rev 2:20 NIV) Nevertheless, I have this against you: You tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess. By her teaching she misleads my servants into sexual immorality and the eating of food sacrificed to idols.

Manuscript Releases, vol. 12, p. 221

True Worship Vs. False Worship, Satan's Sophistry Turns Men Into Hard-spirited Religious Zealots --Every soul that believes is to connect with Christ and angels in saying, Come, whosoever will may partake of the water of life freely. But we look around us, and what do we see? Many churches erected, and worship going on in them formal and insincere. The heart is going after its idols. In the place of heart devotion, the Lord beholds apparent solemnity and formality. The attitudes and signs of devotion are performed. He hears men confessing their sins, but not repenting or forsaking them. He discerns an array of spiritual idols which engage the attention and in which men trust, supplanting God. He sees a system of maxims, customs, and false theories, which they tenaciously cherish, robbing Him of the honor due His name. The idols of the heathen stood between them and their God, obscuring God from their vision. Thus it is today. By the cunning deception of Satan false theories are made a power to rob God. Man's spiritual understanding is darkened by Satan's sophistry. Instead of religion's making men meek and lowly in heart, it works to make them religious zealots, exacting and hard-spirited because their ideas are not met. Their religious ideas do not lead the soul to humble,

Manuscript Releases, vol. 12, p. 221 (continued)

fervent trust in God. False theories, wholly human, stand between them and their God. Their souls are wrapped up in their own preconceived opinions, separating them from all who differ with them, engrossing the soul in self.

Thursday

(1 Cor 8:1-6 NIV) Now about food sacrificed to idols: We know that we all possess knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. {2} The man who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought to know. {3} But the man who loves God is known by God. {4} So then, about eating food sacrificed to idols: We know that an idol is nothing at all in the world and that there is no God but one. {5} For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as indeed there are many "gods" and many "lords"), {6} yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live.

(1 Cor 8:7-13 NIV) But not everyone knows this. Some people are still so accustomed to idols that when they eat such food they think of it as having been sacrificed to an idol, and since their conscience is weak, it is defiled. {8} But food does not bring us near to God; we are no worse if we do not eat, and no better if we do. {9} Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak. {10} For if anyone with a weak conscience sees you who have this knowledge eating in an idol's temple, won't he be emboldened to eat what has been sacrificed to idols?

{11} So this weak brother, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. {12} When you sin against your brothers in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ.

{1 Cor 8:13} Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause him to fall.

(1 Cor 10:27-29 NIV) If some unbeliever invites you to a meal and you want to go, eat whatever is put before you without raising questions of conscience. {28} But if anyone says to you, "This has been offered in sacrifice," then do not eat it, both for the sake of the man who told you and for conscience' sake-- {29} the other man's conscience, I mean, not yours. For why should my freedom be judged by another's conscience?

Friday

(Acts 17:16-33 NIV) While Paul was waiting for them in Athens, he was greatly distressed to see that the city was full of idols. {17} So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and the God-fearing Greeks, as well as in the marketplace day by day with those who happened to be there. {18} A group of Epicurean and Stoic philosophers began to dispute with him. Some of them asked, "What is this babbler trying to say?" Others remarked, "He seems to be advocating foreign gods." They said this because Paul was preaching the good news about Jesus and the resurrection. {19} Then they took him and brought him to a meeting of the Areopagus, where they said to him, "May we know what this new teaching is that you are presenting? {20} You are bringing some strange ideas to our ears, and we want to know what they mean." {21} (All the Athenians and the foreigners who lived there spent their time doing nothing but talking about and listening to the latest ideas.) {22} Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said: "Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. {23} For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Now what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you. {24} "The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. {25} And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. {26} From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. {27} God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. {28} 'For in him we live and move and have our being.' As some of your own poets have said, 'We are his offspring.' {29} "Therefore since we are God's offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone--an image made by man's design and skill. {30} In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. {31} For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to all men by raising him from the dead." {32} When they heard about the resurrection of the dead, some of them sneered, but others said, "We want to hear you again on this subject." {33} At that, Paul left the Council.

(Rom 1:18-32 NIV) The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, {19} since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. {20} For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. {21} For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. {22} Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools {23} and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.

{Rom 1:24-32} Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. {25} They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator--who is forever praised. Amen. {26} Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. {27} In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion. {28} Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. {29} They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, {30} slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; {31} they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless. {32} Although they know God's righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.

(1 Th 1:9-10 NIV) for they themselves report what kind of reception you gave us. They tell how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, {10} and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead--Jesus, who rescues us from the coming wrath.

The Acts of the Apostles, pp. 316 - 317

Called to Reach a Higher Standard - The apostle adjured the Corinthians, "Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall." Should they become boastful and self-confident, neglecting to watch and pray, they would fall into grievous sin, calling down upon themselves the wrath of God. Yet Paul would not have them yield to despondency or discouragement. He gave them the assurance: "God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way of escape, that ye may be able to bear it." Paul urged his brethren to ask themselves what influence their words and deeds would have upon others and to do nothing, however innocent in itself, that would seem to (p. 317) sanction idolatry or offend the scruples of those who might be weak in the faith. "Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God. Give none offense, neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the church of God." The apostle's words of warning to the Corinthian church are applicable to all time and are especially adapted to our day. By idolatry he meant not only the worship of idols, but self-serving, love of ease, the gratification of appetite and passion. A mere profession of faith in Christ, a boastful knowledge of the truth, does not make a man a Christian. A religion that seeks only to gratify the eye, the ear, and the taste, or that sanctions self-indulgence, is not the religion of Christ. By a comparison of the church with the human body, the apostle aptly illustrated the close and harmonious relationship that should exist among all members of the church of Christ. "By one Spirit," he wrote, "are well all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit. For the body is not one member, but many. If the foot shall say, Because I am not the hand, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body? And if the ear shall say, Because I am not the eye, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body? If the whole body were an eye, where were the hearing? If the whole were hearing, where were the smelling? But now hath God set the members every one of them in the body, as it hath pleased Him. And if they were all one member, where were the body? (p. 318) But now are they many members, yet but one body. And the eye cannot say unto the hand, I have no need of thee: nor again the head to the feet, I have no need of you. . . . God hath tempered the body together, having given more abundant honor to that part which lacked: that there should be no schism in the body;

The Acts of the Apostles, pp. 316 - 317 (continued)

but that the members should have the same care one for another. And whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it; or one member be honored, all the members rejoice with it. Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular."

(Acts 15:19-21 NIV) "It is my judgment, therefore, that we should not make it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God. {20} Instead we should write to them, telling them to abstain from food polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals and from blood. {21} For Moses has been preached in every city from the earliest times and is read in the synagogues on every Sabbath."

(Acts 15:28-29 NIV) It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us not to burden you with anything beyond the following requirements: {29} You are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid these things. Farewell.