Categories of Conscience: Guarding Against Sin in the Name of Christian Liberty

In recent weeks, we have been studying Romans 14 and the so-called “gray areas” of Christian liberty and conscience. The “gray areas” are truly morally neutral positions that are, in and of themselves, amoral; however, due to past teaching or experience, someone views the issue as sinful, even though it’s not.

By way of analogy, consider this: It is impossible to convince me that any modern-day democrat can be a Christian. Fifty years ago, however, it is very plausible to be morally neutral in politics. It was not sinful to vote Democrat. It was a matter of choice that was, more or less, amoral (without moral gravity).

This is crucial to understanding Paul’s main teaching in Romans 14. Paul is dealing with issues of indifference, quite literally issues that do not have a right or a wrong side. You may eat the meat, a portion of which was sacrificed to idols, but that which is still meat for food. Or, if your conscience cannot accept this as clean (even though it is), you may not eat it.

Paul’s teaching mainly applies when confronting legalism. Some who leave the KJV-only camp, for instance, may view it is as actual sin to read anything other than the KJV. Or, some (like the Amish) may have been wrongly taught that using electricity is sinful. He should be dealt with in love, even if it means voluntarily laying aside my freedom (my rights) for his sake.

What Paul is dealing with is that one person thinks certain things are clean, while others think they are unclean. Which are they? They’re both. It depends on how we view them and use them.

For instance: meat is meat. God made it. It’s, therefore, clean. But if a Jewish Christian thinks of it as unclean, then it is (until he changes his mind). If a Gentile Christian sees no problem with eating it, and they’re eating it with thanksgiving to God who provided it for them, then it is fine. When they come together, they should abstain from eating because it proves to be a stumbling block to the Jewish Christian who is still immature.

What matters is how we think about the thing. When placed on a table, meat is meat; it’s morally neutral.

What food and days have in common – the focal points of Romans 14 – is that they are both neutral objects. In and of themselves, they are physical things created by God with no moral bearings one way or another. One day is the same as another, but the meaning we give to them, or the way in which we think of them, is what our consciences view as either right or wrong. In and of themselves, neither food nor days are sinful. All is good because God made it all.

There are, however, certain things we think of as “issues of conscience” or “gray areas” that are actually not. This is, probably, my greatest concern as a pastor: Christians living in sin, yet calling it Christian liberty, a “gray area.” We must guard against misrepresenting what Paul is clearly saying in Romans 14.

For instance, consider the way in which we talk. What someone feels convicted by may actually not be sinful, while what someone else does not feel convicted by may actually be sinful. Take coarse joking, for example. Someone might joke in ways that are inappropriate and actually in violation of Scripture and not feel convicted about it. Because he doesn’t feel conviction does not mean it’s a gray area; it means that his mind needs to be sharpened by the Word and the Spirit, that he needs to put to death the deeds of the flesh, and that he needs to grow from childishness to maturity.

Likewise, consider modesty. Modesty is a word that literally means “humility.” By definition, what is often considered modest is actually not humble, but full of pride and attention seeking. Modesty is not a gray area. Paul and Peter command certain things regarding dress (i.e., 1 Peter 3:1-6). Therefore, it is not completely a gray area, but it is an area for growth.

To sum it up, Paul writes something very insightful about freedom in Christ in Galatians 5. He says Christ has set the Jewish-Christian free from the rules and regulations of the Old Covenant. Now, his freedom is found in the Spirit. Yet, there are qualifications Paul lists for what living in the Spirit actually is; it is not freedom in Christ to be morally obtuse. He contrasts living in the flesh with living in the Spirit this way:

But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

Finally, Paul summarizes the command for Christians who have been set free from the law to “walk in the Spirit” (Gal 5:25). Does coarse joking and dressing like the world reveal a lifestyle marked by the Spirit of Christ? Certainly not. That is why these are not areas of moral indifference.

All in all, Paul is dealing with issues concerning someone who thinks a thing is sin but the thing actually isn’t. In short, he says that if someone thinks of eating meat as sinful, then he should abstain – and all loving brothers should do the same to help their weaker brothers.

In short, don’t use Paul’s letter to excuse sin in the name of Christian liberty.