Cor. 8:1-13  Christian Table Manners

INTRODUCTION

            When we sat down to the table every evening for supper, my family was assured that there would be no leftovers.  We were taught good manners.  My two older brothers and younger sister learned to feed unwanted food to the dog under the table, or when we didn’t have a dog, hide food in their napkins, which we were always taught to keep under the table on our laps.  But my oldest brother had a great appetite.  He would finish his first serving of food in a few swift bites and inevitably ask for seconds and thirds.  We learned to take what we thought we would eat for the meal the first time the food was passed around.

            Paul wrote to the Corinthians about many matters, one of which was table manners.  Later in the letter from which we read this morning, Paul chastises the Corinthian Christians for fighting over the bread of communion. (1 Cor. 11:23-33)  Some people were coming hungry to worship and filling up on the communion bread, leaving nothing for others.  Maybe this is why some of our sister denominations serve those individual wafers that taste like cardboard for communion.  No one is tempted to eat more than one of those.

THOSE WILD CORINTHIANS

            The Christians of Corinth were a challenging bunch.  We know this because two letters to them from the Apostle Paul have been preserved.  But we have only half of the correspondence, Paul’s letters to the Corinthians. We don’t have the letters the Corinthians wrote to Paul.  Paul would have done us a favor by holding onto the letters he received from the churches to which he wrote.  However, Paul probably didn’t think his letters would still be informing Christians two thousand years after he wrote them.  In addition, he was in and out of prison and undoubtedly had his files subpoenaed for evidence of his rabble-rousing missionary work.  Wouldn’t it be great if someone someday discovered the lost letters to Paul?!

            As it is we have to do what scholars call “mirror” reading of the letters of Paul.  We have to imagine what concerns and questions arose in the Corinthian church that prompted Paul’s response.  What we can see is a lot of tension among various factions of people.  The Corinthians argue over everything from what to eat to speaking in tongues.  Paul appeals to the Corinthians to overcome the divisions that developed as members of the community aligned themselves with the various teachers itinerating in their midst.

EATING WITH IDOLS 

            The first part of this letter lays out Paul’s theology.  In the second part of the letter, he offers practical advice on a variety of issues.  Today’s lesson is about table manners Christians are to develop.  Corinth at the time of Paul was a very diverse community.  Greek and Roman temples to various gods abounded in the city.  A near universal practice in the Mediterranean world at the time was dining at the local temple.  In fact, eating at temples provided the major way that people included meat in their diet.  Some of the meat brought for sacrifice was allowed to burn on the altar, but the rest was distributed to the people.  So the temples were like church dinners, albeit with a carnivorous bent.  We can imagine the Corinthians checking out the schedule—Monday, the temple of Athena; Tuesday, the temple of Dionysius; Wednesday, we’ll dine with Zeus, etc.  No health inspectors guaranteed that those cooking the sacrifices were using safe handling of food practices.  I wonder what kinds of food poisonings resulted from this practice. 

            Not surprisingly, Christians in Corinth argued over whether or not they should eat food sacrificed to various gods.  Since Christians believed in the one true God as revealed in Jesus Christ, would it not be idolatry to eat food sacrificed to a false god?  This is the question Paul answers in our text this morning.  Paul maintains that a Christian eating food sacrificed to a particular idol was not problematic in and of itself.  Food is food, he writes.  It’s not so much what goes into the body as what comes out that really matters to the Christian.  Of course we now know that what goes into the body is important, but Paul was not a nutritionist. 

The problem in Paul’s estimation was not the food.  It was what one believed about the food that was important.  Paul points out that Christians are at different points in their faith development.  For some, eating food sacrificed to idols poses a problem.  For others who clearly see the idol as merely a physical object with no power over them, eating food at these temple sacrifices is not problematic.

However, Paul reminds the Corinthians that decisions they make are not made in a vacuum.  We are interrelated.  We are the body of Christ.  What one Christian does affects others.  So every decision a Christian makes, even the decision about eating, has an impact on others in the community.  Paul points out that if eating meat sacrificed to idols at the temples causes other Christians to struggle with their faith, then Christians should not eat meat at the temples.

CHRISTIAN ARGUMENTS TODAY

Christians today do not argue over eating sacrificed meat.  And if you decide to dine at the local Methodist Church’s annual sour beef dinner, no one is going to give you a hard time.  Yet we can understand what Paul is saying to Christians today.  Paul’s refusal to eat meat sacrificed to an idol demonstrates his compassion as a Christian.  He values love above knowledge.  He wants to behave in a way that nourishes, strengthens, and builds up the Christian community.  In our context, we hear Paul’s words encouraging us to show love to one another instead of allowing political positions to alienate us from one another.  Instead of picking on our theological opponents, we are to put effort into picking up anyone who has stumbled and fallen in their spiritual journey.  Instead of judging people who have different racial, national, cultural, or sexual identities, we are to love one another.

Paul writes, “Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.”  Paul knows that knowledge can lead to arrogance.  Love on the other hand inspires compassion shown in words we speak and actions we take.  By focusing on Christ’s way of love, we can become a community in which people of different views can actually get along.  Following the 2004 elections, many speculated on the great division between Republicans and Democrats, between the Christian right and…. Well everyone else.  The true test of our Christian commitment is not how well we love the people who are like us, but how well we love the people who differ from us, those with whom we have political and theological adversity.

In Corinth, the meat eaters and the non-meat eaters had to begin to talk with each others.  They had to build a foundation of understanding and trust.  In our world today the conservatives will need to sit down at table with the liberals and the liberals will need to respectfully chat with conservatives.  Instead we tend to associate with people who think as we do, and belittle the thinking of those who are conservative or condemn to hell those who are liberal.  Were he writing to the churches today, Paul would be encouraging the conservatives to build deep personal relationships of trust and support for one another across political and theological lines as together we seek to do Christ’s work in the world.

Fortunately, there are organizations that manage to garner support from both conservatives and liberals because of their focus on issues that all of us agree as Christians we should address.  One such organization is Bread For the World, a nationwide Christian movement that works for social policy that alleviates hunger.  On its Board of Directors, Bread for the World has both Republicans and Democrats, for example former GOP presidential candidate Bob Dole and former Clinton administration budget director Leon Panetta.

CONCLUSION

Ever since the Reformation and the birth of Protestantism, the church has found it easier to create new congregations and new denominations, rather than to tolerate genuine diversity within its ranks.  Some of these divisions arose out of righteous causes, such as Civil Rights, but others over such trivial matters as card playing, jewelry wearing, dancing, drinking, movie-going, and TV watching. Would Paul have felt these reasons justified pulling apart the Body of Christ?   We live with the tension.  Can those who support a woman’s right to choose sit at Christ’s table with someone who is anti-abortion?  Can creationists and evolutionists be friendly?   Can we talk together about economic vitality as it relates to environmental health?  I can just imagine the Apostle Paul shaking his head in dismay at the issues that have divided the Body of Christ.  

God intends a well nourished community of faith.  But if we keep fighting around the table, all we’re going to end up with is heartburn.  Paul’s appeal to the Corinthians offers a word for us today: consider what causes the other to stumble.  Try to see issues from the perspective of one another.  Show compassion.  Look out for those who are at different points in their faith journeys.  I believe this is a very important consideration for us as Hunting Ridge Church.  We must not assume that everyone has the same faith perspective as we do.   Nor are we to assume that everyone has what he or she needs to grow spiritually.  As we act like a community of people who look out for one another and genuinely care for each other, people will be drawn to Christ, who they see revealed within us and among us.  Amen.

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