1 Corinthians 10:23-33 Should I or Shouldnt I?

Translation
19. So what am I saying?
That a thing sacrificed idolatrously is anything, or that an idol is anything?
20. Rather that what the nations are sacrificing is to demons; they are not
sacrificing to God and Im not willing for yall to become partners of the
demons.
21. Yall are not able to drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons.
Yall are not able to partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons.
22. Or shall we provoke the Lord to jealousy? We are not stronger than Him!
23. All things are permissible, but not all things bear together.
All things are permissible, but not all things build up.
24. No one should continue to seek what is for himself, but rather what is for the
other.
25. Yall should continue to eat everything which is being sold in the market,
not making a single judgment with regards to the conscience.
26. For, The earth is the Lords and that which fills her.
27. If someone of the unbelievers calls you and you wish to go, you should eat
anything that is set before you, not making a single judgment with regards to
the conscience.
28. But if someone happens to say to you, This is a temple-sacrifice! stop eating
on account of that informant and his conscience.
29. Now, by the conscience, Im speaking not of your own, but rather than of
the other man,
for why should my freedom be judged by anothers conscience?
30. As for me, if by grace I partake, why should I be slandered over what I
am giving thanks for!
31. Therefore, whether yall are eating, whether yall are drinking, whatever you do,
continue to do all things to Gods glory.
32. Become un-spectacular, both to Jews and to Greeks and to the church of
God,
33. just as I myself also am pleasing all men in all things,
not seeking the bearing together of myself but rather that of the many,
in order that they might be saved.
Introduction
Last Sunday at our church fellowship meal, after you loaded your plate with all
those yummy foods and desserts, what went through your mind as you left the
serving line and looked out over the tables? For most of us, we thought
about who we wanted to sit with. There is something instinctive about the
connection between fellowship and sharing a meal.
Last week we looked at fellowship between man and God demonstrated through
the Lords supper.
This week, were going to look at what promotes fellowship between
one human and another, and that also includes eating meals together.

But the immediate question for the church in Corinth was that the church was
divided over whether or not they could eat meat sacrificed to idols, so they were
not eating together and therefore were not experiencing the fellowship they
should have as a church.
Lowell Bliss, a resident of Manhattan, KS, who has served on the mission field
in India described how this plays out even among Christians in modern-day India:
Each family has a god that they worship in India, and there are many different
gods to choose from. It is customary to go to the temple of your particular god
and bring a box of crackers or some kind of food. The priest at the temple will
offer a blessing over the food and maybe touch the idol with it and hand it back.
This blessed food is called Prasad. The worshipper takes the Prasad home and
shares it with their family. Often if they are feeling sociable, theyll carry some of
the food over to their neighbors and share a snack while shooting the breeze in
conversation. So when Lowells neighbor came over with a box of crackers to chat
he was faced with a question, Should I as a Christian missionary eat this Prasad
that has been offered to an idol and chat with my Hindu neighbor, or should I
refuse the food that my neighbor is offering?
Suppose a new convert to Christianity was with Lowell at his house to be
discipled when the Hindu neighbor came over with his box of crackers. The new
Christian turns to Lowell with a horrified look and says, Sahib, that food has
been offered to an idol! or suppose the Hindu neighbor himself brings it up, I
have just offered this food to the goddess Durga at her temple. I want you to
have some so that she will protect you from evil, too! Whats a Christian to do?
There are several principles that Paul brings out in vs. 23-33 to help the
Corinthians and all Christians after them to decide, Should I or shouldnt I?
I)

Dont get involved in fellowship with demons (vs. 20-22)

A) We saw last week that demons are real and that worship not directed to God is
directed to them. (v.20)
B) Fellowship with demons or false Gods excludes us from fellowship with God
(v.21).
1.
I have an acquaintance who was involved in Satanic ceremonies as a
kid and became a Christian as a young adult. But whenever the Lords
Supper was set up, she would get such a violent stomach ache that she
could not take Communion; she was doubled up with pain. Only after the
elders of the church prayed for her deliverance from this demonic
influence was she able for the first time to take the bread and the cup. You
cant have fellowship with the table of demons and the Lords table.
2.
But its not usually Satan worship that people in our country struggle with.
Much more common is:
(a) a passion for certain sports that take us out of church on Sunday
mornings,
(b) or driven-ness to work or study that lands you in the office or the
library on the Lords Day,
(c) or addiction to entertainment late on Saturday night.
When I was in High School, I could tell who had been up late

watching Saturday Night Live because they were the ones who slept
through Sunday school!
C) Participating in the worship of false Gods provokes God to violently jealous
anger (v.22)
D) For this reason, Paul taught in chapter 8 that it was a bad idea for a
Christian to show up in an idols temple and eat there, even if the Christian
went into it knowing that the idol was not the true God and knowing that
there was nothing physically different between the meat served at that
idolatrous feast and the meat served anywhere else.
II)
A)
B)
C)
D)

E)

F)

All things are lawful (vs. 23-27)

Same principle from Pauls treatment of sexual relationships in Ch 6-7
(quoted from 6:12)
All things are lawful/permissible, in other words, you have authority to use
anything in this world as long as you use it for Gods purposes according to Gods guidelines (for
instance, worshipping demons is not lawful - v.21)
v.26 says to eat anything you want because The earth is the Lords and the
fullness thereof.
1.
Paul quotes from the Psalms (24:1; 50:12; 89:1) to make this point.
2.
When God created the world, everything He made He called Good, so
no thing on this earth is intrinsically bad.
3.
Not even sex, drugs, and rock n roll! Each has a context in which it is
very good.
For instance, the right kind of drug applied carefully to a sick person can
be a wonderful gift of God for healing.
The command to eat whatever is sold in the market is reminiscent of one of
Gods first commands to mankind when He placed the man in the garden of
Eden full of all kinds of trees that were beautiful to look at and good for
food and said with a very emphatic command, Eat! Eat from any tree in the
garden (Gen. 2:16) Later God told Noah (Gen 9:3) Every moving thing
that lives shall be food for you; like the green plants, I give you everything.
1.
Mark 7:18 [Jesus said to His disciples] Dont you understand, that
what ever from outside goes into the man cannot defile him? This He
said, making all meats clean.
2.
1 Tim. 4:1 Now the Spirit says expressly, that in later times some will
fall away from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of
demons 3) forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats,
which God created to be received with thanksgiving by them that believe
and know the truth. 4) For every creature of God is good, and nothing is to
be rejected, as long as it is received with thanksgiving...
3.
Rom 14:14 I know, and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus, that nothing is
unclean of itself... 20) Dont upset the work of God over meat... All things
indeed are clean
So for the Corinthians as they consider whether or not to eat meat
sacrificed to idols, there should be no questions of conscience about whether
or not any particular kind of food was off-limits. The question should not be,
Is it kosher? It should not even be, Has this meat in the marked been
sacrificed to idols before? Its an irrelevant question. The earth is the
Lords and all things are lawful.

G)

Note, however, that this meat is not in the idols temple, it is in the market.
The Greek word Paul uses here is a borrow-word from the Latin Makellum food market. [Hand out pictures of ancient Roman marketplaces.] The
significance of this location is that the meat is no longer of any religious
significance. It is no longer in a pagan worship ceremony; it is now being sold
in the public marketplace. There are no longer any implied associations with
demons.
H) In fact, as v. 27 states, if a non-believing friend asks you over for dinner at
his house or at a restaurant [again, not at the idols temple itself] and serves
you a steak, dont ask if it had been sacrificed to an idol, just go ahead and
eat it!
I)
This follows Jesus command in Luke 10:8 when He was preparing His 70
disciples for a mission trip. He said, Eat whatever they set before you.
J)
Ive been reading Neil Andersons account of his Bible translation work in
Papua New Guinea to my family recently, and he has a great story in his book
entitled In Search of the Source (p.24) about eating whats put in front of
you:
Apusi Ali had another mystery-wrapped leaf bag tied in vine. He opened it
up and spread it out. There, writhing and squirming, was a great pile of
brown-headed, two-inch-long, white sago grubs Apusi Ali started scooping
the grubs by the handful and funneling them into a bamboo tube, banging it
down to pack them in. He plugged the open end with a piece of specially
folded banana leaf and laid the tube across the logs to cook I knew it was
time to turn my attention elsewhere. Anywhere. Though I set my gaze at the
farthest end of the shelter, with the corner of my eye I was still aware of
Apusi Ali turning his bamboo tube of steaming grubs from side to side. Doing
my best to avoid betraying any interest in this at all, I was still aware of his
reaching back and tearing off a piece of banana leaf. I looked the other way.
Still, I knew it when he laid the leaf out, took the bamboo tube off the fire,
opened the top, and plopped the contents out in a big pile. Then, in spite of
my fine performance of treating this activity like it wasn't happening at all,
Apusi Ali, with the delight of a child at a birthday party, gingerly lifted the leaf
by the corners and placed it squarely down in my lap. Looking at me with a
big smile he said, "Eat them, they're good! Suddenly the whole shelter
became silent I looked down at the pile in my lap and up again. In the halflight of the place, all I could see were eyes and gleaming brown faces
catching the fire's glow. Finally, as calmly as I could, I said, "I don't know this
food. How do you eat it?" "Let me show you," Apusi Ali said. He picked up one
of the thick, hot larvae and held it up to his mouth. Feigning to take a few
tentative nibbles, he said, "You don't do it like this! That is the wrong way to
eat sago grubs." Then, scooping up a great handful, he said, "This is the way
to eat them," and he thrust the whole batch into his mouth. He chewed, then
he swallowed. As he swallowed, I did too, though my mouth was dry I took
a handful of the grubs, almost like Apusi Ali had done, inserted them in my
mouth and chomped down. As I chewed, everybody watched. I chewed for a
long time, mouth closed, expression steady and finally they began to slip
down my throat. As I finished, Hotere leaned across the fire and asked,
"Felere? Are they good?"

K)

III)
A)

The principle that all things are lawful applies to anything today your
friends invite you to go hunting or go skinny-dipping or drink a beer or go to a
rock concert.
1.
You can recognize that there is nothing intrinsically evil about anything
that God has not called evil.
2.
Your evaluation of whether you should or shouldnt, needs to be based
on other criteria, such as, Is this activity part of the worship of a false
god? Is it fellowship with demons?
3.
If the activity involves lewdness, drunkenness, wanton destruction of
Gods creation, or filthy speech, then it probably fails the first test and will
probably fail the next test as well:
Edify other people (v.23-24, 28-29)
Paul uses three phrases to speak of considering others in vs. 23-24:
1.
not all things are expedient/helpful/profitable/beneficial/lit.
bear together
(a) Paul just used this word back in chapter 7 to describe how his advice
on singleness and marriage could benefit the church. He wrote, 32.
Now, I want you to be free from cares. The unmarried man cares about
the things of the Lord how he may please the Lord... 35. I am saying
this toward the bearing together of your own selves toward your
good order and good service in the Lord...
(b) So in evaluating whether or not to engage in an activity or use an
item, we should ask ourselves, Will this carry me forward in a lifetime
of unity with God and His people? Is this the kind of thing that would be
a good foundation to build on, or will this bring brokenness, disunity,
disappointment, and disqualification from the race of faith?
2.
not all things edify/build up/are constructive
(a) Paul has also used this word recently in chapter 8: 1. Now concerning
the things sacrificed to idols, we know that we all have knowledge.
Knowledge puffs up but love builds up.
(b) This is a very different way of thinking than the worlds way of
thinking:
(i)
Most people around us evaluate things existentially, Will it be
fun? Is it exciting? Will I enjoy it? Will I get into trouble?
(ii) God tells us here in v.23 that we should instead ask, Does this
build me up [in stature and in favor with God and man]? Will this
edify everybody in my church fellowship?
(c) This is essentially turning from our immediate selfish interests and
seeking to meet Gods interests with consideration for the interests of
other people.
3.
(v.24) seek what is for the other/the others well-being/the
good of others
(a) No one should seek what is for himself does not, by the way, mean
neglecting your personal needs any more than Lev. 19:18 love your
neighbor as yourself means to hate yourself. It just means dont be
self-centered.
(b) Rom 15:1 We that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the
weak, and not to please ourselves. 2) Let each one of us please his
neighbor for that which is good, unto edifying. 3) For Christ also

pleased not himself; but, as it is written, The reproaches of those who

reproached You [God] fell upon me.
(c) Becoming a poor Jewish boy, then getting roughed up by soldiers and
hung on a cross was not pleasant for Jesus, but His life was not
centered around making Himself feel good; He suffered because He
wanted to bring well-being to us by enduring the punishment we
deserve for our sin and offering fellowship with God to us through
Himself.
B) Now we are given an example of a case in which a restraint upon our
Christian liberty could help and build up someone else vs. 28-29
1.
The scenario is that a non-Christian has invited you to a meal at his
house, but someone at the table says, This meat has been used in a
temple sacrifice [to idols].
2.
Paul says in this case to stop eating.
3.
Why?
(a) v. 28 for the sake of that informant
(b) and v.29 for the sake of the other persons conscience
(c) If that other person is your non-Christian host, he might recognize
the incompatibility of Christianity and idolatry and he might
be testing you to see if you will compromise with idolatry. In that case,
refusing to compromise on his terms and not eating that meat will
uphold the integrity of Christianity to him.
(d) If that other person is a Christian guest also at the dinner whose
conscience is telling him that it is wrong to eat that meat, this is not
the right time & place to give him a lesson on the revocation of the
Mosaic food laws. If you make a big deal about the dos and donts of
food at this dinner, your non-Christian host might conclude that
Christianity is all about outward behaviours of what you can and
cannot do. Instead, this is the time to let your Christian brother know
that his conscience is a valuable ally and that it is wise to heed what
your conscience is saying. Dont encourage him to violate his
conscience by going ahead and eating the meat after he has expressed
the objections of his conscience. You can always take that brother out
for lunch the next day and train his conscience with the earth-is-theLords-and-everything-in-it lesson. But not now.
(e) By not eating, you are edifying the conscience of your Christian brother
and of your host, putting their spiritual well-being above the pleasure you
would get from eating that juicy steak.
(f) This does not mean, however, that you have to kowtow to an older
believer who bullies other Christians into following a bunch of man-made
rules. I think this passage is speaking about dealing with someone who
has an honest scruple and who can learn from you.
4.
Application: Say youre browsing for videos with a non-Christian
neighbor. They just love this one video and they recommend it to you.
Then they say apologetically, Well, it does have some language and there
is a sex scene Theres a cue that my neighbors conscience recognizes
an incompatibility between my Christian faith and that movie. It will
reinforce the integrity of Christianity for me to pass over that movie and
get something else. (It will also probably be more edifying to me and my
family.)

IV) Do all to the glory of God (v.30-31)

A) v.29b Why should my freedom be judged by anothers conscience?
1.
This question is interpreted differently by different people:
(a) One commentator I read suggested that Paul is repeating a question
that had been posed to him by the Corinthians and that his reply is in
v. 31. Im not sure I agree.
(b) John Calvin took it to mean that if we set restraints upon ourselves for
the sake of our brothers, we remain free because we have chosen our
own course of action.
(c) I prefer Gordon Clarks comment that we will always be judged by
others, so we ought to avoid unnecessary offences what would cause
them to judge us unfavorably.
2.
Whatever the case, the word WHY is a key consideration. When you
decide upon a course of action, why should you choose that course of
action? If you can say that you chose it because you believed it would glorify
God more than any other course of action, youre probably on track.
B) by grace I partake I am giving thanks (v.30)
1.
If you can also thank God for what you are eating/listening
to/watching/doing, and arent embarrassed to bring it up in His presence,
then, again, you are probably on track.
2.
It was apparently common to use the phrase from Psalm 24 as a
blessing over food, The earth is the Lords and all that fills her.
3.
So here is Paul saying grace over the food and eating with thanks in his
heart toward God for His provision. Is there anything wrong with this? No!
4.
1 Tim. 4:3 God created [food] to be received with thanksgiving
5.
Rom 14:6 He who eats, eats unto the Lord, for he gives God
thanks
C) v.31 so whether you eat or drink or whatever you do
1.
Col 3:17 And whatever you do, in word or in deed, do all in the name of
the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.
2.
Glorifying God should be the ruling motive in the Christians life (ATR).
D) APPLICATION: If the earth is the Lords and everything in it, then alcohol is
not intrinsically evil. So in regards to whether or not to drink wine with my
supper on Saturday, the question is, Whywould I want to do such a thing?
1.
If the answer is that I want to find comfort in getting drunk, or that I like
to make a point to my fuddy-duddy friends, or even just that I like the
taste, then my motivation is wrong, because Im not doing it to the glory
of God.
2.
If, however my main motivation is to follow the recommendations of
Gods word, to set apart the Sabbath day as holy with special food, to
train my family to be moderate around a substance about which the Bible
warns us to be careful, and to rejoice before Him with thanksgiving, then I
am doing it for the glory of God.
3.
But again, its not just about me and God although my relationship
with God holds first place and is mentioned first by Paul here; I also have
to consider the other people around me:
V)

Become un-spectacular/give no offense/do not cause anyone to

stumble (v.32)
A)
The Greek text here says that we should become a-pro-skop-oi: literally
not-before-view-ers The word picture is of a non-Christian Jew or Greek or

B)
C)

D)

E)

even a Christian brother or sister trying to look at God, but they cant see
God because you keep stepping in front of their line of sight so that it is
blocked by your presence.
Rom. 14:13b let no man put a stumblingblock in his brother's way, or an
occasion of falling.
Is it worth being slandered/denounced/having evil spoken of you just to
maintain your liberty?
1.
In the case of drinking wine, even if I drank in moderation with a
genuine motive to glorify God, there could be another person at the table
who sees me drinking and who is distracted by what Im doing. Pastor
Wilson drinks alcohol that makes you drunk? And before you know it,
theres a rumor going around that Pastor Wilson gets drunk on Saturday
nights.
2.
It may be wise to protect yourself from ignorant
slander by not exercising your liberty.
3.
1Cor. 8:13 Therefore, if food scandalizes my brother, I will never eat
meat in this age in order that I might not scandalize my brother.
Food isnt the only thing that can cause a scandal. Cross-cultural
relationships are full of potentials for distractions. For instance: If I were
meeting an Arab to do a Bible study, and I were to walk into the room, drop
my Bible on the floor next to my chair, give him the handout paper with my
left hand, and sit down and cross my legs with the sole of my shoe facing
him, I have just exhibited a lot of disrespect both to him and to Gods word.
He will then have to struggle to put aside my cultural faux pas before he can
hear my message.
The cross will be offensive enough to an unbeliever. Dont add to it by
having bad breath!

VI) Seek the salvation of others (v.33)

A) Bottom line: in order that the many might be saved.
B) 1 Cor. 9: 19. For, being free from all men, I enslaved myself to all men in
order that I might win the more: 20. so I became to the Jews as a Jew in order
that I might win Jews, to those under law as one under law (not being under
law myself) in order that I might win those under law, 21. to the lawless, as a
lawless one (not being lawless in respect to God, but rather within the law of
Christ) in order that I might win the lawless, 22. I became weak to the weak in
order that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all men always in
order that I might save some.
C) Paul speaks of pleasing people, but that doesnt mean he was a peoplepleaser!
1.
People tended to get very displeased around Paul: they mobbed him,
whipped him, stoned him, dragged him to court, and jailed him.
2.
He said himself that his goal was to please God rather than man in Gal.
1:10b if I were still pleasing men, I should not be a servant of Christ.
3.
So how did he seek to be pleasing? By getting out of the way of
peoples line of sight to God, not bringing up unnecessary offenses, and
just giving them the Gospel.
(a) When Paul got to Rome toward the end of his life, he could honestly
say to the Jews there, I have done nothing against the people or the
customs of our fathers (Acts 28). He scrupulously observed all the

Jewish customs so that the gospel would not be hindered among the
Jews.
(b) Among the gentiles he quoted Greek poets and philosophers,
carefully observed Roman law, and did his best not to portray
Christianity as a set of foreign Jewish customs.
(c) By preaching the gospel, Paul was seeking the good of people,
hoping they would enjoy the blessings of salvation.
D) When evaluating whether or not to do something, ask yourself, Will this set
more people toward saving faith in Jesus than if I didnt do it?
1.
No matter who you are, somebody looks up to you as an example. NonChristians know you are a Christian and they judge what it means to be a
Christian by what they see you do. Younger Christians also look at you to
see by your example what Christians should do, and they follow you. In a
very real sense, your decisions influence the faith of others.
2.
Im a father, so I have children who take cues from my example. Last
month, a salesman arranged to give a presentation at my house. When I
found out at breakfast that a salesman was coming to spend an hour of
my time giving me a pitch for something I knew I would not buy, I cracked
a joke in front of my family about a prank we could play on the salesman. I
knew at the time I shouldnt have, but I knew that it would get a laugh out
of my kids, and I sinfully wanted that attention from them. Well of course,
they took my cue and ran with it, wasting about as much time as the
salesman would have wasted by discussing their own ideas for pranks. I
failed to lead my children toward Jesus and instead got them thinking
about things that would have turned that salesman off to the Gospel.