Bible Commentaries

Peculiar Questions

1 Corinthians 7:20):—"Let every man abide in the same calling wherein he was called." How often are these words perverted! The word "calling" is made to signify profession, situation, condition in life; and the Apostle is quoted as saying to all men, how poor and miserable soever, Men, be quiet; be content with that station in life in which it hath pleased God to place you. Nothing of the kind. I say to every 1 Corinthians 7:31 (ch7). What should we say to be the meaning of the word "abusing"? Probably we should say he abuses the world who misuses it. That is not the Apostle's meaning. The Apostle's meaning would be better expressed thus:—"And they that use this world, as not over-using it,"—not being too fussy, and making too much of nothing; playing with clay, trying to find eternity in time. Men over-use the world and get their hands too deeply into it; they play the fool with it.

The next point that is touched upon in the inquiry made by the Corinthians was about meat offered to idols, and about eating that meat. The question is a very simple one. The heathen priests took meat into the temples, and offered it to the idols, and having done this they went and sold it to the dealers who offered it in the shambles; and there was a conscience that said, Now about this meat: it has been handled by pagan priests, it has been offered on pagan altars, and it has been bought out of the heathen temples, and is now in the general shambles offered for sale: what is to be done with this meat? Some say, We cannot touch it, because it has been offered to idols. Others said, An idol! why, an idol is nothing at all; the meat is not tinged or tainted by its having been offered to nothing at all; the meat is as good as any other meat: produce it, enjoy it. The Corinthian casuist said to the Apostle under these circumstances, What shall we do? And the Apostle delivers the judgment which is recorded in the eighth chapter: and having given his own judgment upon the subject he says, After all, we must consider the weak conscience. Weakness governs the world; it is always the minority that rules, although if you were to say so in a public meeting you would be hooted from the platform. But it is always the minority that rules. It is weakness that stops the house, it is the baby that keeps the family at home; it is the lame limb that detains all the sound faculties and says, Stop! What! am I to stop because I have one lame limb? I am sound in all my other limbs, and sound in all my mental faculties, and am I to be humbled in this way? Yes, you are, and you cannot get out of it. So the Apostle says, Here is a lame man in the Church, and the Church must wait for him; and the Church says, This is the singular pass we have come to, all waiting for one lame man. The Apostle says, That is the very idea of the Church. The whole universe may be waiting for one little lame world called the earth: nobody can tell how fast the universe might get on but for this cripple called the earth. Nobody knows how great the family might have been and how wonderful in fame and influence but for the sick-chamber. The Apostle says, Here is one poor man; call him weak, do not let him be under the impression that he is strong; let him know exactly what he is, and tell him that it is to his weakness we make this obeisance. What is the use of your standing over a little baby, and pouring upon its unconscious head a whole Niagara of rhetorical expostulation? The thing is impossible. So the Apostle said, We must wait for this man: he is a man, he is not much of a man, he is about as little of a man as it is possible to be and yet be a man; but Christ died for him, therefore we must wait. Now, says the Apostle, I will tell you what I will do; I dare not say anything to anybody else, but this is my position. I can eat this meat; it is nothing to me that the meat has been offered by some heathen priest to a heathen idol; I do not care for that for one moment: but there is a man just there, who says he would be hurt in his soul if I took it. I say, Very well, I will not take it. That is the ground on which all total abstainers from innocent things must rest, if the action is to be widely influential. Many a man says, I could take this wine, I should know exactly when to give over, it would do me no harm, I could take it with a good conscience; but if I did take it, there is a poor soul that could not even inhale the odour of the wine, without the appetite fired as from hell. I say, Very well, I throw it on the ground, I will not touch it, for your sake. That argument can never be overturned; and if there be a man who never does anything for any other man's sake, let him not name the name of Christ.