1 Corinthians 8:7-13 However, there is not in every man that knowledge… Slight acts may loose vast forces, as a shout starts an Alpine avalanche. Insignificant questions may involve great principles. So was it with the Corinthian Church. The body of Christ was torn about a piece of meat; but the strife involved solemn matters — love for Christ and dying souls. I. THE LAW OF KNOWLEDGE. We commonly reckon knowledge to be a product of the intellect, including the powers by which we learn facts, reason upon them, and draw conclusions. The kind of knowledge determines the instrument by which we are to acquire it. Pure mathematics, abstract logic, may seem to use only the seeing eye and reasoning mind. But really to know a thing, the student must have some affinity for the object. It must find him, must stir a response in his nature. True of nature and art, this is more commandingly true of our fellow man. We cannot know him or any truth concerning his life and character except as we love him. This is the only way to get God's way of looking at him, God's ideal for him. Love is the discoverer, love is the interpreter, love the guide. Knowledge without love is the turbine without waterfall, wire without electricity. Love without knowledge is cataract minus wheel, loose lightning in the heavens. Love with knowledge is the servant and benefactor of mankind. Love has chemic tests, microscope, clairvoyance. It is the expert picking up the pebble a settler's child is playing with and telling the man he is farming over a gold mine. Knowledge despises his ignorance and leaves him to its poverty. The characteristic of modern charity is the combination of scientific method with personal devotion. It studies the case with minute pains, then helps it with cool head and steady hand as well as warm heart. The worst enemy of true charity is indiscriminate giving; and true giving means personal contact. It is so much cheaper to give money than to give one's self, and the reward is correspondingly small. This is the law: True knowledge includes love; it comes through head and heart together. II. THE LAW OF CONSCIENCE. But what law can there be to a faculty divided against itself, that, seeing two men doing the same thing, smiles upon one and smites the other? Which of them is right? How can any one ever be sure he is right? Conscience is called the voice of God in the soul of man; but can God say Yea and Nay together? The faculty we name conscience is not simple, but complex. It includes the impulse which commands, Do right; when you know the light, do it, whatever the cost. But back of this lies the judgment which tells us what is right. Not attempting the philosophical definitions, call the one moral impulse, the other moral judgment. The first of these is essentially the same in all sound souls, while differing in force and accepted control. The second differs according to birth, training, personal experience. Plainly, then, persons equally anxious to do right may differ as to the right or wrong of a specific act. Equally conscientious, they conscientiously disagree. Each, trying to do right, does what the other condemns. They agree in moral impulse, but disagree in moral judgment. The difficulty is great, and to recognise its occasion does not remove it. Two precepts are to be urged — 1. Cultivate the moral impulse, which insists upon obedience to known right. Guard this high conception of the majesty of righteousness. Listen to the whispers of conscience rather than to the shouts of interest or songs of pleasure. Protect the sensitiveness of moral discernment as a piano tuner guards the accuracy of his ear. Recur constantly to the invariable standard. Crowd forward conviction into action. 2. Train the moral judgment, which decides whether a specific act is right or wrong. Extend the control of conscience to the formation of opinions. Educators of the moral judgment are — (1) Revelation. A clear word from God is end of debate. (2) The teachings of reason, vitalised by love. (3) Experience; our own, that of the wise and good, and the broad testimony of history. (4) A spiritual life. Constant fellowship with Christ, effort to grow like Him and to win others to Him, furnish the finest tests and incitements to right moral decisions. We can have God's wisdom for the asking, the especial illumination of the Holy Spirit. Changes of conviction will issue in changes of practice, and with these may come a period of unrest, while the moral sense is becoming adjusted to the judgment. The immorality of false opinions and virtue of right convictions are often discredited; but they make life, character, destiny. This is the law of conscience: Cultivate a sensitive and positive moral impulse; train the moral judgment to clear and spiritual views. III. THE LAW OF CONDUCT. Conduct has two relations — between myself and God, and between myself and my neighbour. An act done in the sight of others becomes example, and what is innocent kept to myself alone may be hurtful if indiscriminately followed. Unfortunately, doing in secret what is condemned in public savours of insincerity and hurts a delicate honour. As a rule, what is good for me is good for my neighbour, and what hurts him is bad for me. Which of us has suffered much from giving the weak brother, the holy Christ, the benefit of the doubt? That weak brother, he is ever with us; what shall we do about him? Would that he were strong! How we admire the well-poised man, clear head at the top and firmly set feet beneath; physical passions and temper and tongue following obediently at the heel of sound reason; warm heart and positive will, handmaids of a sensitive and proud conscience! Such there are, and how simple to them is life! But they are as rare as admirable. The weak brother, whose claim is mainly his weakness — he ought to train his moral judgment, be fully persuaded in his own mind, then be content to stand or fall to his own Master; but it is not so with him. He keeps looking to see what we do, putting us on a pedestal we have no wish to occupy. Have not we rights also? Yes; and what right higher than to surrender rights to gain blessings? To hesitate between tickling one's palate and saving a soul from death would be worse than brutish. Grant that this means surrender of what we might claim but for this weak brother, are we losers? Am I impoverished by putting helpfulness above self-assertion? What is self-denial but choosing the nobler and better part? Give the weak brother and the spiritual life the benefit of the doubt. The example of abstinence involves no risks. Grow rich by giving up, gain life by dying to self and the world. While this law is general, its application in a temperance lesson is peculiarly clear. Here, of all cases, abstinence involves no risks; and appeals to the weaker without example of abstinence come to nothing. (Charles M. Southgate.) Parallel Verses KJV: Howbeit there is not in every man that knowledge: for some with conscience of the idol unto this hour eat it as a thing offered unto an idol; and their conscience being weak is defiled. |
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