Hast *thou* faith? have [it] to thyself before God. Blessed [is] he who does not judge himself in what he allows.
Paul has been dealing with disagreements over food and holy days. Here he turns to the believer who is sure of his liberty. The verse sets two limits. Keep it before God. And keep a clear conscience about what you allow yourself.
The word "faith" here is not the faith that saves. One writer treats the verse as a test that sorts real liberty from a false one:
Verse 22 gives us a decisive test. It always tells genuine spiritual liberty apart from its counterfeit, the self-will of the flesh. "Have you faith? Have it to yourself before God." Some people carelessly assume a privilege because they know the doctrine of liberty. That is quite a different thing from faith. The faith spoken of here is a fruit of the Spirit (Gal. 5:22). It is not the faith in Christ that justifies. It is a fruit that grows in practice out of the justified believer's personal communion with the Lord. This faith is a home joy of the soul. It stays within, choosing the privacy of the presence it loves best. Faith like this seeks no audience and makes no boast of privilege. You find it in its effects. Those effects are always according to God, and so they bring blessing to others.
The words "between yourself and God" do not cancel your liberty. They decide where you use it:
"Are we then never to use our undoubted liberty?" Yes, says the apostle. If you have faith, faith to use it, keep it to yourself before God. Use it in private, but not in public, when using it might stumble a weak brother.
There is a second reason to keep it private. Pushing my convictions on someone else costs him something:
"Have you faith? Have it to yourself before God." Faith must be an intensely personal thing. To press my faith on another would in effect do away with his exercise of faith. If I am before God, then let each individual saint be also before God.
The second half of the verse is a caution. To be before God is to stand in the light, where every claim of liberty faces a test:
The presence of God is the only place where faith can really act. But God is light. In that light we must weigh everything before allowing it under the claim of liberty. Conscience becomes, as it were, the regulator of faith. Otherwise mere self-will might easily take the place of genuine faith toward God. And so it is added: "Happy is he who does not condemn himself in the thing that he allows." That is a weighty sentence, full of needed caution. It tempers and steadies Christian liberty, so that liberty stays within the limits of godly fear and never sinks into mere self-pleasing and the natural licence of the fleshly will.
The blessing belongs to the person whose own conscience makes no charge about what he permits. One writer carries the thought straight into the next verse:
If you have faith, instead of doubts, so much the better, but keep it to yourself before God. Blessed is he who does not judge himself in what he allows, or approves. But he who doubts is condemned if he eats, because it is not from faith. And whatever is not from faith is sin — that is, whatever is not done in the liberty of faith.
This verse asks for tenderness toward the weaker believer. One writer adds where that tenderness stops:
Romans 14:22, with the whole context, teaches us that we must walk tenderly toward the consciences of our brothers. A man may have faith about certain things. He may have perfect liberty in his own mind, whether about days or foods or many other minor matters. But his faith or his liberty should not lead him to act in a way that stumbles his weak brother. Of course, if anyone tried to force the eating of herbs, abstinence from meats, or the keeping of days as a yoke on the necks of the disciples, it would be our place to resist without compromise.
The verse also warns the person with the stricter conscience. What binds him does not bind his brother:
Through lack of faith, I may choose to put myself under law. So let me be very careful not to condemn my brother for what he allows. It may in fact be perfectly clean in the sight of God.
- Faith, defined. This faith does not justify. It is a fruit of the Spirit, grown out of personal communion with the Lord.
- Faith, kept private. Use it before God, not on display. That spares the weak brother, and it leaves him his own exercise of faith.
- Faith, tested. In God's light, conscience keeps liberty in check. Otherwise self-will borrows the name of faith and turns freedom into self-pleasing.
- Faith, rewarded. The happy man is the one whose own heart brings no charge against what he permits; whatever is not from faith is sin.
- Faith, and the other person. Be tender with a weaker conscience. Refuse any rule forced on you as a yoke. Do not condemn a brother for what may be clean before God.
But he that doubts, if he eat, is condemned; because [it is] not of faith; but whatever [is] not of faith is sin.
Romans 14 ends a long argument about food, drink and holy days. Believers in Rome held opposite views on these things, and each side was quick to judge the other. The last verse turns the question inward. What settles right and wrong is not the food on the plate. It is whether you can act before God without a doubt in your mind.
Many read this condemnation as if the doubter's soul were at stake. One writer draws the line clearly, and shows where the real damage lands. He also warns that we can fail on either side of our faith.
Having settled in the Master's presence what we believe He would have us do, let us do it in the simplicity of faith. Only it must be faith, and not self-will. And we must not go beyond or lag behind our faith. To do this is to bring condemnation (not damnation) into our consciences, as the last two verses of the chapter tell us.
The verse does not tell a believer to drop his conviction. It tells him where to keep it, and then defines the faith it is talking about.
If you have faith, instead of doubts, so much the better. But have it to yourself before God. Blessed is he who does not judge himself in what he allows. But he who doubts is condemned if he eats, because it is not from faith. And whatever is not from faith is sin. That is, whatever is not done in liberty of faith.
Nothing changes in the food. What changes is the mind of the man eating it.
A believer's conscience suffers defilement not only when he commits deliberate sin. He also defiles it by allowing anything that in any way dishonours the name or truth of God… Doubt, present or absent in a believer's mind, makes the whole difference between bad and good when we weigh actions of this kind.
The same problem came up over meat offered to idols. One writer traces what happened to believers who ate while still unsure.
Doubting in this way, they were condemned when they ate. Satan took advantage of them through guilty fears… Scripture describes an act by where it tends. It does not soften the description by the grace that steps in to stop the outcome.
If doubt turns an act into sin, then talking a hesitant believer into copying your liberty is not kindness. It pushes him into sin.
Who can measure the results of forcing or persuading someone to act against, or beyond, the light he has from God? The Spirit grieved. The heart unsettled, if not soon hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. How many other things will surely combine with these, if there is no repentance, to drag the soul downward — "sin"! When will we honestly, fully, and in practice accept the apostle's definition: "whatever does not proceed from faith IS SIN"?
Some read the closing words as a rule that stretches over the whole of life.
"For whatever does not proceed from faith is sin." It is a solemn, sweeping statement. Sin is not only in the outward acts of men. It is in everything that faith has no part in. Shall we dare, in effect, to make our brother sin?
Commentators differ here. Another writer objects that people quote the line as a general rule, cut off from the argument Paul is making.
The common use of "whatever does not proceed from faith is sin" is a mere abuse of the text. The apostle is showing that a person may eat what would be clean to stronger faith. To the man who does not have this faith, that same act is sin. It defiles his conscience.
- Doubt — the food is not the problem. The eater is condemned because he acted while unsure. The verdict falls on his conscience, not on his salvation.
- Faith — here it means freedom before God to do the thing. Act inside that freedom and you are clear. Step outside it and the same act is sin.
- Conscience — doubt is what defiles a harmless meal, and Satan then works on the guilty fears that follow.
- Love — pushing a hesitant believer past his own faith is not generosity. It pushes him into sin.
- Limits — some read the closing words as covering all of life. Others keep them to the case Paul is settling.