When is it appropriate for Christians to agree to disagree?

Verse 3: ‘for God has received him’ – what a touching reason to reconsider our behaviour towards our brother: God has received him. God’s love and grace were revealed in Christ – and this should govern even the smallest things in our lives (cf. 15:7). Verse 4: ‘Who art thou that judgest the servant of another?’ This point is addressed to the weak brother who, in pondering the rights and wrongs of his brother’s doings, had forgotten an important point: his brother is responsible not to him but to the Lord! Verse 5: ‘One man esteems day more than day; another esteems every day alike. Let each be fully persuaded in his own mind’. Further, room is to be left for individual exercise. It is good to have convictions, but then we should not force them on others or even resort to fighting over issues we may feel strongly about. How many times great damage has been done by trying to get everyone to agree with one’s own views (sometimes even ‘pet views’ or ‘hobby horses’)! Much rather we should be in prayerful exercise before the Lord. Verses 6–9: This passage emphasises the Lordship of Christ (as verse 4 had emphasised that we are His servants). The Lordship of Christ is here based on His death and resurrection – these two events that are so central to the Christian faith. Therefore, how careful we should be not to interfere with the Lordship of Christ, but rather to be exercised before Him and to live with a view to pleasing Him! Verse 10: ‘for we shall all be placed before the judgment-seat of God’ – here the Apostle brings in another far-reaching thought: one day we will stand before the judgment-seat of God. There we will have to ‘give an account’ (v. 12), the weak brother of how he dealt with the strong brother, and vice versa. The question will not merely be ‘Who was right?’ but: ‘Was my attitude towards my brother to Christ’s honour?’ This challenging thought applies to both groups, those who ‘judge’ and those who tend to ‘make little’. Verse 13: ‘judge ye this rather, not to put a stumbling-block or a fall-trap before his brother’. Here is another vital consideration. My actions have the potential to stumble another. Take the strong one. He is convinced – and rightly so – of his Christian liberty to eat. However, his own liberty is not the only consideration. What about the impact on his brother? If the weak brother sees the strong one eat he might follow suit and eat as well, but without being free in his conscience, which would be sin (v. 23). Verse 15a: ‘For if on account of meat thy brother is grieved, thou walkest no longer according to love.’ Here is another vital Christian principle: love! We can be so taken up with our reasonings and convictions that we completely forget about love which, after all, is the hallmark of Christianity! Love seeks the best for its object. My love to my brother should enable me to forego my rights and liberty. Verse 15b: ‘Destroy not him with thy meat for whom Christ has died’ – this is a powerful comparison indeed. On one side of the scale there is ‘thy meat’ – perhaps a plate full of food, something that will be gone tomorrow. On the other side of the scale you have your brother, designated beautifully as ‘him for whom Christ has died’. The value of an asset is determined by the price a buyer is willing to pay for it. Christ paid with His life – not just for you but also for your brother whom you were just about to despise or to make little of! This sobering thought beautifully puts things into perspective. Can our food be so important that, for the sake of it, we take the risk to harm (or even ‘destroy’) the ‘brother for whom Christ died’, ‘the work of God’ (v. 20)? Next time we are aggravated about this thing or the other that our brother or sister may be doing, let’s check whether it hasn’t been blown up out of proportion! Verse 19: ‘let us pursue the things which tend to peace, and things whereby one shall build up another’. Here are two further considerations: Are we focused on the right issues? Our most cherished and perhaps most strongly held views should not be allowed to put at risk the things that really matter: peace and edification. How easy it is to get worked up with one conviction or another and to forget to ask whether anyone at all will be edified by this dispute, or whether it will contribute to peaceful harmony. Nothing in this article is to discourage us from standing for the truth. We are under an obligation to ‘contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints’, to ‘stand firm’ and to be ‘immovable’ (Jude 3; 1. Cor. 15:58; 16:13; Gal. 5:1; 2. Thess. 2:15). But we need to be careful: we may honestly believe we are contending for the faith and yet be wrong. But in particular, when it comes to matters of conscience or to matters of using our rights and liberty then it is time for us to show flexibility.

The practice to which brethren are called in such matters is mutual forbearance (Rom. 14, Rom. 15:7), all agreeing in doing what they do to the Lord, spite of difference in judgment of what should be done. Room is thus left for growth in knowledge as the word of God opens to our faith, while conscience meanwhile is respected. "Now him that is weak in faith receive, not to decisions of reasonings. One believes that he may eat all things, while he that is weak eats herbs. Let not him that eats despise him that eats not, and let not him that eats not judge him that eats; for God has received him. Who art thou that judgest another's servant? To his own master he stands or falls; but he shall stand, for God is able to make him stand. One esteems† day above day, while another esteems† every day. Let each be fully persuaded in his own mind. He that regards the day to [the] Lord regards [it], [and he that regards not the day to the Lord regards [it] not.]‡ And he that eats to [the] Lord eats, for he thanks God; and he that eats not to [the] Lord eats not and thanks God. For none of us lives to himself, and none to himself dies; for both if we live, to the Lord we live, and if we die, to the Lord we die. Therefore, both whether we live and whether we die, we are the Lord's. For to this [end] Christ died and lived,†† that he should rule over both dead and living. And why dost thou judge thy brother? or why dost thou too despise thy brother? For we shall all stand before the judgment-seat of God. For it is written, [As] I live, saith [the] Lord, to me shall bend every knee, and every tongue shall confess to God. So then each of us shall give account about himself to God." (Ver. 1-12.)

Let us then trace out the various pleas which the apostle urges for this mutual consideration. One, he tells us, believes that he may eat all things: another, who is weak, eateth herbs. Well, shall these two dear believers fall out with one another on this account? No, says the apostle, for he that eateth must not despise the abstainer, nor must the one that does not eat judge him that eateth, for God has received him. The weak in the faith is to be received by the strong, and the strong by the weak, on the ground that both alike are debtors to grace. This principle shows us how very tender we should be in dealing with the scruples of a fellow-believer; and also how very slow we should be to judge one who allows himself a larger liberty than we are accustomed to permit to ourselves. Hence it is that the apostle passes on to maintain individual responsibility, so that no one may judge another man's servant. This is not to say, it must be carefully remembered, that we must not pronounce judgment upon unscriptural things, but only that we must refrain from condemning one another, either for the exercise of Christian liberty, or for refusing to do that which conscience, for want of fuller light, will not allow. In both instances alike they stand or fall to their own Master; and acting before God each shall be holden up, for God is able to make him to stand.

Men who hold lax views of inspiration may no doubt dispute the force of any word because their views are unbelieving and pernicious; for these necessarily enfeeble and undermine inspiration as God has revealed it, and as His Spirit reasons on it. No error has consequences more widely spread than limiting inspiration to God's thoughts in general, and denying it to His written words.

We must remember, of course, the apostle is not here raising any question about doctrine. He is not speaking of the faith. We are not at liberty to believe what we like. A faith has been revealed and committed to us. If question arises as to truth or doctrine, revelation is the only appeal. But this is not what is under consideration here. It is a question of practical conduct that is occupying the apostle now. How am I to act towards a brother whose conscience, as truly before the Lord as my own, does not permit him to do the things 1 feel myself free to do? Is it my conscience that is to govern him or his own? Am I to decide his doubts for him?

Here we need to remember that we each have our predilections, our prejudices, our tastes, our likes and dislikes. In these things we are accountable to the Lord surely, but we are not each other's master. These are things in which one is not the judge for another. We should receive one another without regard to them (Rom. 14:1-12).

“One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.” The reason for regarding special days can easily be seen in Judaism. God had established them in that system of things — certainly only as typical of better things to come, and not in themselves of any spiritual value. Yet if souls still clung in measure to the observance of those days as something that conscience requires of them, let no issue be raised on this account. Nor on the other hand are they to be allowed to require it of others.

The first is stated in verse 4. We may call it the principle of Christian liberty. In these matters that have to do with personal behaviour and conscientious service to the Lord, we are set free from the lordship of our brethren, by being set under the over-lordship of Christ. We may be right or wrong in our judgment, but the thing of prime importance is that we each, with a single eye for our Master, do what we believe to be pleasing to Him. The exhortation which hinges upon this is, "Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind."

God intends us to be exercised as to such matters, each for himself. Were there a definite command in Scripture there need not be the exercise. Then, simple obedience is the only course pleasing to God. But these other matters, how many they are. Should I go here or there? Should I partake of this or that? May I enjoy this pleasurable recreation or not? Ought we to carry out this service or this ordinance in this way or that way? What acrimonious and harmful controversies have raged around such questions. And the answer is so simple. Let the wrangling cease! Hands off each other! Each man to his own knees, in the presence of his own Master, that he may get, as far as in him lies, the knowledge of his Master's will.

Based upon this principle comes the exhortation of verse 19. Being brethren we are to pursue the things that make for peace and edification. We are to be keen to build up, not to knock down. We are to aim at peace not at strife. If tempted to transgress, let us ask ourselves Moses' question, "Sirs, ye are brethren; why do you wrong one to another?"

Connected, therefore, with this third principle we have the exhortation, "Let us therefore follow after the things that make for peace, and things wherewith one may edify another" (verse 19). Our attitude is therefore not to be merely the negative one of avoiding friction and discord, and damage to weaker brethren by the yielding up of one's liberties on certain occasions, but also the positive one of earnestly pursuing all that makes for peace and edification. In so acting, a certain amount of self-denial will certainly be called for, and there will be times, especially for the "strong" believer, when he will have to hold his faith in private before God, and keep in check its manifestation in acts before men, as verse 22 infers.

This is certainly no matter of giving up truth. Truth is not ours to dare to sell at any price: it is a trust given us of our Master, and we must be faithful to Him in it. But mere personal privileges I may and indeed ought to give up for the sake of others. It is an essential principle if we are going to “follow after the things which make for peace, and the things wherewith one may edify another.” There is no real service without the willing spirit of self-sacrifice. If the saints of God insist on their own rights, will they be at peace? will they edify one another?