Some of these are modified from David Prior and Phil Sasser.
Read 1 Cor. 8:1-3. Paul says that knowledge puffs up but love edifies. Are knowledge and love at odds with one another? Why or why not?
Why is it so important that knowledge should be controlled by love (pp. 142f.)? We are either glorifying ourselves and possibly ruining others, or are building up God’s church.
Is our knowledge accompanied by humility, love, and care for others? Do we make it more important that we show love and care than that we demonstrate or exercise our knowledge or expertise?
Where are we tempted to pride in our knowledge or experience?
What are some practical ways we can grow in showing love and building others up through our words and actions?
Is our liberty practiced under the lordship of Christ, or is it a “right” that we presume upon?
In what ways is it a struggle for you to live as “not your own”? Read Romans 15:1-4. How does Jesus’ example provide hope? (It is an encouragement first as an example, and second becuase he is the very one who purchsed us: we are his.)
The Corinthians saw the question of meat offered to idols as a matter of propriety or possibly sin versus Christian liberty. What did Paul say the real issue was? Showing love for the weaker brother. Who is the weaker brother? Not the one who has principled disagreement, but the one who is thereby tempted to sin.
Paul calls the weaker one “the brother for whose sake Christ died.” Why is this important? It demonstrates the value of the brother, and also implies that wounding the brother is to sin against Christ (v. 12). What attitude ought this to provoke in us towards the weaker brother, our knowledge, our liberties, etc.?
What does it take to be a ‘strong’ person? Read Romans 14:22-23. How strong are you?
What are the ‘two sides’ to the question of food offered to idols (pp. 141f.)? What is the basic ‘battle on two fronts’ which Paul needs to address? Can you think of similar issues which face us today?
How does the principle of love apply to the ‘particular question of food offered to idols’ (pp. 143f.)?
How would you answer someone who said that it doesn’t matter what or whom we worship because ‘we are worshipping the same one God, but by different names and in different ways’ (p. 144)?
Is it enough simply to say that idols have no reality and leave it at that? What lies behind idol worship (pp. 145f.)? Why is this so important for us today?
What arguments does Paul use to persuade the ‘strong’ man to restrict his freedom voluntarily (pp. 147f.)?
“What we do is not just a matter of personal preference. Others are affected by our example, and could stumble and fall. Therefore, you can’t do everything you want or have a right to do. We are not our own; we can’t just do what we want. Seek rather to build others up in the faith, in love.”
Paul points out that the key measuring questions are: what does God think of this, what do others in the church think of this, and what do unbelievers think of this.
Does my life cause others to be built up or torn down? Provoked to love God, or to lethargy, complacency, and sin?
How, practically, are we an encouragement/stumbling block?
How do we wrongly hold others hostage to our preferences (c.f. Romans 14; e.g., food, dance)? Is Christ the basis for our fellowship?
The things we want to do, which ones should we not do for the sake of others?
Two questions: whether to take part in “idol feasts”, and whether to eat meat “bought in the shops but with dubious origins”.
“Paul is the only authoritative personality in the apostolic or sub-apostolic church who does not solve the ‘food offered to idols’ controversy by any absolute ban. . . [not] let the legalists win the day.”
“freedom of two kinds: absolute freedom in Christ, and the freedom to restrict one’s freedom for the sake of a brother whose conscience is less robust.”
Battle between legalists and libertines.
8:1-3: love builds up
“Paul’s essential answer is this: love is what matters, not knowledge of the one (negative and legalistic) kind or of the other (permissive) kind.”
“When a Christian’s character is controlled by love and is growing in true knowledge, he is no longer concerned so much with how well he knows God, as with being known by God. That actually is proof of true love for God (Gal. 4:8-9).”
“specialist knowledge . . . will achieve nothing to build up the faith of fellow-Christians.”
“Are people brought closer to God [by my words and actions]? Are Christians strengthened in their faith? Are people glad to have met us?”
8:4-6: there is one God
“To become involved in idolatry of any kind is to open the door to influence by demons, by agents of Satan who are lusting for our worship and are past masters of duping and destruction.” (c.f. Gal 4:8-9, I Cor 10:19-20)
8:7-13: the brother for whom Christ died
“[Paul] argues very strongly the need for the ‘strong’ (i.e., knowledgeable) man, not to please himself, but to consider the weaker brother.”
“Paul clearly wants such a ‘weak’ person to grow into a ‘strong’ position.” But Paul puts the emphasis not on the weak person’s growth, but on the strong person’s building up the weak.
The strong can cause the weak to stumble by “[leading him] to an action which is not based on faith, and such an action is seen by Paul as direct sin.” (Rom 14:23)
The weak brother is “the brother for whom Christ died.” We must “avoid anything by which this weak man is destroyed.”
Sin against the brother is also sin “against Christ himself.”
“It is never a demonstration of true Christian liberty to do ‘doubtful things’ out of bravado.”
Points out that Paul wanted the Corinthians to grow stronger in conscience, allowing their field of witness to be broad, but at the same time to guard those Christians with weaker conscience. The weak grow strong, and the strong guard the weak in love. “Therefore everyone had to be patient, non-judgmental, sensitive, and absolutely committed to building up the life of the Christian community as a whole.”
Romans 15:1-2: “Now we who are strong ought to bear the weaknesses of those without strength and not just please ourselves. Each of us is to please his neighbor for his good, to his edification.”
“love will restrict itself for the sake of others”
8:1-3
“Whatever is devoid of love is of no account in the sight of God; nay more, it is displeasing to him, and much more so what is openly at variance with love.”
“[Paul] simply meant to show what effect knowledge has in an individual, that has not the fear of God, and love of the brethren; for the wicked abuse all the gifts of God, so as to exalt, themselves.”
“The beginning of all true knowledge is acquaintance with God, which produces in us humility and submission. . . . But where pride is, there is ignorance of God.”
8:4-6
8:7-13
“Your actions ought to be regulated not merely according to your knowledge, but also according to their ignorance.”
“There is nothing to which we are more prone than this, that every one follows his own advantage, to the neglect of that of others.”
“This is the kind of offense that Paul reproves in the Corinthians — when we induce weak brethren, by our example, to venture upon anything against their conscience.”
“God would have us try or attempt nothing but what we know for certain is agreeable to Him. Whatever, therefore, is done with a doubting conscience, is, in consequence of doubts of that kind, faulty in the sight of God. And this is what he says, (Romans 14:23,) Whatsoever is not of faith is sin. Hence the truth of the common saying, that ‘those build for hell, who build against their conscience.’ For as the excellence of actions depends on the fear of God and integrity of conscience, so, on the other hand, there is no action, that is so good in appearance, as not to be polluted by a corrupt affection of the mind. For the man, who ventures upon anything in opposition to conscience, does thereby discover some contempt of God; for it is a token that we fear God, when we have respect to His will in all things. Hence you are not without contempt of God, if you so much as move a finger while uncertain, whether it may not be displeasing to Him. . . . In fine, as men’s hearts are purified by faith, so without faith there is nothing that is pure in the sight of God.”
“[But] this liberty, as to the external use of it, is made subject to love.”
“He leaves their liberty untouched, but moderates the use of it.”
“Now when [the weak or ignorant brother] has one to imitate, he thinks that he has a sufficient excuse in the circumstance that he is imitating another, while in the meantime he is acting from an evil conscience.”
“[There is nothing] more unseemly than this, that while Christ did not hesitate to die, in order that the weak might not perish, we, on the other hand, reckon as nothing the salvation of those who have been redeemed with so great a price.”
Freedom not exercised in love “shows how contemptible the blood of Christ is in his view.”
“Participation is in no case lawful, unless it be regulated by the rule of love.”
As to “offending” in v. 13, “[Paul] is not here treating of the retaining of the favor of men, but of the assisting of the weak, so as to prevent their falling.”
“Paul does not command us to calculate, whether there may be an occasion of offense in what we do, except when the danger is present to our view.” — i.e., we are to moderate our liberty out of love, not legalism.