Romans 14
1 Welcome the one who is lacking in trust, so as not to lead to separations over differing rationales.a 2 One person might trust enough to eat everything while the one who is lacking in trust eats only vegetables. 3 The one who eats everything should not have contempt for the one who does not eat everything, and the one who does not eat everything should not judge the one who eats everything since God has welcomed them. 4 Who are you to judge someone else’s servant? They stand or fall with their own Lord, and they will be supported in standing because the Lord is able to support them in standing.
5 You see, one person judges one day as exceptional compared with another day while another person judges all days as equal. Each person should be fully convinced in their own mind. 6 The one who pays attention to the day pays attention to it for the Lord. Also, the one who eats everything eats it for the Lord because they give thanks to God, and the one who does not eat everything does not eat it and gives thanks to God. 7 You see, none of us is alive for themselves, and no one dies for themselves. 8 Both if we are alive, we are alive for God, and also if we die, we die for God. Therefore, whether we are alive or we die, we are the Lord’s. 9 That’s why Christ died and was alive, so he could be Lord of both the dead and the living.
10 Why are you judging your Family member? Or why do you have contempt for your Family member? Everyone will present themselves at God’s seat for making judgments, 11 because it is written, “‘As I live,’ says the Lord, ‘every knee will bow to me, and every tongue will openly acknowledge God’” 12 That means each of us will give an account concerning ourselves.
13 Therefore, we shouldn’t judge each other anymore. Rather, use your judgment for this instead: not to set up an obstacleb or something that trips upc a member of the Family. 14 I have come to understand and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself—except for the one who considers it to be unclean; it is unclean for that person. 15 If your Family member is grieved because of food, you’re not walking according to love anymore. Don’t lose that person for whom Christ died over the issue of food. 16 Don’t cause what is beneficial for you to be discredited. 17 God’s reign is not food and drink but justness and peace and joy according to the standard of the Sacred Life-breath. 18 Whoever is enslaved to Christ according to this standard is pleasing to God and esteemed by people.
19 Therefore, let’s pursue the things of peace and building each other up. 20 Don’t tear down God’s work for the sake of food. Everything may be clean, but eating what is an obstacle for someone is harmful to them. 21 It’s admirable not to eat meat or drink wine or anything by which your Family member trips. 22 You have trust that is your own; hold onto it in God’s presence.d The one who does not judge themselves by what they esteem is gratified,e 23 but the one who separates themselves if they eat has received a judgment against them because it is not from trust, and everything that is not from trust is deviation.
FOOTNOTES:
a Or ‘considerations’ or ‘calculations’
b Or ‘something that would cause to stumble’ or ‘something that would cause inward pain’
c Or ‘a hunting snare’ or ‘trap’ or ‘something that causes one to stumble’
d Or ‘perspective’
e Traditionally, ‘blessed.’ There is not one English word that covers what is being described here. There is a sense of contentedness but also receiving something that meets a need. Sometimes it’s translated ‘happy’ to capture the mental/emotional component, and historically it was translated ‘blessed’ to capture the endowment aspect of it, the aspect that there’s a quality of goodness gifted to those being described, but what’s not captured in either of those is that the goodness being gifted is directly in response to what the recipients’ experience or actions are.