Believers in rome,like believers everywhere has their issues. They needed some answers on the subject of diet. From the beginning of Romans 14 it appears the question was whether one could go Veggie. That was what Paul tried to address in ROMANS 14:17
Food does not commend us to God. Paul argued.
One is free to eat whatever his or her conscience consents to.
Of course this will go with a caveat: it also has to be what is friendly to the body to avoid health crisis. The reason why Paul stressed this point is because the kingdom of God is not about food and drinks; rather it is about righteousness, peace, and joy in the holy spirit.
From this verse we can add another thought to how we can advance the kingdom of God. The moment we are after those elements if the kingdom we are advancing it. Making righteousness your focus is promoting the king and the kingdom. Serving as emissary of peace wherever you find yourself is stretching the kingdom. And whatever you do to give joy to people is a plus to the kingdom. Mind you, we are not talking of any kind of joy.
The joy of the world is sensual and often times short lived. It is one which comes of the spirit that brings refreshing and guarantees life. Be an ambassador of peace today; and give someone a reason to genuinely smile and praise God.
After several years of uncertainties David eventually became king over the entire nation of Israel. He began to live in his own house. But instead of just reveling in the perks of office he became agitated in His spirit. The reason was that while he now lived in luxurious Mansion, there was nowhere befitting for the worship of God.
He purposed to build a temple. This gives a picture of the kind of man David was. Call him a man who was devout; and you will be right. See him as someone who was looking for the material progress as well as spiritual uplift of the people of God, and you will be spot on.
The interesting thing to go with today is how God responded to his move. Though God did not permit him to build the temple, he nonetheless rewarded him for even conceiving the idea. Part of the reward was the promise made by God that he would build him a house.
Again, he was guaranteed a long life. And after him God promised to establish a dynasty for him by raising his son to reign in his stead. Talk of being immortalized! The point we are stressing is that those who devote their lives to expanding the kingdom of God will never go unrewarded.
God had not called us to serve him in vain.
How do we share the beautiful Gospel (our hope) effectively?
Well, I tell you brethren, it goes FAR beyond words; to be honest, those are actually the last part of it.
Where it actually starts is in how we all live our lives, and the actions that we make.
Our words are no good whatsoever if our lives do not back them up.
How can we all live our various lives to spread the gospel?
Well, this topic in discussion could really fill up hundreds of libraries worth of book,
but still, the short of it is that our lives should just reflect the Fruit of the Spirit found in
Galatians 5:22-23
which ultimately reflect Jesus Christ himself.
And to sum it up even shorter, we just simply need to;
1st) Love God with all that we are, and
2nd)
Love all of our neighbors as ourselves (Matthew 22:37-40).
Everything else will eventually follow correctly if we have those two things right.
One thing we always need to remember first is that sharing our hope effectively is always done with GENTLENESS and RESPECT.
