Eden:
Well, I would like to know how someone belonging to that 10% can justify such a teaching and say that it is “biblically based”.
"Paul teaches in 1 Corinthians chapter 8 on a grey area of his time: whether or not Christians should eat meat that was sacrificed to idols. He explained that some Christians have “knowledge” about the fact that there is only one God, and meat sacrificed to idols was not really sacrificed to anything. However, other Christians did not have this same “knowledge”, and if they saw another Christian eating meat that was sacrificed to an idol, their conscience might be “…emboldened to eat those things offered to idols…” To these, this would be a sin in their own minds because of their weaker understanding. Paul warns us of letting our liberty become a “stumbling block” to those who are weaker, or have less understanding. He says in verses 11 and 12, “And because of your knowledge shall the weak brother perish, for whom Christ died? But when you thus sin against the brethren, and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ.”
At the end of the chapter, Paul offers his solution to this problem. He says in verse 13, “Therefore, if food makes my brother stumble, I will never again eat meat, lest I make my brother stumble.” Notice that he does not say, “Therefore, let us try to help others to understand our liberty.” Why? Because of a basic Christian doctrine that should be practiced by every denomination across the board…"
Things have changed. When people drank thousands of years ago, there was not the rampant problems we have now.
I know that when I have drank, on rare occasions, in front of my friends who are not believers, I have been labeled a hypocrite.
That is why I would never do it again.
BH
