1 Corinthians 8
8
Food Offered to Idols
1In your letter you asked me about food offered to idols. All of us know something about this subject. But knowledge makes us proud of ourselves, while love makes us helpful to others. 2In fact, people who think they know so much don't know anything at all. 3But God has no doubts about who loves him.
4Even though food is offered to idols, we know that none of the idols in this world are alive. After all, there is only one God. 5Many things in heaven and on earth are called gods and lords, but none of them really are gods or lords. 6We have only one God, and he is the Father. He created everything, and we live for him. Jesus Christ is our only Lord. Everything was made by him, and by him life was given to us.
7Not everyone knows these things. In fact, many people have grown up with the belief that idols have life in them. So when they eat meat offered to idols, they are bothered by a weak conscience. 8But food doesn't bring us any closer to God. We are no worse off if we don't eat, and we are no better off if we do.
9Don't cause problems for someone with a weak conscience, just because you have the right to eat anything. 10You know all this, and so it doesn't bother you to eat in the temple of an idol. But suppose a person with a weak conscience sees you and decides to eat food that has been offered to idols. 11Then what you know has destroyed someone Christ died for. 12When you sin by hurting a follower with a weak conscience, you sin against Christ. 13So if I hurt one of the Lord's followers by what I eat, I will never eat meat as long as I live.
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Contemporary English Version, Second Edition (CEV®)
© 2006 American Bible Society. All rights reserved.
1 Corinthians 8
8
1 Now concerning those things that are sacrificed to idols: we know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but charity builds up.
2 But if anyone considers himself to know anything, he does not yet know in the way that he ought to know.
3 For if anyone loves God, he is known by him.
4 But as to the foods that are immolated to idols, we know that an idol in the world is nothing, and that no one is God, except One.
5 For although there are things that are called gods, whether in heaven or on earth, (if one even considers there to be many gods and many lords)
6 yet we know that there is only one God, the Father, from whom all things are, and in whom we are, and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom all things are, and by whom we are.
7 But knowledge is not in everyone. For some persons, even now, with consent to an idol, eat what has been sacrificed to an idol. And their conscience, being infirm, becomes polluted.
8 Yet food does not commend us to God. For if we eat, we will not have more, and if we do not eat, we will not have less.
9 But be careful not to let your liberty become a cause of sin to those who are weak.
10 For if anyone sees someone with knowledge sitting down to eat in idolatry, will not his own conscience, being infirm, be emboldened to eat what has been sacrificed to idols?
11 And should an infirm brother perish by your knowledge, even though Christ died for him?
12 So when you sin in this way against the brothers, and you harm their weakened conscience, then you sin against Christ.
13 Because of this, if food leads my brother to sin, I will never eat meat, lest I lead my brother to sin.
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