instance. The error of the scrupulous was that of asceticism,
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not that of legalism; and so the Apostle here counsels mutual forbearance. He condemns everything like intolerance and recrimination. Those who had attained to such breadth of view that they felt no difficulty about eating anything that was set before them, were not to arrogate to themselves superiority over those who felt no such liberty; and on the other hand, those whose consciences would not allow them to partake of every sort of food were not to condemn such as had no scruples on the matter. The Jewish believer who kept all the festivals of his nation was not to look upon himself as better than he who observed only the Christian festival of the first day of the week ; and neither were they whose strength of mind had raised them above such things to despise those who still considered that they were important. There was to be an agreement between them to differ in love ; and if in any case the exercise of his undoubted liberty by one should seriously imperil the spiritual welfare of another by leading him to commit sin, then that liberty was to be cheerfully sacrificed in order that a brother should not be destroyed, for " the kingdom of God " was not a thing of " meats and drinks," but of " righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost."
Now the truth which has been affirmed in regard to the use of food, and observance or non-observance of days, is here based on a large truth of which it is a part. The whole life of the Christian belongs not to himself, but to his Lord, " None of us liveth to himself," means that no Christian is his own end in life ; what is always present to his mind, as the rule of his conduct, is the will and the interest of his Lord. The same holds of his dying. He does not choose either the time or the mode of it, like a Eoman Stoic, to please himself. He dies when the Lord will, as the Lord will, and even by his death glorifies God. In ver. 14 ff. St. Paul comes to speak of the influence of conduct upon others; but here there is no such thing in view; the prominence given to " the Lord," three times named in ver. 8, shows that the one truth present to his mind is the all-determining significance, for Christian conduct, of the relation to Christ. This (ideally) determines everything, alike in life and in death ; and all that is determined by it is right.
The following verses indicate that St. Paul has at heart the truth that we live for ever related to one another, but he reaches
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it through the greater, deeper, antecedent truth of our relation \/ to the Lord. The Christian is related to his brother-Christian through Christ, not to Christ through his brother, or through the common organism in which the brethren are "each other's limos." "To the Lord" with absolute directness, with a perfect and wonderful immediateness, each individual Christian is first related. His life and death are " to others," but through Him. The Master's claim is eternally first ; for it is based directly upon the redeeming work in which He bought us for Himself.
I.
In Life. " None of us liveth to himself ... we live unto the Lord."
1. What is meant by this strange phraseology translated "unto" or "to"? We live "unto" the Lord. It seems to impart at once to the phrase an air of unfamiliarity, if not of actual unreality. Shall we try to understand this ? The right and full understanding of it, indeed, would make any one a master of St. Paul's philosophy, but some understanding of it we may all win.
We have very close relations with one another. Each one of us has duties to his friends, his society, his country. No one saw more clearly than St. Paul that religion was bound to take all these duties into account, to illuminate and sanctify them. Christ's religion is above all others the religion of humanity. And on this aspect of religious duty — our duty to one another, and to the society of which we form a part — St. Paul spoke and wrote often and urgently. These duties are so exhaustive in their sphere, so far-reaching, so varied, that they make almost a religion of themselves.
But St. Paul knew very well that the religion which is based only on men's relations to one another would be a very imperfect one. There is a third element in religion which must never be absent, and that is God. If we wish to grasp the significance of religion we must keep in view the thought of God, the thought of the world, and the thought of our own individual soul, and ROMANS — 26
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assign to each its proper place. If we leave out the thought of the world we may sink into a morbid, unpractical life of super- stition and seclusion ; if we leave out the thought of God we shall certainly fall into a somewhat fashionable philosophy, which is, however, one-sided, incomplete, not profound or j&naL