Thursday, May 16, 2024

Dietary Restrictions?

"And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual people but as to carnal, as to babes in Christ.
I fed you with milk and not solid food; for until now you were not able to receive it, and even now you are still not able;
"
1 Corinthians 3:1-2 (NKJV)

If you are selecting a meal for an airplane flight, ordering some food in a restaurant, or if you are planning a meal for other people, the issue of dietary restrictions may come up.  Some people have allergies to certain things, so there are some foods that they should not eat.  But this is not the same as someone who just refuses to eat something, or they have a dislike for something.  Sometimes what someone eats, or will not eat, is not a matter of a dietary restriction, but it is simply a personal preference, and there is a big difference.

When Paul wrote his first letter to the Corinthians, he said that he could not feed them (teach them) some things, because they were so carnal.  But it is good to see how in this situation Paul still continued to feed the believers the "milk of the Word", which is what they were able to receive.  It was not that Paul was unwilling to teach some things to the believers in Corinth, but there were some things Paul was not able to teach them, because they were not ready to receive it.

God has given us His Word to help us grow spiritually, to see who we are in Christ, and learn what belongs to us because of Jesus.  We do not want to be like the people in Corinth who were too carnal to receive some of the teaching that Paul had, but we want to continually develop spiritually and feed on all of God's Word.  We do not need any spiritual dietary restrictions with God's Word, there is no part of it that should be avoided, because God's Word is good for us and we should willingly receive all of it.

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