Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to Romans · About this commentary
Whatever Is Not of Faith
Romans 14:19-26
19 So then, let’s follow after things which make for peace, and things by which we may build one another up. · WEB
The pursuit is peace and building, liberty goes quiet for a brother's sake, and in this numbering the letter's doxology stands here.
So then, let's follow after things which make for peace, and things by which we may build one another up.
The pursuit-verb is the hunting word Romans 12:13: peace and mutual building chased deliberately, not hoped for. And the stakes named again: don't overthrow God's work for food's sake Romans 14:20 — a brother is God's construction site; demolishing one over a menu is vandalism against the builder. The liberty is restated once more at full strength — all things indeed are clean — and once more subordinated: it is evil for that man who creates a stumbling block by eating.
Verse 21 gives the strong their positive rule, and its scope is deliberately generous: it is good to not eat meat, drink wine, nor do anything by which your brother stumbles. Abstinence as strength's freedom — the liberty that includes the liberty not to use itself.
And verse 22 sends the strong's confidence into the right room: do you have faith? Have it to yourself before God. Conviction of liberty is real property, held privately before the only audience that ratified it — not paraded where it trips the wavering. Happy is he who doesn't judge himself in that which he approves: the clean conscience in one's freedoms is a blessing, not a broadcast.
Then the principle that closes the chapter's argument, wider than any menu: he who doubts is condemned if he eats, because it isn't of faith; and whatever is not of faith is sin Romans 14:23.
Acting against conscience — proceeding while the inner verdict says no — is sin in the acting, whatever the object's actual status Romans 14:14. The rule cuts every direction: the weak must not be pressured past conscience, and no one's practice is safe ground merely because someone stronger does it freely.
And here, in this numbering, the letter's great doxology stands — the English translations divide on its placement, some carrying it at the letter's very end: now to him who is able to establish you according to my Good News... according to the revelation of the mystery which has been kept secret through long ages, but now is revealed... is made known for obedience of faith to all the nations; to the only wise God, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever! Amen Romans 14:24–26.
Wherever it stands, it gathers the whole letter: the establishing God, the long-hidden mystery now published Romans 11:25, the Scriptures of the prophets Romans 1:2, and the frame-phrase returning — obedience of faith to all the nations Romans 1:5 — sealed with glory to the only wise God.
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