Seasoned With Love                                                                       (1 Corinthians 8:1–13)

 

When it comes to church a lot is about food. We like to have our coffee and cookies after worship. Christians – at least American Christians LOVE potlucks. (I by the way had no idea what a potluck was until I came to Michigan). And even the bible tells us a lot about food and habits around the food like the little passage in Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians.

Many people like to eat good food. But many also like to cook good food.

And if the food is not only seasoned with pepper, salt, basil, sage, parsley, thyme, rosemary, or other herbs, but if it is seasoned with love, then it becomes real good food: nourishing and strengthening.

 

Here is an interesting Story:

A holy man was having a conversation with the Lord one day and said, “Lord, I would like to know what heaven and hell are like.”

The Lord led the holy man to two doors. He opened one of the doors and the holy man looked in. In the middle of the room was a large round table. In the middle of the table was a large pot of stew, which smelled delicious and made the holy man’s mouth water.

The people sitting around the table were thin and sickly. They appeared to be famished. They were holding spoons with very long handles that were strapped to their arms, and each found it possible to reach into the pot of stew and take a spoonful. But because the handles were longer than their arms, they could not get the spoons back into their mouths.

The holy man shuddered at the sight of their misery and suffering. The Lord said, “You have seen hell.” They went to the next room and opened the door. It was exactly the same as the first one. There was the large round table with the large pot of stew which made the holy man’s mouth water. The people were equipped with the same long-handled spoons, but here the people were well nourished and plump, laughing and talking.

 

The holy man said, “I don’t understand.”

“It is simple,” said the Lord. “It requires but one skill. You see they have learned to feed each other, while the greedy think only of themselves.”
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Food needs to be seasoned with love. Love not only for ourselves but for others as well.

When we do potlucks for example we usually enjoy feeding others. And it is not about eating alone. It is about  spending time together, it is about fellowship.

But seasoning with love also means that we are aware of our eating habits. If we go for the sweet stuff all the time we might encourage a child to eat all the sweet stuff all the time as well, which is not good for them.

Or: do we think of our guests every time we throw a party? Maybe there is a vegetarian among our guests, and we only have meat dishes to offer.

 

Paul’s concern is about food that had been consecrated to a pagan deity. Leftovers from pagan worship services so to say.  Often enough the meat eaten on various social occasions came from this source. Now imagine a pagan becoming Christian: They would not break with all their (pagan) friends but continue meeting with them. They would still be invited to certain occasions – where the dinner is sometimes made out of pagan worship leftovers. This why Paul sees the need to walk the Corinthians through a theological kitchen: First, there is only one God, and therefore idols of gods are actually powerless pieces of stone. Some people know this truth, and so if temple-sold meat was previously sacrificed to an idol, it is meaningless to them. But: Other “weak believers” don’t understand the powerlessness of idols, and therefore eating meat sacrificed to a pagan idol would be a sin for them.

Paul wants the stronger believers to keep in mind that there are others who might get confused and even be tempted to sin.

 

It is a very particular issue Paul addresses here but on the other hand it is just an example for Christian attitude in general. Christians are meant to season their whole behavior with love. Because we are examples for others. And we are meant to be good examples. Our acts, our attitude, our behavior has consequences and we need to be aware of it. This is what feeding each other means. This is what seasoning with love means.

 

But there is more involved with Paul’s “Theological Kitchen” than just the recipe that tells us: Lead by good example! And: Beware of the consequences of your actions.

Paul’s Theological kitchen shows that sometimes there are gray areas in terms of people’s actions:

 

When Paul writes about eating habits he also shows the Corinthians and us that the same action can have different consequences. For strong believers eating meat that’s been consecrated to pagan deities doesn’t mean anything because they don’t believe in the existence of these deities anyway. So they are fine. But the ones who are not as mature in their faith yet commit a sin. So they are not only tempted to do something wrong but the deed itself is wrong in one case, in another it is not. Depending on how mature a Christian is in their faith. They all do the same thing but some sin, others don’t.

 

And there are many gray areas in our lives as well.

A friend of mine used to go to a casino once a year together with some friends. They would take about a hundred dollars with them for gambling. They had this unwritten rule to only spend these 100 Dollars and not more. They used to have a wonderful night out, they had a reason to dress up a little bit, drink some cocktails and just had a wonderful time. That was their way of having a night out. For them it was a nice way of spending an evening together.

For an addict this same thing could be devastating. For an addict this same night out with friends could destroy his whole life. Gray area!

 

Another example: Eating onions will keep some people healthy because Onions are a tasty vegetable with vitamins, and they are good for us. On the other hand: An onion might send another person straight to the ER because he or she is highly allergic.

 

Offering wine for communion at church isn’t any different. For many of us communion is coming together in the presence of Christ and receiving a means of grace. For an alcoholic receiving wine during communion could be a death sentence. Gray area. This is why we have grape juice available as well for communion  J

 

Or to push it even further: let’s think about death.

For some people death is a great threat. Usually we don’t want to die or want our loved ones to die. At least not too soon. For most of us death means loss. It is the end of life. It is the end of something nice and enjoyable. But for other people death means the end of pain, the end of despair. For others death is a relief not a threat. Gray area.

 

Actions are not necessarily just good or just bad. It really depends on what’s behind them. It depends on the circumstances. This is something Paul is making us aware of in this passage.

He is telling us to season our attitudes with love and to be aware of consequences. But he also is telling us to be aware of the circumstances. He is telling us to become an “It depends” church.

 

An “it depends “ church is a group of people who are not only interested in “what do I get out of this” but is aware of others.  An “it depends “ church is a group of people who lead by good example but who don’t judge. An “it depends “ church is a group of people who just don’t declare certain actions as sin but are able to say: It depends on the circumstances.

But I am convinced that if we keep seasoning with love we will automatically become an “it depends” church. When we season with love we are willing to feed not only ourselves but others as well. When we season with love we are aware of the fact that there are more people on this planet than just us. Seasoning with love makes us sensitive for the needs of others,  but makes us also sensitive for the circumstances of a particular situation.

 

An “it depends “ church is a church that is aware of the fact that gray areas can exist in a community. An “it depends “ church is a church that doesn’t patronize.

An “it depends “ church is a church that sees that there are people out there who don’t believe and who don’t share our ethics because of that. An “it depends“ church is an open and understanding church. An “it depends “ church is a forgiving church.

An “it depends “ church is a church that has it down that respect is not a concession (Zugeständniss) but that it’s serving God, it’s worship.

 

Church is not Hell’s Kitchen it’s Heaven’s Kitchen!

In Heaven’s Kitchen we are told to season with love, and then we have the best recipe for becoming an “it depends “ church. And because it is such a great recipe – all recipes from Heaven’s Kitchen are great - it is worth sharing. It belongs in a cookbook which is for free and available for everyone.

Amen