How can we treat believers better who differ with us about Christian liberty?

For whatever things were written before were written for our learning, that we through the patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope. 5Now may the God of patience and comfort grant you to be like-minded toward one another, according to Christ Jesus.” Romans 15:4-5

In Romans 14, the apostle Paul admonished the Jewish and Gentile Christians in Rome to accept and love one another despite their differences concerning their Christian liberty. Beginning in chapter 15, he tells the stronger Christian whose faith permits him to eat all foods and observe every day the same, to “bear with the scruples” or weaknesses of believers whose faith did not permit him to exercise his Christian liberty to the same extent (15:1). Instead of pleasing himself, he was to put the welfare of others before himself like Jesus did (15:2-3a). Paul then quotes King David whose commitment to building up the physical house of God is to be displayed by Christians in their commitment to building up God’s spiritual house (15:3b; cf. Psalm 69:9). 

Notice that when Paul seeks to motivate his readers to treat one another better, he does not refer to some seminar or some promo on Facebook. He refers to the Bible in verse 3 when he quotes King David (cf. Psalm 69:9). By referring to the Old Testament, Paul was showing that Christians can receive from the Bible the instruction (“learning”), perseverance (“patience”),“comfort,” and “hope” they need to bear with one another despite their differences regarding their Christian liberty (15:4). But he does not stop there. 

The reason the Bible can give us everything we need to bear with one another in the family of God is because of the Person behind the Bible: Now may the God of patience and comfort grant you to be like-minded toward one another, according to Christ Jesus” (15:5). Knowing the Bible is not enough to treat one another better. We must know the Author of the Bible if we are going to treat one another better (cf. 2 Timothy 3:16-17; 2 Peter 1:20-21). The more we know God who is love, the more loving we will become toward one another (cf. I John 4:7-8). 

Do you have teenage girls? They must be very careful with internet chat rooms. Teenage girls can fall in love with evil men on the internet because the words they read have a person behind them. As she hangs out with this man on the internet for days and weeks, he eventually says,“Can we meet at the park this Saturday at five o’clock?” She has been trained all these years not to hang out with strangers, yet now she goes to meet this stranger. Why? Because she has fallen in love with someone she has never seen. The reason she has fallen in love with someone she has never seen is because of the power of the written word. Why? Because behind that written word is a real person. If an evil man can take the words of a computer and transform a teenage girl so that she will go meet him in private at a park somewhere and risk her life because she has been overwhelmed with the word, then how much more can the God of the Bible overwhelm us with His written Word so that we change from what we might normally do because we have been overwhelmed with a love relationship with Someone we have never seen.

Do not underestimate what the God of the Bible can do in our lives when we sit down to hear His voice as we read and apply the Bible to our lives. Spending time with Him in His Word can transform us so that we treat other believers better who may differ with us concerning Christian liberty.