What can we do/not do as a Christian?
1. Can we watch movies?
2. Can we smoke?
3. Can we drink wine?
4. Can we play mahjong/Big 2?
5. Can we play video games?
6. Can we become a businessman?
7. Can we become insurance agent, financial adviser or any job based on commission?
8. Can a Pastor drive a sport car?
I won't list every possible question. However, we've got to find a general rule of thumb on these issues.
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3 comments:
It is very good that you ask this question, because I want to know also (especially #4). I guess Bible never point out such specific rules. These questions are more related to general Christian morale, which is usually higher the common morale of the society. So something that is well accepted in the society (e.g. #4 again), it may not be recommended based on Christian morale. That perhaps is the part some people feel uncomfortable.
The next question may be who defines Christian morale!? I guess some are straight out from Bible, some are harder to make the call. Even society morale varies from time and location. For example, smoking in the public is bad in US but probably it is OK 50 years ago in China. To share some personal experience, for common social morale I listen to my parents and elder relatives. For Christian morale, I listen to Pastor and senior Christian bro/sis. Pardon the long reply, hope this helps.
Many of us have these questions in different stages of life. The Bible did
not give us a list of do's and dont's in our practical daily life. Thanks
God for this! Otherwise, we will become a robot/slave. Nevertheless, we
can still extract some principles from the verses of the Bible....
To give a topic for these questions, I would use "About the Believer's
Freedom". I think of some verses from the First Corinthians Chp 10
v.23-33. "Everything is permissible, but NOT everything is beneficial.
Everything is permissible, but NOT everything is constructive. Nobody
should seek his own good, but the good of others......" NIV. About the
Freedom, we cannot skip reading the book of Galatian. Its main topic is
about the Freedom. Based on the book of Galatian, Martin Luther had a lot
of discussion about this topic....
In short, if you think your doing may become a stumbling stone for your
brothers, then do not do it because you LOVE your brothers. If something is
symbolised as wrongdoings as a Christian in the society, even though the
thing itself is not a sinful nature, we choose not to do it, because we
don't want the non-believers keep staying away from God because they see our
so-called wrongdoings.
For example, "mahjong" itself is just a game of numbers, the good side for
this: it may help us to relax, or help us to use our brain, or whatever etc.
Yet mahjong is widely used as a gambling tool in the society. So we
choose not to play it. We won't die if we don't play it, rite ?!
About Big-2, hmmm..... I did play a lot with my fellowship b/s in HK,
especially during typhoon days. We had lot of fun ! And later on, we found
that we need to spend more time to read the Bible and pray together, then
we reached a balance. So we enjoyed and cherished every moments of
fellowship, either playing Big-2 or reading the Bible. :))
To conclude, it is good to find a balance between LOVE, FREEDOM and KNOWLEGE
in our daily life.
5CM
The Bible said that we are free in a sense that we won't be controlled by sin anymore after becoming a Christian. In any of the activities that we are going to do, some general guidelines might be
- why do I do it
- what consequences I will bear
From a Christian's perspective, we might have another level to consider ie
- will it please the Lord
- will it affect other people
- does it have any negative effect on my spiritual growth
Remember PC used to have a sport car too!
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