TRUNEWS with Rick Wiles - Morning Manna - May 6, 2025 - Romans 14:13-18 - Let Us Not Judge

Episode Date: May 6, 2025

TruNews may be retired, but Morning Manna is growing stronger than ever. Rick shares the ministry’s new vision—including daily Bible teaching and a future Bible school for children—before diving into Romans 14:13–18. The message? Stop judging. Build up the body of Christ. Use your freedom to foster unity, not division. True righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit are the marks of the Kingdom.Rick Wiles, Doc Burkhart. Airdate 5/6/25You can partner with us by visiting FaithandValues.com, calling 1-800-576-2116, or by mail at PO Box 399 Vero Beach, FL 32961.Get high-quality emergency preparedness food today from American Reserves!AmericanReserves.comIt’s the Final Day! The day Jesus Christ bursts into our dimension of time, space, and matter. Now available in eBook and audio formats! Order Final Day from Amazon today!Amazon.com/Final-DayApple users, you can download the audio version on Apple Books!books.apple.com/final-dayPurchase the 4-part DVD set or start streaming Sacrificing Liberty today.Sacrificingliberty.comThe Fauci Elf is a hilarious gift guaranteed to make your friends laugh! Order yours today!Trunews/faucielf

Good afternoon, everybody. It's our 3 p.m. meeting time, and Doc and I, we just want to step into the studio, let you know that we're here and proceeding, moving ahead with a new vision for this ministry, which is morning manna, Bible teaching. We hope to greatly expand the distribution of Morning Manna on every podcast platform, and also begin the work to build an online Bible school for children, which is a big project because we have to create the platform and the content. It's a big vision, but it needs to be done. We had a fantastic, awesome response to my email yesterday. Yes.

When we came in this morning, there were over 600 replies. I don't know what it's up to now. But everybody liked the email, liked the format. So I just finished the second one for today and it may already be in your box. I don't know if it's gone out in the last five minutes. I don't know if it's gone out yet. So anyhow, I'll be watching for it this evening. It's coming soon. I just finished it a few minutes ago and it was being formatted ready to be emailed to you. And in this one I covered the highlights of Greg

Hunter's interview with Martin Armstrong who's a I call him a renegade economist and he speaks his mind. You know Martin always talked about his proprietary software that he would get He would get Analysis and projections about the world economy about cycles and things You remember doc. This is where the US government he said I mean he did go he did go to prison And it wasn't he wasn't convicted. It was contempt of court, right? And he said the US government wanted that software and he wouldn't give it up And I have to wonder and I haven't talked to Martin Armstrong for quite some time

But I have to wonder did he have a an early version of artificial intelligence? Yeah, that's the same thing. I was thinking of sitting here Rick Maybe he was on the cutting edge of some of that technology before. Because he's never referred to it as AI. But I'm going to ask him that someday. Anyhow, he gave a fascinating interview to Greg Hunter and gave his projections of what he sees coming in the coming year or so. And it lines up with a lot of other

what I call cycles, experts, people that study historical cycles. And so Martin Armstrong is expecting, you know, a very severe downturn in the U.S. economy next year. But so was Paul Tudor Jones, a billionaire. Right. And he was on CNBC's Squawk Box today and said it's too late to undo the damage caused by the tariffs. He said even if President Trump dials them back 50%. The damage is already done. And he's expecting a significant drop in the US stock market. So, just read the newsletter. It's there all in the newsletter. If you like it, and so far everybody has said,

yes, we love it, I'll continue doing it's it's not eating up a lot of my time to do it now if you're not receiving the newsletter you can just go to true news calm and scroll down to the bottom of the page you're gonna see a form at the bottom of the page on the home page for the newsletter just fill in the information and you'll start receiving these updates as well so if you're not currently on our newsletter list, now you can join the newsletter list, get updates from Rick on world events, World War III,

the markets, everything that's going on, just as he likes to do on his own schedule. Yeah, you know, I like this, Doc. I'm able to give a perspective in an update on the most important things without spending a whole day preparing for a one hour podcast. And this way with this email format, I you know, maybe half an hour, you know, putting it together.

It's all things that I'm watching or reading in my own personal time. Right. Things that have caught my attention. I'll share it in an email. So I like this format. This allows Doc and I to work on ministry projects like Morning Manna and the Bible, the Ark Bible School for Children. And this is in the past week my schedule has been completely totally liberated set free so I'm enjoying it and I just want to let you know we're here we haven't disappeared we're here every day and so anyhow we're going to stream today's morning man. We're in the 14th chapter of the Book of Romans. Here it is, and Doc and I will be back here tomorrow at 3 PM.

Good morning, everybody. Welcome to Morning Manna. It is Tuesday, and we are gathered here, many people from around the world, typically 20, 22 nations gather at 8 a.m. Eastern Time at faithandvalues.com. Of course, throughout the day, many thousands join in our additional streams and video on demand.

So whatever method, time of the day, welcome. We're glad to have you with us today. If you're in the class at 8 a.m., you can chat with Christians from around the world. You can meet friends and develop relationships and friendships with other brothers and sisters in many countries. We're glad that that feature is available

and I know it builds a community among this class. So today we're going to continue our study in Romans chapter 14 and we're looking at verses 13 through 18. So we try typically to stick to about five to six verses per day. And it takes us an hour to get through those five or six verses. Sometimes we spend a whole hour in one verse. Yes. There have been days like that. We've been one hour on one verse.

But anyhow, today we're gonna go for verses 13 through 18. So let's pray. Our dear heavenly Father, Father, you are so good and you're so kind and you're so merciful. Help us to be like you, Father. Help us to have your attributes, your virtues of kindness, gentleness, mercy, patience. Father, we love you very much, and we have gathered here, Father, to learn about your Son Jesus Christ whom you gave to us as the only way to be reconciled to you. And we have accepted that offer of reconciliation by believing in your Son and by accepting Him as our Savior, our Messiah.

And Father, we have believed in the sacrifice that He made on the cross, that our sins are forgiven, they are forgotten, they are as far as the East is from the West, that we are washed in your blood and there is no condemnation. And so Father, we rejoice in your goodness. We invite the Holy Spirit to gather here with us to take charge of this Bible study, to reveal to us the magnificence of your son Jesus and the greatness of his kingdom. These things we ask in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Amen. And good morning, everyone. No matter where you are in the world today, you've joined us for Morning Manna. We say hello to our friends in Russia, Malaysia, Philippines, Japan, Australia today, and Brazil. And so thank you for joining us. I'm going to read verses 13 through 18 in chapter 14. So while you're turning there, I'd like to remind everyone Rick sent an email out

yesterday. And be sure to check your inbox and to receive the message that Rick had sent out yesterday. If you don't see it in your inbox, check your junk folder. It might have gone in there. Sometimes it does that. But Rick had some very important information he wanted to share with you plus some commentary on the news, but he asked a question in that email and we've already received a tremendous response to it, but we'd love to hear from you as well today. So if you did not receive the newsletter, then double-check to make sure that you're on the newsletter list by going to truenews.com, scrolling to the bottom of the page, signing

up for the newsletter, and that way we can make sure that you receive future correspondence from Rick. So anyway, that's just a little housekeeping there for everybody. And Miss Susan was telling me, Rick, that we had nearly 600 responses to your email already yesterday. 600. And so that is encouraging. So but we're here to study the Word, not talk about email lists and newsletter and stuff like that. Let's read the Word. And we are in Romans chapter 14 starting at verse number 13 today. Let us therefore, excuse me, let us not therefore judge one another anymore, but judge this rather, that no man put a stumbling block or an

occasion to fall in his brother's way. I know and I am persuaded by the Lord Jesus that there is nothing unclean of itself, but to him that esteemeth anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean. But if thy brother be greed with thy meat, now walkest thou not charitably. Destroy not him with thy meat, for whom Christ died. Let not then your good be evil spoken of. For the kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost. For he that in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God and approved of men. God bless the reading of his word today. Amen. Verse 13, therefore, let's not judge one another anymore, but judge this rather,

that no man put a stumbling block in his brother's way or an occasion for falling. So Paul continues with his theme to stop judging others. We're simply not qualified nor authorized to judge somebody else. Clean up your own life. Deal with your own problems. Get your own life in line with the Word of God and stop judging other people. Especially over things like food and days of the week and I mean there are people today that will condemn you if you don't celebrate the Jewish feast days. Yes. That's a trend nowadays. Well you're just not you nowadays. Well, you're just not, you know, living right. If you're not Jesus celebrated this feast day, so should you. That's an example where people are

judging and condemning you. But it can be in other matters as well. Yes, that's right. The main message here is stop judging people. Right. Just call it off. Stop it. I mean some people just need to be told stop it. Knock it off. Some people are, I mean look, there's a difference, a big difference between occasionally judging someone and realizing I shouldn't have done that. And at the extreme, people who are judging others all day long. It's as if they have the ministry of judgment. Yes.

They have a license and they've been empowered to judge. And they have a license to sin with their mouth. Good point. Somehow heaven granted them a kind of like a driver's license except they have a mouth license. And everybody else is prohibited from using their tongue in a destructive way. But you know, some people have a license.

They get a permit and they think that they are entitled to judge other people, to criticize, to slander. That tongue is a nasty thing. It is a nasty, nasty thing in our body. The sooner you learn to put that thing under control, the better your life will be and the better other people's lives will be. Because that tongue is... Unfortunately, some people use it as a weapon.

Yes. They have weaponized their tongue, and they slash and cut and slander and accuse and defame. I feel sorry for them on Judgment Day. I don't know how they get out of that mess. I don't know. I don't know how they get out of that mess. I don't know. I don't know. I know people who profess to be Christians and yet they're the most slanderous, accusatory people you've ever been around. I don't know how they're going to fare on Judgment Day, But see, that's not for me to judge. Right. I don't know. I'm just going, that don't look good to me. I'd be very concerned.

Now in this case, Paul is talking about items like food and religious holidays. People getting in arguments about the food that they're eating. So, Paul is pleading for unity. He's redirecting disciples to focus on protecting others, instead of defending yourself. Right. The command, judge this rather. That means to prioritize decisions

that promote other people's spiritual growth and peace and comfort. Right. Judge this rather. And it's as if Paul is saying, take that magnifying glass of judgment that you're pointing on others and start pointing it at yourself. Right. So a stumbling block is any action that could cause another person to sin or to weaken their faith, occasion to fall, causing others to falter in their faith. All of us have responsibility that our lives should not be done in a way that causes another

person to stumble in their faith. At the heart of it, Paul is saying constantly seek harmony in the church among brothers and sisters. Build up. Don't tear down. Use your mouth to build up, to encourage, to strengthen. Do not use your mouth to weaken and destroy, cause people to back away from the faith or to be wounded. Make sure that your actions are building up others. So avoid stumbling blocks. Yes. And you do that by putting other people ahead of yourself.

Love for your brothers and sisters sometimes requires setting aside your personal freedoms if they risk harming another person's conscience. Because this call to protect unites disciples, and it encourages them to share in the goal of mutual edification. Edification means building up, strengthening. We are to edify. When you hear somebody say say edify something,

they're talking about building it up, strengthening it. And one way you strengthen, edify and build up is your words, words that you speak. Paul's also teaching us to live with sensitivity towards others, to consider their thoughts, their feelings, and not to harm them in the way that you live, the way that you, things that you do, even as simple as the food that you eat. Yes. Verse 14.

I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean of itself, but to him who considers anything to be unclean to him, it is unclean. to him it is unclean. So first of all, Paul says in the New Covenant age nothing is unclean, meaning the food. And yet he says you should respect the consciences of those people who view certain things as unclean. Yes. See, selfish person says, hey, it's my right. If I wanna eat it, there's nothing wrong with eating that slice of ham, eating that seafood.

There's nothing wrong with it. I'm not gonna change my ways because this guy sitting here at the table is offended by it. See, that's selfish. That's right. You're thinking of yourself instead of the other. But on the other side, if the other person on the other side of the table is saying, I find that food to be offensive and I prefer that you not eat it.

That person is selfish. Also, and I'd prefer that you not eat it. That person is selfish also. Both are thinking of themselves. When you're with somebody that has convictions about certain foods, and you know that they don't think people should eat certain foods, it's best just not order it. Don't eat it. Right. Just be respectful. There will be more hot dogs tomorrow. That's right. Okay. Every 7-Eleven sells it, you can always get one. Yeah, it's not like this is the last ham you'll ever see. There'll be bacon tomorrow.

Just be respectful. Now, I think we've all encountered people. They have their own personal convictions about food. And in this case, particularly, it's not religious. It's a health choice. Let's say they're vegans, okay? They think everybody should be a vegan. I'm not saying all vegans think that.

I'm just using this as an example. That somebody who has very strong personal convictions about what food should be eaten or not eaten, they can be overbearing. And while you're sitting there at the table, eating a cheeseburger and they're eating tofu, they're lecturing you the whole time, telling you how wrong you are, what you're doing is wrong. See, that's a very selfish person.

Then they're only thinking of themselves and they're imposing their values on you. Now if I ask the person, why are you vegan? And they tell me that's fine. But if you're going to impose your views on me and make me feel inferior or try to put guilt shame on me then that's wrong. In these verses Paul's talking about religious convictions. Yes. Either as he talked about earlier in Romans meat that had been offered to false idols, or the dietary laws of the dietary regulations of the law of Moses, those are religious issues. Right. And so you get different people with different reasons for not eating certain food. Right. I recall when my teenage years and everything, you know,

everybody after church, everyone would go out to eat, right? And same thing, I'm sure your family as well, go out to a restaurant restaurants were allowed to be open on Sundays where a lot of other things were closed down, even gas stations were open on Sundays where a lot of other things were closed down. Even gas stations were closed on Sundays. There was a restaurant. Right. And so there was a Pizza Hut, okay. And Pizza Hut started serving beer, okay. This was, I think I was 16 years old.

And so, but they had available you know all the time but the churches would not go to Pizza Hut on Sundays the churches in our town would not go to Pizza Hut on Sundays because they served alcohol they go any other they go any other day of the week, but not on Sunday. They would go Monday through Saturday. Right. Now, it's the same beer that's being served. But on Sundays, and they would say this, we're taking a stand.

We're saying no to alcohol in the community and everything. But everybody ate pizza at Pizza Hut the rest of the week. That's the religious spirit that kicks in. But people would be offended if they saw you pulling up at Pizza Hut. I saw your pickup at Pizza Hut last Sunday. Well, there'd be people who'd get offended over that. That's the kind of religious spirit that Paul is addressing there. I thought you were going to say that they were offended by the pork and the pepperoni. Oh no, no, no. They ate the pepperoni. They ate the bacon. They ate everything.

It was just the beer. And they weren't ordering the beer. They were butters for pizza. And they weren't ordering the beer, but other people at other tables were the beer. And they weren't ordering beer. They were butting for pizza, but. And they weren't ordering the beer, but other people at other tables were ordering beer. Yes. So the phrase, nothing unclean of itself, it teaches that external things like food are clean in God's sight and that all things are pure in terms of food. It wasn't that way in the old covenant, but God had

specific dietary rules for the Hebrew people. Right. To the disciple, to the Christian disciple who sincerely considers something to be unclean, it is unclean for them. So if Doc sincerely believed that eating a lobster was sinful, but I served him a lobster and he ate it so he wouldn't offend me, he was offending his conscience. And Paul says that's sin because you believed it was wrong and you did something that you you sincerely believed was wrong even though it's not wrong Is that right doc is that the right way to explain it yes, you're violating your own conscience even though your conscience Has rules that God says there's no need to have that rule. But since you have it, if you violate it, then you're sinning against yourself. Yes.

Because the issue, the important thing is having your conscience clear. That's what repentance does. It washes the conscience. You repent. You get it over with quickly. Move on. Move on. Others want to stay there. They want to keep reminding you, but the repentance is to move on. It's dealt with, it's washed away, move on. There'll be other opportunities to sin. There are more days and more opportunities to sin. Learn to repent quickly and get over it and move on and do not judge others. Okay, because you have your own issues and you don't want people judging you.

So this teaching is encouraging Christian disciples to act with sensitivity towards others, that our freedom, our personal freedom does not harm another brother or sister's faith. Yes. Doc mentioned beer. Okay, so Doc, when I was a young Christian, the churches that I went to were teetotallers. You know what? You would know what a teetotaller is. As an old term.

Absolutely no alcohol, not a drop. It can't touch your lips. And you can't be around it. You can't be near it. You can't even be in a room with it. That's that's that was how strict the churches were that I attended as a young Christian. So that was burning them. That was burned into my head. You can't even go. If you drive down the street and even look at a bar, you've already send. We don't want to hear it. We don't want to be like those Methodists Rick. Right, right. So, but it was very, very strong, very judgmental. And I, you know, as a young Christian, I just thought if I even came in the presence of somebody drinking beer, I was already contaminated. And that makes you very judgmental.

And it makes other people feel judged. I've mellowed out a lot over the years on issues like this. And, you know, I personally don't drink. I don't, you know, I'm not at a bar. I don't have beer in my house, all right? But I don't, I'm not offended by people who are drinking a beer or a glass of wine. That doesn't offend me. There was a day when I would be, oh, I can't sit here with this person, especially if it was a person who went to church and said, hey, I'm going to drink this beer. I would

just be like, oh, you're on your way to hell. You need deliverance. Remember the messages about sipping saints? No. Sipping saints. Oh, you didn't hear that one? Sipping saints. I still remember those messages. But like Rick said, when we were growing up, when we were first introduced to church,

there was a lot of condemnation in that area. But things have kind of changed through the years. There's a different attitude toward it. But the thing is that, you know, back when we were kids and young men, Rick, there were still dry counties around the country. And there's still a few around. Mm-hmm. There's still a few dry counties around. But yeah, there was an implied condemnation.

But every dry county had private clubs. Yeah. So, where there's a law, there's an exception to the law. So. So, there's a law, there's an exception to the law. So. So I have no, I personally have no issue with a Christian drinking beer or wine. It doesn't bother me. I do have concerns about hard liquor

and I would probably say something privately to a brother or sister and say, hey, And I would probably say something privately to a brother or sister and say, hey, you're putting down some heavy whiskey there. You're bordering on being an alcoholic. See, that would bother me because of the addiction. But I'm not bothered. If I'm at dinner and somebody orders a couple wine or beer, that doesn't offend me. And the Bible's not condemning the drink itself as condemning being drunk. Yes. Drunkenness is what's condemned.

So my view is that you can drink a beer, you can drink a cup of wine, as long as you're not drunk. That's my view. Now, there are churches that would kick me out the front door, if I said that in their sanctuary. If I said that from their pulpit, I mean, they would throw me out. Today. There are churches that would do that But i'm i'm just saying in my own personal view. I doesn't bother me. I i'm not I'm not bothered. Um in in many denominations and in many countries I think of my my ancestral home germany

A beer drinking and christian Christianity go together. Right? Yeah. And Martin Luther started the Lutheran Church and he started he started the Reformation in a in a bar. And he had a brewery. And he owned a brewery. Was it Luther said, beer is proof that God loves men. Yeah, there you go. I'm gonna tell you a story. I'm gonna leave out names. If you if you put a name in it, that's your business. I'm not going to put a name on it. Okay. But many, many years ago when I lived in Texas and worked for an international ministry, I witnessed something one day in the private offices where I saw a high-level official in that ministry treat some employees extremely cruelly. I mean, just downright mean, nasty, uncalled for, outburstyards of Fort Worth. I was in the stockyards of Fort Worth. I was in the stockyards of Fort Worth.

I was in the stockyards of Fort Worth. I was in the stockyards of Fort Worth. I was in the stockyards of Fort Worth. I was in the stockyards of Fort Worth. I was in the stockyards of Fort Worth. I was in the stock well, not downtown, I was in the stockyards of Fort Worth. And if you've ever been to Fort Worth,

you know where the stockyards are at. It's the old Fort Worth. It's the original Fort Worth where they drove the cattle in. The old saloons are there where they had the gunfights. You know, it's the slaughterhouses, the rodeo arena. It's where Fort Worth started, okay? And I love that place. I haven't been there for years. And there was always activity there, music and festivals and things, because it's a tourist site. But Doc, I was there on a Saturday afternoon,

this is a day or two after I witnessed a very ugly scene inside the ministry that I worked in, and I saw no repentance from the person who verbally, emotionally abused some employees. I saw nothing, maybe they did later, but I didn't see it. And I'm standing there. There was a small crowd gathered around a Texas cowboy who had a guitar and he was singing. Oh, man, I love country music. I mean, this is Fort Worth, Texas.

I mean, I love country music. I mean, this is Fort Worth, Texas. And here's a genuine cowboy with a genuine guitar genuinely singing genuine country music. I mean, this was pretty good. And so I'm just standing there enjoying the atmosphere. And Doc, he had a big, you know, he had a bottle of beer. And, you know, he'd play a little bit and drink a beer. But then he started witnessing about his relationship with Jesus Christ. And this young cowboy had just the most gentle,

kind, beautiful, loving spirit. young cowboy had just the most gentle, kind, beautiful, loving spirit. And as he's witnessing his love for Christ and Christ's love for him, he's sipping on his beer. And it, I'm standing there thinking, wait a minute, yesterday over here at this big ministry where I work, I just witnessed a ministry official treat employees like they were, you know, rodents. And I'm here right now in Fort Worth in the stockyards and here's a cowboy sipping on a beer and

He's got a gentle loving kind Spirit which one's closer to Christ Which one is closer to Christ I Which one is closer to Christ? I had that revelation standing there saying that cowboy with the beard is closer to Jesus than the big famous TV person I just saw. Is your spirit gentle? Is your spirit gentle?

How do you treat others? Are you full of anger? Are you full bitterness? Are you full of vindictiveness? Is your mouth spew out hatred? Or are you gentle? And so I'm saying this story because we're talking about drinking beer or wine or eating

food. That cowboy's spirit was more Christ-like with a beer in his hand than the ministry official I saw with a knife in her mouth carrying up people. So whether we're talking about these verses of what we eat or drink, the main message is drink. The main message is it is our responsibility every day to be Christ-like and to conform to the image of Christ. And when a brother or sister does something that offends you, you don't tear them apart, you don't tear them down, you don't judge, you love them. That's the message. I mean, if you're offended over a hot dog,

folks, there are a lot bigger problems in the world than somebody eating a pork hot dog. problems in the world than somebody eating a pork hot dog. How about children in Gaza being slaughtered today? Religious people get upset because somebody ate pork, but they're not upset because the state of Israel slaughtered more kids today as they were sleeping in their tents. That doesn't offend them. I say you got problems. You have serious problems Let's move on verse 16 let not then your good be evil spoken of So we are to ensure that our good actions are not criticized.

Our responsibility, our motive should always be to protect the gospel. Yes. We don't always do that. We don't always do that in our behavior, our words, our actions, our attitudes. The public is watching. I have witnessed Christians on the phone

with customer service of various departments, companies, and just ripping into the customer service of various departments, companies, and just ripping into the customer service rep, like, oh my, this is terrible. Oh my, you shouldn't talk like that. Especially if the phone call originates from a church and the customer service rep is looking at the caller ID and says, First Baptist Church or Methodist Church or such and such and the person on the line is just tearing them up, what's the witness? Why is that sin less important than another sin? You're harming the reputation of the gospel by the way you're talking to other people. When Paul speaks of your good, he's talking about your freedom that we have in Christ, such as eating all kinds of food.

That we have to exercise that freedom carefully. Yes. So like Paul said, he was convinced in his mind that there was nothing unclean. He made that very clear here in previous verse. But he's also making the case saying, just because you believe that, and it's true, don't use that as a weapon. Don't use that as a weapon. It's liberty in you, but don't let it be an occasion for evil to be spoken of. And that word evil, the root word is blasphemy. And so Paul is saying your Christian liberty, your conscience as far as food is concerned, could become blasphemous to the gospel because you've wielded this freedom like a weapon now, like a knife. Precisely. So allowing good to be evil spoken of means causing others to misjudge or stumble. And so we are to use our personal freedom in Christ, we would use it wisely to make sure that it glorifies God and not offend somebody else. Again, we're always back to fostering harmony and unity

in the body of Christ. Remember in the book of Acts, the church was in one accord. of Acts, the church was in one accord. Unity was, it was so high of a, of a virtue, a value that they had among themselves, that at the slightest disagreement broke out, they were all hurt and said, no, no, no, no, no, no no let's fix it right now we have to stay in one accord yes we have to we have to guard this unity when doc when did they stop guarding the unity when were they no longer in one accord at some point they stopped being in one accord. When they started arguing over hot dogs. Over meat and days of the week.

But in the beginning they did guard the unity. So love requires us to sacrifice our freedoms if they risk harming the witness of the church. Verse 17, for the kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost. We're not to be arguing and having disputes over silly things like food and drink. The priorities are righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. That's important, in the Holy Spirit. We are to redirect our focus on spiritual values over external practices.

It's part of our debt of love. Oh, no, man, nothing except the debt of love. except the debt of love. Not meat and drink. That phrase emphasizes that God's kingdom transcends trivial matters. Yes, it's not about a menu. Yeah, much more important issues to talk about. Righteousness reflects a life aligned with God's will.

Peace in the kingdom fosters harmony. Joy in the Holy Spirit brings delight. How many professing Christians do you know who have absolutely no joy? And they go beyond having no joy. They go to the extreme of being downright miserable. Right. And I mean, and they even go so far, they don't lack joy and they don't want you to have any and they're going to make sure you don't have any either because when they're

present in the room, they suck all the joy and happiness out of the room. I'm not going to judge where they're at, but there's something wrong. There's something wrong. When a person who claims to be a Christian is perpetually unhappy, miserable, angry, depressed, whatever it is, can be a combination of all those. There is something spiritually wrong. And they will try to put it on somebody else. Well, I wouldn't be like this if it wasn't for so-and-so. No, it's you.

You are the one who is not right with God. You are the one who's not right with God. Don't blame somebody else. You take ownership of those ugly attitudes and get the joy of the Lord in your life. Amen. Satan wants you to believe that somebody else makes you unhappy. Somebody else makes you miserable.

Sometimes you have to really work at being happy in the Lord while you're in the presence of people who are unhappy in the Lord. Yeah, that's true. It's taxing your happiness. You're like, you got the happiness motor running full blast to try to keep the happiness level up. And you're around one or two other people who are working day and night to not be happy, to be miserable.

Verse 18, For he that is in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God and approved of men. Amen. So this verse teaches that serving Christ through righteousness, peace and joy pleases your heavenly father and it earns human approval. I would add it can also attract opposition. Niserable people, like Doc just said, miserable people are not content to just be miserable by themselves. Right. When Paul says in verse 18 here, in these things, what are the these things that he's talking about? Righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost. In these things, if you're living in that,

not in bacon mode or anything, but you're living in righteous mode, joy mode, patience mode, in these things, you're serving Christ. And that's acceptable to God. And men can't condemn you for it. They can't condemn you for those things. They'll find something else to condemn you for. Right, but not for those things.

But they can't condemn you for that one. So Doc's absolutely right. Serving Christ in things means pursuing kingdom values. Let me get a drink of water, Doc. Okay. So, Paul is saying here, he's affirming that those who walk in righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost and use their liberty in love, they're the ones who are truly serving Christ. Yes. in love, they're the ones who are truly serving Christ. Yes.

It goes back to fostering harmony in the church, unity. An attitude that unites rather than divides. Amen. Why? Because we should reflect the selfless love of Christ, who lived on earth to please his father. And that should be our same pursuit. So by serving Christ in these things, disciples shine as lights,

and we invite others to experience God's kingdom. And we're not a stumbling block to other people knowing the Lord. Yes. And don't you know stumbling blocks out there? I'm sure you've encountered stumbling blocks, those who claim the name of Christ, but the world just is like offended by them, not because of their testimony for Christ, but because of their attitude and their behavior and their, you know, or condemning others. And so, so when Paul is saying here, it's not, you know, it's one thing to be approved by God, but can you be approved of men as well in your lifestyle? That's a tough one.

You mean I have to live this out in front of my family? You mean I have to live godly in front of my spouse? I have to do that? Yes, you do. I have to be godly in front of my spouse? I have to do that? Yes, you do. I have to be godly in front of my kids and my friends? Yes. But not godly in the sense that you're using as a weapon, but that you're living this out, that the Holy Spirit is just bubbling through you.

How are we doing so far in the Book of Romans? We only have two more chapters, 15 and 16. We'll probably be finished 14, maybe tomorrow? Probably tomorrow for 14, so yes. Yeah. Yes. Well, no. See, I stopped. Possible.

It was 19-20. We might be able to do it. We'll see. Tomorrow or Thursday. And that means next Monday we'll be on chapter 15. All right, Doc, that's it for me today. All right, well, we appreciate the lesson today, Rick. And I hope people have been blessed by it today

and that they are continuing their study on their own as well. Paul's been talking about walking the walk, talking the talk, and practical Christian living in these three chapters 12, 13, and 14. He goes on a little bit deeper in chapter 15, which we'll probably get into on Thursday at this point, but I pray that everyone's getting blessed by this. I'd like to remind you that we'll be streaming this later this morning at 10 a.m. Eastern time and also this afternoon at 3 p.m. So we'll be streaming Morning Manor twice today and to give

the audience out there an opportunity to have some fresh exposure to Morning Manna now that it's our primary production and primary podcast or however you want to call it. I just call it getting together and receiving of the Lord and I'm encouraged by the number of people that have been showing up. Once again today close to 400 people that were with us today, and so encouraged by those numbers. And we'd love to have you back here tomorrow as well. And so I pray that the Lord blesses you in it. Rick, any other thoughts or words today that can be? I'm out of words. You're out of words. All right. And you don't want to offend in word or in deed, right? So praise God. All right, ladies and gentlemen, on that note, we'll

depart for now, but we invite you to be back here tomorrow morning, bright and early, 8 a.m. on the East Coast for the next edition of Morning Manna. God bless you, and we'll see you then. See you tomorrow. Bye.