The Sunday Sermon: Christian Liberty
What is the Christian position on smoking cigarettes? Can a Christian smoke a cigarette or does God consider it sin? On the one hand, there is no Bible verse that forbids us from smoking cigarettes. On the other hand, the Bible tells us that our body is a temple and there is a direct correlation between cigarettes and adverse health consequences.
Some ignorant person will send me an email pointing out that I smoke cigars and fail to realize that cigars are completely different. So forget cigarettes. What about desserts? If our body is a temple can I have one dessert per week? One per day? Excessive sugar intake leads to a laundry list of health issues. Where is the line?
There is a level of liberty among non-salvation-centric issues that the modern Christian seems to have lost in public discussions. Take a listen:
I learned from a film involving John Wayne and Katherine Hepburn that there is no scriptural prohibition against smoking as such. (She was a missionary rescued by John Wayne's character, who was a bounty hunter and deputy sheriff of some kind.). And it was interesting to learn from Walter Scott's novels that people in the time of the seventeenth century would always ask guests what they would like to drink, even if they were strict Protestants themselves.
This is exactly what we need to do as Christians. We must offer each other Liberty in the non-essentials and do so in love. This is the message that Georgia US Senate candidate Josh Clark is offering with his campaign slogan Overcoming Together. Holding firm on his principles in the Christian faith, he allows others into his circle that do not think like him so he can influence them with grace and love that Jesus offers. I just left his kickoff event in Sugar Hill, GA and he is a candidate any Christian in Georgia should consider. Got to http://votejosh.com to learn more.