”’Everything is permissible,’ but not everything is beneficial. ‘Everything is permissible,’ but not everything builds up.” (v. 23)

Christians are asking the wrong question.

Too often, we come to the Word or to the church or to a pastor, and we ask, “What am I allowed to do?” What things are in-bounds, under Christian freedom? Can I eat this or drink that or enjoy those things? What am I allowed to do?

But that’s the wrong question.

Instead of asking what you’re allowed to do, the better question is, “What ought I be doing?”

If you will focus your freedom rightly—if you will see the grace and the mercy of Christ as freedom FROM legalism—you will also see that He frees you FOR purity. You are no longer simply a moral performer. You are one whose moral preference is to honor God in what you eat, drink, and enjoy. If that stuff doesn’t build you up in Him, then it fails the “ought” test, even if it passes as permissible.

Before you do whatever you do, ask the better question. “Is this what I ought to be doing?” You will know a new freedom—the freedom from moral compromise—when you do.

— Tyler