Bible Verses About Self-Denial

since it is written in the Tanakh, “As I live, says Adonai, every knee will bend before me, and every tongue will publicly acknowledge God.”

So then, every one of us will have to give an account of himself to God.

Therefore, let’s stop passing judgment on each other! Instead, make this one judgment — not to put a stumbling block or a snare in a brother’s way.

I know — that is, I have been persuaded by the Lord Yeshua the Messiah — that nothing is unclean in itself. But if a person considers something unclean, then for him it is unclean;

and if your brother is being upset by the food you eat, your life is no longer one of love. Do not, by your eating habits, destroy someone for whom the Messiah died!

Do not let what you know to be good, be spoken of as bad;

for the Kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness, shalom and joy in the Ruach HaKodesh.

Anyone who serves the Messiah in this fashion both pleases God and wins the approval of other people.

So then, let us pursue the things that make for shalom and mutual upbuilding.

Don’t tear down God’s work for the sake of food. True enough, all things are clean; but it is wrong for anybody by his eating to cause someone to fall away.

What is good is not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that causes your brother to stumble.

The belief you hold about such things, keep between yourself and God. Happy the person who is free of self-condemnation when he approves of something!

So we who are strong have a duty to bear the weaknesses of those who are not strong, rather than please ourselves.

Each of us should please his neighbor and act for his good, thus building him up.

For even the Messiah did not please himself; rather, as the Tanakh says, ‘The insults of those insulting you fell on me.’

For everything written in the past was written to teach us, so that with the encouragement of the Tanakh we might patiently hold on to our hope.

And may God, the source of encouragement and patience, give you the same attitude among yourselves as the Messiah Yeshua had,

You say, “For me, everything is permitted”? Maybe, but not everything is helpful. “For me, everything is permitted”? Maybe, but as far as I am concerned, I am not going to let anything gain control over me.

You have this “knowledge”; but suppose someone with a weak conscience sees you sitting, eating a meal in the temple of an idol. Won’t he be built up wrongly to eat this food which has been sacrificed to idols?

Thus by your “knowledge” this weak person is destroyed, this brother for whom the Messiah died;

and so, when you sin against the brothers by wounding their conscience when it is weak, you are sinning against the Messiah!

To sum up, if food will be a snare for my brother, I will never eat meat again, lest I cause my brother to sin.

If others are sharing in this right to be supported by you, don’t we have a greater claim to it? But we don’t make use of this right. Rather, we put up with all kinds of things so as not to impede in any way the Good News about the Messiah.

But I have not made use of any of these rights. Nor am I writing now to secure them for myself, for I would rather die than be deprived of my ground for boasting!

So then, what is my reward? Just this: that in proclaiming the Good News I can make it available free of charge, without making use of the rights to which it entitles me.