My wife and I went through a very beneficial marriage class a few months ago. It was based on the book His Needs, Her Needs by Dr. Willard Harley. While doing our homework one night, things became pretty heated. My wife is very offended when it comes to cigars, and I'm not against the occasional puff on a stogey with a great friend or family member (and you can imagine how that conversation went). However, I made a promise to my wife after we had spoken our peace: I would never smoke another cigar.
Why? My decision was based on offense, not on health. It wasn't that cigars were intrinsically sinful, or that I saw them as such, or to smoke a cigar would put my soul at risk of eternal damnation. It WAS about a perceived offense that was causing a strain on our marital relationship...a strain that resulted in the expulsion of this perceived "offense" from my life. I chose not to do it because I love my wife.
In my previous post, I said that I would never "condemn a new father lighting up a celebratory stogey at the birth of his firstborn." I wouldn't. It doesn't bother me. It's not an offense to me. Now, could I light up a stogey when my son is born this June, and it be alright? No. Why? Because it IS an offense to my wife, and a violation of my promise to her.
Smoking the occasional cigar is a liberty, a choice. It has to be. In Romans 14, we have what has been defined as the "stumbling-block principle." Some were eating meat that was sacrificed on altars to other gods. Was that a sin in, and of, itself? No. Nothing in the Lord Jesus was unclean (Romans 14:14). It was a liberty...a choice. Thus, if the stumbling-block principle is applied to this discussion, then smoking that stogey MUST be defined as a liberty...not a sin.
Now,"it is good not to eat meat or drink wine that causes your brother to stumble," (Romans 14:21) but "blessed are those who don't feel guilty for doing something they have decided is right." (Romans 14:22). If you perceive this liberty as a sin, then don't do it. If this liberty is perceived as a sin to others, then don't flaunt it in front of them. Keep that liberty between yourself and God (Romans 14:22). Remember, liberties cannot be sinful within themselves...they are defined as such based upon environment and circumstance.
