To answer the Corinthian congregation’s question, “Is it acceptable to eat meat offered to idols?” (8:1), the Apostle Paul could have repeated the letter written by the apostles and elders of Jerusalem to the brothers, Gentile believers in Antioch, Syria, and Cilicia (Acts 15). However, that letter simply gave the general requirements, “You are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid these things.” (Acts 15:29). No reasons or details were given. So, Apostle Paul, in love for the believers in Corinth, does so here.
The scenario in these verses was not unknown to Paul. After stating two general concepts (23-26), he starts his answer in the second person (27-29a), but ends in the first person, saying “my freedom”, “I take part”, “why am I denounced,” and “I thank God” (29b-30).
Paul, when founding churches like the one in Corinth, was probably often invited to a Gentile house and served meat, not knowing where it came from, but could have assumed it came from a sacrifice to an idol. What did he do? He became uncircumcised to the uncircumcised and ate it without questions about where it came from to win the uncircumcised to Christ. He is telling the Corinthians to do the same.
“The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it.” (26) Why not use everything that is the Lord’s to win the hearts of men to the Lord? “So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” (31) Now the next advice is not easy, “Do not cause anyone to stumble, whether Jews (not yet believing in Jesus), Greeks (not yet believing in Jesus), or the church of God– even as I try to please everybody in every way. For I am not seeking my own good but the good of many, so that they may be saved.” (32-33)
