Instructions for both weak and strong
Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God. 8 For I tell you that Christ has become a servant of the Jews on behalf of God’s truth, to confirm the promises made to the patriarchs 9 so that the Gentiles may glorify God for his mercy, as it is written:
“Therefore I will praise you among the Gentiles; I will sing hymns to your name.”
When Paul says “Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you,” he is clearly turning his attention once more to both groups, the weak and the strong. Both are to bring praise to God by accepting each other. Such acceptance is not an unrealistic expectation on Paul’s part, for he states emphatically that Christ has served both groups equally on behalf of God’s truth.
We have previously noted that, in a general way, many of the issues that divided the weak and the strong were culturally conditioned, such as eating habits and worship styles. To the extent that the issues are cultural, they reflect some of the inevitable tensions between Jews and Gentiles that needed to be resolved in the early Christian church. It is in the hope of relieving this tension that Paul, in bringing this section of his letter to a close, calls attention once more to the common salvation they both share.
Solemnly, Paul testifies, “I tell you that Christ has become a servant of the Jews on behalf of God’s truth, to confirm the promises made to the patriarchs.” Going as far back as God’s calling of the patriarch Abraham (Genesis 12:1-3), the Jewish nation had been God’s chosen people to whom he had promised the Savior. In sending Jesus of Nazareth as that promised Messiah, God “confirm[ed] the promises made to the patriarchs.” For Paul and his readers, there could be no doubt that God was the God of the Jews. That was clearly proven by Christ’s “becom[ing] a servant of the Jews on behalf of God’s truth.”
But Paul’s solemn assertion doesn’t stop with his testimony of God’s faithfulness to the Jews. Paul’s sentence continues, “I tell you that Christ has become a servant of the Jews on behalf of God’s truth, to confirm the promises made to the patriarchs so that the Gentiles may glorify God for his mercy.”
Recall the major section in the middle part of this letter (chapters 9–11) that Paul devoted to the relationship between Jews and Gentiles. As the apostle there pointed out, when the Jews, for the most part, turned their backs on God’s salvation in Christ, God took that salvation to the Gentiles. Even though the pagan Gentiles were no better than the Jews, and though they were in no way looking for salvation, yet in his great mercy God sent Paul and his missionary peers to bring the gospel to them. Thus, pagan nations “who once were far away” were now “brought near” (Ephesians 2:13), so that the Gentiles might “glorify God for his mercy.”