For all the work done by Christians on the extreme ends of the spectrum (both liberal and conservative) to boil Christianity down to set of rules which one must follow in order to be saved I offer in return Romans 14.1-12.
For conservative Christians, Paul is the source of most of the rules. It makes sense that Paul would be a ruley sort of guy; he was, after all, a Pharisee. And maybe its because of the whole "New Testament" name that credit is given to the newer (read found later in the Bible) material (even though Paul's letter's most likely pre-date the written text of 75% of the gospels).
It is interesting then that Paul, rule guy that he is, would take the time to write a paragraph that is so clearly postmodern. Well, not postmodern, since modernity wouldn't come around for another 1400 years or so, but it is a very open and conversational approach to Christian community. "Those who eat must not despise those who abstain, and those who abstain must not pass judgment on those who eat; for God has welcomed them." Or, in other words, it ain't up to us, so let's follow God to the best of our abilities. Surely, we are called to discern as a community, but the group that I run with is just one of hundreds of thousands of such groups, and we all come up with slightly different understandings of God's will for his Creation.
And that is OK.
As the Collect for Sunday says, "O God, because without you we are not able to please you mercifully grant that your Holy Spirit may in all things direct and rule our hearts..." Amen.
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