SCRIPTURE: 1 CORINTHIANS 6
MEMORY VERSE:
“You were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body.” (1 Corinthians 6:20)
LAWSUITS AMONG BELIEVERS (vs. 1-11)
Paul told the believers:
- If you have a dispute with another, take the judgment before the saints instead of taking it before the ungodly. (vs. 1-5)
- The fact that you have lawsuits among you means there are those who cheat and do wrong. (vs. 7-8)
- The wicked – sexually immoral, idolaters, adulterers, male prostitutes, homosexual offenders, thieves, the greedy, drunkards, slanderers, swindlers – will not inherit the kingdom of God. (v.9-10)
SEXUAL IMMORALITY (vs. 12-20)
“Everything is permissible for me, but not everything is beneficial. “Everything is permissible for me, but I will not be mastered by anything.” (vs. 12). The body is not meant for sexual immorality, but for the Lord and the Lord for the body. Your bodies are members of Christ himself. So never take the members of Christ and unite them with a prostitute. He who unites himself with the Lord is one with him in Spirit.
Flee from sexual immorality for he who sins sexually sins against his own body. Your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God. You are not your own. You were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body.
THOUGHTS:
The Corinthian believers were compromising with the world and losing their testimony before the unbelievers. They brought cases to court before pagan judges. Paul asked them to settle their disputes and resolve their differences among themselves. As Christians, we have the Holy Spirit and the mind of Christ, so why should we turn to those who lack God’s wisdom? Believers are given the authority in the future to judge the world and the angels, so why won’t we be able to deal with disputes among ourselves?
God gives us freedom to use and enjoy anything that comes from God. But Christians should not abuse this freedom and hurt themselves or others. We have the freedom to eat and drink. But eating too much leads to gluttony, and gluttony to obesity. Drinking too much liquor leads to health problems and relationship issues. Be careful that what God has allowed you to enjoy does not grow into a bad habit that controls you.
Sexual sin has the power to destroy physically and mentally. Sexual immorality had devastated countless lives and destroyed families, churches, communities and even nations. Since Corinth has the temple of the love goddess Aphrodite, sex was part of their worship ritual. Paul specifically stated that Christians are to have no part in sexual immorality even if it is acceptable and popular in their culture.
God created sex to be an essential ingredient of marriage. But sexual sin – sex outside the marriage relationship – hurts God and man. It hurts God because it shows that we prefer following our own desires instead of the leading of the Holy Spirit. It hurts others because it violates the commitment necessary to a relationship. It brings diseases to bodies and affects our personality.
When we become Christians, the Holy Spirit comes to live in us. Therefore, we no longer own our bodies. Christ’s death freed us from sin but also obligates us to his service. Since your body belongs to God, you must not violate his standards for living.