Two weeks ago, we started a series entitled "Stand in the Gap", based upon Ezekiel 22:30. In short, God looked at Israel and found a very corrupt nation with no man that would "stand in the gap" and stand for what was holy and right. Today, we see the same thing in our country; there are many, many more that stand for what is wrong that what is right. My challenge to you was and is simply this: as a Christian, are you willing to stand in the gap--to stand for what is holy, true, just and righteous?
There are some issues that a source of contention in our society today, and sadly, even within our churches themselves. Our family left a mainline denomination in 1997 because of one of these polar issues that was rapidly on the rise: the embracing of homosexuality as an alternate lifestyle. The denomination allowed a homosexual acceptance booth at the annual denomination meeting stating they were "members in good standing" and were allowed. That denomination battles the issue still today, and, sadly, the movement has made strides toward what appears to be full acceptance.
Today's battleground has moved toward the arena of gay marriage. The common statement that comes from those wanting acceptance of or have a so-called neutral position is summed up with this statement: "if you don't agree with gay marriage, don't marry someone of the same sex!" My comeback to that statement, and yes I know this will ruffle some feathers, is this: "If we are to make that statement, then how about this one? Don't agree with Jerry Sandusky molesting children? Then don't molest children!"
Harsh statement? Perhaps. Yet, sexual sin is sexual sin according to God's Word. As I have mentioned before, we are missing the big picture. It is not just homosexuality, or polygamy or premarital sex or adultery or pornography--it is sexual sin. The church has grown tolerant of sexual sin, and that is quite contrary to God's Word.
This week, we are going to begin a teaching, which may last a few weeks, regarding sexual sin, God's view of the seriousness of that sin, and how we as believers are to react to it both individually and as a church. We will also discover how the church's neglect in dealing with the issue has affected it's witness in the world and also in our own neighborhood.
The Corinthianizing of the Church
It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and such sexual immorality as is not even named among the Gentiles--that a man has his father's wife! 1 Corinthians 5:1(NKJV)
We are going to begin by looking at sexual sin within the context of the local church, how that church dealt with it, and how it should mourned instead of being filled with pride. It is not a comfortable topic to discuss, but one that is needed if we are to be salt and light in the world and have a good reputation with God and with men.
The Bible is replete with passages that condemn sexual sin. The seventh commandment concerns sexual sin (adultery), but it is not the first passage that dealt with that sin. We can see sexual sin in the book of Genesis with such accounts of the people of Sodom and Gomorrrah and the destruction due to their sexual sin and other sins; Abraham and Hagar; Judah and Tamar; the attempted seduction of Joseph by Potiphar's wife and others. Indeed, sexual sin is as old as history records and is addressed in most books of the Bible at least in an indirect form.
The city of Corinth was a pagan city that had a sex and alcohol debauched religion. In fact, Corinth was so corrupt morally that people from the region in referring to one whom was completely debauched and grossly immoral were said to be "corinthianized". No, the town has nothing to do with that famous term coined by Chrysler Corporation and uttered by the late Ricardo Montalban "fine Corinthian leather". It was a city of a moral limbo dance, with each one trying to see "how low you can go".
But, God changes lives when He saves people through Jesus Christ and a local church was started in Corinth. But that church had huge problems as the issues of pride, lust, sex, covetousness, drunkenness, infighting and heresy in the church to the extent that John MacArthur calls them the "cruddy Corinthians". But really, if you give it some thought, does this not describe many churches today?
Paul had been contacted by members of the Corinthian church about the different issues contained in this first letter to the Corinthians and Paul goes to great lengths to correct these problems. In fact, a common phrase in 1 Corinthians is "Do you not know?" Paul had taught them prior both personally and in a prior letter which is not part of the canon of Scripture and was, in short, saying "You don't know this? You were taught this before, how could you forget"?
Here is 1 Corinthians 5, he addresses the most serious of issues: not just sexual sin, not just extramarital sex but the sin of incest. This was a man who was living in sin with his stepmother! This was a sin that was not only shunned by those of the faith but also the Roman government and other religions of the day as well.
Today's church in America by and large, is "corinthianized". It has allowed the world--including sexual immorality--to infect the church.
It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and such sexual immorality as is not even named among the Gentiles--that a man has his father's wife! And you are puffed up, and have not rather mourned, that he who has done this deed might be taken away from among you. For I indeed, as absent in body but present in spirit, have already judged (as though I were present) him who has so done this deed. In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when you are gathered together, along with my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. 1 Corinthians 5:1-5
Danger From Within
"All it takes for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing"--Edmund Burke
In order to cover the rest of 1 Corinthians 5, we must move along quickly so let's roll. Paul is speaking about a man who is in an incestuous relationship with his stepmother (his father's wife). This is an ongoing situation, is a known fact (because of the wording of "actually reported") and not mere gossip. In fact, Paul is astonished as we should be should such a situation occur.
But worse yet is the attitude of the Corinthian church toward the situation: they were in a mode of "acceptance". In fact, they were "puffed up" in their pride that they were "accepting" of this man, when in fact they should have mourned over his sin and it's seriousness and Paul is astonished that they have not dealt with the situation.
How should a situation be dealt with? The common thought among many, including those in the church, is "judge not lest ye be judged!" However, in that passage, Matthew 7:1, Jesus dealt with motive and not known and proven action. You and I are not to judge motives of others, but we are to judge action or fruit (whether good or bad). The method of church discipline is shown in Matthew 18:15-20, is, stated concisely this: one on one, offended to offender; if no resolution, then repeat taking along two witnesses; if no resolution then take it before the church as a whole. This situation was being dealt with in spirit but not in actual presence by Paul who was directing the Corinthian church in this manner since they would not do it themselves.
But next comes a measure than none of us would relish, and if we do then we would have to be indeed heartless and cold. Because of the great sin involved, and the apparent unwillingness to turn from the sin this man was involved in, Paul said to turn him over to Satan for "the destruction of his flesh". Strong punishment? Yes. But sometimes that is what it takes, for a person to go through a hell on earth to come to face their sin for what it is and to come back to God in obedience.
We are to love people, but when it comes to the church we are also to love them enough to address their sin and even ask God to deal with them. Hard? Yes. Needed? Absolutely. Sadly, needed more in the church today than ever.
Your glorying is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump? Therefore purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened. For indeed Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us. Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
1 Corinthians 5:6-8 (NKJV)
The Wedge In The Locust Post
There is good glory, and there is bad glory. The term from Koine Greek translated as glory here is better translated in the NASB Updated as boasting. We can boast or brag about things that are good but most often it is the negatives that we do. In Corinth, there was more bad glorying going on than good glorying.
As we saw in yesterday's devotional, the brethren in Corinth were more than accepting the situation with the incestuous man, they were all puffed up and proud of the fact! There are some folks in churches today that are all about grace and not about truth, and that was the case with the Corinthians. There must be a balance or we either stray into legalism or into license; we are all about keeping the rules or we are all about freedom without restraint.
See, here in Corinth and in the local church, we see an important principle: sin corrupts. As I mentioned last week, Satan rarely does an all out frontal assault but instead seeks to separate the Christian from God in fellowship by eating away at their morals little by little. When I was a kid, I remember splitting locust logs into posts. That old locust wood was great for making posts, it was tough and long lasting but after you started driving a wedge in it would start to split until the log was in two long pieces--two separate posts.
The metaphor that Paul uses here is leaven or yeast. All it takes is a small pinch of yeast to make bread rise and puff up, and Paul's point here is that sin does the same thing to a local church. There are different shades to our attitude toward sin; there is tolerance and then there is acceptance. We may not agree with a certain sin that a person does but we tolerate it but it is a different story when we accept that as common practice and condone it. And when one person in a church accepts the sinful behavior of a person then another does and another until the majority of the people accept it. It is the wedge in the locust post.
The example of leaven and sin is shown in the Passover feast itself. Jesus was without sin, and the Feast of Unleavened Bread which preceded the Passover showed the symbolism of getting rid of sin in the life of the Jew and now in us as believers. The Israelites were instructed in Exodus to remove each and every bit of leaven from the home, the same as a person that comes to Jesus Christ repents of sin and leaves it behind. Here in Corinth, they were returning to the sin that they had repented of when they came to Jesus in faith and were making a mockery of the faith.
When we are sincere about our faith and straight up applying the truth of God's Word in our individual walk and corporate walk as a church, then God is glorified and God does miraculous things. Otherwise, God is mocked by the unsaved.
I wrote to you in my epistle not to keep company with sexually immoral people. Yet I certainly did not mean with the sexually immoral people of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world. But now I have written to you not to keep company with anyone named a brother, who is sexually immoral, or covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or an extortioner--not even to eat with such a person.
1 Corinthians 5:9-11 (NKJV)
Shame, Shame! We Know Your Name!
There is a great deal of press today on the topic of self esteem. While there are some folks that suffer from a lack of self esteem--which is indeed a problem--our society has gone overboard with the topic. Children in grade school are not given the A-F grades as I did when I was a kid, but instead are given what some call "Lucky Charms" report cards with stars, moons and clovers! I was part of a major denominational church back in the 1990's that actually taught in a Sunday School teacher training school that the teacher is a mere moderator, and that all viewpoints are equally valid. It was politically correct teaching; if I believed that lying was not justified but you did then both points are valid even though the Bible says that we are more like Satan when we lie!
Shame is perhaps one of the greatest teachers one can have. If we are blindly accepted and never corrected then we have no moral compass to go by; there is no accountability and we can act however we want. Here in the Corinthian church the idea was that sin was accepted as the norm and there were no repercussions. Now comes a tough teaching where, as J. Vernon McGee often said "the rubber meets the road".
If someone claims Jesus as their Savior but is involved in sexual immorality, or are covetous (here meaning someone that defrauds), or extortioners (those that enrich themselves by using violent means, such as threats of harm or death), or idolaters (those who are given over to the worship of anyone or anything other than the true God, and who practice the terrible sins of immorality that are almost always connected with idolatry) then we are not to associate with them.1
Why would we not associate with them? To bring them shame. It is tough love, but there is a need for people to understand that there are consequences to sin. Otherwise, why would a person abandon that behavior?
However, Paul makes it abundantly clear that this prohibition does not apply to those that are without Jesus as their Savior. Why? Those folks are lost in their sin and they are judged by God already. Because they are lost in sin, how would we expect them to live for Christ when He does not live within their hearts?
The last verse gives a virtual plethora of sinful behavior that is not to be part of the life of the believer that includes the prior list but adds two additional sinful lifestyles: revilers (those abusive toward others) and drunkards (self explanatory). Paul states we are not to even have a common meal with that person.--JH
Typing MAD!
For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Do you not judge those who are within the church? But those who are outside, God judges. REMOVE THE WICKED MAN FROM AMONG YOURSELVES. 1 Corinthians 5:12-13 (NASB)
"Discipline is not inconsistent with love. It is lack of discipline, in fact, that is inconsistent with love." John MacArthur, MacArthur New Testament Commentary – 1 Corinthians
If you are online in one of the social networks or text often, you are probably familiar with what CAPS LOCK means. It is sometimes used to make a point, but most often it means that you are YELLING AT SOMEONE!
Here, I have used the New American Standard Version (NASB) for emphasis of Paul's point--that action was in order in the situation. It could not possibly be any more clear what Paul means here, to not only shun fellowship on a personal basis but to remove that man from fellowship.
How should we deal with sin? Straight up. With sincerity and truth. First as an individual out of love, then if that doesn't work with two witnesses. If that does not work, then the subject is brought to the church. With each successive step, the shame factor weighs on the heart; the person will come to understand that sin is not part and parcel of the church. And, if that person does not repent, then drastic steps must be taken.
But is that the end of the story? Absolutely not. What is the goal of God in dealing with such a person? To bring them back to fellowship. That person, when he or she is outside the church fellowship, then becomes fair game for Satan and beyond the protection of God. In short, we turn that person over to Satan to "have at em". There is Biblical precedent for this; in the book of Job we see where Job was turned over to Satan, and also in 1 Timothy 1:20 where Alexander and Hymenaeus were turned over to Satan for blasphemy.
In all things, we are to love people and this type of situation is no exception. We are not to take pleasure in bringing a person to shame AT ALL. As Paul said in the beginning of this chapter, we should mourn over this type of sin and not to revel in the acceptance in it. We need to let that person know that we love them, do not want to see them continue in this sin and offer to pray and even to help them if they seek to turn from that sin and back to God.
What then, happened to this man? Did he turn from his sin? Yes, he did. We see in 2 Corinthians 2:5-11 deals with forgiving those that have fallen and turned away from their sin and back to God, and how we are to "love on em". Welcome them home. They are children of God, and we are to welcome them back to the fold the same as the Prodigal Son was welcomed back home by his father.
Pray for them. Look for them to come back. Love them when they do.
