1 Corinthinas 5:5-6 "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. Your glorying is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump?"
This scripture is written in the context of a church having a member sin without repentance. To make matters worse the church just excepted his sin and kept on going as if it was okay. The dude was sleeping with his dads wife (stepmother to him), ya you heard me right! And we think that the stuff we see on Springer is "new school". His sin was bad enough but for him to continue to live in this sin unrepentantly (not acknowledging it as wrong) was ridiculous and it even made the Pagans cringe (according to Johnny Mac). Paul is telling them they need to rebuke this guy and if he still is shameless they need to boot him out of the church. Paul makes his point clear with verse 6 that I love, "a little leaven leavens the whole lump". If you got a batch of dough and you put a little leaven in it the whole lump rises, the same way a little mildew can spoil a whole loaf.
We can look at this scripture in a couple different ways.
1) watch who we surround ourselves with and when our friends are claiming to be part of the flock (christian) and living in unrepentant sin we need to hold them accountable despite the uncomfortable nature of the conversation. When you accept Jesus you sign on for this.
2) we need to be aware of the sin that can creep into our lives. The small sins that starts to infect other parts of our life and then explode into a huge (possibly public) issue.
This really goes back to one of my favorite themes "keep fighting against temptation and sin".
1 comment:
Good post Jules. The church has a problem with this way too often. The church will tolerate sin within but shun the sin outside. What since does that make? The church will hate on homosexuals while members within are committing adultery left and right. Both are lust issues that need to be addressed but which one do you think the church puts more focus on sometimes?
We are not to judge each other as believers with self-righteous intent and we are to not waste our time judging non-believers at all. When we judge one another as believers often times it is done in a way as to put yourself above your fellow brother and to look down upon him. There is a righteous kind of judgement that we are supposed to exercise with careful discernment. Paul was very clear on this in his first letter to the Corinthians (1 Corinthians 5:9-13). Paul demands that sin within the church be addressed and judged rightly for correction in order to save the fellow believer from his own sinful self-destruction (1 Corinthians 5:1-5). The unrepentant person should be judged so that they will not be an evil influence in the church and will more likely be saved through such judgement rather than if his actions were simply tolerated and accepted within the church. Anyone who tolerates and accepts habitual sin practiced by a fellow believer does not truly love or care for their brothers in Christ. Now as for non-believers, Paul says it best, "For what have I to do with judging those also who are outside?"(1 Corinthians 5:12). Jesus says, "do not cast your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you in pieces" (Matthew 7:6). Judging non-believers is a meaningless waste of time because you are basically trying to hold them to a standard that they do not acknowledge in the first place. What good does it do to condemn someone for having pre-marital sex if they do not already acknowledge that pre-marital sex is wrong. It is a waste of time and is dishonoring to God when we judge non-believers since we are first called to reach out and love our non-believing neighbors. Immorality within the church must be judged but immorality outside the church is not for us to judge. So self-examination time.... am I guilty of sometimes judging those outside of the church? Yes. Too often. Am I also guilty of sometimes tolerating and accepting habitual sin within the lifestyles of fellow brothers? Again, Yes. Answering "yes" to both questions is so embarrassing and disappointing because how big of a hypocrite must I be to judge those outside of the church and at the same time tolerate the same immoralities within members of the church? Wow, disgraceful to say the least.
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