The wrong question (1Cor 6:12)

All things are lawful for me, but not all things are profitable. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be mastered by anything. (1Cor 6:12)

Does God allow us to sin?

It’s always hard to find right answers to wrong questions. And this question, that has apparently been posed in some form or another by the Corinthians, is most definitely wrong.

No doubt Paul had taught the Corinthians about Christian liberty when he worked among them. He would have preached the good news of a new covenant, where your relationship with God is not founded on works of the law, but on the Grace of God poured out on them through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.

So if we asked “will God punish us for our sins”, the answer -- according to the Gospel -- is a loud, clear no! If God has given you new birth through his Spirit, then he also has by his sovereign decree chosen to love you unconditionally. No matter what you’ve done in the past, and no matter what you do in the future.

So doesn’t that mean the same as allowing us to sin?

The question still sounds odd, doesn’t it? It’s odd because it presumes that you want to sin. And as a born-again believer in Christ, you are overjoyed by the fact that God allows you not to sin. And you’re not -- or at least you shouldn’t be -- looking for a way back into the misery that God saved you from.

It’s kind of like asking “will God allow me to knock myself over the head with a two-by-four and then poke out both of my eyes with a rusty shrimp-fork?” Well, he may not have loved you any less if you were to do that, but that doesn’t mean that it’s not still stupid. And it doesn’t mean that there won’t be any consequences if you do it. Your head will still hurt, and you’ll still be blind, even if God still loves you.

Sin is the same way, only a lot more stupid, and with much greater potential to hurt both you and everyone you come into contact with. So are you “allowed” to do it? Is it lawful? If you still insist on asking the wrong question, than yes, it is “lawful”. But it’s not profitable. And it will master you.

An introduction to kicking people out of Church (1. Cor 5:1-8)

It is actually reported that there is immorality among you, and immorality of such a kind as does not exist even among the Gentiles, that someone has his father’s wife. You have become arrogant and have not mourned instead, so that the one who had done this deed would be removed from your midst. (1 Cor 5:1-2)

In this chapter, Paul addresses something that has grieved him deeply to hear. He has received reports of a certain sin in the church. Now of course, sin in the church is nothing new. Where there are humans in the church, there is bound to be sin. And there will be grace for the sinner to find forgiveness for it and freedom from it. That doesn’t mean that there’s something wrong with the church, but only that it’s operating normally, and doing what it’s supposed to: Putting redeemed rebels together for their common sanctification.

But you wouldn’t expect to find the type of sins that shock and disgust even unregenerate people, simply because as Christians we are not who we used to be, but we are in the process of becoming holy like God is holy. So there is bound to be an improvement compared to what we were. And as we come further and further in that process, our conscienes grow more and more sensitive, and the sins that we’re dealing with are usually things that we as unregenerate people would not even think twice about.

So when a transgression of this magnitude had happened, you’d expect the church to be at least as shocked and disgusted as the world, and to mourn this atrocity. But in stead, Paul says, they had become arrogant. In stead of being ashamed, they were proud. How could that be?

It seems like the Corinthian Church seems to have fallen into a heresy that uses grace as a means to sin in stead of to holiness. That says Christ died so that I could keep sinning, and not be punished for it, in stead of Christ died to take my punishment and set me free from the power of sin.

They would see their freedom in Christ as a freedom to sin, rather than a freedom from sin. So when they saw what they perceived to be freedom flourishing in such abundance in their church, then in stead of grieving, they became arrogant toward those whom they perceived as slaves to the law of God.

For I, on my part, though absent in body but present in spirit, have already judged him who has so committed this, as though I were present. In the name of our Lord Jesus, when you are assembled, and I with you in spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus, I have decided to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of his flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.  

Your boasting is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough? Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. For Christ our Passover also has been sacrificed. Therefore let us celebrate the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. (1 Cor 5:3-8)

We already saw it in verse 2: “so that the one who has done this deed would be removed from your midst”. Now we are going to get in to what that entails. What Paul is about to teach the Corinthians here has become one of the most unpopular doctrines in the entire Bible. Partly because in some circles it has been abused and misapplied, and partly because it’s not a pleasant or easy thing to do.

But the church has both a right and an obligation to publicly disassociate themselves from anyone who claims to be a brother, but persists in unrepentant sin.

Since this is such a controversial issue, I will be very careful to limit myself to saying what the Bible says, and not draw any conclusions and implications, except for those that are so painfully obvious that there’s no way to avoid them. So with that in mind we are going to make three observations in these verses.

1. Church discipline happens in the context of the church being gathered together:
The church is to carry out this task in unity. Paul orders them to gather the church together and pronounce a judgment on this man in unison. And though he’s absent, he adds his consent to this judgment. Another key passage on church discipline says the same:

If your brother sins, go and show him his fault in private; if he listens to you, you have won your brother. But if he does not listen to you, take one or two more with you, so that BY THE MOUTH OF TWO OR THREE WITNESSES EVERY FACT MAY BE CONFIRMED. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. (Matt 18:15-17)

Jesus goes on to say, in Matthew 18, that when the church is gathered together in unison like this then he is gathered with them. When they are judging according to his word, they are acting as his agents, pronouncing his judgments. And they are as valid in heaven as on earth:

Truly I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven. “Again I say to you, that if two of you agree on earth about anything that they may ask, it shall be done for them by My Father who is in heaven. For where two or three have gathered together in My name, I am there in their midst.” (Matt 18:18-20)

So church discipline is not something we tuck away and deal with privately. And that public process will benefit everyone in the church, as they are reminded of the dangers of starting down a path of sin. Every one present, if their hearts are right with God, will walk out of that meeting, not with a sense of pride, but with a renewed commitment to fight any appearance of evil in their own hearts.

2. The aim of church discipline is restoration:
The explanation Paul offers for his decision to put this man out of the church is so that he might have a hope of being saved: “I have decided to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of his flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.” The word flesh, can mean two things. It can mean our actual body, but it is more often used about our natural inclination toward evil. And that seems to be the most natural understanding here as well, because putting someone out of the church doesn’t really do any harm to their body.

It is also worth noting here, that Satan serves as a tool in this process. Martin Luther said something profoundly true when he said “The devil is God’s devil”. God and Satan are not equal forces battling against each other. God is the only God and infinite creator, and Satan is merely a created being in rebellion to his master. And God is keeping him on a tight leach for as long as it serves his divine purposes. Always remember that!

3. The aim of church discipline is to purify the church:
The third observation from these verses is that church discipline purifies the church. A leaven is a peace of sourdough, that was kept from one batch to the next, to get the new dough to start rising. Once the leaven was kneaded into the dough, the whole dough would take on those same properties, and you could even take a new lump from that dough and keep for the next one.

That is what happens with sin when it gets to exist within the church. It inevitably spreads to the whole church, and no one can remain unaffected by it.

Paul points to the symbolism that God installed into the passover celebration 1500 years earlier, as he freed his people from their captivity in Egypt. On the day when he told them to slaughter a lamb and put its blood on the doorposts of their house. So that the angel that God sent to execute Gods punishment over Egypt would see it, and pass over their house. And then to bake a loaf of unleavened bread, as a sign of his promise of a new nature.

At the time this provided a very real way of salvation from God’s judgment for Israel, but it was yet to be revealed that all of this was pointing to a much greater salvation. 1500 years later God slaughtered a lamb himself. And that lamb was his only son. And the blood from this lamb, his blood shed to atone for sins, covers all those who believe in him and receive him, so that on the day of judgment, God will pass over us. But if God has put the blood of his lamb on our doorposts, he has also transformed us to unleavened bread, and we are not to change that by mixing ourselves with the leaven of malice and wickedness.

Church discipline purifies the church. It helps us by freeing us from a sinful influence that would otherwise pull us down, and it also helps our outward testimony. Isn’t one of the main accusations that are leveled against the church that there are so many hypocrites in it? How many people have been turned off from the Gospel because the church has not done it’s job and cleansed out those who only claim to be Christians, but really aren’t?

I repeat that this is not a pleasant thing to do, but it is important. It’s usually not perceived as a good thing, but we can not afford not to do it. The truth is that some people are of Christ and some are of the devil. And if we allow the latter to infiltrate the church and muddle the line between the two categories, that is a wicked thing to do.

Next time we'll look more into what exactly qualifies for church discipline, so if this is all new to you, please don't go to church this Sunday applying this teaching on everyone you don't like. So please hold off at least until you get the full picture.

What do you have that you did not receive? (1. Cor 4:7)

For who regards you as superior? What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it? (1. Cor 4:7)

Here, Paul makes it personal. They can’t hide their pride behind their preachers anymore. Paul demands an answer to what would lead them to see themselves as superior to anyone else. He does so with the piercing question “what do you have that you did not receive?”

No question could be more deadly to pride and arrogance. So you claim to have discernment, do you? Who did you get it from? So your preacher is better than his preacher? Who created your preacher? Who called him into the ministry? Who died on a cross to give him something to preach about? Was it you?

Try to think about the most evil and wicked human being you can possibly imagine. Someone who’s committed sins that would make the devil himself blush. Now ask the question. What separates you from him? Nothing but the grace of God. Left to yourself you’d not only be as bad as him. You’d be worse.

“Wait”, you say. “I’m not like that. I don’t have those same inclinations to sin.” That is right, and the reason you don’t is because of God’s grace. Even if you’re a first rank atheist, you still have some remnant of god-given grace in your life too keep you from going where you would go left to yourself. His grace is to some degree restraining even the most evil person you can think of.

For when Gentiles who do not have the Law do instinctively the things of the Law, these, not having the Law, are a law to themselves, in that they show the work of the Law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness and their thoughts alternately accusing or else defending them, (Rom 2:14-15)

So what do you have that you have not received? Name one thing you’ve earned by your merits, or created yourself from nothing.

God resists the proud and gives grace to the humble. Becoming arrogant because of what you have received, is to take God’s gracious free gifts to you and turn them into something he detests. “But he who boasts is to boast in the Lord” (2.Cor 10:17).

The blessing of an undefiled conscience (1. Cor 4:4)

For I am conscious of nothing against myself, yet I am not by this acquitted; but the one who examines me is the Lord. (1.Cor 4:4)

What a blessing it is to be able to say “I don’t know of anything against myself”. It is a statement of complete rest. It is from this firm standing point that Paul can say, like he does in the previous verse, “You can think what you want about me, I don’t even care about my own opinion”. If you are able to make this statement, there are only two possible explanations. You’ve either deceived yourself to a point where your conscience is completely dead, or you’ve been cleansed by the blood of Christ.

Paul is not making this claim from a pharisaic standpoint, as one who has redefined and twisted the law to fit with his lifestyle. Nor did he make it from a standpoint of sinless perfection. This is the same man, after all, who claimed the title of chief of sinners.

So what is Paul saying here? The same thing as every Christian should be able to say. I don’t know of any past sin that I haven’t brought before Christ and been granted forgiveness for. And I don’t know of any present sin that I am not battling to the full extent of my capabilities. My soul is resting before God. I’m not hiding anything from him, and there’s no area of my life that I’m trying to keep him out of. Yes, I am a wretch, but all my faults are in God’s hands.

Satan is a carnal Christian

There's a certain odor that has been making its rounds in my general vicinity lately. Namely the preposterous idea that someone can be a Christian, and yet keep living in sin. That if you just have confessed faith in Christ with your mouth you are saved, no matter how your life looks. This couldn't possibly be further from biblical truth. Yes, the Bible says that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. (Rom 10:9) But let's be a bit more exact when we define our terms here. Nowhere does the Bible allow us a definition of faith that does not express itself in righteous living.

Even in the very next verse we find that this faith in the heart must be one resulting in righteousness. We learn in the book of James that faith not resulting in works is dead. (Jms 2:17) Then in verse 19 he really beats the final nail into the coffin of said dead faith:

You believe that God is one You do well; the demons also believe, and shudder.

There's not a demon in all of Hell that doesn't believe in God. Even Satan believes in God. Yet they live in disobedience against him. So anyone who expresses belief in God, and yet disobey him are actually placing themselves in the same category as the devil and his angels. Yet with one significant difference:

At least the demons have the fear of God to shudder at the thought of their rebellion against his holy throne.