Nope, you still can't divorce (1Cor 7:15-16)

Yet if the unbelieving one leaves, let him leave; the brother or the sister is not under bondage in such cases, but God has called us to peace. For how do you know, O wife, whether you will save your husband? Or how do you know, O husband, whether you will save your wife? (1Cor 7:15-16)

This is a very controversial piece of text, since many are very eager to read into it something that isn't there. But let's start with the easy part. What everyone can agree on is that if the unbelieving spouse leaves, then let them leave. You don’t have to club them over the head and drag them to a dungeon in your basement so you can keep them around. When you have done everything you can to win them over, and at the end of it all they still decide to leave, then there’s nothing you can do about it.

The part that gets controversial is the question of what it means that the brother or the sister is not under bondage in such cases. Most theologians say that it means they are free to divorce their unsaved spouse and marry someone else. The text doesn’t specifically say that though. It just says they are not under bondage. That could very well mean under bondage to live together as husband and wife. After all that was the command the whole chapter started with. That is the basic doctrine that Paul is expanding on in this context.

And from looking at the Greek text a very strong case could be made for saying that the bondage referred to is not the marriage bond that God has bound them together with. First of all the word used here, dedoulotai - a form of douloo, is not the same as the Bible uses elsewhere when it talks about the marriage bond. Actually the word used means slavery, which is why some translations instead say that the brother or sister is not enslaved. I’m sure you’ll all agree with me that being bound to a spouse is not the same thing as being enslaved, even if they are an unbeliever.

In addition the phrase “not under bondage” is written in the perfect passive indicative tense. And we all know what that means, don’t we?

*chirp, chirp*

Well if we don’t we can do like I did and read about it on the Internet. It means that it is a present condition arising out of a past action. Which means that the believing spouse neither is, nor has been enslaved in such cases.

That means that if you are going to say that not enslaved meas free to remarry, you are saying that the spouse is not bound to the marriage, and never has been bound to the marriage. Even before the unsaved spouse leaves. But that would totally contradict verse 12-13, which say a marriage to an unbeliever is still valid. And that means we have to discard that interpretation.

So that that all this verse says is that a believer is not enslaved to an unsaved spouse who leaves them. They are free to not live together as husband and wife. Nothing more, nothing less.

Verse 16 confirms this interpretation. “For how do you know whether you can save your spouse?” What interpretation of the previous verse makes sense in combination with this one? Try it! If they leave, you are free to remarry, because you don’t know that staying single is going to save your spouse? That doesn’t fit together. This does: If they leave, you are free to let them go. But am I not responsible for staying with them and bringing them to Christ? No. How do you know whether they ever will be saved, and whether you’ll be the instrument to bring them there?

Making sense of 1 Cor 7:14

For the unbelieving husband is sanctified through his wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified through her believing husband; for otherwise your children are unclean, but now they are holy. (1Cor 7:14)

Now what do we have here? This is one of those verses that has always left readers scratching their heads. The lack of context has led to some strange interpretations, such as the idea that someone could achieve salvation simply by being married to a believer, or have a believing parent.

Others have used this to argue that there is clearly a transaction of holiness from parents to children, so therefore we should baptize infants.

But let’s take a closer look at the verse, and see if we can’t make better sense of it after all.

The verse starts with the word “for”, which binds it to the previous verse. You should not break off a marriage with an unbelieving spouse, for the unbelieving spouse is sanctified through the believing one. If that wasn’t so your children would be unclean.

I want you to notice that Paul doesn’t say “their children.” He says “your children.” That’s interesting. He is speaking in third person about those who are in mixed marriages, but then he switches to second person. So the children who would be unclean is not the children of an unbelieving spouse. It is the children of everyone in the Corinthian church.

Now that probably only made matters worse when it comes to understanding this verse. So let me explain how I read this verse.

I believe Paul is making a parallel between the relationship between a husband and wife, and the relationship between parents and children. He is saying that if those who are in mixed marriages can’t live with their spouse because they haven’t come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, then you couldn’t live with your children either. Not until they had been saved.

He is agreeing that there is a problem with being married to an unbeliever. The holy and the unclean under the same roof. What is set apart for God being mixed with what is unclean. But the issue isn’t limited to those mixed marriages. It is an issue that exists in every Christian home where there are children who haven’t come to know God.

But in God’s eyes that does not make the christian unclean, but rather it makes the non-christian set apart in a certain sense because of the christian.

Do not divorce! (1Cor 7:10-13)

But to the married I give instructions, not I, but the Lord, that the wife should not leave her husband (but if she does leave, she must remain unmarried, or else be reconciled to her husband), and that the husband should not divorce his wife. (1Cor 7:10-13)

But to the rest I say, not the Lord, that if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, and she consents to live with him, he must not divorce her. And a woman who has an unbelieving husband, and he consents to live with her, she must not send her husband away.

Now we move on to the instructions to those who are already married. First to those where both spouses are children of God, and then to those where one spouse is not saved.

So to those who are married, he doesn’t say anything on his own, but reminds them of the words of the Lord Jesus when he dealt with the same question. “What God has put together, let no man separate.” And “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery against her; and if she herself divorces her husband and marries another man, she is committing adultery”

I want you to look a little at the language used here though. It says the wife must not leave, or separate from, her husband. And then, remarkably it says “but if she does...” We’ll get back to that part later.

Then it says a husband must not divorce, or send away, his wife. There’s no “but if he does” in this case.

I don’t think the point here is to distinguish between men and women. I don’t see any hints of that elsewhere in the Bible. “Do not divorce” seems universal. Rather I think what Paul is doing is including both men and women, and distinguishing between divorce and separation.

So his command is the same as the Lords command: Do not divorce! And then he adds, do not separate either! But if you do, don’t further violate your marriage covenant, and seek to be reconciled to each other again.

Be careful so that you don’t interpret “but if you do” as a permission to break the command. “Do not separate” is still valid even if it is followed by “but if you do”. And the “but if you do” basically tells you to undo what has been done in the breaking of the commandment. It is a gracious provision to get you back on the track that you left, but you’d still be better off never leaving that track in the first place.

Then he goes on to address those who are married to someone who isn’t saved. When he says that these instructions are from himself and not from the Lord, he is not saying that this particular portion of scripture is not the word of God. That it’s just something that he made up on his own without any divine inspiration. What he’s saying is that Jesus didn’t specifically talk about the issue of mixed marriages during his ministry on earth..

This really is another case of “but if you do”, because as Christians we are commanded not to be bound together with unbelievers.

Do not be bound together with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness? Or what harmony has Christ with Belial, or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever? (2Cor 6:14-15)

And in verse 39 in this chapter when we get to the instructions for widows, Paul says they can marry whomever they want to, but with one stipulation. They must be “in the Lord”. They have to be believers.

So this provision seems to have been made primarily for those who were already married before they were saved, and therefore had an unbelieving spouse, although there might have been some who had foolishly let themselves be bound together with an unbeliever after they had been saved as well.

This teaches us something about the nature of marriage. These are people who were married before they knew God, in a pagan temple, according to pagan customs. Their covenant was not established before God. But still he holds them to it. He considers their marriage to be valid, and expects them to honor it. In God’s eyes they are married even though it wasn’t a Christian marriage. I’m just pointing that out because you may find it useful when counseling people who come to Jesus with a complicated past when it comes to marriage.

Check back on Monday to see if there's an exception to this rule if you're married to someone who isn't saved (hint: There isn't)

God's word to the single (1Cor 7:8-9)

But I say to the unmarried and to widows that it is good for them if they remain even as I. But if they do not have self-control, let them marry; for it is better to marry than to burn with passion. (1Cor 7:8-9)

Having laid out some principles about marriage and singleness, Paul now moves on to give more concrete advice, first to the unmarried and then to the married. We'll deal with the unmarried today, and move on to those who are married on Wednesday, Lord willing.

To the unmarried and to widows he says it is good for them to remain single. We talked a little about why last time, and we’ll talk more about it later. If you are single you don’t have to worry about all the things that married people worry about. You have fewer responsibilities, and more time to devote to serving God.

If I may be so bold, I want to point out one thing that Paul doesn’t touch on here, and that is that while some are called to be single and some are called to be married, all of us are called to be single in seasons of our lives. Even if you know you are ultimately called to marriage, you still have to be single until you get married. And since it is the exception that spouses die at the same time, there’s a good chance that you will go through another unmarried season as a widow or widower.

So if you are called to marriage, you are still called to seasons of singleness as well. And if you are in one of those seasons, in spite of your gifting and calling, God has a plan and purpose for that. A lot of us, myself included, wasted many of the extra opportunities that season brought by focusing too much on making it end.

There’s nothing wrong with wanting the single season to end, because along with unique opportunities it brings unique temptations. It is better to marry than to burn with passion. Marriage is a high calling, bu it is not your primary calling. Your primary purpose is to glorify God and enjoy him forever. Marriage is one way to do that. While you’re waiting to get there, you can still glorify God and enjoy him in other ways. If you can’t glorify God as a single person, you can’t glorify him as a married person. If marriage is the primary purpose of your existence, then God isn’t It’s as simple as that.

Marriage or singleness - What's best? (1 Cor 7:6-7)

But this I say by way of concession, not of command. Yet I wish that all men were even as I myself am. However, each man has his own gift from God, one in this manner, and another in that. (1 Cor 7:6-7)

A concession means that an exception is made to the general rule. An accommodation made necessary by extraordinary circumstances. The rule that the exception is made to is the one we see in verse 2: Each man is to have his own wife and each woman her own husband.

Of course when a single man like Paul says that every man should have his own wife, it’s natural to ask why he doesn’t have one himself. If singleness is not spiritually superior to marriage, then why doesn’t he, as their spiritual father, take a wife.

Paul deals with this question with tremendous wisdom. He says he wishes everybody was like him; single and satisfied living his life in celibacy. But he also recognises that that his ability to be satisfied without a wife is a special gift from the Lord that not everybody has. From his vantage point he sees many advantages to being single. In stead of focusing on a wife and children he is able to devote his life totally and completely to Christ in ways that no married man can do. He is able to travel the world, to dangerous places where Christians are persecuted for Christ’s sake. All his time and energy can be put into proclaiming the Gospel.

It is important for us not to miss the last sentence in verse 7, though. Each man has his own gift from God, one in this manner and another in that. Like the Corinthians we’re inclined to ask the question “What is best?” The answer is that what is best depends on your calling and gifting.

If you are going to travel like Paul to preach the gospel in places where it’s likely that you and your family will face severe persecution, and in addition God has gifted you in a way that allows you to be satisfied as a single man without facing any great temptations because of it, then it is probably best for you to remain single, in the same way that it was best for Paul to be single.

However, if God has called you to be a husband and a father, or a wife and mother, then it’s probably best for you to marry.

As we go through the rest of this chapter over the next weeks, that will be a reoccurring theme. How you apply this chapter to your life depends on your particular calling and gifting. We don’t get absolute answers. Just the right questions to ask, so that we can find the right answer for ourselves in our unique situations.

Don't quote this verse to your wife (1 Cor 7:3-5)

The husband must fulfill his duty to his wife, and likewise also the wife to her husband. The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does; and likewise also the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. Stop depriving one another, except by agreement for a time, so that you may devote yourselves to prayer, and come together again so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control (1 Cor 7:3-5)

Paul goes on to warn married Corinthians, that there is no spiritual gain in abstaining from sex with your spouse. To the contrary, you owe it to each other, and depriving each other will put both of you in serious spiritual danger. If you do, you’ll be tempted to fulfill your God-given desires for marital intimacy in less God-honoring ways.

So false gnostic ideas of spirituality is what is in view here. That is what the verse talks about, and that’s the context in which we are to use it. But there is another use that is very tempting to some, and I want to take a couple of minutes to warn you against that use in hopes to bless your marriages and point out the importance of always practising good hermeneutics.

If you are blessed to be married, you’ve probably noticed that you are two separate people, and as such you are almost certainly different. And one of the differences that most often cause conflicts in marriages are the different levels of physical desires and needs.

I’ll direct this advice to the husbands, although some times it’s reversed. This is my challenge to you, men: If this is an area of conflict in your marriage, then make a commitment today to never quote this verse to your wife. You may win the argument with it, but you’ll lose your wife’s heart. In stead be a man and sacrifice for her. You be the one who yields to her! You find out what her needs are and meet them. Study your wife. Love her like Christ loves the church. Make her want you by loving her sacrificially. Not by legalistic duty.

Now notice that I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with this Bible verse. What I’m telling you is that this verse is not for this use. The issue Paul is addressing is the idea that abstaining from sex in marriage makes you more spiritual. If that is the issue in your marriage, feel free to make an exception to my rule, and quote this verse to your wife every day. In that case this truth would liberate her to fully enjoy all of God’s gifts in marriage.

But most likely that is not your issue. That is not an idea that is very prevalent in our culture at all. So all you would achieve by quoting this verse is using guilt to pressure your wife to do something she for some reason is reluctant to do. There are two great dangers here. First you put her soul at risk by leading her into legalism. Second, you take away any inclination she might have to enjoy it. If you make sex a duty it will cease to be a joy.

With this in mind, we get to the exception that Paul makes. That is, that you may by mutual consent abstain for a period of time for the sake of prayer. There are times in our christian walk when we pray about certain things with great urgency. Often when we or someone we love are going through a great trial, or we have an important decision to make that we don’t feel a peace about. Whatever the situation is, God puts this urgency on our hearts and draws us into prayer in such a special way that everything else becomes unimportant. Even food. And this can go over a period of hours or days or longer.

I’m sure you would agree with me that if you are in such a state it’s not a good time for your spouse to come and suggest you take a trip to the bedroom. The good and understanding husband or wife will in stead join their spouse in prayer, and agree to put their immediate physical needs on hold until God has released their spouse from their calling to urgent prayer.

Abstaining from sex, in itself, is not spiritual, just as abstaining from food in itself is not spiritual. But some times you do it, not for the sake of false spirituality or legalism, but because God moves you to do it.

Hands off the ladies? (1 Cor. 7:1-2)

Now concerning the things about which you wrote, it is good for a man not to touch a woman. But because of immoralities, each man is to have his own wife, and each woman is to have her own husband. (1 Cor 7:1-2)

Paul’s first sentence in this chapter invites us to do a little bit of speculation. What were the things about which they wrote? Actually it doesn’t take too much speculation to get a rough idea. In the rest of the chapter he answers questions about marriage versus singleness. Although the questions aren’t stated, the answers give us a pretty good idea of what kind of questions they might have been.

He answers that while singleness is good, marriage is also good, and each have their strengths and weaknesses based on the particular gifting you have, what your calling is, and other circumstances. He answers that those who are married to unbelievers should do their utmost to preserve those marriages. And he says that while those who are single have more freedom to serve the Lord, those who are married should not divorce so that they can share in this privilege.

Apparently the idea that celibacy was superior to marriage had gained some traction in Corinth. In some ways it’s easy to understand, considering the prevalence of sexual immorality there as we have seen in the last two chapters. And Paul himself was a single man, so perhaps they thought he would agree with them that, for the sake of avoiding such carnal pleasures, it was better to avoid sex altogether, even in the context of marriage.

That idea stems from a heresy known as gnosticism, and the basic premise it that the material world is inherently evil, and that there is a special knowledge (gnosis) that allows us to break free from the physical realm into the spiritual. This usually involves various practices of self-denial and self-abasement. Paul confronts this more directly in his letter to the Colossians:

If you have died with Christ to the elementary principles of the world, why, as if you were living in the world, do you submit yourself to decrees, such as, “Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch!” (which all refer to things destined to perish with use)—in accordance with the commandments and teachings of men? These are matters which have, to be sure, the appearance of wisdom in self-made religion and self-abasement and severe treatment of the body, but are of no value against fleshly indulgence. (Col 2:20-23)

So answering their first question he says yes, it is good for a man not to touch a woman. It is good for a man to live a celibate lifestyle, but only insofar as that doesn’t put him in a situation where he’s tempted to commit immorality. But because of the risk of immorality, every man who desires a wife should be allowed to have one, and every woman who desires a husband should be allowed to have one without being subjected to man-made commandments of self-abasement.

What you do to your body, you do to God's temple (1Cor 6:18-20)

Flee immorality. Every other sin that a man commits is outside the body, but the immoral man sins against his own body. Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body. (1Cor 6:18-20)

Concluding this section dedicated to sexual immorality, Paul says flee from it. That means run. Run for your life. Run faster than you run from every other sin, because this one defiles you in a way that no other sin has the power to do.

If you’re like me, you’re tempted to say “Wait a minute. There are other sins that affects your body. How about drug abuse? Or suicide? That has to affect the body more than fornication”

If you still think of your body as merely a biological entity, you’d be correct in stating those objections, but Paul argues that since the Holy Spirit lives in you, your body is a temple. And the worst sin you can commit against a temple is not tearing it down. It is defiling it. Bringing that which is unclean into it.

The Lord never let fire rain down on the Roman army that destroyed the temple in Jerusalem in 70 AD. But when Nadab and Abihu approached God’s altar with a fire that wasn’t from God, he torched them alive (Lev 10:1-2)

Your body is a temple. It is holy, set apart for God. It doesn’t belong to you. It is his. He bought it at the price of his son’s blood. Therefore glorify God in it.

Don't prostitute Christ (1Cor 6:14-17)

Now God has not only raised the Lord, but will also raise us up through His power. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take away the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? May it never be! Or do you not know that the one who joins himself to a prostitute is one body with her? For He says, “THE TWO SHALL BECOME ONE FLESH.” But the one who joins himself to the Lord is one spirit with Him. (1Cor 6:14-17)

The stomach and the food in it will pass away, we learnt in the last verse. But you are a member of the Body of Christ. And that is not temporary, but eternal. God raised him from his grave, to live eternally, and he has promised to raise us up to eternal life with him as well.

As members of the Body of Christ - his hands and his feet, his eyes and his ears and mouth - whatever we do with our bodies we also do with his body. If we prostitute our own bodies, we prostitute his body.

Now when Paul says “he who joins himself with a prostitute”, you need to know how common prostitution was in Corinth. In our culture prostitution is considered immoral, but it is not considered immoral to sleep with just about anyone you’re not married to as long as there’s no exchange of money involved. In Corinth it was almost the other way around. Ancient Greece was a society very much divided by class, and to defile a free woman was a very serious matter. A slave or a prostitute on the other hand was no big deal. So with the average age of marriage for men being 30 years, you can probably imagine how common this sin was.

In addition Corinth had a temple to the goddess Aphrodite. Like with modern paganism, Aphrodite worshippers saw sexuality as a pathway to religious experiences, and their ceremonies were very sexual in nature. That made the temple a natural marketplace for those who sold such services.

So when Paul is talking about joining oneself to a prostitute, he is not saying that prostitution is the only form of fornication that is wrong. But he’s addressing the most common form of fornication that took place in their culture.

While prostitutes were looked down upon, their clients were not accustomed to being under the same stigma. And telling them that if they sleep with prostitutes they are no better than them would be as strange to them as saying if you eat beef you’re no better than a cow.

But sex has the power to create a very unique and powerful union between a man and a woman. Indeed that was the purpose for which God created it. To tie a wife and a husband together for life with unbreakable bonds. Those who treat it as just another biological process soon end up discovering the pain for those bods being torn apart as you move from one partner to another. You have joined yourself to them. In Biblical terms, you have become one flesh with them.

Now when you make yourself one with a prostitute, than you’ve made yourself a prostitute. And if you are one spirit with Christ, if you are a member of his body, then you have prostituted him.

On eating forks (1Cor 6:13)

Food is for the stomach and the stomach is for food, but God will do away with both of them. Yet the body is not for immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord is for the body. (1Cor 6:13)

Some things are made for each other, and others aren’t. The stomach is for food. A couple of years ago, a dutch medical magazine published an article about a 52 years old woman who came to the hospital complaining about a stomach ache. They ended up giving her an x-ray that revealed that her stomach contained no less than 78 spoons and forks that she had swallowed.

When asked about it she gave the following explanation: “I don't know why but I felt an urge to eat the silverware - I could not help myself.” (Source: The daily mail)

I think you’d join me in saying that woman was insane.The stomach is not for forks and spoons. And if you swallow them it has serious repercussions for your health. Yes indeed. But don’t let yourself get of any easier. The body is not for immorality, and if you use it for that you are no less insane than that woman. And if I ask you about it, you’ll answer with sorrow-filled eyes, those words that so many have uttered before you: “I don’t know why but I felt an urge to commit immorality - I could not help myself”

The particular type of immorality in view in this verse is sex outside of marriage, as we talked about last time. It’s the same Greek word “porneia”.

My hope today is to get you to the point where you’d rather eat a fork than commit fornication. Not because I’m against sex, but because I’m for it. If you love food, you will not eat forks. Because you know that a stomach full of forks will hinder your ability to eat, enjoy and digest food. Now if I may be so blunt as to say this: If you love sex, you ought to know that a past full of sin will limit your enjoyment of it. Those old fork-wounds will add a constant pain of shame and regret to that aspect of your life that will follow you for many years.

Every hint of immorality counts. Don’t console yourself by saying “I haven’t gone all the way”, as if that is all that counts. I’ll tell you that if you’ve gone half the way you have half the wounds. And if you’ve gone half the way twice - well it doesn’t take more than two half forks to make a whole one, does it?

Now what you do with your stomach doesn’t really matter in the big picture. It is a temporal matter of appetite and biology. God will do away with both your stomach and the food in it. But as we will see in the next verse, sex is not merely a temporal matter of appetite and biology. It has eternal significance.

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.

I was born this way (1Cor 6:11)

Such were some of you; but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God. (1Cor 6:11)

We all have issues with the way we were born. That’s why Jesus said that unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God (John 3:3)

“Such were some of you”. Yet something happened to you, so that you’re not defined by your past sins and inclinations any more.

You were washed. You’re not dirty anymore. Your past sins no longer defile you. There is no need for you to feel dirty, because God has washed your old dirt away.

You are sanctified. That means you are in a process of becoming more and more holy. Gradually those sins become less appealing to you. And in place of the inclination to sin you’ll find an increasingly strong inclination toward serving and obeying God.

You were justified. That is a legal term, which means you are declared not guilty. Yes, you have sinned, but Jesus took on himself the guilt for your sin. He took the punishment that belonged to you. Jesus was punished to the full extent of your guilt. Now you’re free to go. No punishment, no grudges. Your guilt is erased, and your record is clean. It is just as if you had never committed those sins in the first place.

I know many of us have things in our pasts that we are deeply ashamed of. But if you have been born again, let these truths penetrate the way you think about those sins. There’s no need to feel dirty. There’s no need to hide your guilt, or to explain yourself, or justify yourself. Doing that only serves to hold on to what you were, and hinder you in what you now are.

Let it go!

You'll probably read this, cause it is about sex... (1Cor 6:9-10)

Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God. (1Cor 6:9-10)

One of the great blessings of studying the Bible verse by verse as we have done, is that our understanding of each verse becomes so much richer. So in these verses we find more than a list of sins that bring on the judgment of God.

We already saw in chapter 5 the connection between Gods condemnation and Church discipline. If God has rejected someone the church should not accept them. That is connected in here.

Another thing that is connected is our discussion last time about law suits. “Do not be deceived” takes on two different meanings here: Do not be deceived into thinking that if some brother has sinned against you, justice won’t be done unless an earthly court rules in your favor. God will certainly bring them to justice.

And do not be deceived into thinking you can get away with anything either. If you are taking your brother to court with the intention to defraud him, God knows your heart.

And on top of all that, these verses also transition us into a longer discussion on sexual immorality. We have here roughly the same list of sins that we found in chapter five, when we talked about church discipline. Except this time Paul is a bit more specific about some sexual sins that apparently must have been prevalent in Corinth.

First in the list is Fornicators, or “pornos” in Greek, that we discussed briefly back in chapter 5. The word means someone who commits any kind of sexual immorality.



What's in a word?


A question that has been much debated over the last few decades is what is actually immoral and what is not. For the first 1900 years or so after these words were written, “pornos” was more or less universally understood to mean any sex outside of marriage. Over the last 50 to 100 years, our culture has gone through a massive paradigm shift when it comes to sexual morality. And we seem to be almost at the point where it is considered immoral to even suggest that sex is limited only to marriage. But at the same time we know that God is unchanging, and what he considered immoral 2000 years ago, he still considers immoral today. So someone must be wrong here. It’s either us or everyone who lived before us.

So given our cultural context, I find myself being forced to look for a Bible verse that explicitly states that sex is immoral outside of marriage, without understanding the word “pornos” to mean what it has meant for nearly two millennia. It is a bit of a challenge, but even if we reduce the semantic range of the word to mean only marital unfaithfulness as many have suggested, we still have a rich supply of arguments and implications that support the traditional view of sex.


The true meaning of marriage

First we can look to God’s original design for marriage. The first marriage took place as early as Genesis 2:21-25:

So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then He took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh at that place. The LORD God fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man. The man said, “This is now bone of my bones, And flesh of my flesh; She shall be called Woman, Because she was taken out of Man.” For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.

When God instituted marriage he did it for a very specific reason. He didn’t let us know what that reason was right away, but in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians he makes it very clear:

Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the body. But as the church is subject to Christ, so also the wives ought to be to their husbands in everything.

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless. So husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself; for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church, because we are members of His body.

FOR THIS REASON A MAN SHALL LEAVE HIS FATHER AND MOTHER AND SHALL BE JOINED TO HIS WIFE, AND THE TWO SHALL BECOME ONE FLESH. This mystery is great; but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the church. Nevertheless, each individual among you also is to love his own wife even as himself, and the wife must see to it that she respects her husband. (Eph 5:22-33)

What I want to impress on your minds is how highly God esteems marriage, and how profound that union really is. It is more than a couple of signatures on a document. Yet in our culture that is what it has been reduced to, and thus it’s easy to argue that those signatures make no significant difference. If you love one-another and are committed to one-another, what is really the difference morally if you sign a contract that you can get out of anyway if you want to?

That’s not what God designed marriage to be though. It is an unbreakable, life-long covenant between a man and a woman, where they play out a small-scale version of the unbreakable life-long covenant between Christ and the Church.

So marriage is a relation unlike any other. This is so lost in our culture, that I dare to say that many who are married on paper are still committing fornication because they are not married according to God’s definition of what marriage is. And God’s definition is what goes, no matter what documents our government decides to issue.

In light of what marriage is then, God commands us to esteem it, and keep the physical relation that comes with it undefiled:

Marriage is to be held in honor among all, and the marriage bed is to be undefiled; for fornicators and adulterers God will judge. (Heb 13:4)

Does all of this combined, even without the word “pornos” meaning what it actually means, add up to an explicit command not to have sex outside of marriage? I’d say we’re at least getting very, very close. And I chose to take you down this road because understanding the reason for a command is the best way to be convinced of it. It is a lot easier to obey commands when we understand why they exist.


What "pornos" means elsewhere...

But with this foundation being laid, I also want to take a few seconds to convince you that the Greek word “pornos” also includes sex out of marriage, and that Paul would uses that word to mean sex out of marriage just a few sentences away from where we’re at. We’ll jump a bit ahead of ourselves to chapter 7, verse 1 and 2:

Now concerning the things about which you wrote, it is good for a man not to touch a woman. But because of immoralities, each man is to have his own wife, and each woman is to have her own husband.

The word immoralities here is the “porneia” in Greek. It is a different form of the same word, both from the common root “porneo”. What Paul is saing here, is that there are some advantages to being unmarried (and we’ll learn more about that when we get here in our studies), but that because of the temptation to have sex outside of marriage, each man should have his own wife, and each woman her own husband. It can not mean anything else. Try substituting it for adultery, and the sentence doesn’t make sense.


Homosexuality and scripture twisting

Having laid a solid foundation with God’s original design for marriage and sex, we are now better suited to understand the reasoning behind the two other sins that we didn’t already go through in chapter 5. We see that included in the list of people who will not inherit the kingdom of God are effeminate and homosexuals.

Of course the meaning of these words have been subject to some controversy as well. They refer to the passive and the active partner in a homosexual relationship. In Ancient Greek culture homosexuality was very common, and young boys were even dragged into this and abused by older men. Knowing this, many have tried to argue that it is only this practice Paul was forbidding. Not relationships between consenting adults.

So if this verse only forbids older men (the active parner) from abusing young boys (the passive partner, or the effeminate), let’s try to insert that meaning into the text: “...nor children who are molested, nor the people who molest them … shall inherit the kingdom of God.” How’s that interpretation working out for you?


God's unpopular stance on homosexuality

It is not politically correct to say this, and it is not unlikely that it will soon become illegal to say this, but we need to say it anyways. The Bible is crystal clear that homosexuality is a sin. Our culture has trained us from childhood to be abhorred at such a suggestion, and to automatically ascribe a motive of hatred, prejudice and self-righteousness to whoever dares say it. It is a sin worse than not rinsing and folding your milk cartons before you put them in the recycling bin.

But the Bible is still insistent:

You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female; it is an abomination. (Lev 18:22)

For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error. (Rom 1:26-27)

These and several other passages are very clear in their condemnation of homosexuality. Not because God hates them, but because is is a sin which by nature obscures God’s original purpose for marriage. The picture of Christ and the church is obscured when marriage becomes anything else than a life-long covenant between a man and a woman.

That being said, it is a fact that many still find themselves primarily attracted to someone of the same sex. It is much debated whether they are born that way or become that way through cultural influence. The argument is that if they are born that way, then certainly God cannot blame them for being that way. So many feel like if we can prove that they weren’t born that way that would absolve God of responsibility in the matter.

On closer examination though, we realize that God holds us responsible for following all kinds of inclinations that we were born with. God commands us not to lie, yet we were all born with the inclination to lie. No one had to teach me how to do it. I figured it out all on my own the first time I found myself in a situation where the truth was to my disadvantage. My parents didn’t have to teach me how to do it, they had to teach me not to lie. Now just because I was not born with any inclination toward homosexuality, I discovered fairly early in my life that I had an inclination to be attracted to girls. I was born that way. But that doesn’t mean I’m not guilty for the sinful thoughts and actions that have resulted from that inclination.

Now I don’t mean to be insensitive to those who are experiencing same-sex attraction, because at the very least I had the hope of some day living out those inclinations that I had in a righteous and God-honoring way, even though I had to wait for a bit. They do not. Still the truth is we all at some level have to deny the inclinations we were born with to obey God. And the key to being able to do that comes to us in the next verse...

Stay tuned!

Why not rather be wronged? (1Cor 6:7-8)

Actually, then, it is already a defeat for you, that you have lawsuits with one another. Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be defrauded? On the contrary, you yourselves wrong and defraud. You do this even to your brethren. (1Cor 6:7-8)

Jesus said some very radical things about the attitude a believer should have toward being wronged. He said:

You have heard that it was said, ‘AN EYE FOR AN EYE, AND A TOOTH FOR A TOOTH.’ But I say to you, do not resist an evil person; but whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also. If anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, let him have your coat also. (Matt 5:38-40)

So then it becomes obvious that going to court against anyone is already a defeat. By doing so we put on display a heart that seeks revenge, rather than reconciliation. We reveal that we are not like Jesus, who by his death opened up the door to heaven for his killers. In fact one of the Roman centurions who conducted his execution, when he saw the supernatural events that followed Jesus’ death, he said “Truly, this was the son of God”. I would not be shocked to one day see this roman centurion in heaven. That is the grace of Christ.

“Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be defrauded?” Those are indeed strange questions for those who do not have this mindset that our savior has, who died praying for the for forgiveness for those who killed him.

Having this mindset is a statement of trust in the supreme, eternal justice of God. It means setting aside your desire for immediate justice, knowing that God will not let any wrongdoing go unpunished:

Never take your own revenge, beloved, but leave room for the wrath of God, for it is written, “VENGEANCE IS MINE, I WILL REPAY,” says the Lord. (Rom 12:19)

Do you believe in the wrath of God? When someone does wrong to you, God is angry. And he will make sure justice is done in the end. Even if they live a long and happy life, and die in peacefully at old age without ever seeing any retribution, God will pour out his wrath on them in Hell.

Or even better, if they repent from their sins they will have part in the atoning death of Christ, when God poured out his wrath over their sin on his own son. And they will have part in the same undeserved salvation that we have.

Taking your own revenge is denying these realities. So in stead of trusting in God’s justice, you put yourself in his place, and execute your own judgment. You may get the immediate satisfaction you’re looking for, but God’s perfect will is always best, and sin always takes you out of God’s perfect will.

So in light of this, Paul offers another way of dealing with evil. Not combating it with further evil, but defeating it with good:

BUT IF YOUR ENEMY IS HUNGRY, FEED HIM, AND IF HE IS THIRSTY, GIVE HIM A DRINK; FOR IN SO DOING YOU WILL HEAP BURNING COALS ON HIS HEAD.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. (Rom 12:20-21)

So then going to court against a brother is an act of unwillingness to forgive and to show another the same kind of grace that God has shown us. And it is an act of deliberate injustice, by circumventing the church and seeking mediation from those who do not know God, hoping that they will rule unjustly in your favor, rather than the church ruling justly in favor of your opponent, or telling you to let it go. And finally it is an act of distrust in the supreme eternal justice of God. It is shoving God out of the courtroom to deal with things on our own, in ways that fall short of God’s perfect justice.

See you in court? (1Cor 6:1-6)

Does any one of you, when he has a case against his neighbor, dare to go to law before the unrighteous and not before the saints? Or do you not know that the saints will judge the world? If the world is judged by you, are you not competent to constitute the smallest law courts? Do you not know that we will judge angels? How much more matters of this life? So if you have law courts dealing with matters of this life, do you appoint them as judges who are of no account in the church? I say this to your shame. Is it so, that there is not among you one wise man who will be able to decide between his brethren, but brother goes to law with brother, and that before unbelievers? (1Cor 6:1-6)

Usually in literature chapters come at natural breaks in the text, and changes of topic. That’s true most of the time in the Bible as well, but we need to keep in mind that the division into chapters and verses were added to the text 1500 years later.

So then we need to ask ourselves, does this break considerably from what we were talking about in chapter five with church discipline, or is it just a natural extension of it?

Last time we were talking about how the church deals with a member who sins, and this time we’re talking about how the church deals with a member who sins. The difference is this time the sin has caused a deep disagreement between two members of the church, and it is not immediately clear which one of them actually is the sinner and which one is the victim.

So, being the Greeks they are, and being children of their time, the most natural thing for them to do is to take their brother to court to have the dispute settled. The courts of the time were called the dikastic courts, and were run by fairly simple principles. There was an assembly of 200 to 500 men, depending on the type of case. These men held the title of dikastai. They were appointed at the beginning of every year. To become a dikastai, you had to be a legal citizen over the age of 30, and you had to be willing to take a dikastic oath.

The accuser would make a speech before the court, and then the defendant would do the same. Then the dikastai, would vote in favor of one of them. If it was a crime that required punishment, they would have another round afterward, where the accuser and defendant both proposed what they saw as an appropriate punishment, and they would decide that as well by vote.

The democratic courts were the pride and joy if the Greek civilisation. The symbol of their civility and wisdom. In most other cultures at the time, you would take them before a regional leader appointed by the king, or even just someone who had great power because he was rich, and the verdict and punishment would be completely at this one mans discretion.

But the wisdom of the world is not like the wisdom of God. And what is right in the eyes of a democratic assembly is not necessarily what God wants.

God’s laws are written on every man’s heart, and this is reflected in every law text of every country in the world to some degree. But sin clouds our judgment and causes us to collectively make up provisions for it. And those compromises make it into law as well. So even though the laws and morals of unbelievers are influenced by God, they are not a perfect reflection of his righteousness.

So Paul poses the question, why would you not rather go to those who have the spiritual wisdom to judge? Why do you go to those who lack an intimate knowledge of the heart of God, and ask them to decide? The implication being, maybe the unregenerate are more likely to rule in your favor. Maybe they will not see your subtle “legalized” sin in all of this, but rather rule against the one you’re disagreeing with. While in God’s eyes you yourself are the offender. It is probably in this sense Paul say that you wrong and defraud your brethren, when you go to court against them in verse 8.

The saints will rule the earth with Christ in the millennial kingdom. And angels will be subject to us as well. So is the spiritual state in Corinth so poor that there isn’t even one in the church who has the wisdom to pass good judgments? Do they need to get an unbeliever to decide in even the most minor of disagreements?

Paul is not proposing here, that we should set up a Christian court system, like the Muslims do with their sharia courts. What would have been the right response is for the man who feels he has been defrauded, to go about the normal procedure for church discipline. After all this man would probably have committed a sin that would warrant church discipline. So first he would need to talk to the offender and see if he would repent. Then take with him one or two other brothers, and finally, if he refused to repent, take him before the whole church.

Now if this man was expelled from the church, I suppose by this text, it wouldn’t be unlawful to then open a court case against him, but as we will see soon that is not really the heart of a believer. Stay tuned for the next post!

A Father's Discipline (1 Cor 4:18-21)

Now some have become arrogant, as though I were not coming to you. But I will come to you soon, if the Lord wills, and I shall find out, not the words of those who are arrogant but their power. For the kingdom of God does not consist in words but in power. What do you desire? Shall I come to you with a rod, or with love and a spirit of gentleness?

The final aspect of spiritual fatherhood that we’ll look at today is that of authority. Take careful note of the fact that this is the last one Paul mentions, after the loving care, and the godly example he has provided for them. It is in this context that Paul now has gained the right to exercise authority.

Just like with natural children, if you try to exercise authority without loving and caring for them, and leading by example, you’ll find that your authority and discipline only serves to harm them and provoke them to anger. That is not strange, because apart from love and godliness your only other possible motives for exercising authority and disciplining would be your own selfish desires.

I’m sure most of us growing up can remember a few days when we dreaded the sound of dad’s car pulling up in the driveway, because we knew that he would learn of something that we had done during the course of the day, and deal with us accordingly. It is something very similar Paul is threatening here. He’s saying to those who are arrogant that they’d better have the power to substantiate their words, because he’s coming back. And depending on their response he’s either coming with a rod or with love and gentleness.

Now they have the choice to respond in a way that removes the need for discipline, or if they truly do think themselves to be spiritually superior to Paul, to face his rod with divine power that matches their big words.

This is the last of a 3 part series on Spiritual Fatherhood Check out the other ones as well:

1 Cor 4:14-15 - The Forgotten Doctrine of Spiritual Fatherhood

1 Cor 4:16-17 - A Father's Example 

1 Cor 4:18-21 - A Father's  Discipline

A Father's Example (1 Cor 4:16-17)

Therefore I exhort you, be imitators of me. For this reason I have sent to you Timothy, who is my beloved and faithful child in the Lord, and he will remind you of my ways which are in Christ, just as I teach everywhere in every church.

You may have heard a failing father, seeing his children fall into the same vices as he himself is captive of, pleading with them to follow what he says, and not what he does. As surely as that tactic will fail with natural children, it will fail with spiritual children. Every father leads by example, whether he wants to or not.

Paul does not merely tell them what to do. He lives it. And since he does, he can say “be imitators of me”. There are many words in this epistle, but Paul knows he can not lead by words alone. But being prevented from coming himself, he sends another. Timothy is another of his spiritual children, who has walked with him and followed his ways thoroughly. In 2 Timothy, written some years later Paul says to him:

(10) Now you followed my teaching, conduct, purpose, faith, patience, love, perseverance, (11) persecutions, and sufferings, such as happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium and at Lystra; what persecutions I endured, and out of them all the Lord rescued me! (...) (14)You, however, continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned them (2 Tim 3:10,11,14)

Timothy had been so conformed to Christ that in stead of Paul coming himself to remind them of his ways in Christ, he could send Timothy to refresh their minds on the very same thing. He had walked with Paul for a long time, and grown into a level of maturity where he was able to represent Paul. He was a faithful, mature child that Paul could send to set an example for his younger brothers and lead them into the same maturity.


This is part 2 of a 3 part series on Spiritual Fatherhood the last one is being posted on Monday

1 Cor 4:14-15 - The Forgotten Doctrine of Spiritual Fatherhood
1 Cor 4:16-17 - A Father's Example 
1 Cor 4:18-21 - A Father's  Discipline

The Forgotten Doctrine of Spiritual Fatherhood 1 Cor 4:14-15

I do not write these things to shame you, but to admonish you as my beloved children. For if you were to have countless tutors in Christ, yet you would not have many fathers, for in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel.

God loves family. He loves it because he invented it, and purposefully crafted every relationship and every natural emotion involved in each of those different relationships as pictures of spiritual realities. And throughout the Bible he continuously keeps pointing to different family relationships to explain things in terms that we can understand. Christians are called God’s Children, and are taught to see him as our Father. We are to see each other as brothers and sisters. In relation to Christ the church is a betroth bride waiting for the wedding feast. And now we come upon another such picture that is replete all throughout scripture, but sadly almost completely overlooked.

Paul has become a “father” to the Corinthians. How did he become their father? Certainly not the natural way, but rather through the Gospel. That was his instrument of labour when he worked among them, and that was what caused them to be born into the family of God.

Paul went through the pains of birth with these men and women as he prayed for them, witnessed to them, was rejected by them and was persecuted by them. These birth pains were not unique to Corinth. In the Galatian church he even at one point wrote and told them that he was going through this labour with them once again because they had embraced false teachers (Gal 4:19).

After suffering for them, Paul had rejoiced with the angels to see each of them take their first breath as a new creature in Christ. He had carefully instructed them and paid close attention to them. I’m sure he shared the sentiment of the apostle John, who said “I have no greater joy than this, to hear of my children walking in the truth.” (3 John 1:4)

Paul loved his children dearly, and took personal responsibility for them and their growth in Christ. A responsibility that extended deeply into his wallet. Speaking in 2. Corinthians of his plan to make a third visit to them he said:

“Here for this third time I am ready to come to you, and I will not be a burden to you; for I do not seek what is yours, but you; for children are not responsible to save up for their parents, but parents for their children.” (2Cor 12:14)

God loves fathers. One would expect nothing less from one who has taken Father as his title. And conversely, the devil hates fathers, and has created a culture where the vast majority of families don’t have one. They may have an adult male family member, but not one that fulfils the biblical role of fatherhood.

The same is true in the church. Spiritual children are born, and left as defenseless orphans. Some churches try to patch things up with discipleship programs, counseling and various classes and courses, but the real problem goes unaddressed. Their spiritual fathers have abandoned them.

We’ve been conditioned to see evangelism as a short term job. We preach the word, get the largest possible number of “decisions” and then move on to the next place. That is not how Paul operated. He knew that once a spiritual child was born into his hands he had become a father.

This is part 1 of a 3 part series on Spiritual Fatherhood based on 1 Corinthians 4 stay tuned for the other parts:

1 Cor 4:14-15 - The Forgotten Doctrine of Spiritual Fatherhood
1 Cor 4:16-17 - A Father's Example
1 Cor 4:18-21 - A Father's  Discipline

Will they cheer when we die? (1.Cor 4:8-10)

You are already filled, you have already become rich, you have become kings without us; and indeed, I wish that you had become kings so that we also might reign with you. For, I think, God has exhibited us apostles last of all, as men condemned to death; because we have become a spectacle to the world, both to angels and to men. We are fools for Christ's sake, but you are prudent in Christ; we are weak, but you are strong; you are distinguished, but we are without honor. (1. Cor 4:8-10)

When Paul says the apostles are exhibited last of all, as men condemned to death, the picture that would have formed in the minds of the original readers is the picture of a roman arena, and the grand finale of their gladiator show. He saw the world standing up and on the tribunes and cheering as the main attraction is dragged out by thick iron chains and released.They are prisoners, condemned to die a violent and gruesome death.

The world is not content just disliking, or being mildly annoyed with Christians. Throughout the history, in every part of the world, they have suffered persecution from Pagans, Muslims, Catholics, Atheists and everything in between. The relative peace that European and American Christians have enjoyed over the last few centuries is really an anomaly. So these verses seem strange to us. Maybe a little bit outdated. But both history and current developments with Islam and militant atheism would lead us to be prepared for times to get harder.

Christians have always been misrepresented and hated. If you read news you can hear the echoes of it. Evangelism is hate speech, teaching your children Christianity is child abuse. This is not new. And it is not extreme, compared to the accusations against Christians in atheist countries like China and North Korea, and Muslim countries in the Middle East and North Africa.

It is a rarity that the world in general does not cheer when we die. And we should not take it for granted.

Illusions of grandeur (1.Cor 4:8-10)

You are already filled, you have already become rich, you have become kings without us; and indeed, I wish that you had become kings so that we also might reign with you. For, I think, God has exhibited us apostles last of all, as men condemned to death; because we have become a spectacle to the world, both to angels and to men. We are fools for Christ's sake, but you are prudent in Christ; we are weak, but you are strong; you are distinguished, but we are without honor. (1.Cor 4:8-10)

Wait... Who put that picture here?

If Paul had had the common sense to end this section after his initial remarks, he could have been quite a successful mega-church pastor or TV-preacher. “You are already filled, you have already become rich, you have become kings...” Just add something about turkey-bacon, and you’re pretty much set. But of course he has to go and ruin it, by saying he wished it all was true.

Of course, we don’t panic yet, because surely Paul will offer some kind of solution for this predicament? How to become filled, rich and reign as kings so they won’t be lacking all of this anymore? Perhaps they need to have more faith? Or maybe they haven’t been faithful tithers, and Paul will instruct them to sow their seed into his ministry? Do they need to pray harder, do a 40 day fast, or just speak it into existence? Because surely God wouldn’t want anything less for his servants.

To the contrary, dear fried. Look at how Paul contrasts his own christian walk to the proclaimed grandeur of the Corinthians:

For, I think, God has exhibited us apostles last of all, as men condemned to death; because we have become a spectacle to the world, both to angels and to men. We are fools for Christ's sake, but you are prudent in Christ; we are weak, but you are strong; you are distinguished, but we are without honor.

Paul is not complaining here. He’s setting forth himself and the other apostles as examples to be followed. If you want to follow Christ in the same way as the apostles, be prepared to be a weak, dishonored fool in the eyes of everyone else.