Lesson 2050

(Lesson 2050)(06-13-17) 1 Corinthians Chapter 5

"It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father's wife. And ye are puffed up, and have not rather mourned, that he that hath done this deed might be taken away from among you. For I verily, as absent in body, but present in spirit, have judged already, as though I were present, concerning him that hath so done this deed, In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, To deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. Your glorying is not good. Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump? Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us: Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. I wrote unto you in an epistle not to company with fornicators: Yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or with idolaters; for then must ye needs go out of the world. But now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such an one no not to eat. For what have I to do to judge them also that are without? do not ye judge them that are within? But them that are without God judgeth. Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person."

In this fifth chapter of first Corinthians, Paul clearly demanded that the children of God separate themselves from those brothers and sisters in Christ who walk outside the limits of Christian morality.

Even though, as born again believers, we are to refrain from judging the worldly actions of non-believers. Conversely, when it comes to the members of Christ's church, we are most certainly commanded to point out the errors of those brothers and sisters in Christ who break the known laws of Christianity. Paul lists fornicators, drunkards, the covetous, and railers as a few of the violators of those laws.

If we learn of a brother or sister who has broken the moral laws of Jesus Christ we are to "To deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus." This quote assures us that even if we throw out from among us those who commit "sins", though their bodies will be given over to destruction by Satan, their souls will remain preserved by the seal of the Holy Spirit of Jesus Christ until "the day of the Lord Jesus".~