Alright, let's take our Bibles
and turn back to 1 Corinthians 6. 1 Corinthians 6, and we'll begin in verse 12. I want to say before I begin,
I want you to remember that Corinth, The city in which the Lord raised
up a church was one of the most wicked cities ever raised up. It was a city of gross, gross
immorality. And God was pleased to raise
up a church in that place. put a lighthouse of life. But as the case often is, when
the Lord calls men and women out of darkness, we carry a whole
lot of baggage with us. And we've got to be taught, we
all need to be taught the truth. We need to be taught concerning
our walk. And that's what the Apostle Paul
is doing here in this passage. Now having dealt previously with
the truth that those who live... Now listen, he was talking about
in 1 Corinthians 6 Verse 9, 10, Know ye not that the unrighteous
shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived, neither
fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, effeminate, abusers of themselves
with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor
revelers, nor revilers, nor extortioners shall inherit the kingdom of
God. He said, in such were some of
you, but you're washed in the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. You're sanctified. A new principle
of life has been created within you. And you're justified before
God. Christ having bore your debt
at Calvary, having paid the demand of God's
law, Paul says now, you that were
at one time those that actually without any check to your life. You that at one time walked in
this unchastened immorality. God Almighty has given you a
new heart. And now you don't walk that way
anymore. All that temptation is there.
That temptation to walk thinking that our bodies are our own. That we can do whatever we want
to do and it don't matter. It matters. It matters. Every believer knows that he's
been delivered from the bondage of the law for righteousness.
Because Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to
everyone that believeth. And now he doesn't walk anymore. He's tempted. If he stumbles,
the Lord picks him up and believers love him and encourage him and
help him. He said, you don't walk anymore
in an unchecked walk. He's not a believer. Not a believer. And you don't walk around with
that teaching of this world, the regulations for acceptance. Handle not. Taste not. Touch not. Religion. A believer. is free in Christ. Stand fast therefore in the liberty
wherewith Christ has made us free and be not entangled again
with the yoke of bondage. Here's what believers do. They
stand fast. They highly esteem and defend
their liberty in Christ because He's freed His people from the
bondage and the guilt of sin from the law as a covenant of
works for salvation. Now we're free from the fear
of death and judgment by the blood of Christ. But you listen
to this. Now we're free. We don't try to obey the law
for righteousness. That's absolutely right. But
though a regenerated sinner is relieved from the bondage of
the law for obedience unto salvation, He's been delivered from the
bondage of that blindness, that blindness by which he thought
he was pleasing God because of his works, but the Spirit of
God is going to set forth in this passage of Scripture the
restraint that a believer still has. We're free. We're free in Christ. We're free
from the establishment of salvation by the works of the law. We're
free from that. Before God delivered us out of the bondage of that
thought, we were all trying to run around thinking we were doing
something. For God, we were doing something. There's no end to it. What men
tell other men they have to do in order to be saved, we're free
from that. But that does not mean that we are completely at
liberty to do whatever we want in this world. Now here's what
the Apostle Paul says in 1 Corinthians 6 verse 12. All things are lawful
unto me, but all things are not expedient, that is, profitable.
All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought unto
the power of any. Now what does he say here? Everything
is permissible. He's not speaking of those things
which are forbidden by God. Now there's some things that
the scripture sets forth that we just, you're not permitted
to do. He's not talking about those
things that God has forbidden. He's speaking of those things
which are not forbidden by God. Things that don't matter. There is no sin in stuff. I tell you what, that liquor,
the sin that's in liquor and smoking, there's no sin in that. You may
harm your body, you know, but the sin comes out of the heart. Sin is out of the heart. Material
pleasures, not at the expense of disregarding what God has
to say our primary responsibilities are, but all things, Paul says,
are lawful unto me. If you want to eat tree bark,
if you want to boil tree bark and put turmeric in it, and you
like that, eat it. That's fine. All things are lawful. But he said, all things are not
expedient. They're not all profitable. Not
all things are good for me. There's no sin in them, but that
doesn't mean they're all good for you. All things are lawful,
but not profitable. And Paul said, I'm not going
to become a slave of anything brings me under his power. But
now what is he saying when he says all that? People put rules
and regulations on me. Don't eat this, don't drink that,
don't do this, don't do that. Paul knew that he was not hindered
spiritually by those things that are in the world. You know, I'm
telling you this external religion, people think, you know, don't
do this, don't do that, don't taste this, don't touch that,
don't... Paul said that he was not hindered
spiritually by the things that were in the world, that were
not forbidden of God. I want to keep bringing that
up. If God has forbidden something, then don't do it. But if it came to those things
that he had no problem with, And it would come to a point
to where it would start hindering his fellowship with a weak brother. If a brother was caused to stumble
by seeing Paul partake of a certain thing, Paul said, I'm not going
to become a slave to those things that I have no problem with.
I have no problem with them. I'm not going to do something
in front of somebody else. that I have no problem with,
if I think it's going to offend you. I'm not going to do it. If I know that it will offend
you, or I think it might offend you, I'm not going to do it.
I would rather not. I'd rather
not do it. He was saying nothing in this
world Even those things that I have no problem with personally
are going to enslave me to partake if it causes my brother to be
offended. I'm going to set them aside for
the glory of God and the goodness or the good of the brethren.
Listen, he says in verse 13, Meats for the belly and the belly
for meats, but God shall destroy both of them. You know why God
made meat? So we did it. Somebody says,
well, I just don't believe in eating meat. Well, that's OK.
All right. But I guarantee you, if you give
me a steak, I'm going to eat it. I promise you. And if I can get some mushrooms
and saute them down, a good salad. I just don't think, I think that
meat is harmful for your body. And I just think, well, if I
know it's going to offend you, and I'm going to invite you over
to the house. We'll have salad. That'll be fine. I'm not going
to offend you because of a piece of meat that I don't have. You
know, meats for the belly and the belly for meats. But here's
the problem. I mean, here's the end result.
God's going to destroy both of those. It's not going to, it's
not, you know, food is intended for the body and the body for
food. We're at liberty to satisfy the
natural hunger cravings of our bodies with food, but it's not
always going to be like that. Paul didn't have a problem eating
anything that was legitimately food, but he wasn't going to
offend his brother over it. Hold your place right there.
Just turn over to 1 Corinthians 8, 8 to 13. 1 Corinthians 8. He says in 1 Corinthians 8, 8,
But meat commendeth us not to God. For neither if we eat are
we better, neither if we eat not are we worse. But take heed,
lest by any means this liberty of yours become a stumbling block
to them that are weak. For if any man see thee which
hath knowledge, He's talking about now, if the Lord's given
you some light, that there's nothing wrong with eating meat. Whatever, whatever kind, whatever.
The Lord has shown you, you know, if any man see thee which has
knowledge, sit at meat in the idol's temple. Shall not the
conscience of him which is weak be emboldened to eat those things
which are offered to idols? And through thy knowledge shall
the weak brother perish for whom Christ died? Now what did he
say there? He said, look, meat was offered to idols back then
and they'd take it and whatever it was, they killed the lamb
and maybe you like lamb, maybe it's good, maybe it was offered
to an idol. And they took it and they put it on there and
they roasted it. Now what's wrong with that piece of meat? Ain't
nothing wrong with it. There's no more problem with it than
if it was on my pit, on my grill. It's a piece of meat. But Paul
says, if a weaker brother sees you eat something that was offered
to an idol, and he's now, he's thinking, now that, somehow it's
become tainted, because it's something spiritually wrong with
it now, because it was offered to an idol. Paul said, it was
a piece of meat, that's all it was. But he said, if you eat
in front of a weaker brother, and you cause him because you've
got liberty to do it, and he sees you eat it, and now he's
going to say he's going to go against his conscience. He had
a problem with it. He thought it's been tainted
now. It's spiritual. Somehow it's
got demons in it or something. And I'm not going to eat that
piece of meat, but he sees you eating it. Well, I guess if Marvin
did it, I guess it's okay, and I'll go against my conscience,
and I'll eat. Well, he said, what you're going
to do is you're going to cause him now to start going against
other things that are against his conscience. And it's going
to cause harm to him by doing something in front of him that
caused him to go against what he felt was the wrong thing.
Paul said, don't do that. Back in 1 Corinthians 6, there,
meets for the belly, and belly for the meats, God shall destroy
them both. But he said, now, the body, though
there is no problem, he eats things that are not forbidden
by God. He said, now, the body is not for fornication, but for
the Lord, and the Lord for the body. He said, now, when it comes
to eating good food and the body, it just doesn't matter. It doesn't
matter. Whatever you want to eat is not
forbidden of God. You do whatever you want, it's
not forbidden of God. God created the body for food.
But that's not the case, Paul says. And he's talking to a group
of people, as I told you, there in Corinth, that was living in
a society that thought it was no worse to live in sexual immorality
than it was to eat a piece of meat. We're at liberty. We're at liberty in the Lord.
The Lord has delivered us from all of the bondage of the law. Paul said, when it comes to certain
things, God is explicit on what's permissible, what's not permissible.
And that which is not permissible, he said, now the body, that body
that I wanted to go ahead and deal with, gave us all the conclusion. This body is not your own. It's
not yours. He said that body was not created,
wasn't made for fornication. It was made for the Lord. How
many bodies? All of them. You mean just believers? All of them. All of them. We were all created. Man was
created for God's glory. for the glory of the Lord Jesus
Christ as the husband of his bride. And in Adam's fall in
the garden, that didn't change. God created man, gave him a body
and a spirit. He breathed into him. And that
body was not created for fornication, adultery, incest. It was created
for the glory of God. God Almighty created mankind,
out of which He chose a people unto salvation, that they might
know the Son savingly, and love Him, and trust Him, and come
to Him for life, and not to be united to a harlot, especially
spiritually speaking, of the false harlot of Mystery Babylon. A man was not created that his
emotional needs be satisfied outside the bond of marriage. Why is there marriage? It's a picture. It's a type. It's an illustration. People
get married, they go and they have a marriage. They may not
even know, they have no idea who the Lord is, they have no
idea, they don't even, they don't care, they don't care. They don't
realize why marriage was created. It's a picture, people all over
this world, rebels against God that don't know Him. And they're
getting married. They're legitimately getting
married. And every time they get married, Almighty God has
ordained and purposed that the glory of His Son in the marriage
to His Bride is openly displayed. Everybody is just displayed.
The glory of God is being displayed. And they don't even know it. Paul said this body was not created. for fornication outside of the
bond of marriage. Verse 14, God has both raised
up the Lord and will also raise us up by His power. How is He
going to raise us? In a body. This body, we're going
to see God in a changed body, but we're going to see Him in
this body. He's made a body. for His glory, for the glory
of His Son, to glorify Him as the Head and Savior of His people.
And He raised up the Lord Jesus Christ, the firstfruits of those
who sleep in the Lord, the One who's the surety of the believers'
resurrection. And He's going to raise up our
bodies, His people's bodies, by that same power. It matters. what we do with our bodies. Because
if we consider that first service, they're not ours. We don't own them. They've been made for God's glory. Verse 15, Know ye not that your
bodies are the members of Christ? This is a marvelous mystery. But these physical bodies that
we're living in, spirit, body, soul, they are members of Christ's
body. We're a physical exhibition. You say, well, that's just all
spiritual. No, it's not, not according to scripture. These
bodies, no, your bodies are the members of Christ. This, that
finger right there is a member of my body. Well, that's, but
I got a foot too. And that's a member of my body.
There it is, there's a physical, and I got a soul that you don't
see. But I'm going to tell you something, that's my finger.
That's a member. Know you not that your bodies
are members of Christ. He's talking to believers now.
He's telling them something. Do you not see that your bodies
are actually bodily parts? This body for a believer is going
to be with Him. This body belongs to Him. He's going to have it. He's going
to change it. But that's what Job said, with
these eyes, I'm going to see God. We were chosen in Christ and
made one with Him before the foundation of the world, body
and soul. This is His body. We're His as a gift from the
Father. We fell in Adam, but Christ redeemed us, body and
soul, from the corruption of sin. Body and soul are His by
electing grace, redeeming grace, and willful subjection in regenerating
grace to the Lord Jesus Christ, made willing in the day of His
power. We're not our own. Bought with a price. As I said
this morning, it's amazing. This whole world is filled with
people that have bodies. Every one of those bodies. I'm
talking about from the one that displays the greatest exhibition
of immorality to the one that stands the most consistent and
trusting Christ. We all belong to Him. And He's
going to do whatever He wants to with them. He's going to bring
glory to Himself. He's going to honor the Son in
grace or justice. Paul says in verse 15, shall
I then take the members of Christ and make them the members of
a harlot? God forbid. If it feels good, do it. What
difference does it make? It makes all the difference in
the world. Why? Because you don't own your body.
It's not yours. I'm over 21. What difference
does that make? Your bodies are the members of
Christ. Shall I take the members of Christ and make them the members
of the harlot? God forbid. As carnal fornication, adultery
and incest is a natural evil. Forbidden of God. Spiritual fornication. Idolatry. God forbidden. giving
of ourselves spiritually to another. It's forbidden. It's forbidden. Man doesn't know this by nature
and doesn't care. But God's people care. God's
people are told. This is a secret. Almighty God
will leave men to themselves, let them do exactly what they
want to do and go through this life thinking it just doesn't
matter. One day, they'll realize. They'll stand before God, and
but for the grace of God, they'll hear Him say, Depart from Me. I never knew you. Look at verse
16, 17. What? Know ye not that He which
is joined to a harlot is one body? For two saith He shall
be one flesh. But he that is joined unto the
Lord is one spirit. According to the decree of God
in the garden after man's fall, this is what the Lord said concerning
a man. He let him leave his father and
mother, cleave unto his wife, and they shall be one flesh. They're one. They're one. A man, a woman, You lose your
spouse. You know, that's part of you. Somebody said, you know, unfaithfulness
to your spouse? You know, you're sinning. You're
not just sinning against yourself. You're sinning against one of
which you're one with. That's you. You're sinning against
yourself. The whole issue of marriage, that revelation of
the glorious union of Christ and His church, Paul set forth
concerning the honor of marriage, union of a man with his wife,
their one flesh. I heard someone say, you take
two rivers, two rivers are flowing, and they come to this point,
and they come to a point, and then they just keep flowing.
Is this river that's flowing down here, is it one or two? It's one. It's one river. Yeah, but it was made out of
two. That's alright. That's fine. It's one river. It's one river. It's one. When a man and a woman
is joined together, they're one. They're one. And the union of
a man with a harlot, of which he's not one, He's joined himself
in a wicked, immoral act. And it's disrespectful to this
body that was created for the glory of God. To picture the
glorious union of Christ and His bride, and it's forbidden.
It's forbidden. Listen, it's forbidden. It's
forbidden. Someone says it just doesn't
matter. Yes, it does. Yes it will, yes it will. But
he who is united to the Lord, united in that mystical union
with Him. I've said this before, I'm so
far over my head here, I can understand somewhat of the glorious
spiritual union with the Lord. But it's just, Paul is setting
forth, he said these bodies are members of His body. How respectful we would desire
to be. How disrespectful we see ourselves. But a believer, what's a believer
going to do? A believer is going to hear this
and he's going to say, I don't want to do that. God, keep me
from that. Luke verse 18. Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is
without the body, but he that committeth fornication sinneth
against his own body." The Apostle cries into the church at Corinth,
shun immorality, physically. Flee from the horrible impurity
of disrespect to Christ in word and thought and deed, but especially
do we need to hear these words spiritually. Understanding. And truly, fornication is not
set forth here as being any greater sin than another. But I will
tell you this, it's revealed here to bring hurt and reproach
upon the body that was created by the Lord. This body, because of fornication.
It's defiled, it's dishonored, it's disgraced by this horrible
act because of what the body was created for. You know, we
just go around and say, well, I tell you what, I've been saved
by grace and it just doesn't matter what I do. That's not
so. That is not so. It matters. You're not going
to do anything to save yourself, but I'm going to tell you something.
We do walk as children of light, and the Spirit of God has revealed
that which God Almighty forbids. Paul said, eat what you want
to, drink what you want to. But when it comes to the sin
of fornication against this body, he said, that is forbidden of
God. Apostle, ask this soul-searching
question that we looked for, that we looked at last time.
What? Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost,
which is in you, which you have of God, and you're not your own? You know, in Solomon's temple,
the glory of Almighty God rested on the mercy seat. It was there
that the Shekinah was exhibited, you could see, and when they
were in the wilderness, the Shekinah went forth. I mean, you could
see, there's the Mercy Seat, it's inside that Holy of Holies
right there, and there's the Shekinah, there's the fire, you
could see it. It was that, it rested on the
Mercy Seat. That Mercy Seat that was found
within the Holy of Holies. That place that was entered into
only one day of the year by the high priest and then not without
blood on the day of atonement. And that made the temple, that
place where the mercy seat was found, where the presence of
God was. He said, I'll meet you between
the cherubim. That's where God rested. It was a witness to the
presence and the power of God. Now here's what Paul the Apostle
is saying, that in that temple, in the Old Testament, where the
mercy seat was, that's where the presence of God rests. Now the Spirit of God reveals
through Paul this truth. He's talking to believers, those
that thought because of former practice It just doesn't matter. It just doesn't matter. It's
just the way we do things around here. It's just the way things
are. We just, you know, that's what we do. Paul said, no, no. You that know Him, you that believe
Him, you that trust Him, do you not know that the body, your
body is the temple of the Holy Ghost? The Holy Ghost which is in you, that Holy Ghost which is there
of the Lord Himself who chose to take up residence in you,
you are the temple of God. Believer, this body wasn't made for fornication. His body was made for God's glory
and God's honor. 1 Peter 2.5, "...Ye also, as
lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to
offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ."
2 Corinthians 6.16, what agreement? hath the temple of God with idols,
for ye are the temple of the living God." As God has said,
I will dwell in them and walk in them, I will be their God,
they shall be my people. The whole person of a believer,
a child of God, this is body, soul, and spirit. That actual
flesh that's going to be changed. That actual soul that gonna live
forever in the spirit of life that moves this physical body
is Christ's. It is His members openly displayed
in this world. Does it matter what I do? Yes
it does. Yes it does. When this physical
body dies and goes back to the earth Because of its union with
Christ, it's going to raise again. It's going to be raised again.
Incorruptible. What a sobering thought. That
God dwells in the body of His people. In the new heart given
in regeneration. Our bodies, our souls, our spirit,
they're not our own. We don't own them. And just,
if we thought they did, well, just get that thought out of
our minds. They're not ours. And what's God going to do with
them? What He's pleased to do. If He's pleased to show mercy,
thanks be unto His holy name. And if He's pleased to leave
us to ourselves, He's going to justly do that which is right. We as chosen. redeemed and regenerated
saints are not our own masters to live for the satisfaction
of the lusts of our old man. We have no right, we have no
liberty to abuse these temples where the Lord's by creation,
by purchase, and by willing submissiveness unto Him walk as children of
light. I needed to hear this. I needed
to be reminded. We're so prone to just think
so lightly, so loosely, of who we are. The promised child of
God's grace. May we honor the Lord in our
walk. And all the while, I know what's
going to happen. We're going to struggle. We're
going to see ourselves. We're going to see that war that's
within. We're going to cry out to the
Lord, Lord, have mercy on me. Lord, if you left me to myself,
where would I be? I am what I am by the grace of
God. May the Lord bless the Word to
our hearts for Christ's sake.