Now, 1 Corinthians 5, this is
quite honestly a difficult lesson, as I've been studying it over
the past few days. But let's go down through here,
see if the Lord will teach us something. It's difficult, but
it's necessary for our learning and instruction, or else it wouldn't
be in God's Word. So, in verse 1, 1 Corinthians
5, Paul writes, It's reported commonly that there is fornication
among you. and such fornication as is not
so much as is named among the Gentiles, that one should have
his father's wife." Now, Paul said it's common knowledge that
there's sexual immorality among you in your congregation, and
no one can plead ignorance about this. It's common knowledge.
It's common knowledge in the town. It's common knowledge in
the church and among people that know the situation there in Corinth. There was a man there in the
congregation. living in incest with his father's
wife, his stepmother. And apparently she was separated
or divorced from his father. And from what we understand,
his father is probably still living, and here's his son living
with his ex-wife. And Paul says this is a vile
thing that even the heathen Gentiles don't tolerate such behavior,
and it's going on here in the church. And the result of this
is this man, through his actions, is bringing dishonor and reproach
on the gospel. He's bringing dishonor on the
Savior. Because this is common knowledge in the town, and people
think, well, his religion doesn't make any difference in Him. And
even worse, is the church is tolerating this behavior. The
body of believers there is tolerating this behavior. And that brought
even more reproach on Christ. Because people understandably
thought, well, No one in that church thinks he's doing anything
wrong. Everything's still the same with them. They have fellowship
with each other. They continue meeting and worshiping
together just like they always did. They must not think he's
doing anything wrong. When just to the heathen it was
obvious he was doing something wrong. And that's just heaping
reproach on the saviors. Heaping reproach on everything
they claim to believe. Everything they preach. And to
go even further, to make matters even worse, Nobody seems to be
grieved about this. Look at verse 2. Paul says, And
you are puffed up, and have not rather mourned, that he that
hath done this deed might be taken away from among you. Now
Paul says you're puffed up. Being puffed up is a problem
for these Corinthians. Three times in chapter 4, Paul
mentioned them being puffed up. As he began to write this epistle,
we studied this a few weeks ago, that there were divisions and
contentions among the people. They were puffed up against each
other. Now, apparently, this man was a leader of one of these
factions. It became divided and kind of
contending against one another. He may have been a preacher or
a teacher, a very gifted man in the scriptures, or at least
in speaking for sure. So one faction looks down on
the other, and they say, they boasted how, well, nobody of
our group would ever do anything like that. They're boasting. They're puffed up with pride
against this other faction. The faction this man is a leader
of, they end up defending this man's actions. They end up being
puffed up defending this man's actions saying, well everybody
sins. Everybody lusts in their heart. Everybody does things
wrong. It's okay because he's not doing
anything different than anybody else. And you notice there's
a lot of activity going on surrounding this. But you know what's not
going on? Nobody's mourning this man's
sin. Nobody's mourning about the effect
that this situation is having on the reputation of the gospel.
Nobody's mourning the bad effect of the reputation of Christ in
the community, the people who are watching this. There's a
lot going on, but nobody's praying that the Lord will resolve this
situation somehow, either by changing this man's actions or
by removing him from their midst. Nobody's praying that the Lord
will solve this situation. So, verse 3, Paul says, For I
verily, as absent in the body, but present in spirit, have judged
already, as though I were present, concerning him that hath so done
this deed. Now, Paul says, I'm absent in
body, but I'm present with you in spirit. No matter where Paul
was, he had a genuine care for these people, that he thought
about them. He said, I'm with you in spirit. and I have judged
how this situation is to be handled. He says in verse 4, In the name
of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together in my
spirit with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, to deliver
such a one unto Satan, for the destruction of the flesh, that
the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. Now Paul
instructs them when the whole church is gathered together,
as one body there to excommunicate this man, to remove him from
their and to deliver his body to Satan, so that his flesh will
be destroyed and his spirit may be saved. And this word destroyed
doesn't mean necessarily destroyed, it means an afflicting or a shaking
of his flesh, that his spirit may be saved. Now let me say
this first. This is the apostle Paul giving
this instruction. The No one today can do what
the apostle is doing here today because he's doing this with
apostolic authority. There are no apostles left today.
Nobody has the authority to do this today to turn one over to
Satan. And certainly none of us are
to trifle with this power, to play with something that doesn't
belong to us. But you'll notice here first, when Paul says you're
to excommunicate him, to give his body to Satan. Only his body,
only his flesh is given to Satan. Just like Job, not his soul.
God told Job, you can touch his body, but you can't touch his
soul. You can only go so far. And Paul says his flesh, his
body is to be given to Satan, but not his soul. And why did
Paul do this? Why does he say you're excommunicating
him and turning him over to Satan? To teach this man repentance.
Paul's not doing this just to be mean and judge. It's done
to teach this man repentance. And this is an example of church
discipline. Now, that's a popular thing in
our day. Church discipline. My brother
Jonathan worked with a man, a very religious man. All he ever talked
about was church discipline. You know, how to handle church
discipline. We're doing this with church discipline. This with
church discipline. And Jonathan told me, son, that's all he ever
talks about. After this, we worked together for over a year, he
said, I never one time heard a man mention Christ. Not once.
And people become so interested in this terse discipline because
it gives them power over people. It gives them power to inspect
someone's lives. It makes them feel self-righteous
to inspect someone else. I'm better than that. We're going
to terse them. I'd never do that. We're going to terse them. Now,
something like this may become necessary in the church. It did
here in Corinth. It may become necessary. But
it certainly would be the wrong attitude to take a lot of joy
in it. Paul did it with tears. You know,
to look forward to doing something like this would certainly be
the wrong attitude. But if it becomes necessary,
and we pray that it never would, but if it would become necessary,
we have in Scripture the example of how it's to be handled. First,
we're to talk to the person privately, bluntly, not you know, holding
any punches back, talk to them bluntly about the problem. Look
over in Titus chapter 3. Titus chapter 3, verse 10. A man that is an heretic,
after the first and second admonition, rejects So you don't reject him
until after the first and second admonition. You go to him and
talk to him about this. Tell him what he's doing wrong,
what needs to be done to correct it. And if it's not corrected,
you do it the second time. And he's not to be rejected until
after those two conversations. But if the person is just incorrigible,
they won't change their behavior, then he is to be put out of the
church. And we're not to have fellowship with this person.
As long as he's living in this open sin and rebellion. Now, that's harsh. I mean, that's
just harsh. There is no two ways about it.
That's harsh. And that's not done lightly at
all. But also, this is not done to
just rid the church of sin. You know, we're going to keep
the church pure and, you know, rid people who are sinners from
the church. If we're doing that, none of us would be here. The
place would be empty. That's not why this is done.
It's not done so we can be judgmental, set ourselves up as judges over
our brethren. All that will do is lead to self-righteousness
every single time. This has been done to teach this
person the seriousness of the situation, to have them feel
some punishment, that they feel embarrassed, so that they are
led to repent. That's the key. This is done
so they are led to repent. to save the soul. That's what
Paul says here, that his spirit may be saved in the day of the
Lord Jesus. That's the goal. The goal is
not to punish him. It's not to, you know, set yourself
up as judge over him. It's to save his soul. The goal
is not to have everyone living in fear of judgment. God's sheep
are not ruled by fear, you know, of being judged by our brother
and being kicked out of the church. That's not how The sheep's behavior
is controlled. The goal is to lead to repentance
and to lead to restoration of fellowship. Look over 2 Corinthians
chapter 2, and that's exactly what happened to this man. Ultimately, he did repent, and
after he repented, Paul wrote him another letter and gave him
instruction on how to handle this situation now. In 2 Corinthians
2, verse 6, Paul is speaking about this very man. He says
sufficient to such a man is this punishment which was inflicted
on many. So that contrary wise you ought rather to forgive him
and comfort him. Now he's repented of this. He's
quit doing that. Now you comfort him. Lest perhaps
such a one should be swallowed up with overmuch sorrow. Now
you comfort him. Wherefore, I beseech you that
you would confirm your love towards him. See, you're not removing
your love from him. It's just like you have to punish
one of your children. It's not that you don't love him. You
confirm your love to him. That's what this whole thing
has been for. In verse 9, For to this end also
did I write, This is the reason that I wrote to you, that he'd
repent, and you'd restore him to fellowship, that I might know
the proof of you, whether you be obedient in all things. So
that was the purpose. of this excommunication to lead
this man to repentance, that this behavior would stop. Now
verse 6, for your glorying is not good. Know ye not that a
little leaven leaveneth the whole lump? Now we know that glorying
in anything other than Christ is not good. Look in Galatians
chapter 6, glorying in anything other than Christ is not good. As many as desire to make a fair
show in the flesh, they constrain you to be circumcised, only lest
they should suffer persecution for the cross of Christ. For
neither they themselves, who are circumcised, keep the law,
but desire to have you circumcised, that they may glory in your flesh."
They're going to glory in the outward show of religion. They're
going to glory in how many converts that they've made. If they've
made you a convert, they can count you in their numbers. That's
their glorying in the flesh. But God forbid that I should
glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ by whom the
world is crucified unto me and I unto the world. We don't glory
in anything other than Christ. We glory in Christ alone. And
we don't glory in the gifts that He's given. We don't glory in
what He may or may not have done through me. It's glorying in
Christ alone, in him alone. But these Corinthians had this
problem, you know, as we've read through here so far. They gloried
in their wealth. They gloried in their knowledge
of the scriptures. They gloried in who their preachers were,
who it was that had taught them. And even now, when this situation
is going on in their midst and they should be ashamed, they
continue to glory. That's just the flesh. That's
this flesh that we drag around with us. We'll continue to glory
in these things. And Paul says, no, this is not
good. This has got to be corrected. This attitude must be corrected.
Don't you know that a little leaven will leaven the whole
lump? Don't you know that if you leave
just a little leaven alone, it's going to spread till it affects
the whole body? And you know very well that leaven
in scripture is a picture of sin. And if just a little sin
is left alone, it's going to increase and it will spread until
it affects the whole body. Just a little false doctrine,
if it's left alone, will spread and it will corrode our entire
doctrine until before long, Christ is taken out of it. Just a little
false doctrine will do that. That's why the pastor so carefully
guards the pulpit, so carefully guards our doctrine, because
I'm telling you, just a little bit, if you let it get in, it'll
spread and destroy the whole thing. Just a little bit of immorality,
if it's left alone, will just spread until it just spreads
to more and more and more evil. Once that gate's open, buddy,
it's just going to pour through. So that sin must be purged. and put out so the whole body
won't be affected. Just like if you've got a gangrene
leg, you cut it off to save the whole body. When I was a kid,
12, 13, 14 years old, I was always a big reader. And I could read
well beyond my age level. And so I did. I went to the library
and got books and read. And after I could have been,
my dad would throw them and read them. And some of them, he didn't
approve of them. Sometimes he made me take them
back, quit reading them. Another time he warned me, he said, you
are what you read. He said, it might be a small
thing, but what you fill your mind with is what you will become. And this might be a small thing,
but once it's in your mind, it doesn't go out. It'll grow and
spread till you become what you've read. And that's exactly what
sin does in this flesh. Once it gets in there, just a
little bit of it now, it'll grow and spread till it affects the
whole body. So verse 7, Paul says, purge out therefore the
old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as you are unleavened. For even Christ our Passover
is sacrificed for us. Now he says, you purge out the
old leaven. You purge out that sin. Just like those old Jews
used to purge out leaven from their houses before the Passover.
They searched their house for leaven to make sure it was all
out. They searched every nook and cranny. They looked in all
their secret hiding places in case some had been put in one
of their secret hiding places and they forgot about it over
the year. They searched for it so it was out of the house during
the Passover. And that's the way we're to search
our hearts for sin and remove it. Search the nooks and crannies
and remove it to purge ourselves from wickedness and from malice
and from evil. Look over in Ephesians chapter
4. You purge out these things. In Ephesians 4 verse 17, This
I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that ye henceforth
walk not as other Gentiles walk in the vanity of their mind,
having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life
of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the
blindness of their heart, who, being past feeling, have given
themselves over unto lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness and greediness. But ye have not so learned Christ. If so, be that ye have heard
him, and have been taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus.
That ye put off concerning the former conversation of the old
man. Search those things out and put them off. That old man
which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed
in the spirit of your mind. That ye put on the new man, which
after God is created in righteousness and true holiness. Wherefore,
putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbor.
So we are members one of another. Be ye angry and sin not. Let
not the sun go down upon your wrath, neither give place to
the devil. Let him that stole, steal no
more, but rather let him labor, working with his hands the thing
which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth.
Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth. See,
all these things are this leaven that you search and put off.
But speak that which is good. to the use of edifying, that
it may minister grace unto the hearers. And grieve not the Holy
Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.
Let all bitterness, with wrath, and anger, and clamor, and evil
speaking, be put away from you with all malice. And be ye kind
one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as
God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you." See, that's all that leaven
that we search for and put out. Now in this particular case,
Paul's telling them they are to rid themselves, they're to
rid the local congregation of this evil by putting the man
out. That the body of believers in
that town may appear to be what they profess to be. That they
may appear to men to be what they profess to be. They profess
to be new creatures in Christ. And Paul says that you put this
evil out so you will appear to be what you claim to be. Now
I know, and you do too, we still have sin in this flesh. We're
not talking about putting sin out so you don't have any more
sin. But believers do have a new man that's created in them. A
man that's created with absolutely no sin. There's no leaven in
that lump. And we should appear righteous
to men. And that doesn't mean without
sin. It means being a moral, honest, upright person. It's
not being self-righteous, but it's being Christ-like. That
you appear to be what you claim to be because Paul says, as ye
are unleavened. That new man that's in you is
unleavened. There's no leaven in him. He's
created without sin. He cannot sin. He's unleavened
without sin. He's born of God. And the church
must be a reflection of Christ who saved us. Isn't that so?
The church should be a reflection of our Savior. And the believer's
motivation to live a holy life is always the Lord Jesus Christ. Every single time in Scripture
you read one of the apostles talking about living a holy life,
the motivation is always Christ. Every single time. It's not fear
being judged by your neighbors. Our motivation is Christ. Paul
says here, because Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us. That's your motivation to live
a holy life. It's not the threat of church
discipline. It's the sacrifice of Christ. Christ our Passover. When Paul talks about our Passover,
he's speaking about our substitute. That Passover lamb died as a
substitute for the firstborn. If that lamb didn't die, the
firstborn was going to die. There had to be death in every
home. That Passover lamb died as a substitute for the firstborn. And Christ is our Passover. He suffered under the hand of
God, both body and soul. He suffered the punishment that
we deserve. He took that punishment as our
substitute. Our substitute suffered unspeakably
and he died. Why did he die? He's our substitute. He became
guilty of my sin and your sin, and He died our substitute. Now,
when Christ reveals Himself to us and we're born again, there's
a new man born. That man hates sin. You won't
have it. And we hate the sin that nailed
our Savior to the tree. We hate it. We hate the sin that
caused so much pain and agony to our Savior. Well, then how
can we condone that sin in ourselves? Can't do it. How can we condone
that sin in our congregation? Can't do it because you hate
sin. Now, I know we still sin every single second. You know
that. But what Paul's talking about
here is an open, willful sin. A pattern of sinning against
God. Just a child living in open rebellion
against God. That's what he's talking about.
Now verse 80 says, 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. Now when
Paul talks about the feast here, automatically we think about
the Lord's table. His table's a feast. But this
is not just restricted just to the Lord's table. It's the daily
feast that we have in Christ. What we have in Christ is a feast
of good things. It's our public worship. It's
our private daily worship and reading the scriptures, our preaching
services. It's a feast of the fellowship
that we have with one another. And now those things are enjoyed
with sincerity and truth. Those are not enjoyed in the
old man, in the flesh. They're enjoyed in the new man,
in the spirit, in his ways. And no one can truly worship,
can't worship God in the flesh. It can't be done. We can't worship
God with a heart of hatred. We can't worship God when we're
taking part in these divisions or strife or immorality because
God's not going to honor that with His presence. We worship
God in spirit and in truth. Not with the old leaven and the
old man, those old ways, but the new man and the new ways,
God's way. And we keep this feast every
day. Christ died. so that we would
be dead to sin. We died with him and because
we died with him, we're dead to sin. We're dead to this world
and we're raised to newness of life in Christ. So we live a
holy life. And that's internally before
God, that new man that God created, and it's externally before man
by living as a good person, not condoning sin, just as an honest,
upright person. And we keep this feast every
day by rejoicing always in Christ and following him. Now, verse
9, Paul says, I wrote unto you an epistle not to company with
fornicators, yet not altogether with the fornicators of this
world or with covetous or extortioners or with idolaters. For then must
ye needs to go out of the world. But now I've 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 in one know not to eat." Now,
Paul had written other letters. They were not divinely inspired.
They didn't become part of Scripture, so we don't have copies of them
today. But in these other letters, he had instructed them not to
keep company with fornicators, or extortioners, or idolaters. It's people who openly violate
the principles of righteousness. But now, he's not saying don't
have any contact with people like that out in the world. Because
if that was the case, you'd have to leave the world. We'd all
have to be totally separate from the world, live in a commune
or something. People's talking here about people who claim to
be believers, who are believers or brethren, or at the very least,
they made a profession of religion and joined with your congregation.
If someone like that lives in open immorality, They live with
greed and idolatry and drunkenness and laziness and foul language.
They're a thief and they just remain unrepentant. You talk
to them the first and second time and they just remain unrepentant. Then you're to separate yourself
from them. We're not to have fellowship with someone who professes
to know Christ, yet lives in open sin, lives in just obviously
not following Christ. And he's talking about people
in the church here. Maybe they're believers or maybe they're a
pretender. We don't know. But he's not talking about people
out in the world now. He's talking about people in the church. And
the reason he's not talking about people out in the world is because
they're unregenerate. They're dead. You can't expect
anything else from them because they've not been taught any better.
But you have. Someone who's in the church who
spent time in the church being taught from the scripture. That's
a different story because they have been taught better. Look
at verse 12. He says, 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 judges. Therefore put away
from among yourselves that wicked person. And we don't have any
authority to judge people outside the church because, like I said,
they haven't been taught any better. The Lord will judge them.
But in the church, this is what Paul's talking about. We are
to exhort one another and encourage one another daily with the word,
with the word of God. We reprove and we rebuke behavior
that's contrary to the word with the word, with the word of God.
And Paul told Timothy, you do that with all long suffering
and patience, because I'm telling you, it's necessary. Even with
believers now, we're still in this flesh. It takes long suffering
and patience a lot of times to deal with each other. But when
one will not repent of this kind of behavior, won't change this
kind of behavior, like this man here living in incest, he's to
be put out of the church. We're to have no fellowship with
him. But we have to remember here, that's done in hopes that
he will repent. And if he does, were to receive
him in the spirit of Christ. Well, what's the spirit of Christ?
The forgiving and receiving. How did Christ receive you? He
forgave you. He received you into fellowship.
Did you deserve it? Absolutely not. But he forgave
you. And that's what we're to do with
our brethren. All right.