1 CORINTHIANS CHAPTER 5:
“Church Discipline”
By
1.
INTRO
1.1.1. In our last study we looked
at the power of being a godly example
1.1.1.1.In that section, Paul
pointed to himself, Peter, Apollos, and the other apostles as being godly
examples for the church to follow in all of their conduct
1.1.1.2.Paul told the people that if
they would be pleasing to the Lord and greatly used by Him all they needed to
do was to do as he did, or follow his own example
1.1.1.3.There is tremendous power in
a consistent Christian testimony and example, for the principle ‘like produces
like’ is always in effect in this world.
Children grow up tending to do the very things that their parents do,
churches tend to follow the example of their leadership, etc.
1.2.
In our study today we are going to look at Paul’s exhortation to the
church in Corinth concerning church discipline
1.2.1. We have now reached the point
in the book where we are dealing with the issue that probably most grieved
Paul, and all that he had previously written in the book has been built in
order for him to deal with this very delicate yet critical issue in the church
1.2.2. We saw when we first began
our study of this book that Paul wrote this letter to the Corinthians with many
tears, for his heart had been broken because the Corinthian church had become
so hardened in their heart against the Lord.
This hardness was seen in the factions that the church was involved in
as well as in their allowing a certain man in their fellowship to continue in
fellowship with them while living a lifestyle that was very far from honoring
the Lord
1.2.3. We who are called into
Christ’s church have come into fellowship with Christ by death. That is, we all died to ourselves and our
own self-will and have now yielded our lives to Christ to make us the very
people that He wants us to be
1.2.4. In this relationship with
God we Christians are in we have been forgiven all of our sins and been given
assurance of eternal life with God, and all by the grace of God. Since receiving eternal life, we have been
brought into “fellowship” with God.
However, as it was our sin before coming to Christ that had separated us
from knowing God, it is now our sin as Christians which separates us from
having “fellowship” with God. Until we
confess and repent of sin we have committed, though we may still be a child of
God, we are not in fellowship with God.
1.2.4.1.This is very similar to what
happens in a marriage. Though my
relationship with my wife Jill has never changed throughout our 21 years of
marriage, for when we married it was for life, yet there are many times that I
have done things to her that have hurt her feelings. My actions have then hindered us from expressing the love that we
should express to each other until I have asked her forgiveness and assured her
that I would try not to do anything like that again. In the same way, we as Christians must realize that when we sin
we effect our relationship with Christ, and until we confess and repent of the
sins that we may commit, our fellowship with God is hindered. We are still saved (if we have truly come to
salvation), however we are just not experiencing the fellowship that we should
be experiencing
1.2.4.2.We have to realize then that
in our life that there are things that we must avoid if we are to be in that
place where we are in fellowship with God and growing in our faith
1.2.5. Likewise, there are some
sins which if we allow them in our life, they will eventually destroy any hope of a walk with God.
1.2.5.1.I wonder what you might do
if you went to rent a motel room and the owner told you that there was just one
room left that you could rent. Then, as
you were happily writing the check out to the motel manager he mentioned to you
that he was giving you a bit of a discount on the room because there was a
loose cobra in the room. I don’t know
about you but if that happened to me, I tell you that I would make sure that
that cobra was out of the room before I would stay in that room or go to sleep
on the bed. In the same way, there are
some sins which a person can commit which will have such a devastating and
deadly effect on their spiritual life it would be like having a cobra in your
motel room. Paul wrote about sexual
immorality in his epistles as being unlike any other sin, because of the
devastation that it wreaks in a person’s life.
He wrote that every other sin that a person sinned was outside his body
but that the person who committed that sin sinned against his own body
1.2.5.2.Imagine a young girl who
wants to be a figure skater, and every day she goes to the ice rink to train,
and her trainer meets her. She works
hard each and every day but she doesn’t really seem to get any better. The problem is you see that every day for
lunch she eats three cheese burgers and a gallon of ice cream. No matter how hard she works gravity
eventually wins out and she cannot get into any kind of shape in order to
compete. In the words of the cartoon
character the Tick when he fell off a building, “Gravity is a harsh mistress!”
1.2.5.2.1.In the same way, sexual
immorality so zaps a Christian of his spiritual and moral vigor that there is
no way that he can have any hope of being made into the image of Christ as long
as he allows that sin to be in his life
1.2.5.2.2.There is no point in trying
to work on building our Christian character or walking as God wants us to walk if
we are allowing that sin to dwell in our life, for it will make all of our
efforts be made in vain
1.2.6. When we came to know Christ,
our bodies were indwelt by the Holy Spirit, and the New Testament tells us that
our bodies have been made to be temples to God, a place of worship to God. Whatever we do in our bodies we do as a
temple to God, and in fact whatever we do in our bodies we join the Lord to
also, for we are His temple. If we do
things that please the Lord then our bodies are serving their proper function
and providing a place where God is worshipped.
However, if we allow sin in our lives then we are joining the Lord to
that sin and we become a defiled temple of God
1.2.6.1.Paul writes about this in 1
Cor. 6:17-20, “17 But the one who joins himself to the Lord is one spirit
with Him.18 Flee immorality. Every other sin that a man commits is outside the
body, but the immoral man sins against his own body.19 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?20 For you have been bought with a price:
therefore glorify God in your body.”
1.2.7. The scriptures teach us very
clearly that to commit any sex outside of marriage is to sin. This is called the sin of “fornication” or
“sexual immorality.”
1.2.7.1.This is the sin which a man
in the Corinthian church was committing, and instead of the church becoming
very grieved over this sin being in their midst and defiling their worship with
God, they instead were arrogant and puffed up and perhaps even thought that
they were being liberal-minded or loving unconditionally by allowing this sin
to exist in the church
1.2.7.2.Paul tells the church in this
chapter that they were to remove this man who is committing this sin from their
midst
2.
VS 5:1 - “5:1
It is actually reported that there is immorality that there is
immorality among you, and immorality of such a kind as does not exist even
among the Gentiles, that someone has his father’s wife.” - Paul
tells the Corinthians of his shock that amongst the church there is a man who
is living with his father’s wife
2.1.
In
our world today it is so commonplace for people to live together out of wedlock
or to have sexual relations out of wedlock that we in the church have almost
gotten numbed to the fact that this is sin, the breaking of God’s law, and a
very wrong thing to do.
2.1.1. Paul found out from those of
Chloe’s household about the man who had taken his step mother (his father’s
wife) and was living with her as if she were his wife. Paul was shocked at the news and he desires
to indicate his shock by his wording in this verse, ‘it is ACTUALLY
reported’.
2.1.2. Not only was this man having
sexual relations outside of wedlock, he was doing so with a woman who was his
father’s wife, or his step mother. He
was committing incest.
2.1.3. There was a lot of
promiscuity among the Corinthian people outside of the church, however the laws
of their own Greek society forbid incestuous relations with one’s natural or
step mother. This kind of behavior was
frowned upon by non-believers of the city, however to Paul’s horror there was a
man in the church who was commiting this very horrible sin.
2.2.
Paul
says here that there is ‘immorality’ among them in the church, and this word
for ‘immorality’ is also translated ‘fornication’, and it means any sexual
relations outside of marriage. The
Greek word used by Paul for ‘immorality’ is actually ‘porneia’, from which our
word “pornography” comes from.
2.3.
God’s
law in Lev. 18:7-8, 29 and Deut. 22:30 states that anyone who had relations
with his step mother was to be killed just as the one who had relations with
his mother.
2.4.
From
this letter we can tell that this woman is not a Christian since there is no
rebuke or discipline which Paul suggests should be given to her.
2.5.
The
man had not married this woman since the sin of “adultery” is not condemned in
this letter.
2.6.
It
is believed that the man’s father is still alive from comments made concerning
him in 2 Corinthians, and thus he is a victim of this sin as well.
2.7.
We
in the church must be shocked at sin in a Christian’s life, especially that
which is of such a horrible and scandalous nature as immorality. There is so much sin around in our world, as
there was in Paul’s world, however we must not lose our sensitivity to the
ugliness and horror of such blatant sin.
2.8.
Spurgeon once spoke about how forcefully Paul preached against and exposed this
sin of immorality, “Be sure
also to note that the apostle, when he is exposing sin, does not trifle with
it, but like a mighty hunter before the Lord, pursues it with all his might;
his hatred to it is intense; he drags it forth to the light; he bids us mark
its hideous deformity; he hunts it through all its purlieus, hotfoot, as we
say. He never leaves it breathing time; argument after argument he hurls like
javelins upon it; he will by no means spare the filthy thing. He who above all
others speaks most positively of salvation by grace, and is most clear upon the
fact that salvation is not by the works of the law, is at the same time most
intensely earnest for the holiness of Christians, and most zealously denounces
those who would say, “Let us do evil, that good may come.””
3.
VS 5:2 - “5:2
And you have become arrogant, and have not mourned instead, in order
that the one who had done this deed might be removed from your midst.” - Paul
rebukes the Corinthians for having become arrogant because of this sin in their
midst when they should rather have been mourning
3.1.
Paul
was more concerned about the attitude that the church had about the man’s sin,
than the sin itself. He says that he
wrote this letter with much weeping and tears, and the church’s attitude
concerning tolerating this sin was probably the source of most of Paul’s grief. The church was tolerating this thing that
was being done out in the open.
3.2.
It
could be that the church’s reliance upon and love of worldly philosophy had
helped in bringing about their present attitude about this sin.
3.2.1. They might well have taken
the attitude that they had to be open minded about personal matters of one’s
life.
3.2.2. They may have thought that
they were to show this man unconditional love no matter how heinous his
sin.
3.2.3. They may have felt that the
church had progressed spiritually beyond the point to where they needed to be
careful to separate out person’s who were living in such sin.
3.3.
Paul
describes the attitude of the Corinthians as being ‘arrogant’, and their
‘arrogance’ was partially to blame for their not taking action to remove this
sin.
3.3.1. They should have been
mourning that the situation was such an ugly blot upon their witness in the
world, and horribly grievous to the Lord.
3.3.2. They may have been so caught
up in their various factions and divisions that they were not concerned to deal
with this situation.
3.4.
We
in the church need to realize that Christ’s church must be carefully guarded
and kept pure and untainted from the sins of the world around us. When there is substantial sin that is
continuing in the lives of believers, we must not sleep until it be eradicated.
4.
VS 5:3-5 - “5:3
For I, on my part, though absent in body but present in spirit, have
already judged him who has so committed this, as though I were present. In the name of our Lord Jesus, when you are
assembled, and I with you in spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus, I have decided to deliver such a one to
Satan for the destruction of his flesh, that his spirit may be saved in the day
of the Lord Jesus.” - Paul tells the Corinthians that he has already judged this person
and situation, and now they needed to deal with the situation appropriately
4.1.
Paul
tells the Corinthians that they already have his vote on this issue of what to
do about the man who is sinning. Paul
tells them that when they assemble together in Jesus’ Name that he would be
with them in his spirit, and that they were to ‘deliver such a one to Satan for
the destruction of his flesh’.
4.2.
Satan
is the god of this world, and if a person is excommunicated from the church,
then he leaves the umbrella of protection and blessing that the church
provides, and he comes under Satan’s dominion.
4.3.
The
isolation of not having any Christian fellowship as well as suffering at
Satan’s hands will result in ‘the destruction of his flesh’. In other words, if a man will not come to
repent of his sins and crucify the flesh while in fellowship with the church,
then as a believer who has been cut off from the church he will have better
opportunity and reason to find repentance.
4.4.
The
end result is that if the man eventually repents of his sin, then we can be
sure of his salvation when Christ returns for his church.
4.5.
Some
have erroneously taught that the church had the power to inflict harm upon a
sinning Christian by summoning Satan’s power, however there is no place in
scripture where the saints pray Satan’s power for infliction of injury upon a
brother or sister.
5.
VS 5:6 - “5:6
Your boasting is not good. Do
you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough.” - Paul tells the Corinthians that their boasting is not good
5.1.
Paul
tells them that their boasting about tolerating the sin of this man is not good
because sin is like the yeast in leaven.
A little yeast in a bunch of dough will eventually spread to the whole
loaf.
5.2.
In
Paul’s day when they made bread, before they put it in an oven to bake they
would take the smallest piece off of a corner of the dough and they would save
it. Then, the next time that they made
bread they would place that little bit of leavened dough in with the bread and
let it rise until the yeast had leavened the whole loaf. In the same way, a little sin tolerated will
eventually spread and infect the whole church sapping its life away.
5.3.
In
our lives individually as well as in the church, sin left unchecked spreads and
will eventually infect the whole of us, for one sin will lead to another sin
until all is confessed and repented of.
6.
VS 5:7 - “5:7
Clean out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. For Christ our Passover also has been
sacrificed.” - Paul tells the Corinthians to clean out the old leaven
6.1.
Paul
through the symbolism in this verse tells the Corinthians to remove the person
who is sinning from their communion in order that they may be renewed with new
spiritual life.
6.2.
In
this verse, we see a principle concerning sanctification. The word “sanctification” means to be set
apart a holy thing by the Lord. All of
us as God’s people have been once and for all set apart to the Lord, or sanctified,
for we are His people (see Heb. 10:10; 1 Cor. 1:2; 1 Cor. 6:11). In fact, He calls us “saints”, which means “holy
ones”, and this term also indicates our sanctification by the Lord. However, this is “positional sanctification”. There is a second kind of sanctification
that is mentioned in the scripture and this is called “experimental
sanctification” (see 2 Tim. 2:21). God
is working in our lives through all that we experience to gradually make us
more and more like Christ in all of our conduct and character. We are “being sanctified”.
6.2.1. He tells them that they are
‘in fact unleavened’, or pure and undefiled from sin.
6.2.2. Now they need to remove the
defilement from their company so that they might in experience be undefiled,
that they might be made into a new lump.
6.3.
Paul
tells the Corinthians that Christ is their ‘Passorver’, the One who has been
sacrificed for them.
6.4.
In
the Old Testament, when the Israelites were preparing to leave Egypt, and Moses
had commanded them to put the blood on their doorposts, the people were to make
unleavened bread for their trip. There
could be no leaven in it. This was
symbolic of the fact that they were starting a new life, and therefore they
could have nothing impure and undefiled in their life. Then when the Passover was celebrated each
year, the Israelites had to remove all leaven from their houses lest they would
become ceremonially defiled and unable to celebrate the Passover feast.
6.4.1. This observance was given to
Moses to serve as a type for what sin does in the lives of God’s people and how
we need to flee it.
6.4.2. The saints (all believers)
in Christ’s church are made new creatures at salvation. They are forgiven all of their sins at that
point. Now they cannot allow sin to
have a place in their lives. Christ is
their Passover celebration, and they are to show their devotion and love for
Him by abstaining from all sin in their lives.
6.5.
Unless
a person makes a clean break with sin in his life when coming to Christ, he
will struggle mightily for he will find himself constantly negotiating and
struggling with the Lord about areas in his life that the Lord wants Him to
deal with. It is important then for a
Christian to just make up his mind once and for all and make a commitment to
the Lord to do everything that He wants him to do, whatever it entails. This clean break with the past will be
honored by the Lord. When we make that
sort of commitment in obedience, the Lord will also give us the power and
strength to obey Him, for His power meets our lives at the point of obedience
and enables us to be obedient. Paul
wrote about how this works in Phil. 4:13, “I can do all things through Him
who strengthens me.”
6.5.1. Perhaps you are at that
place where you need to make a clean break with the past and commit your way to
be obedient to the Lord, whatever it will entail? You will never regret making a decision to be obedient to the
Lord.
7.
VS 5:8 - “5:8
Let us therefore celebrate the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the
leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and
truth.” - Paul tells the Corinthians that now as a fellowship they were to
symbolically celebrate the Passover by removing the leaven from among their
midst
7.1.
Paul
tells the Corinthians that they are to celebrate in Christ who is their
Passover, not with the old leaven of their flesh life, nor with the attitude of
sinful malice or wickedness, but rather they were to worship and celebrate in
Christ with pure and sincere hearts, and be committed to living the truth that
is found in Him and His word.
7.2.
We
Christians need to purge our lives from any sinful activity and let Christ
develop within us sincere and pure hearts.
We need to be committed to searching out ‘truth’ from God’s word so that
we can be sure to be faithful and obedient to all that God wants for us to be
doing.
8.
VS 5:9-10 - “5:9
I wrote you in my letter not to associate with immoral people; I did
not at all mean with the immoral
people of this world, or with the covetous and swindlers, or with
idolaters; for then you would have to
go out of the world.” - Paul tells the Corinthians that in a previous letter to them that
he wrote, he meant to say that they were not to associate with a “so-called
brother who was immoral, etc”, however they had thought that he was referring
only to not associate with non-believers who do those sorts of things
8.1.
Paul
refers to a letter which is now lost that he wrote to the Corinthians. In that letter he told the church not to
associate with immoral people. However,
the church quit associating with the immoral people outside of the church,
while tolerating immorality of people who were within the church.
8.2.
Paul
lists what types of sins that worldly people commit, and yet he infers that
they should still be a witness to the people committing those sins:
8.2.1. The sins listed by Paul are
immorality covetousness, swindling, and idolatry.
8.2.1.1.Immorality is the same word
that is also translated in the New Testament as “fornication,” and it means any
sexual relations that are outside of heterosexual marriage.
8.2.1.2.Covetousness is the desire
for what others possess and for those things which God has forbidden for
us. This sin is expressed by people in
many ways.
8.2.1.3.Swindlers are those who make
money by conning people out of their possessions in a duplicitous manner.
8.2.1.4.Idolaters are those who
serve not only Jesus but also go into the temples of other gods and bend the
knee and offer forbidden sacrifices.
However, there are many things which can be idols of the heart, things
which take place where the Lord should be, or usurp His authority.
8.3.
We
Christians are called to be witnesses to the people of this world. We are called to be in the world, but not of
it. We ought to be like Jesus who was a
man who was known for hanging around sinners and tax gatherers, as He made the
best of every opportunity for sharing the gospel with sinners.
9.
VS 5:11 - “5:11 But actually, I wrote to you not to
associate with any so-called brother if he should be an immoral person, or
covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or a swindler- not even
to eat with such a one.” - Paul tells the Corinthians that in the previous letter he meant
to say that they were not to associate with someone who claimed to be a
believer and yet was living in sin
9.1.
Paul
tells the Corinthians that if any man claims to be Christian (whether he is one
or not), and yet he habitually practices immorality (fornication),
covetousness, idolatry, reviling, or drunkenness, or swindling, then the church
is not to allow that person into their fellowship and communion. They should be excluded from church
fellowships and meetings of any kind, and even from such casual social contact
such as eating meals together.
9.2.
The
Greek word Paul used for ‘associate’ in this verse means “to mix up with.”
9.3.
A
‘reviler’ is one who uses abusive language.
9.4.
Fellowship
with so-called brothers who are drunkards is forbidden in this verse.
10.
VS 5:12 - “5:12
For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Do you not judge those who are within the church? But those who
are outside, God judges. Remove the
wicked man from among yourselves.” - Paul tells the Corinthians that they need to judge amongst
themselves and remove people who have a harmful influence
10.1.
Paul
tells the Corinthians that his and their job is not to act as judges of
nonbelievers since Christ will judge all nonbelievers on their day of
judgment. However, it is his and their
responsibility to judge and discipline those within the church who are living
in sin.
10.2.
Then
he tells them one last time to remove the wicked man from their fellowship.
10.3.
We
Christians must be zealous that Christ’s church be kept pure and undefiled.
10.4.
We
need to follow Jesus’ command for dealing with anyone who is found to be
sinning in Matt. 18:15-18, 15 "If
your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two
of you. If he listens to you, you have won your brother over. 16 But if he will not listen, take one or
two others along, so that `every matter may be established by the testimony of
two or three witnesses.' 17 If he
refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen
even to the church, treat him as you would a pagan or a tax collector 18 "I
tell you the truth, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and
whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
10.4.1. Go to them in private so
that they can have the opportunity to repent without being shamed. Besides, you may have misunderstood or
misinterpreted the situation, and doing this in private will keep hurtful
gossip from being spread.
10.4.2. If the person still will not
repent, take a brother or sister (if you are a woman) and go again and rebuke
them.
10.4.3. If they still will not
repent, then the matter needs to be brought to the church and the person asked
to leave.