The Devotional - 1036 - Foot steps in First Corinthians, ongoing

The Devotional – 1036 – Foot steps in First Corinthians, ongoing

In the United States of America we do not have unlimited freedom, yet we do have more freedom in this nation than most. Even to our north and south, those nations have limited freedoms compared to the liberality experienced by most of us. While I do not have a first-hand experience of this, I am told by my son who was stationed in Germany that it is a crime to spit on the sidewalk in one of the major cities. Okay I agree that spitting is not suitable anywhere unless you are choking or gagging, but there is not just one law on the books in this city but four against spitting with various degrees of fines against those who spit. Also I am told that any civil crime or infraction of the law is backed up with two or more laws in that if you are cleared of one, they have back-up law to nab you with.

CHALLENGES & COMMENTS – 1 CORINTHIANS 6:12-20

The above is just a thought or two concerning the restricted and governing control that the world around us imposes on citizens and foreigners in an attempt to keep peace. We have the command of God to submit to the authorities governing the nation around us, Romans 13:1-7 and 2 Peter 2:13-17. 

What then does the apostle mean in 1 Cor 6:12 that all things are lawful for him? As believers in the LORD, we are not above the law, are we? Certainly not and the apostle is not referring to civil law anyway, he is referring to the law of the body and the spirit. We must remember that he is speaking directly to the corrupted church at Corinth and describing things of a personal nature that individual members of the church indulge in and in this practice they corrupt the church.

If we take a look at Romans we see this a bit more clearly in that the law of God cannot save us from sin, it can only point out that we have. Romans 7:12-25 speaks clearly about this but I especially like verses 22-25; “for I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. But I see another law in my members (body), warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members (body). O wretched man that I am! Who is able to deliver me from this body of death? I thank God – through Jesus Christ our LORD! So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin”.

Therefore I see in the Corinthian passage and I hope you do as well that the apostle is exhorting all to live in the law of the Spirit of God which glorifies God and to disregard the law of sin which destroys the life of the saint of God. Read the context here in 1 Corinthians 6, we are not to submit to the limited and failing power or law of flesh, or to the influences of the flesh around us. We are members of Christ’s kingdom, to place our body with that of a member of the kingdom of this world is spiritually and physically immoral.

It is clear to be joined to the world is spiritual adultery and the two shall become one! This is a terrible spiritual death to experience, if this is a physical joining of the flesh it is physically deadly. But he or she who is joined to the LORD is “ONE SPIRIT WITH HIM!” So should we say more? Well yes! You were bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body through His perfect law of liberty and do not forget to remember what you look like in the mirror. James 1:21-27.