2 Lapses from 2 Lapses from SanctificationSanctification

I Corinthians 6I Corinthians 6

A ReviewA Review• Chapter 1:• Overview – Cliques / Distortion of Wisdom• Chapter 2:• Human Wisdom vs Spiritual Wisdom• Chapter 3:• Ministers are servants of the congregation• Chapter 4: • Ministers are servants of God• Chapter 5:• Church Discipline: Incest• Chapter 6:• 2 Lapses in Judgment: Lawsuits and Sexual Immorality

Introduction to Chapter 6Introduction to Chapter 6In Chapter 5 Paul made the congregation responsible for judging and maintaining Christian conduct in its midst. In this chapter he supplies an additional example of the kind of judging a Christian congregation is to do.In the second half of the chapter he takes up the background of the case of incest dealt with in chapter 5 and corrects the wrong attitudes of the Corinthains toward sex.

I Corinthians 6:1-11I Corinthians 6:1-11• 1 Lapse: A Failure of Judgment• Lawsuits Among Believers• 1. Why is it out of place for Christians to go to law

with their differences before the ungodly?• 2. What was lacking in their relations to each

other?• 3. Compare vs 9-10 with 5:11. What kind of sins

receive additional emphasis in this section?• 4. What is Paul’s ultimate appeal to Christians

who are tempted to practice immorality?

A failure of JudgmentA failure of Judgment• Under what circumstances may Christians appeal

to public courts? • (Acts 16:37; 25:9-11)• What challenges face a Christian who serves as a

judge? A lawyer?• In what respects may the functions of church and

state overlap?• How can a Christian congregation prevent

“church quarrels” and other unchristian conduct in its midst?

• How is Paul’s list of sins viewed by the world today? (vs 9-10)

Sexual ImmoralitySexual Immorality• I Corinthians 6:12-20• 1. What basic principle does Paul

maintain, even though the Corinthians abused it?

• What two limitations does he place on Christian liberty?

• How do we know that Paul does not apply the principle of Christian liberty to sexual immorality?

Sexual ImmoralitySexual Immorality• Why doesn’t Paul apply the same principle

to food as to fornication?• Why does Paul forbid sexual relations with

a prostitute?• What makes sexual immorality

(fornication) different from other sins? (vs 18)

• What are Paul’s ultimate appeals against engaging in sex outside of marriage?

Sexual Immorality in the Sexual Immorality in the BibleBible

• 2 Samuel 11:2-5• One evening David got up from his bed and

walked around on the roof of the palace. From the roof he saw a woman bathing. The woman was very beautiful, and David sent someone to find out about her. The man said, “Isn’t this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam and the wife of Uriah the Hittite?” Then David sent messengers to get her. She came to him, and he slept with her. (She had purified herself from her uncleanness.) Then she went back home. The woman conceived and sent word to David, saying, “I am pregnant.”

Sexual Immorality in the BibleSexual Immorality in the Bible• 2 Samuel 12:7-14• 7 Then Nathan said to David, “You are the man! This is what the Lord, the

God of Israel, says: ‘I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you from the hand of Saul. 8 I gave your master’s house to you, and your master’s wives into your arms. I gave you the house of Israel and Judah. And if all this had been too little, I would have given you even more. 9 Why did you despise the word of the Lord by doing what is evil in his eyes? You struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword and took his wife to be your own. You killed him with the sword of the Ammonites. 10 Now, therefore, the sword will never depart from your house, because you despised me and took the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your own.’

• 11 “This is what the Lord says: ‘Out of your own household I am going to bring calamity upon you. Before your very eyes I will take your wives and give them to one who is close to you, and he will lie with your wives in broad daylight. 12 You did it in secret, but I will do this thing in broad daylight before all Israel.’”

• 13 Then David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the Lord.” • Nathan replied, “The Lord has taken away your sin. You are not going to

die. 14 But because by doing this you have made the enemies of the Lord show utter contempt, the son born to you will die.”

Sexual Immorality in the BibleSexual Immorality in the Bible

• Matthew 5:28• But I tell you that anyone who looks at a

woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

• Romans 1:26,27• 26 Because of this, God gave them over to

shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. 27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.

Sexual Immorality in the BibleSexual Immorality in the Bible

• I Corinthians 7:2• But since there is so much

immorality, each man should have his own wife, and each woman her own husband.

• I Corinthians 10:8• We should not commit sexual

immorality, as some of them did—and in one day twenty-three thousand of them died.

Sexual Immorality in the BibleSexual Immorality in the Bible

• Ephesians 5:1-3• Be imitators of God, therefore, as

dearly loved children and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

• But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of greed, because these are improper for God’s holy people.

Sexual Immorality in the BibleSexual Immorality in the Bible• I Thessalonians 4:1-7• Finally, brothers, we instructed you how to live in order to

please God, as in fact you are living. Now we ask you and urge you in the Lord Jesus to do this more and more. For you know what instructions we gave you by the authority of the Lord Jesus.

• It is God’s will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid sexual immorality; that each of you should learn to control his own body in a way that is holy and honorable, not in passionate lust like the heathen, who do not know God; and that in this matter no one should wrong his brother or take advantage of him. The Lord will punish men for all such sins, as we have already told you and warned you. For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy life.

Sexual ImmoralitySexual Immorality• What forms of sexual activity does

God condemn?• Why does Scripture condemn sexual

immorality?• What motivates a Christian to live in

chastity and purity?• What reasons does Paul give for

avoiding sexual immorality?

Applying the principlesApplying the principles• How does engaging in sexual immorality

differ from using alcohol or drugs?• What do arguments in favor of pre-marital

sex leave out of consideration?• Why does Paul argue so vigorously against

sexual immorality?• What does a Christian do about all the

sexually explicit “stuff” on TV, the internet, social medias, movies, magazine and books?