1 Corinthians 5:9-11

1 Corinthians 5:9-11

"I wrote to you in my epistle not to keep company with sexually immoral people. Yet I certainly did not mean with the sexually immoral people of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world. But now I have written to you not to keep company with anyone named a brother, who is sexually immoral, or covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or an extortioner--not even to eat with such a person."
NKJV

Seinfeld made light of the classic break up line, "It's not you, it's me." Maybe you've been handed that line before, but you know what? There's some truth behind it. Deep inside, you know it's the sin inside you. Relationships are complicated. They are complicated even more by the sin in your life. Are there rocky relationships in your life? Own the problem; look at yourself.

Whether at work, home or church, relationships are everywhere, and you are to be stewards of them. Relationships can promote your walk with Jesus or they can derail you - if you allow it. You are called to love the unlovable, but there are times when you will have to decide which relationships are healthy and which relationships are not. A relationship that is promoting you to sin and wander from your walk with Christ is not a good relationship.

There are some who think that if they get away from other people they will get away from the sin that's in the world. Convents, monasteries and the like have all been built with this mindset. That's not a solution. This only walls them in with their own sin while denying the world the "salt" in their lives. Jesus told you to be the salt of the world. You know what salt does? It makes people thirsty. You are to make this world thirst for a relationship with Jesus. If you withdraw from the world, this doesn't happen.

You are a steward of the life God has blessed you with. Whether you participate in wrong activities or not the decision is yours to make. God has called you, Christian, to be active in other's lives and a part of that is confronting sin, with a heart of love. When this fails to happen, everyone gets hurt; feelings get bent, anger festers, and relationships become whack. Confrontation is uncomfortable. It's not fun. But love requires us to step beyond the bounds of comfort because we love others. This, my friend, is the calling of all Christians ... to be leaders in the world.

Life Lesson: Our main problem is the sin inside us not the people around us.

Dear Father,
Thank You for loving me. Thank You for the forgiveness of my sins. Even though I have done wrong things, You ask me to come to You. It is through Your payment for my sins that I can come to you in repentance. Lord, I am sorry. I ask that You help me to own up to the things I try to hide from You. Empower and equip me with the knowledge of Your will for my life. Lord, give me the power to live for You, and help me to walk in the newness of life. In Jesus' name, Amen.

Living to tell what He died to say,
Pastor David McGee

My comment:

Is'nt it amazing or maybe curious is a better word, that when people read this they think it is for them to go out and tell the whole world how bad they are because they are doing such and such when this particular passage clearly is for those of us who have accepted the righteousness of God through the blood of the Lamb Jesus Christ our Savior. We are admonished to not do these things that displease God and to help our brothers/sisters who stumble in these areas and to not continue with our walk with them if they continue to purpose in these ways. Why? Because when one says they have accepted the Lord Jesus the Christ as their Savior they put Him on and He is in them and to do these things is to disrespect Him. Yet even more it is to throw mud in His face with the world watching.

If I threw mud in the face of the person I say I love in front of the world would they believe I loved the person I say I loved? Absolutely not. So then why do people who claim to love Jesus do it? Why do they think He would be okay with it (I have heard people who claim to be Christians or followers of Jesus make this claim, "I can do anything I want") when the Word of God plainly says not to do them?

Well, there are many reasons I suppose yet I am talking about the person who purposes them. Makes a conscious choice to do them. Lives in the life style that God says is wrong. They do not agree it is wrong usually and so they go their merry way telling people they are saved and in reality they probably are not. Oh, they might have said the words yet they did not truely accept His sacrifice. It was with conditions in their hearts. Can Christ Jesus use them? You betcha. Can He help them to walk away from those things? Absolutly! If they want to. There in lies the rub. Do they want to really be saved?

As for Christians we are called out ones and that means we should give our lives to Him who gave everything for us. If we put our lives into His hands He will help us to give up those things in our sin nature that seem to grip us. He can overcome anything in us. Trust Him and follow Him and keep in His Word and you my friend will find yourself becomeing more and more like Him. You will become the salt in the lives of many and be the bearer of the waters of life to a thristy world, you will be living water.

When He admonishes us to not continue to walk with someone who continues to listen to their sin nature who has said they are a child of God and bought with Jesus's sacrifice we do not help them to turn away from sin and we give credance to what they do. If you were at a store with a person who you knew was a theif and they stole something and you did not seperate from them and turn tem in you would be a part of the thieft. The same is true in this respect. That is why we are told to go to the brother/sister in Christ Jesus,  and loveingly tell them to turn away from what they are doing. Then if that fails take another brother/sister and confront them again. Then they are put out of the church until they repent and are accepted back with love. We hope and pray for them to repent and turn from what they were doing and if they do we accept them with out throwing the sin in their faces. Christ does not do that with us. We are commanded to love and sometimes love is doing the tough thing of walking away from the person until they turn to the Lord.

Now back to the original thought this is not what we are asked to do to those who do not know the Lord and do not profess to know Him. We loveingly try to bring them to the knowledge and understanding of the Lord's Sacrifice for their sin and hopefully lead them to the Cross and redemption. Yet it is their choice.  We do not stay and keep offering. Christ did not stay in one place nor should we. There are many. We are to plant the seed, some times we get to water it and even less we get to watch it sprout and grow. It is for some to plant and some to harvest and it is up to God as to who those are. Just be willing brothers/sisters to be used of Him however He chooses to use you.

Lord let me know where you want to use me and help me to be willing to go and do as you desire and have created me to do. Amen