Henry: Welcome To Immerse: The Daily Bible Reading Experience.
Day 22.
Dear brothers and sisters, when I was with you, I couldn't talk to
you as I would to spiritual people.
I had to talk as though you belong to this world or as though
you were infants in Christ.
I had to feed you with milk, not with solid food because you weren't
ready for anything stronger, and you still aren't ready.
For you are still controlled by your sinful nature.
You are jealous of one another and quarrel with each other.
Doesn't that prove you are controlled by your sinful nature?
Aren't you living like people of the world?
When one of you says, I'm a follower of Paul, and another says, I follow Apollos,
aren't you acting just like people of the world after all, who is Apollos?
Who is Paul?
We are only God's servants through whom you believed the good news.
Each of us did the work the Lord gave us.
I planted the seed in your hearts and Apollos watered it,
but it was God who made it grow.
It's not important.
Who does the planting or who does the watering?
What's important is that God makes the seed grow.
The one who plants and the one who waters.
Work together with the same purpose and both will be
rewarded for their own hard work.
For we are both God's workers and you are God's field.
You are God's building because of God's grace.
To me, I have laid the foundation like an expert builder.
Now others are building on it, but whoever is building on this
foundation must be very careful.
For no one can lay any foundation other than the one we already have.
Jesus Christ.
Anyone who builds on that foundation may use a variety of materials.
Gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, or straw.
But on the judgment day, fire will reveal what kind of work each builder has done.
The fire will show if a person's work has any value.
If the work survives, that builder will receive a reward.
But if the work is burned up, the builder will suffer great loss.
The builder will be saved, but like someone barely escaping through a wall
of flames, don't you realize that all of you together are the temple of God
and that the spirit of God lives in you.
God will destroy anyone who destroys this temple.
For God's temple is holy.
And you are that temple.
Stop deceiving yourselves.
If you think you are wise by this world's standards.
You need to become a fool.
To be truly wise for the wisdom of this world is foolishness
to God as the scriptures say.
He traps the wise in this snare of their own cleverness.
And again, the Lord knows the thoughts of the wise.
He knows they are worthless.
So don't boast about following a particular human leader.
For everything belongs to you, whether Paul or Apollos or Peter, or
the world, or life and death, or the present and the future, everything
belongs to you and you belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God.
So look at Apollos and me as mere servants of Christ.
Who have been put in charge of explaining God's mysteries.
Now, a person who is put in charge as a manager must be faithful as for me.
It matters very little how I might be evaluated by you
or by any human authority.
I don't even trust my own judgment on this point.
My conscience is clear, but that doesn't prove I'm right.
It is the Lord himself who will examine me and decide.
So don't make judgements about anyone ahead of time.
Before the Lord returns for, he will bring our darkest secrets to light
and will reveal our private motives.
Then God will give to each one whatever praise is due.
Dear brothers and sisters, I've used Apollo and myself to
illustrate what I've been saying.
If you pay attention to what I've quoted from the scriptures, you won't
be proud of one of your leaders at the expense of another for what gives
you the right to make such a judgment.
What do you have that God hasn't given you?
And if everything you have is from God, why boast as though it were not a gift.
You think you already have everything you need.
You think you are already rich.
You have begun to reign in God's kingdom without us.
I wish you really were reigning already for then we would be raining with you.
Instead, I sometimes think God has put us apostles on display like
prisoners of war At the end of a Victor's parade condemned to die.
We have become a spectacle to the entire world, to people and angels alike.
Our dedication to Christ makes us look like fools.
But you claim to be so wise in Christ, we are weak, but you are so powerful.
You are honored, but we are ridiculed.
Even now, we go hungry and thirsty, and we don't have enough clothes to keep warm.
We are often beaten and have no home.
We work wearily with our own hands to earn our living.
We bless those who curse us.
We are patient with those who abuse us.
We appeal gently when evil things are said about us.
Yet we are treated like the world's garbage, like everybody's trash.
Right up to the present moment.
I'm not writing these things to shame you, but to warn you as my beloved children,
for even if you had 10,000 others to teach you about Christ, you have only
one spiritual father for I became your father in Christ Jesus when I the good
news to you, so I urge you to imitate me.
That's why I have sent Timothy.
My beloved and faithful child in the Lord, he will remind you
of how I follow Christ Jesus.
Just as I teach in all the churches, wherever I go.
Some of you have become arrogant thinking, I will not visit you again,
but I will come and soon if the Lord lets me, and then I'll find out
whether these arrogant people just give pretentious speeches or whether they
really have God's power for the kingdom of God is not just a lot of talk.
It is living by God's power, which do you choose?
Should I come with a rod to punish you or should I come
with love and a gentle spirit?
I can hardly believe the report about the sexual immorality going on among
you something that even pagans don't do.
I'm told that a man in your church is living in sin with his stepmother.
You are so proud of yourselves, but you should be mourning in sorrow
and shame and you should remove this man from your fellowship.
Even though I am not with you in person, I am with you in the spirit and as though I
were there, I have already passed judgment on this man in the name of the Lord Jesus,
you must call a meeting of the church.
I will be present with you in spirit and so will the power of our Lord Jesus.
Then you must throw this man out and hand him over to Satan so that his sinful
nature will be destroyed and he himself will be saved on the day the Lord returns.
Your boasting about this is terrible.
Don't you realize that this sin is like a little yeast that spreads
through the whole batch of dough.
Get rid of the old yeast by removing this wicked person from among you.
Then you will be like a fresh batch of dough made without yeast,
which is what you really are.
Christ.
Our Passover lamb has been sacrificed for us, so let us celebrate the
festival, not with the old bread of wickedness and evil, but with the
new bread of sincerity and truth.
When I wrote to you before I told you not to associate with
people who indulge in sexual sin.
But I wasn't talking about unbelievers who indulge in sexual sin or are greedy
or cheat people or worship idols.
You would have to leave this world to avoid people like that.
I meant that you are not to associate with anyone who claims to be a
believer yet indulges in sexual sin or is greedy or worships idols, or is
abusive or is a drunkard or cheats.
People don't even eat with such people.
It isn't my responsibility to judge outsiders, but it certainly is
your responsibility to judge those inside the church who are sinning.
God will judge those on the outside, but as the scriptures say, you must
remove the evil person from among you
When one of you has a dispute with another believer.
How dare you file a lawsuit and ask a secular court to decide the matter
instead of taking it to other believers.
Don't you realize that someday we believers will judge the world?
And since you are going to judge the world, can't you decide even these
little things among yourselves?
Don't you realize that we will judge angels, so you should surely be able to
resolve ordinary disputes in this life.
If you have legal disputes about such matters, why go to outside judges
who are not respected by the church?
I'm saying this to shame you.
Isn't there anyone in all the church who is wise enough to decide these
issues, but instead, one believer sues another right in front of unbelievers?
Even to have such lawsuits with one another is a defeat for you?
Why not just accept the injustice and leave it at that?
Why not let yourselves be cheated?
Instead, you yourselves are the ones who do wrong and cheat.
Even your fellow believers, don't you realize that those who do wrong
will not inherit the kingdom of God?
Don't fool yourselves.
Those who indulge in sexual sin or who worship idols or commit adultery
or are male prostitutes or practice homosexuality, or are thieves or
greedy people, or drunkards or are abusive or cheat people, none of
these will inherit the kingdom of God.
Some of you were once like that, but you were cleansed, you were made
holy, you were made right with God.
By calling on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And by the spirit of our God.
You say I am allowed to do anything, but not everything is good for you.
And even though I am allowed to do anything, I must not become
a slave to anything you say.
Food was made for the stomach and the stomach for food.
This is true though.
Someday God will do away with both of them.
But you can't say that our bodies were made for sexual immorality.
They were made for the Lord, and the Lord cares about our bodies, and God
will raise us from the dead by his power just as he raised our Lord from the dead.
Don't you realize that your bodies are actually parts of Christ?
Should a man take his body, which is a part of Christ and
join it to a prostitute, never.
And don't you realize that if a man joins himself to a prostitute,
he becomes one body with her.
For the scriptures say the two are united into one, but the person
who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with him run from sexual sin.
No other sin so clearly affects the body as this one does for sexual immorality
is a sin against your own body.
Don't you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who lives
in you and was given to you by God.
You do not belong to yourself.
For God bought you with a high price, so you must honor God with your body.
Now, regarding the questions you asked in your letter, yes, it is good to abstain
from sexual relations, but because there is so much sexual immorality,
Each man should have his own wife, and each woman should have her own husband.
The husband should fulfill his wife's sexual needs and the wife
should fulfill her husband's needs.
The wife gives authority over her body to her husband, and the husband gives
authority over his body to his wife.
Do not deprive each other of sexual relations unless you both agree to refrain
from sexual intimacy for a limited time.
So you can give yourselves more completely to prayer afterward, you
should come together again so that Satan won't be able to tempt you
because of your lack of self-control.
I say this as a concession, not as a command, but I wish
everyone was single just as I am.
Yet each person has a special gift from God of one kind or another.
So I say to those who aren't married and to widows, it's better
to stay unmarried just as I am.
But if they can't control themselves, they should go ahead and marry.
It's better to marry than to burn with lust.
But for those who are married, I have a command that comes
not from me, but from the Lord.
A wife must not leave her husband, but if she does leave him, let her remain single.
Or else be reconciled to him and the husband must not leave his wife.
Now, I will speak to the rest of you though I do not have a
direct command from the Lord.
If a fellow believer has a wife who is not a believer and she is willing to continue
living with him, he must not leave her.
And if a believing woman has a husband who is not a believer and he is
willing to continue living with her.
She must not leave him for the believing wife brings holiness to her
marriage and the believing husband brings holiness to his marriage.
Otherwise, your children would not be holy, but now they are holy.
But if the husband or wife who isn't a believer insists on leaving, let them go.
In such cases, the believing husband or wife is no longer bound to the other
for God has called you to live in peace.
Don't you wives realize that your husbands might be saved because of you,
and don't you husbands realize that your wives might be saved because of you.
Each of you should continue to live in whatever situation the Lord
has placed you and remain as you were when God first called you.
This is my rule for all the churches.
For instance, a man who was circumcised before he became a believer should
not try to reverse it, and the man who was uncircumcised when he became
a believer should not be circumcised.
Now for it makes no difference whether or not a man has been circumcised.
The important thing is to keep God's commandments.
Yes, each of you should remain as you were when God called you.
Are you a slave?
Don't let that worry you.
But if you get a chance to be free, take it.
And remember, if you were a slave when the Lord called you,
you are now free in the Lord.
And if you were free when the Lord called you, you are now a slave of Christ.
God paid a high price for you, so don't be enslaved by the world.
Each of you dear brothers and sisters, should remain as you
were when God first called you.
This concludes today's Immer Reading experience.
Thank you for joining us.