I started this blog a few weeks ago, but have been trying to study more before rushing to post.

Lately, my attention span has plummeted. I cannot pay attention to anything, it seems, including reading my bible and spending time with Jesus. I have watched sermons, but that is not the same and, to me, is cheating. A few weeks ago, I watched a ‘questions and answers’ video with Paul Washer maybe a week ago, and he said he does not have life-changing prayers all the time. When he studies, he studies. Usually, he wakes up, drinks his coffee, and reads his bible to spend time with Jesus. There is no intense studies, but opening and reading. That was comforting for me right now, honestly.

I also am aware of how much I have mentioned Paul Washer lately. hah!!

Anyway, one night I had a bizarre dream, and when I woke up ran to my bible and started reading 1 Corinthians. I am not exactly sure why or how I chose that book, but I have been reading it since. Chapter five is what stuck out the most, and I could not move past it and honestly started getting a bit alarmed about it. I kept praying, wondering what God was trying to tell me because the chapter is about incest in the church. I was unsure how this related to my current life and was disturbed. Still, I kept re-reading it, read commentaries about it, and a few other things that would help go deeper. There is so much more to study and to say, but for time and length’s sake of this post will try and stay on one or two points that God showed me.

1 Corinthians chapter 5

Verse 1-2; 6

“It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father’s wife.

And ye are puffed up, and have not rather mourned, that he that hath done this deed might be taken away from among you….Your glorying is not good. Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump?”

WHY IS JESUS pointing out incest to me?!? I honestly started getting freaked out, but I knew that this is where God wanted me to read.

“And suddenly”

As I was reading, I started thinking about what is happening “churches” today. They allow gay marriage, women pastors, and are teaching feelings and prosperity gospels. They have watered down scripture to fill up the church buildings, but they are starving God’s sheep by not preaching what He says. Current ‘pastors’ are tickling ears, and the congregations are getting what they want and deserve. They are choosing emotions instead of standing on God’s truth.

Churches teach God is the God of love, and you can sin because we are covered by grace.

In his letter to the Romans, what does Paul say?

“Shall we sin lest grace abounds? God forbid.”

Paul’s letter to the church of Corinth was one of horror, shock, grievance, and a cry for repentance.

1 Corinthians 5:6-8 “Your glorying is not good. Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump? Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us: Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.”

My own words: ‘Look at the destruction this is causing, for the Gentiles are not even doing what you are doing, and you call yourselves God’s people.’

The church was proud of this. Were they boasting about the sin or the fact that it was someone else and not themselves doing it? Did they puff themselves up thinking they were better than the called-out sinner? Even if they were not directly involved in the sin, they did not correct the behavior or throw him out of the church.

As a former Pharisee, Paul is well aware of the law and Passover feast. He knew that to celebrate God’s Passover, every house had to be purged of leaven, and as we know, leaven is a symbol of sin. He is telling them to analyze every aspect of their lives and get rid of their sin. Get rid of the old leaven, and be unleavened. Christ is come and is our Passover. This led to reading about the Passover in Exodus 12, which I will not get into in this specific post.

 Verses 9-10:

“I wrote unto you in an epistle not to company with fornicators: Yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or with idolaters; for then must ye needs go out of the world.”

What is the church allowing in modern times? Paul may have been writing about incest, but the same spirit of his letter applies today, and many things can replace ‘incest’. Leaven, or sin, is praised in the churches in the name of tolerance and acceptance. We are called to love others but not accept sin. We are called to point out when our Christian family falls and help them back up and encourage them to turn away from their sin. Paul says,

Verses 11-13: “But now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolator, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such an one no not to eat. For what have I to do to judge them also that are without? do not ye judge them that are within? But them that are without God judgeth. Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person.“

Paul says not to eat or fellowship with those who call themselves Christians and continue in their sin. Why? Bad company corrupts good character and it is a bad witness of Christ. If Jesus says to stay away from XYZ, and we not only do it, but encourage it around us to not hurt feelings, why would anyone want to turn to Christ if we look the same?

I know none of us are perfect, and we will always fight the flesh until we are called home. However, there is a difference between a flesh struggle and outright living happily in sin/slop.

“A man that is an heretick after the first and second admonition reject; Knowing that he that is such is subverted, and sinneth, being condemned of himself.” – Titus 3:10-11

I watched a sermon one time where the preacher emphasized this, and I think of it often.

Paul is not passively saying to flee fornication. It is a dire warning to RUN! Do not coddle it. Do not entertain it. Flee. RUN! Our flesh is selfish and always wants the opposite of what God says. He does not say to stay and fight it. If the temptation arises, you RUN from it. Run hard and as fast as you can. The temptation is not sin; choosing to stay and allow it because you are covered by grace is sin. ‘Don’t you know that you are not your own? You belong to God, and your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit.’ Jesus was crucified because of our sin. We are to not dwell in sin, but were given His spirit to overcome it.

RUN!

False Preachers, Love, and Suicide: Where is the hope?

Woe to you false teachers…