All things are lawful

Good morning and welcome to CCC. I am so very glad each of you are here this morning. If you joined us for our final Men’s breakfast of the year what a wonderful morning that was yesterday. Men I think that needs to become a yearly tradition, the Men serving their Brides on the last Men’s breakfast of the year! What a blessing it was to fellowship with everyone yesterday!

If you are not a member of Groupme yet I put the QR code on your notes page. All you have to do is scan that QR code with your phone. It is best to download the free app but Groupme will walk you through what you need to do. If you need help please see me and I will help you. The only reason I mention this is because the idea of the Men serving their Brides at yesterday’s Men’s breakfast came later in the week and we announced it through Groupme as well as facebook.

Let’s Pray

START OBS

My original plan this morning was to cover I Corinthians 6:12-20. I had a sermon written over the entire thing but it just was not sitting right in my soul. As I prayed about it and sought God He began to show me this morning’s message is only to cover verses 12 and 13 in I Corinthians 6.

This is because we must understand the truth God through Paul is addressing here. There is no way to grasp the rest of the passage without understanding the truth in 12-13. So that is what we are going to wrestle with today.

The 1st thing we need to understand is some background on Corinth and the Corinthians. Corinth was a very important and wealthy city. Many people in and out with trade and business. With many people in and out many different cultural ideas flowed in and out of the city and people.

Sounds familiar doesn’t it. Most of our major cities here in the USA can relate and fit this description some more than others. NYC or LA come to mind.

Corinth was a wealthy city…humans don’t seem to handle wealth very well. We tend to become prideful and dependent upon money instead of God and wealth corrodes our idea of rules and responsibility.

The culture the Corinth church was in was like our own but probably worse. When it came to sex any and everything was acceptable and celebrated.

Our own culture is approaching this but is not quite there yet as there are a few things still illegal or off limits in most of our society.

In Corinth anything was acceptable....if you felt it you could do it.

The Corinthian church was born out of this culture. The Corinthian Christians were once a part of this culture and they were struggling with leaving everything behind, especially their ideas and thinking about sex. They were struggling with being in the world not of the world.

Sex and sexual acts and, I believe, more importantly thinking about sex and sexual acts were a part of everything that they did.

I want you to notice something, this is one of the devils classic plays out of his playbook. He understands just how deeply sexual sin corrodes people. It penetrates everything that a person does and is. It dominates their thinking and brings them far from God and true fellowship with their brothers and sisters because everything is filtered through a sexually corrupted mind.

Look around. Our culture is not quite where the Corinthian culture but you don’t have to look very far for sex or sexual thoughts. If we do not awaken from our slumber our culture will soon be just as bad as the Corinthian culture and shame on us because we have the Bible.....God’s Word to guide us, the problem is we are not looking to it to guide us but to make us feel better or to check a box.

God’s Word must define you and me as Christians.

I believe this morning God wanted us to fully look at, think about, pray about and respond to verse 12 and 13 because He talks directly about renewing our minds.

He talks directly about conforming to the Word instead of conforming to the world when it comes to our thoughts and beliefs.

I Corinthians 6:12-13

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“All things are lawful for me,” but not all things are helpful. “All things are lawful for me,” but I will not be dominated by anything. “Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food”—and God will destroy both one and the other. The body is not meant for sexual immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body.”

I believe most of today’s Christians don’t understand how to discern their thoughts. They think they do, they may even be able to quote you the scripture about taking thoughts captive but they truly don’t know how to discern their thoughts because they have never, through the Holy Spirit, applied that scripture.

II Corinthians 10:5

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“We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ,”

Take every thought captive to obey Christ. That is something we are told to do but how many of us truly understand and apply that truth?

We have and will continue to talk about that verse and its truth because here in I Corinthians 6 we see it applied and Paul gives very real and practical advice on how to do just that.

We all struggle. Maybe you are here today or watching online and you struggle with killing the old you

Maybe you are struggling with leaving culture behind and walking in the Spirit

Maybe you have a worldly view or belief when it comes to sex

Maybe you are struggling with leaving some other world view behind, abortion, homosexuality, transgenderism or confusion, addiction, etc etc etc there are too many to list here this morning

In verses 12-13 Paul gives us a wonderful, practical way to evaluate our thoughts, take them captive to obey Christ

Paul starts by using a Corinthian slogan, way of thinking, way of life really that should have died with their old self when they were saved but it was alive and well inside the Corinthian church

All things are lawful for me

What did/does that mean?

What’s the big deal?

You do you

You only live once

Do what feels good life is short

Inside the church it could look like this

God’s grace and mercy are endless so how I think or talk or live doesn’t matter

We are free in Christ to do what we want when we want to do it

God’s forgives so why try to obey?

These are spiritually deadly and physically deadly thoughts.

Inside the Corinthian Church and culture it meant in regards to sex

It is biological so do whatever fells good

Our bodies are temporary so it doesn’t matter

This is the belief Paul was attacking here. God is holy. God is righteous. God’s grace and mercy are limitless and we are free in Christ but our actions have consequences and obedience is commanded and expected.

We demonstrate our love of God and Jesus by our obedience

John 14:15-24

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15 “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, 17 even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.

18 “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. 19 Yet a little while and the world will see me no more, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. 20 In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. 21 Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me. And he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him.” 22 Judas (not Iscariot) said to him, “Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourself to us, and not to the world?” 23 Jesus answered him, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. 24 Whoever does not love me does not keep my words. And the word that you hear is not mine but the Father’s who sent me.

Jesus is clear here. If you love me keep my commandments.

Here is where the struggle begins. So many of us struggle to keep Jesus’ commandments on our own. We struggle to keep them in our own power and we fail over and over and over again.

We forget the other truth taught in this passage....Jesus is giving us the Holy Spirit to give us the ability and power to keep His commands. You and I cannot keep Jesus’ commands without the Holy Spirit.

Look again at 23-24 because they are super clear about obedience

Keep My Word

What is Jesus’ Word....the Bible in fact Jesus and the Bible are one.

John 1:14

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“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”

The Word became flesh and dwelt among us....that is Jesus....Jesus is the Word

When you ignore your Bible you are ignoring Jesus

When you read your Bible and reject it’s truth you are rejecting Jesus

Church the Bible is alive and well because it is Jesus!!!!!!! If you love Jesus you will love the Word of God because they are one in the same.

Back to our John 14 keeping the Word demonstrates love and not keeping His Word demonstrates not loving Him.

Since that is the case we must figure out how to discern what is obedience and what is not.

In I Corinthians 6:12-13 Paul gives us three ways

1 Consider if it is Spiritually beneficial

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vs 12 All things are lawful for me but not all things are helpful

Whatever you are struggling with or trying to decide if it is a sin or not ask if it is helpful

Not in a physical sense but a spiritual sense

As you struggle to seek God’s discernment ask Does this match God’s Word?

Does this bring me closer to Jesus?

Would I do or say this in front of Jesus?

WWJD

Remember those bracelets and T-shirts and bumper stickers?

What Would Jesus Do?

That is a great question however most of us answer it with our opinion of what Jesus would do not the truth of scripture.

It doesn’t matter what you or I think Jesus would do it matters what the Bible tells us Jesus would do so we need to be in God’s Word

Another thing to think about in discerning if something is helpful spiritually is

Where does this lead?

Where might this road or path take me?

Will one drink or hit lead to a life of addiction?

Will that work dinner lead to a kiss or sexual sin?

Once I start the journey where will I end up?

2. Will this enslave me again to sin?

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vs 12 says all things are lawful for me but I will not be dominated by anything.

Paul here is talking about being enslaved to sin.

I worded this question like this because it really references two truths to remind us the power and love and grace and mercy of God.

There are many passages of scripture that deal with Christians being free from sin but God lead me to

Romans 6:12-14

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“Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions. Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness. For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.”

Sin has no dominion over you.

Sin no longer enslaves you Christian

You are set free so why in the world do we continue to choose to do or say or think things that enslave us??????

God doesnt love me

One drink wont hurt

My body my choice

Abortion is a medical procedure not murder

This is just to name a few

Sin will always enslave us when we choose it and give it power

Does whatever you are struggling with lead you to be enslaved by sin?

3. Does this glorify God?

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Vs 13 Paul uses another slogan of the Corinthians this time from the church that was being used to justify sexual sin.

Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food

What was being implied by this slogan is that both food and the stomach were temporary. If they both were temporary and when the stomach desired food we feed it then that should also apply to sex because our sexual organs are made for sex and if they desire sex we should feed them and have sex.

Paul address this very directly. “God will destroy both one and the other. The body is not meant for sexual immorality but for the Lord and the Lord for the body.”

He says listen you have it all wrong. God will destroy the temporary you are correct but you are missing why He created you

Your body is to glorify God.

Romans 8:12-17

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“So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.”

You no longer matter, Jesus matters.

Your wants no longer matter

Your desires no longer matter

Your thoughts on things no longer matter

Your beliefs about things no longer matter

You are a debtor

Debtor to who....Jesus.

Jesus took your sin

Jesus took my sin

Jesus mounted a cross and paid the physical and spiritual price for our sin

His blood covers our sin and we owe Him everything

We are to walk in the Spirit and everything we do is to bring God glory and shine the light of Jesus into a dark, sinful world.

When we walk in the flesh

live in sin

return to sin

when we justify sin instead of confess sin

when we justify sin instead of walking away from sin

when we bring sin to church to spread sin instead of get rid of sin

we are walking in the flesh and bringing glory to satan not Jesus!

When we walk in the Spirit

When we live in the Spirit

when we justify our actions by the Bible

when we walk away from sin because of the Bible

when we bring our sin to church to leave it at Jesus feet and walk away clean and righteous then

We are walking in the Spirit and bringing Glory to God and shining the light of Jesus into the dark sinful world

The question is where are you at this morning?

As this song plays if you do not know Jesus it is time to make the most important, eternal decision you will ever make and accept Him as your Lord and Savior.

If you have realized that you are like the Corinthians and struggling with bring your worldly, cultural ideas and thoughts and behaviors and trying to make the Bible match them instead of dying to them to make them match the Bible come…confess that and leave here renewed!

Whatever your struggle Jesus is the answer! Come and sit with Him and find your answers!

Invitation song Nothing/Something