You Were Bought with a Price: A Sermon for the Second Sunday after the Epiphany

1 Corinthians 6:12-20

1 Corinthians 6:12–20 NKJV

All things are lawful for me, but all things are not helpful. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any. Foods for the stomach and the stomach for foods, but God will destroy both it and them. Now the body is not for sexual immorality but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. And God both raised up the Lord and will also raise us up by His power. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a harlot? Certainly not! Or do you not know that he who is joined to a harlot is one body with her? For “the two,” He says, “shall become one flesh.” But he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with Him. Flee sexual immorality. Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body. Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.

The Corinthian Church was at the same time the best of churches and the worst of churches. By the help of the Spirit, Paul, Apollos. Cephas?, and others had labored to establish a church there. Corinth was known for its gross immorality. Even the Romans thought the city to be profligate. It took mighty leadership to make the church work there. The church had to emerge from this culture. It was a city given over to brothels, Pagan temples, and amateur philosophers who would argue over a topic just for the sake of presenting an argument. From what Paul describes was going on in the church there, it is hard to believe that he called the church “called saints.” Perhaps this was to help them to remember what they were called to be, separated unto God, This would increase the rebukes Paul thought necessary to address. But they were still a church. They were loved by God and Paul as well. So even when Paul speaks out of frustration, it is because he wants them to become what God has already called them to be — saints.

One of the themes of the Gospel is liberty or freedom. But what is meant by freedom here? Freedom was a concept among the Greco-Roman culture as well. To them, one of the definitions of freedom was being able to do as one pleases without external restraint. While there were some cultural restraints such as observing the distinctions of the classes in society, Greco-Roman society was quite libertine, especially for men. Those of the higher classes could seduce those of the lower classes, but “inferiors” were never to do so. The lower classes could indulge their passions with others of the same class. Pedophilia was rampant. Prostitutes were everywhere. But this is not the Christian definition of freedom. Paul’s argument ends with “You were purchased with a price; therefore, glorify God with your bodies.” This is what to define Christian conduct. We are not free to indulge our passions. We are owned by the Lord. In other words, we are slaves who have changed masters. Each master of a household set the rules for the people who were part of the household. In the upper classes, this would include his servants, slaves, and family. So, whatever freedom and privileges we might have in the Lord’s household is determined by Jesus Himself.

So let us now examine this passage in light of the conclusion. Paul begins in 1 Corinthians 6:12:

1 Corinthians 6:12 NKJV

All things are lawful for me, but all things are not helpful. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any.

At first this could be interpreted as supporting a libertine lifestyle. “All things are lawful for me” might have been a slogan among the Christians at Corinth as a justification to live a worldly lifestyle. Another slogan may have been “Meat is for the belly and the belly for meat.” The extension of this thought is that the body is made for sex and should then be indulged in. This is a gross misunderstanding of the liberty which Paul presented to the Corinthians in the Gospel. What the Greeks considered to be freedom is actually slavery, slavery to one’s passions. It is true that food is necessary for the body. Likewise, sex is needed for procreation. It is not that sex is evil. There were some Greeks who went to the opposite extreme and practiced asceticism. This is also an abuse, as one becomes a slave to ideas which are contrary to God’s design for us. The way to freedom is to remember that true freedom is based upon responsible use of the gift of sex. Sex is the means to an end, that is to produce children. The blessing of God upon sex appears in Genesis where God commands: “Be fruitful and multiply.” Sexual desire is the means of seeing that the man and the woman would have incentive to conceive seed. The attraction of male and female within the scope of marriage is meant to keep the man and the woman together that these children might be raised by both parents in a godly home.

Paul reminds the believers that even though earthly food is necessary and that God made the stomach and intestines to process these foods. that every one will die. This does not mean that in heaven we will not eat food, but that we will have a different relationship to it. It might come as a shock that there will be no need for sex in heaven. Jesus Himself says that in heaven that no one will marry or be given in marriage. This might come as a shock, but sex will no longer have a biological purpose. Some might think that there is emotional bonding and pleasure in sex, therefore husbands and wives will have sexual relations in heaven. This is entirely an argument from silence which I can’t address here. whatever heaven turns out to be, it will far exceed our expectations. The text says that we have been raised up with Jesus in the resurrection. To some extent this is to happen in this life, although the final transformation into our new bodies will complete the process. But we need in the meanwhile is to become more of what we already are. We are called saints and should act accordingly.

The Christian freedom is that we are no longer to live in worldly slavery to our old master. Instead, we embrace the rules of our new master. This freedom is based upon obedience. It is a responsible freedom. If we were to go back to the 20th chapter of Exodus where the Ten Commandments are listed, we can see what is meant by freedom in the sight of God. We tend to gloss over the first verse which says “I AM the LORD thy God which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage,” We tend to zoom into all the prohibitions, and this becomes the means of our ensnarement. The Ten Commandments rightly express God’s will and expectations for His people. But without the first verse, the Devil deceives us into embracing slavery to the Law. No one can keep them, and they condemn all who break even the least of these commandments. It is when we remember that the Israelites had already been freed from bondage solely by God’s grace. They had not freed themselves. So we cannot see the Ten Commandments as a means of subjecting Israel to bondage again. Rather, the Ten Commandments must be seen as an act of grace on the part of Yahweh. This is how the Israelites were to maintain their liberty. Likewise, the christian correctly remembers that we are saved entirely by grace and not the works of the Law, But this is not the freedom to return to Egypt, to the house of bondage. God opened the Red Sea for Israel to pass over from Egypt. He was not about to open it so that backsliding Israel could cross back into Egypt.

We now look at Paul’s next step in the argument. Since we are the Lord’s body, should we join the Lord’s body to a prostitute? God forbid! How can one be one with the Lord and one with a prostitute at the same time. This is a failure to discern the Lord’s body. A little later, Paul talked about their conduct at the Lord’s supper. They seemed to divide the body by social class, with the best classes having the best food and drink, They also got to eat first. This was Roman custom for the feast. Then the lessers were seated by class with increasingly reduced quantity and quality of food. Those who ate first were gluttons and drunk, and the poor went home hungry. Paul said that the Corinthians failed to properly discern the Lord’s body. This is why some were sick and others died. There is a hint here in this passage when Paul reminds them that God will destroy both food and the stomach. One might also look at the words Paul had just penned before this passage in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11:

1 Corinthians 6:9–11 (NKJV)

Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.

Paul then goes on to say that sexual immortality is not just a sin against the body of Christ but against one’s own body as well which is created in the image of God, as if the previous rationale was not enough. Even by worldly terms, one becomes a slave. to this Paul adds we are the Temple of the Holy Spirit. The Temple of the Holy Spirit is to be holy. The plural “your” rather than the singular “thy” may add that the sin of the individual body is a stain upon the entire church and not just the man himself.

This is the argument Paul uses to draw the conclusion that because we are bought with a price, we are to glorify God in our body. Note again that the “your” in the text is plural. This means that there must be admonition and rebuke of the errant members. We see an example of the man who was sleeping with his father’s wife which would be an utter scandal even to the Pagans. The elders were to gather together, Paul being there in spirit and excommunicate such a member, to turn him over to Satan. This might seem harsh, but it was meant to bring the sinner to his senses. It may have worked as ir seems that Paul in 2 Corinthians makes mention that this member was to be restored.

So what do we make of this? We, too, live in a profligate society. And sorry to say, this has infected the Church just as it did in Corinth, So what Paul told the Corinthians is equally valid for us today. The Church needs to restore its discipline and dare to confront those who walk contrary to sound Christian teaching. There is no place for libertinism in the church. We are to be accountable to God and each other. Until this happens, the Church will continue to languish and lose its distinct identity. We have been purchased with a price. We have been set apart to Christ. Let us remember this.