1 Corinthians 5:6-13

Immorality in the Church, Part 2: Disciplining Sin in the Church

1 Corinthians 5:6–13

1824

October 19, 1975

Sermon Summary

1 Corinthians 5:6–13 — Disciplining Sin in the Church (continued)

Theme: The church must practice biblically defined discipline to preserve holiness, protect the congregation from corruption, and maintain a credible witness—while still engaging the unbelieving world evangelistically.

MacArthur resumes his exposition of 1 Corinthians 5 by reminding the congregation that Paul wrote to Corinth to correct believers who claimed Christ while tolerating patterns of life inconsistent with Christ. Chapter 5 confronts a church that had become morally careless in a sexually saturated culture. The specific case that sparked Paul’s rebuke (1 Cor 5:1–5) was incest tolerated within the fellowship; the section covered in this sermon (1 Cor 5:6–13) explains why discipline is necessary and where its limits apply.

MacArthur frames the chapter as “Disciplining Sin in the Church” and organizes Paul’s instruction under four headings: the need, the method, the reason, and the sphere (limits) of church discipline. The first two (need and method) were addressed previously; this sermon emphasizes the last two: the reason (preservation) and the sphere (who discipline applies to).

Key Sections at a Glance

Introduction: Why a cross-centered life produces holiness (Brainerd; 1 Cor 2:2).

Cultural context: A body-obsessed society distorts God’s design (1 Cor 6:13; Rom 12:1; Heb 13:4).

Review: Discipline requires recognition of sin and decisive action (1 Cor 5:1–5).

Reason for discipline: Sin spreads—“a little leaven leavens the whole lump” (1 Cor 5:6–8).

Passover imagery: Christ’s sacrifice demands an “unleavened” people (Exod 12; 1 Cor 5:7–8).

Sphere/limits: Separate from professing believers who persist in open sin, not from unbelievers (1 Cor 5:9–13).

Conclusion: Contact without conformity—mission to the world, purity in the church (Matt 5:13–16; Phil 2:15; John 17:15).

Historical and Theological Context

Corinth was notorious for sexual immorality and pagan worship practices. Paul’s concern is not merely that believers stumble into sin, but that the church normalizes what God condemns. Biblically, God’s redeemed people are to be distinct—not isolated from sinners (evangelism would be impossible), but separated from sin (holiness is non-negotiable). The church is portrayed as Christ’s treasured possession, intended to be pure and credible, not compromised and indistinguishable from the world.

1) The Cross as the Engine of Holiness

Let’s look at 1 Corinthians chapter 5. First Corinthians chapter 5. For our visiting friends, let me just say that we believe in just teaching the Word of God. That’s what God has called us to do, and we proceed to just go right through the Word of God from book to book, chapter to chapter, verse to verse, and we find ourselves at this point in 1 Corinthians dealing in the 5th chapter with a study of disciplining immorality in the church.

If you’re here this morning and you’re kind of an outsider looking in, you’re not a Christian, you’ve never committed yourself to Christ, but you’re kind of interested, you’ve come this far, the message that we’re going to give this morning is really geared for Christians. It’s geared for our church family. We’re happy to have you listen in on it and get the inside scoop in what God has to say about some very basic things for the Christian family.

Also, I would add that this sermon is rated PG, so I just want to say that at the beginning because of the nature of the subject so you’ll be prepared and you won’t panic when we get into a few things we’re going to discuss.

The title of our subject is “Disciplining Sin in the Church,” and that is the subject of the 13 verses that make up the 5th chapter of 1 Corinthians. Now, the Corinthian letter was written by the Apostle Paul, a Jewish apostle, to a group of Christians in the city of Corinth to straighten out their misbehaviors. They had claimed to be believers in Jesus Christ, they had given their lives to Christ, and yet they had proceeded to live the kind of life that is inconsistent with what they believe.

There were all kinds of sins and problems manifest among them. Paul writes this letter to deal with those problems. One of the problems he has to deal with is the problem of a tolerance of immorality, and that is the theme of chapter 5.

 A great missionary, David Brainerd, who spent his life - and a brief life indeed it was, I think he died before the age of 30- ministering to American Indians, wrote in his journal these words, quote: “I never got away from Jesus and Him crucified, and I found that when my people were gripped by this great evangelical doctrine of Christ and Him crucified, I had no need to give them instructions about morality. I found that one followed as the sure and inevitable fruit of the other.”

He also said this in another place: “I find my Indians begin to put on the garments of holiness, and their common life begins to be sanctified, even in small matters, when they are possessed by the doctrine of Christ and Him crucified,” end quote.

What Brainerd was saying was this: that when a Christian realizes who Christ is and what Christ has done for him so graciously, as we have been singing about, it tends to have a dramatic effect on his life, not only in salvation, but in holiness. When I celebrate the cross and the death of Christ in behalf of sin, I can’t go out and sin and really, truly be focusing on Christ. If I’m glad He died for me, if I’m concentrating on His paying for my sin, I will not go out overtly and commit sins for which He Himself has died. And so a preoccupation with Christ and the cross is its own deterrent to sin.

Now, that is the reason, precisely, that the Apostle Paul wrote 1 Corinthians 2:2, expressing his perspective when he approached the Corinthians. He says there this: “For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.” Paul went into a city that was immoral. It was the vice capital of the world, of that world, the Greek-Roman world, and he realized that he had to refocus them into a whole kind of life that they were unfamiliar with, and so he focused everything on Christ and the payment of sin on the cross and how Christ had died to deliver us from sin and into a new kind of life.

That was his emphasis, and, apparently, as long as he was there emphasizing that, they didn’t have any problem. As Brainerd said, when his Indians focused on that, morality took care of itself. But what happened was Paul left and the focus apparently changed, and now he has to write back to them regarding the sins of immorality. They had lost the concentration on Christ, and they had begun to focus on human teachers. They were glorifying their own human teachers. They were glorifying themselves. They were very egotistical.

He says to them in verse 18 of chapter 4, “You are arrogant.” He says in chapter 5, verse 2, “You are arrogant.” And they had a pride problem. They had turned the focus on themselves and as a result, immorality had come to exist. So Paul writes this chapter to deal with the consequences of their sin, their immorality. Now, we discussed the first five verses last time, and we’ll look at the last section from verses 6 to 13 this morning.

One of the things that I kept very much aware of as I was studying this chapter was how very current it is. This particular immoral situation, the immoral context in which the Corinthian church existed in that city, is no different than today. If there was one way to categorize today, we would have to say we live in a sexually mad society. We’ve gone totally overboard on the subject of sex. We have perverted a very basic thing that God has designed for the happiness and enjoyment and procreation of man, and we’ve perverted it and twisted it and pushed it completely out of shape so that it’s totally distorted.

D. H. Lawrence, who has written many books, none of which I would recommend - I won’t even give you the titles - D. H. Lawrence gives us an idea of the modern mentality. This is what he says, quote: “Give me the body. I believe the body is a greater reality than the life of the mind. With the Greeks, it gave a lovely flicker. Then Plato and Aristotle killed it, and Jesus finished it off, but now the body is really coming to life,” end quote. Everything for him is the body.

Well, you know, that’s our whole society. The constant pampering of the body. The constant exploitation of the body. The constant presentation on the screen and wherever else, the body. We are absolutely worshiping the flesh as if it were God. The preoccupation with fashion, with figures, physiques, exposure, pornographic material, on and on and on. The body, we have pushed it so far out of whack, it’s incredible.

C. S. Lewis has a beautiful analogy. This is his analogy. He says, “You can get a large audience together for a striptease. There’s no question about it. You can get a lot of people to come to a striptease, and they come to watch a girl undress on the stage. Now suppose,” he says, “you came to a country where they filled an auditorium a different way.

Not by having a girl undress, but that they filled an auditorium, it was packed to the walls, and a guy walked out with a big tray, and the tray was covered with a - with a - some kind of a cloth covering, and wild music began to play and lights began to flash, and all of a sudden, through all of this, in a rather enticing manner, he pulled off the veil, and there on the tray was a pork chop. Wouldn’t you think,” says C. S. Lewis, “that in that country something had gone wrong with their appetite for food?”

MacArthur begins with David Brainerd’s observation: when people are gripped by “Jesus and Him crucified,” morality follows as fruit. That is essentially Paul’s approach to Corinth:

1 Corinthians 2:2 (quoted): “For I determined not to know anything among you, except Jesus Christ, and him crucified.”

The point is not that moral instruction is unnecessary, but that the deepest antidote to sin is worshipful fixation on the Cross. When believers drift from Christ-centeredness into self-centeredness, pride, factionalism, and eventually moral laxity follow. MacArthur notes Paul’s repeated diagnosis of arrogance in Corinth (cf. 1 Cor 4:18; 5:2).

2) The Body: Not for Immorality but for the Lord

Boy, that is good, isn’t it? The Bible, you see, clearly speaks regarding the proper use of the body. In 1 Corinthians 6:13, the Bible says, “The body is not for immorality, it is for the Lord.” The body was designed to be used by God, to be blessed by God, to serve God, to be honored. And yet what happens in our society? The body is pushed in total distortion to a place of perversion. But, you know, Satan has always done this.

Now, there have been in history some people who fought that, and they went clear the other way. You know, there are some people look at the body as if the body itself were a horrible, evil, rotten, vile thing. For example, the pagan esthetics in ancient times called the body a tomb. Some early Christians referred to it as a sack of manure, in a very derogatory view of the body. Epictetus referred to himself as a poor soul shackled to a corpse.

Plato’s account of Socrates’ last hour, as he says, “I reckon that we make the nearest possible approach to knowledge when we have the least possible communion with the body, and we are not surfeited with the bodily nature, but keep ourselves pure until the hour when God is pleased to release us, and thus having gotten rid of the foolishness of the body, we shall be pure, hold converse with the pure, and know ourselves the clear light everywhere, which is no other than the light of truth.”

Now, don’t worry about the philosophical jargon. All he’s really saying is, “The body’s a hang-up. We got to rid of this evil body.” Some Gnostics called marriage a foul, polluted way of life, because it involved sexual relationships. They went to the extreme where any kind of sexual relationship was evil, where the body itself was evil. In fact, in the Acts of John, which is an apocryphal writing, not inspired by God, it describes sexual intercourse as an experiment of the serpent which separates from the Lord.

MacArthur addresses two historic distortions: (1) hedonistic worship of the body, and (2) ascetic hatred of the body. Scripture rejects both extremes. The body is not evil; it is designed for God’s purposes.

1 Corinthians 6:13 (quoted): “The body is not for fornication, but for the Lord; and the Lord for the body.”

Romans 12:1 (quoted): “Present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God…”

Hebrews 13:4 (quoted): “Marriage is honourable in all, and the bed undefiled…”

So the issue is not that sexuality is dirty, but that it is sacred and therefore must be governed by God’s design. When the church treats sexual sin lightly, it dishonors the Lord who purchased the church.

3) Review: The Need and the Method (1 Cor 5:1–5)

MacArthur briefly reiterates what Paul demanded earlier in the chapter:

The Need: Recognize sin honestly

Corinth’s arrogance was irrational because it coexisted with tolerated scandal. A church cannot pretend spiritual health while refusing moral clarity.

The Method: Assemble and remove the unrepentant offender

1 Corinthians 5:4–5 (quoted): “In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together… to deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.”

MacArthur understands “deliver… unto Satan” as excommunication—putting the person outside the protective fellowship into the world system where Satan operates, with the goal being remedial chastening and repentance.

4) The Reason for Discipline: Preservation (1 Cor 5:6–8)

Paul’s logic is blunt: tolerating sin is not kindness—it is congregational self-destruction.

A) Pride is incompatible with tolerated sin

1 Corinthians 5:6 (quoted): “Your glorying is not good…”

MacArthur warns that churches and individuals can misread their condition, boasting in externals while ignoring internal corruption. He illustrates this with Christ’s diagnosis of self-deceived religiosity:

Revelation 3:17 (quoted): “Thou sayest, I am rich… and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked.”

2 Corinthians 13:5 (quoted): “Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith…”

He also points to Christ’s exposure of Pharisaic hypocrisy (Matthew 23) as an example of religious confidence masking spiritual decay.

B) Sin spreads like leaven

1 Corinthians 5:6 (quoted): “Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump?”

MacArthur explains leaven as a permeating influence—small in amount, massive in impact. The church is the “lump”; tolerated sin becomes the starter that infects the whole. Discipline is therefore not optional; it is protective surgery.

C) Passover theology: Christ died to separate us from the old life

1 Corinthians 5:7 (quoted): “Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump… For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us.”

1 Corinthians 5:8 (quoted): “Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven… but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.”

MacArthur ties Paul’s imagery to the Exodus pattern (cf. Exodus 12; especially 12:39, referenced): Israel left Egypt with unleavened bread—no lingering “Egypt” carried into the new life. Likewise, Christ’s sacrifice marks the believer’s definitive break with the old world-patterns. A disciplined church is an “unleavened” church—morally distinct because redemption is morally purposeful.

He also includes Paul’s moral categories from 1 Cor 5:8:

“leaven of malice and wickedness” versus

“unleavened… sincerity and truth.”

5) The Sphere and Limits of Discipline (1 Cor 5:9–13)

Here MacArthur makes a crucial distinction: discipline is for the professing church, not the unbelieving world.

A) Paul’s earlier instruction was misunderstood

1 Corinthians 5:9 (quoted): “I wrote unto you in an epistle not to company with fornicators.”

MacArthur explains that the Corinthians apparently misapplied this to mean total withdrawal from unbelievers. Paul corrects that misreading:

1 Corinthians 5:10 (quoted): “Yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world… for then must ye needs go out of the world.”

In other words: if you refuse contact with all sinners, you must leave planet earth.

B) The command is separation from a professing brother who persists in sin

1 Corinthians 5:11 (quoted): “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 idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such an one no not to eat.”

MacArthur emphasizes the seriousness of “not to keep company.” (Underlying Greek: συναναμίγνυμι / sunanamígnymi, “to mix up together with,” used in 1 Cor 5:9, 11—an intensified prohibition.) The practical point: no intimate fellowship with an unrepentant, openly sinning professing believer; even shared meals imply acceptance and normalcy.

He notes this list is not hypothetical; those sins appear throughout Corinthians:

immorality (chapter 5),

greed/material exploitation (cf. 1 Cor 6; also 10:24 referenced),

idolatry (cf. 10:20–21 referenced),

slander/railing factionalism (cf. 16:11 referenced),

drunkenness at the Lord’s Table (cf. 11:21 referenced),

extortion and legal exploitation (cf. 1 Cor 6).

C) Why the world is different

1 Corinthians 5:12 (quoted): “For what have I to do to judge them also that are without? do not ye judge them that are within?”

1 Corinthians 5:13 (quoted): “But them that are without God judgeth. Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person.”

MacArthur stresses: the church has jurisdiction over its own membership and testimony. God judges outsiders; the church confronts and disciplines insiders for the sake of purity.

(He notes Paul’s concluding phrase echoes Old Testament covenant discipline language, referencing Deuteronomy 17:7; 24:7: “put away… the evil/wicked person,” applied now to the covenant community of the church.)

6) Contact Without Conformity: The Church’s Posture Toward the World

MacArthur rejects separatist isolation as unbiblical. Christians are not called to “no contact,” but to no conformity. The church must be present in the world to evangelize sinners, while refusing the world’s moral shape.

Matthew 5:13–16 (quoted): “Ye are the salt of the earth… Ye are the light of the world… Let your light so shine before men…”

Philippians 2:15 (quoted): “That ye may be blameless… in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world.”

John 17:15 (quoted): “I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil.”

So the church must not bless the world’s sin; it must bring the world the Savior—while keeping the church from internal corruption.

Application Points

Measure your spiritual condition by Scripture, not by feelings, activity, or reputation. Pride can coexist with serious compromise.

Treat sin as spiritually infectious. “A little leaven” is never “just a little.”

See discipline as love—first for the sinner’s restoration, and also for the church’s protection.

Maintain biblical balance: evangelistic engagement with unbelievers, uncompromising holiness among professing believers.

Practice early, private correction. Don’t wait until sin becomes public and entrenched; intervene when you “see them looking toward the street.”

Memory Verses

1 Corinthians 5:6: “Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump?”

1 Corinthians 5:7: “Purge out therefore the old leaven… For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us.”

1 Corinthians 5:11: “…with such an one no not to eat.”

2 Corinthians 13:5: “Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith…”

Cross-References Mentioned in the Sermon (with key lines MacArthur used)

1 Cor 2:2 — “Jesus Christ, and him crucified.”

1 Cor 6:13 — “The body is not for fornication, but for the Lord…”

Rom 12:1 — “Present your bodies a living sacrifice…”

Heb 13:4 — “Marriage is honourable… bed undefiled…”

Rev 3:17 — “wretched… miserable… poor… blind… naked.”

2 Cor 13:5 — “Examine yourselves…”

1 Cor 11:28–30 (referenced with quoted ideas) — examine yourself; unworthy participation brings chastening (“weak… sick… sleep”).

Matt 5:13–16 — salt and light.

Phil 2:15 — “in the midst… shine as lights.”

John 17:15 — kept from the evil one, not removed from the world.

Exod 12 (incl. 12:39) — unleavened bread imagery at the Exodus.

Deut 17:7; 24:7 — “put away” principle applied to covenant community.

Teaching Outline (Addendum)

I. Introduction: Cross-centered doctrine yields holy living

Brainerd’s observation; Paul’s approach (1 Cor 2:2)

II. The body and sexuality under God’s design

Body for the Lord (1 Cor 6:13)

Bodies offered to God (Rom 12:1)

Marriage honored (Heb 13:4)

III. Review: The need and method of discipline

Recognize sin (1 Cor 5:1–2)

Assemble and remove the unrepentant (1 Cor 5:4–5)

IV. The reason for discipline: preservation

Pride is “not good” (1 Cor 5:6)

Leaven spreads (1 Cor 5:6)

Purge the old leaven; Christ our Passover (1 Cor 5:7–8; Exod 12)

V. The sphere/limits: inside vs. outside

Not withdrawal from the world (1 Cor 5:10)

Separation from a professing brother persisting in sin (1 Cor 5:11)

God judges outsiders; the church judges insiders (1 Cor 5:12–13)

VI. Missional posture: contact without conformity

Salt and light (Matt 5:13–16)

Shine in a crooked world (Phil 2:15)

In the world, kept from evil (John 17:15)

Discussion Guide (Addendum)

Self-examination: Using 2 Cor 13:5, what are the most common ways Christians can deceive themselves about spiritual health?

Leaven principle: Where have you seen “small” tolerated sins become normal and then spread in a group or church?

Passover imagery: How does “Christ our Passover” (1 Cor 5:7) strengthen the argument that holiness is not legalism but gospel-consistency?

Boundaries: What does Paul prohibit in 1 Cor 5:11 (“no not to eat”)? What does he permit in 1 Cor 5:10 (continued contact with unbelievers)?

Church responsibility: According to 1 Cor 5:12–13, what belongs to the church’s responsibility, and what belongs to God’s?

Personal practice: If you needed to confront a professing believer in persistent sin, what would love, clarity, and courage look like in your first conversation?

Evangelistic balance: How can a church be meaningfully engaged with unbelievers without absorbing the world’s moral categories?

If you want, I can also produce a Logos-ready “sermon notes” version (same content, tighter formatting for pasting), while keeping it table-free.

Reference

John MacArthur. https://www.gty.org/sermons/1824/immorality-in-the-church-part-2-disciplining-sin-in-the-church