Taking Brothers Before Unbelievers
Believers are dragging each other before pagan courts — already a defeat; better to be wronged. Then their slogan about freedom is tested against sexual sin: their bodies are Christ's parts and the Spirit's temple, bought at a price, so glorify our Father in the body.
6 1When one of you has a dispute with another, does he dare take it before the unrighteous for judgment, not before God's people? 2Don't you know the saints will judge the world? If you judge the world, are you unfit for the smallest cases? 3Don't you know we'll judge angels? How much more, matters of this life! 4So when you have such disputes, do you appoint as judges those who count for nothing in the church? 5I say this to shame you. Is there no one among you wise enough to judge between fellow believers? 6Instead, one brother takes another to court, and this in front of unbelievers! 7Having lawsuits against each other is already a total defeat for you. Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be cheated? 8Instead, you yourselves do wrong and cheat, and you do it to your own brothers and sisters.
9Or don't you know the unrighteous won't inherit our Father's kingdom? Don't be fooled: no sexually immoral person, no idol worshiper, adulterer, male prostitute, nor man who sleeps with men, 10nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunks, nor insulters, nor cheats will inherit the kingdom of our Father. 11Such were some of you. But you were washed, but made holy, but set right in the Lord Jesus Christ's name and by the Spirit of our Father.
12"I'm free to do anything"—but not everything helps. "I'm free to do anything"—but nothing will control me. 13"Food is for the stomach and the stomach for food"—and our Father will destroy both. But the body isn't for sexual sin—it's for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. 14And our Father, who raised the Lord, will also raise us up by his power. 15Don't you know your bodies are parts of Christ? Should I take Christ's parts and make them parts of a prostitute? Never! 16Or don't you know that whoever joins himself to a prostitute becomes one body with her? For it says, "The two will become one flesh." 17But whoever joins himself to the Lord is one spirit with him.
18Flee sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral sins against his own body. 19Or don't you know your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from our Father? You're not your own, 20for you were bought at a price. So glorify our Father in your body.
