Lessons from Israel’s history
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📚And✭, brethren, I do not want you to be unaware that all our fathers were under the cloud✭, and all passed through the sea✭, 2 📚and all were baptized✭ into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, 3 📚✭and all ate the same spiritual food, 4 📚✭and all drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Christ. 5 📚✭But with most of them God was not pleased; their bodies were scattered in the desert. 6 📚✭✭Now these things happened as examples for us, so that we would not crave evil things, as they craved them. 7 📚✭And do not become idolaters, as some of them were. As it is written, The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play. 8 📚✭And let us not commit sexual immorality, as some of them did, and in one day twenty-three thousand fell dead.
9 📚✭And let us not put Christ to the test, as some of them did, and were destroyed by serpents. 10 📚✭And do not complain, as some of them complained, and were destroyed by the destroyer.
11 📚Now all these things happened to them as examples✭. And they are written as a warning to us, on whom the ends of the ages✭ have come.
Escape from temptation
12 📚✭Therefore let him who thinks he stands watch out that he does not fall.
13 📚✭No temptation has taken hold of you but such as is common to man. But God is faithful. He will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able to bear, but with the temptation will also make a way to escape, so that you may be able to bear it.
The table of demons and the Lord’s table
14 📚✭✭Therefore, my dearly loved ones, flee from idolatry. 15 📚I speak as to wise men. Judge for yourselves what I say. 16 📚✭The cup of blessing for which we give thanks, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? 17 📚✭For though we are many we are one bread, one body, for we all partake of that one bread.
18 📚✭Look at Israel according to the flesh. Do not those who eat of the sacrifices partake of the altar? 19 📚✭What am I saying then? That an idol is anything, or what is offered in sacrifice to idols is anything? 20 📚✭No, but I say that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons, and not to God, and I do not want you to have fellowship with demons. 21 📚You cannot drink both the cup of the Lord, and the cup of demons. You cannot take part in the Lord’s table✭, and in the table of demons. 22 📚✭Are we provoking the Lord to jealousy? Are we stronger than he?
Freedom and principles believers should follow
23 📚All things are lawful for me, but not all things are beneficial. All things are lawful for me, but not all things build up. 24 📚✭No one should seek his own benefit, but each one the benefit of others.
25 📚✭Eat whatever is sold in the meat market, asking no questions, for conscience sake. 26 📚✭“For the earth and its fullness belongs to the Lord”.
27 📚✭If any of those who are unbelievers ask you to a feast, and you have a mind to go, eat whatever is set before you, asking no question, for conscience’ sake. 28 📚✭But if anyone says to you, “This was offered in sacrifice to idols”, do not eat it, for the sake of the one who pointed this out, and for conscience’ sake; for the earth and its fullness belongs to the Lord. 29 📚✭“Conscience”, I say, not meaning your own, but that of the other person. For why should my liberty be judged by another man’s conscience? 30 📚For if I partake with thanksgiving, why am I slanderously accused for something for which I give thanks?
31 📚✭Therefore, whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all for the glory of God.