Lawsuits among Christians
6
📚When anyone of you has something against someone else, dare he go for judgment to the unrighteous 📖, and not before the saints? 2 📚Do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And since the world will be judged by you, are you unworthy to judge the smallest matters? 6:2 This refers to the judgment that will take place when Christ comes again. Christ’s people will reign with Him (2 Tim 2:12; Rev 3:21; 20:4). That is, they will administer God’s kingdom with Him, and this will include judging. Compare Matt 19:28; Luke 22:30; Rev 2:26-27.⚜
3 📚Do you not know that we will judge angels? How much more things that pertain to this life!
6:3 Ruling and judging with Christ will mean ruling and judging over all creation and created beings, even the highest. Cannot believers, then, judge the lowly matters of earth?⚜
4 📚If then you have matters requiring judgment about things pertaining to this life, appoint as judges even those who are least esteemed in the church.
6:4 He may be speaking with irony or sarcasm. Or he could mean – “it is better to appoint the least qualified believer than to go to worldly judges”.⚜
5 📚I speak to your shame. Can it be that there is not a wise 📖 man among you? Not even one who would be able to judge a dispute between his brethren? 6 📚But instead, brother goes to law against brother, and that in front of unbelievers!
7 📚Now, therefore, there is utter failure for you, because you go to law against one another. Why do you not rather accept wrong? Why do you not rather let yourselves be cheated?
6:7 Christians engaging in lawsuits with fellow Christians is not merely failure, it is “utter” failure. They are overcome by the spirit of this world, by greed, or malice, or desire for revenge, or determination to get what they think are their rights, regardless of what happens to their Christian testimony and the reputation of Christ. Their love, their humility, their obedience to God have fallen by the wayside (if indeed they ever had these qualities). It is better to suffer wrong and be cheated than to fight with other Christians for one’s so-called rights in a secular court. Compare Matt 5:38-41; Luke 9:23; 14:33.⚜
8 📚Instead, you do wrong, and cheat, and do this to your brethren!
6:1-8 Some Christians still seem to think it is all right to bring lawsuits against one another in secular courts. Even whole churches and denominations sometimes engage in this. Here the words of the apostle (which are inspired by God) utterly condemn any such thing. It is “shameful” (v 5), it shows an utter lack of wisdom in the church (v 5), and it means that the church is defeated in its Christian life and walk (v 7).⚜
6:8 It is sad that such words then and now apply to any who profess to belong to Christ.⚜
9 📚Do you not know 📖 that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor male prostitutes, nor men who practice sodomy, 10 📚nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 📚And such were some 📖 of you. But you were washed 📖, you were sanctified 📖, you were justified 📖 in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.
Immorality
12 📚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 anything. 13 📚Foods for the belly, and the belly 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. 14 📚And God has both raised up the Lord, and will raise us up by his own power. 15 📚Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them the members of a prostitute? Absolutely not!
6:15 See 1 Cor 12:27; Rom 12:4-5; Eph 1:22-23. A believer should never even consider doing what Christ Himself would not do.⚜
16 📚What? Do you not know that he who is joined to a prostitute is one body with her? For two, he says, “will be one flesh”. 17 📚But he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit. 18 📚Flee 📖 from sexual immorality. Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who is sexually immoral sins against his own body.
The bodies of believers belong to God
19 📚What? Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have received from God, and you are not your own 📖? 20 📚For you were bought at a price 📖. Therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God’s.
6:12-20 Now Paul speaks of the freedom that believers have in Christ. Writing to other churches Paul had said that believers are not under the law (Rom 6:14), that Christ had given them liberty (Gal 5:1), that in the matter of food and the observance of days there is no restriction whatever (Rom 14:1-6, 14). It seems some Christians in Corinth were twisting Paul’s teaching and saying that any believer was free to practice whatever he pleased, including sexual sins. Paul here fights this false teaching. He shows that believers have not been set free from the law so that they might sin, but that they might not sin. Verse 12 gives two restrictions on the liberty believers have (1 Cor 10:23-24, 31 adds two more). They must do only those things which are beneficial and must not become enslaved to any desire or habit (compare Rom 6:16-18; John 8:34). Verse 13 was aimed at those who thought they were free to commit sexual sins just as they were free to eat anything they wanted. But the two things are entirely different. No kind of food is contrary to God’s purpose for man’s stomach, but sexual sins are against God’s purposes for the human body. God will raise the bodies of believers from the dead to live an eternal life in glory and holiness (v 14). Believers now must recognize this and use their bodies for God’s high purpose.⚜
6:19-20 See 1 Cor 3:16. The temple does not belong to itself but to God. It is set apart for His worship and praise. A believer has no right to use his body as if it were his own. Here is the clearest restriction on the freedom believers have in Christ. They must do only those things which please and honor God’s Spirit who lives in them.⚜