The big picture
A grave report reaches Paul about the church in Corinth, a Greek city. Paul is a messenger of Jesus Christ and has been challenging the believers' pride. Now he addresses a sexual relationship within a family that even outsiders reject. The church is proud. Paul expects grief and action instead. He orders a boundary around the church. This does not mean believers must cut off all contact with the outside world.
In this chapter
- A Member Must Be Removed 1 Corinthians 5:1-5
A man is having sex with his father's wife.
- A Little Yeast Changes the Whole Batch 1 Corinthians 5:6-8
The church's boasting is misplaced.
- The Boundary Concerns Claimed Membership 1 Corinthians 5:9-13
Paul clarifies an earlier instruction not to keep company with sexually immoral people.
Central truth
Paul requires the church to confront serious sexual wrongdoing within its membership without confusing that duty with judging everyone outside it.
Scripture beside the summary
1 Corinthians · King James Version · 131 Corinthians 5:1-5
A Member Must Be Removed
A man is having sex with his father's wife. Paul says even Gentiles, people outside the Jewish nation, reject this act. The church has remained proud instead of mourning and removing the offender. Paul is absent but gives his ruling. The church must gather and act in Jesus' name and power. They must hand him to Satan, God's enemy, for the destruction of his flesh. The aim is to save his spirit on the Lord's day. Christians differ on what this harsh act means in detail. The goal is his final rescue, not acceptance of the wrong.
In everyday life
A safeguarding panel reads a grave report of harm within a family. The group has tried to hide it behind a cheerful public face. The panel names the harm and removes the offender from his role. Silence is not care. The response must name the wrong. Paul calls for a severe act within the church, aimed at the man's final salvation.
Notice
1 Corinthians 5:2 Paul contrasts pride with mourning. The first failure is not lack of a clever policy but a refusal to grieve and act over a grave wrong.
1 Corinthians 5:1-5
King James Version1It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father’s wife.
2And ye are puffed up, and have not rather mourned, that he that hath done this deed might be taken away from among you.
3For I verily, as absent in body, but present in spirit, have judged already, as though I were present, concerning him that hath so done this deed,
4In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ,
5To 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.
1 Corinthians 5:6-8
A Little Yeast Changes the Whole Batch
The church's boasting is misplaced. Paul compares tolerated evil to a little yeast spreading through dough. The old yeast must be cleared so the community lives as a fresh batch. He links this with passover, the feast of rescue from slavery. Christ is their passover sacrifice. They must keep the feast with sincerity and truth. Those are the clean bread in his picture, unlike malice and evil. The image concerns the character of their shared life. One unchecked wrong can shape the whole group. It is not only this man's private affair.
In everyday life
A records custodian finds that a club has copied one concealed false entry into years of official returns. The first concealment has shaped decisions far from its starting point. She corrects the record and changes the practice that kept reproducing it. Paul speaks of the church's life through Christ's sacrifice, not only sound records.
Notice
1 Corinthians 5:7 Paul joins the command to clear old yeast with the claim that Christ has been sacrificed. The call to change grows from what Christ has already done.
1 Corinthians 5:6-8
King James Version6Your glorying is not good. Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump?
7Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us:
8Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
1 Corinthians 5:9-13
The Boundary Concerns Claimed Membership
Paul clarifies an earlier instruction not to keep company with sexually immoral people. He did not mean avoiding every such person in the world, or all greedy people, idol worshippers, and extortioners. That would require leaving the world entirely. He means a claimed fellow believer who keeps doing such wrongs. He adds abusive speech and drunkenness to the list. The church must not even eat with that person as though nothing is wrong. It judges its own membership; God judges outsiders. Paul therefore repeats the order to remove the wicked member.
In everyday life
A professional association removes a member who keeps exploiting clients under its badge. The members still meet and work with ordinary neighbours who do not belong to the association. Refusing endorsement is different from avoiding the whole town. Paul's boundary governs fellowship in the church and leaves judgement of outsiders to God.
Notice
1 Corinthians 5:12 Paul distinguishes inside from outside when assigning the church's task. The church must deal with its own members. Its rules of belonging do not give it charge over the whole outside world.
1 Corinthians 5:9-13
King James Version9I wrote unto you in an epistle not to company with fornicators:
10Yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or with idolaters; for then must ye needs go out of the world.
11But 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.
12For what have I to do to judge them also that are without? do not ye judge them that are within?
13But them that are without God judgeth. Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person.
Details worth noticing
The opening image
1 Corinthians 5:1 begins with “It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his…”
Where the chapter turns
1 Corinthians 5:6 forms a natural hinge: “Your glorying is not good. Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump?”
The final note
1 Corinthians 5:13 leaves the reader with “But them that are without God judgeth. Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person.”
A word trail through the chapter
The words leaven, Christ, Jesus, Lord, spirit, company help reveal the chapter’s repeated concerns.
KJV words made clear
- fornication
- Sexual immorality, here a forbidden sexual relationship within a family.
- leaven
- Yeast or fermenting dough that spreads through a batch.
- extortioners
- People who take money or goods through pressure, force, or abuse of power.
Music and video connected to the passage
No exact media match is cataloged for this passage yet. New material can be connected when it becomes available.