Earlier this week I took an informal poll among staff and fellow clergy on whether I should preach on
the conversion of Philip and Nathaniel, or preach on sex. I regret to tell you that the response was
unanimous. Sorry, Philip and Nathaniel, we’ll catch up with you next time around on the lectionary
cycle. And in a way I really did feel some trepidation about preaching on the 1 Corinthians passage
(as I felt led), because there are few more controversial and (dare I say) ‘passionate’ topics in all of
the Christian faith, at least in our culture.
But taking a close look at this passage it soon became clear that a discussion that centers around
what we do and don’t do with our bodies is enormously significant. It gets right down to the nitty-gritty
of how we respond to the gift of grace, and what are some of the implications of being indwelt by the
Holy Spirit, as we talked about last week.
It’s imperative that we put this into cultural and historical context to get the full meaning of Paul’s
words. I’ll begin by quoting William Barclay in the observation that Paul’s overall battle cry in this
passage is “Glorify God in your body.” And it’s no accident that these words were addressed to the
new church in Corinth. Corinth was a teaming seaport and probably the major city in Greece at the
time, with a total population of well over 600,000 people. The Greeks of that era were not known for
thinking especially highly of the human body. In fact the prevailing belief was that it would be a relief
to be rid of the body and away from all ugly and gross matter, and to join the pure realm of spirit if
you were lucky or prosperous enough to obtain the secret information that would get you there.
With this little value attached to the human body, it was probably the default position of most
Corinthians, at least the Gentiles, that what we do with our bodies really doesn’t matter that much.
And on top of this way of thinking was a form of paganism in which sexual license and religion were
combined. Atop the highest spot in Corinth, the Acrocorinth, was the temple of Aphrodite, which was
thought to employ over 1000 prostitute-priestesses. I’ll leave it to your own imaginations as to what
went on there—and it was probably worse than most of your imaginations. At least I hope so. I think.
The moral situation was so notorious that the Greek verb ‘to Corinthianize’ came to mean ‘to
practice sexual immorality’. You talk about a tricky church plant… And I thought my stress level was
high!
So this is the situation into which Paul is writing. Clearly there were people in the Corinthian church
who remained acculturated to Greco-Roman ways. In fact it looks like some of the Corinthians were
using Paul’s very own teachings of freedom within grace to justify things that Paul was horrified by.
Paul quotes what were probably two popular sayings used to do this: “All things are lawful for me”
and “Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food,” implying that we should just let our
appetites have their way. Paul makes pretty quick work of both of these by saying, “Not all things are
beneficial” and by promptly pointing out that there’s something about sexual immorality that goes a
lot deeper than say, the sin of gluttony. He says, “The body is meant not for fornication but for the
Lord, and the Lord for the body.”
There are two things that need to be said about this. First, the word translated as ‘fornication’ is the
Greek work porneia. It’s actually much broader than just intemperate bed-hopping, but applies to all
kinds of sexual impurity. In fact porneia is the root word from which we get the word ‘pornography’.
So it might actually be more accurate to report that Paul’s saying, “The body isn’t meant for sexual
impurity.”
Second, Paul seems to be saying that there’s something about our sexual behavior that is directly
related to our spirits, both with respect to God and to other people. He reminds us that our bodies
are members of Christ. We are Christ’s body on this earth pending his return. “Should I therefore
take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never!” Paul’s saying that this
is not only not acceptable under grace, but it’s a slap in the face of the one who gave us grace in
sacrificing himself for us. We’re dwelling in him and he’s dwelling in us, and by engaging in impurity it’
s almost like we’re dragging him down into the muck. A couple of lines down Paul likens this kind of
behavior to desecrating, vandalizing a holy temple. “Do you not know that your body is a temple of
the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God? Glorify God in your body! Act in ways that will
bring honor to God in your eyes, others’ eyes, and in the eyes of God himself.
There’s another aspect of our sexual behavior as it applies to the participants. And to fully
understand this we have to take it all the way back to creation. God designed sex for specific
purposes, and placed boundaries around those purposes. Broadly, those purposes have to do with
relationship and life itself. The Bible says “God created humankind in his image, in the image of God
he created them; male and female he created them.” Jesus quoted these same words in his
teaching on marriage and divorce.
This brief passage is explosively meaningful. Remember we talked a bit last week about the Holy
Trinity. The nature of the eternal God is relational—a relationship between the persons of the Trinity
from before time. Well, to be created in God’s image is to be relational. In fact the fullness of God’s
image in humanity is completed in the relationship between male and female. Equal, complementary
persons of one human substance.
But it doesn’t stop there. All throughout scripture the ideas of faithfulness and permanence in God’s
bond with his human creation are symbolized by faithfulness and permanence in the union of a
woman and a man. This ideal is of course marred by the realities of a fallen world, but it’s the way
God intended for it to be. Spouses are intended to be faithful to each other, and to be committed for
life. This way of thinking about sex and marriage would have been second nature for Jesus and his
disciples.
It would be second nature, but the faithful would be no less exposed to the temptations common in a
fallen world. And this is what brings this passage into a special relevance for us here today. In
discussing this I have to acknowledge first that it’s no news flash that sex is a pretty powerful
phenomenon. I can’t think of anything that generates stronger temptations. It’s generally very
pleasurable. Any argument there? I didn’t think so. It’s pleasurable because God designed it to be
pleasurable.
But here’s where the problem is (and I’d like you to listen to this closely, because it explains a lot
about why we Christians try to make sense of the boundaries around our sexuality). God knew a
good thing when he designed it. He designed it for beautiful and noble purposes. At its best it’s one
of the wonderful agents that holds a married couple together. The twosome designed in God’s
image finds union and pleasure that, when both are faithful, create trust, closeness and
permanence in the relationship. In fact the scriptures are clear that sex even creates a spiritual
intertwining between people.
And of course sex is also designed to be life-giving. It’s the means designed by God in creation to
bring about the proliferation of life. It brings new life into the world, and with the bonding it inspires it
provides a safe and secure nest within which the new life can experience and learn to share love.
Again, this is when it’s all done rightly—according to the original plan.
Now, I’d like you to do something briefly. I’d like to you to think of what television, magazines, the
Internet, and for that matter, idle conversation, tell us about sex. Think about the magazines at the
checkout stand, and the most popular sitcoms on TV. Think about the attention-grabbing news
banners on your Home Page. You know, “Daring Pics of Brittney’s Bikini Body”, or “Was Halle Berry’
s Skirt Too Much?”
The question is this: How are loyalty, self-discipline, fidelity, permanence, and self-giving love
promoted here? Do you see the point? And don’t get me wrong, this isn’t a new situation. If it were,
Paul would never have had to write about it to the new church in Corinth. Sexual misuse and
confusion have been happening for a very, very long time. But never in history have we been so
pervasively surrounded by images that thoroughly drown out the God-given intent of our sexuality.
We’ve been bludgeoned into insensitivity. What was designed by God for union, love and
procreation has been degraded to a commodity. It’s been reduced to a cheap and addictive high.
Pay your money and get your kicks. Be bold to demean your fellow human being to gratify your
lusts. And if you dare to challenge this degradation be ready for some pretty serious sneering and
name-calling.
It’s to this way of thinking that Paul says: If Jesus is your Lord, if you really have given yourself to
your Creator and Redeemer, the greatest lover of your soul, remember that “You are not your own.
You were bought with a price.” You say that grace means now you’re free to sin; I say that, with God’
s help, grace means now you’re free not to sin. Porneia, sexual immorality, has an enormous social
cost. Divorce. Human trafficking. Child abuse. Even murder. But this social cost is based on spiritual
emptiness. We’re using the wrong things to fill the void. And it’s based on the lie that serving our
own pleasures for their own sake doesn’t have any negative consequences. All we need do is to
honestly look around ourselves and ask ourselves if this is really true. You who’ve been around a
while, can you honestly say that we’re all better off now—that the sexual revolution for instance has
had no negative consequences on our society?
Having said that, I have to say, as believers we’re incredibly blessed. When we do succumb to
temptation and repent, we have the grace of forgiveness. We’re promised eternal life in the midst of
the graveyard of our own fallenness. But even forgiveness doesn’t take us the full way to the
glorious destination promised to every believer. When we hop on the bus to heaven our driver offers
a journey of transformation. It may not always be easy, but he’ll give us his power to live the way he
wants us to live, the way we all know in our hearts that we should be living. We don’t have to settle
for the world’s standards, or its substitutes for the joy that comes directly from a relationship with our
loving God, and with each other, in the way he prescribes. We just have to be willing to let the driver
be the driver. And we need to remember that he’s already paid our fare.
May we hunger to be the people our Lord wants us to be. May we be bold to defend and protect the
people who’ve been injured by the self-serving lies of this world. And most of all, may we remember
that we were bought with a price, and then endeavor to bring honor to the one who sacrificed
himself to bring us new life. Amen.
the conversion of Philip and Nathaniel, or preach on sex. I regret to tell you that the response was
unanimous. Sorry, Philip and Nathaniel, we’ll catch up with you next time around on the lectionary
cycle. And in a way I really did feel some trepidation about preaching on the 1 Corinthians passage
(as I felt led), because there are few more controversial and (dare I say) ‘passionate’ topics in all of
the Christian faith, at least in our culture.
But taking a close look at this passage it soon became clear that a discussion that centers around
what we do and don’t do with our bodies is enormously significant. It gets right down to the nitty-gritty
of how we respond to the gift of grace, and what are some of the implications of being indwelt by the
Holy Spirit, as we talked about last week.
It’s imperative that we put this into cultural and historical context to get the full meaning of Paul’s
words. I’ll begin by quoting William Barclay in the observation that Paul’s overall battle cry in this
passage is “Glorify God in your body.” And it’s no accident that these words were addressed to the
new church in Corinth. Corinth was a teaming seaport and probably the major city in Greece at the
time, with a total population of well over 600,000 people. The Greeks of that era were not known for
thinking especially highly of the human body. In fact the prevailing belief was that it would be a relief
to be rid of the body and away from all ugly and gross matter, and to join the pure realm of spirit if
you were lucky or prosperous enough to obtain the secret information that would get you there.
With this little value attached to the human body, it was probably the default position of most
Corinthians, at least the Gentiles, that what we do with our bodies really doesn’t matter that much.
And on top of this way of thinking was a form of paganism in which sexual license and religion were
combined. Atop the highest spot in Corinth, the Acrocorinth, was the temple of Aphrodite, which was
thought to employ over 1000 prostitute-priestesses. I’ll leave it to your own imaginations as to what
went on there—and it was probably worse than most of your imaginations. At least I hope so. I think.
The moral situation was so notorious that the Greek verb ‘to Corinthianize’ came to mean ‘to
practice sexual immorality’. You talk about a tricky church plant… And I thought my stress level was
high!
So this is the situation into which Paul is writing. Clearly there were people in the Corinthian church
who remained acculturated to Greco-Roman ways. In fact it looks like some of the Corinthians were
using Paul’s very own teachings of freedom within grace to justify things that Paul was horrified by.
Paul quotes what were probably two popular sayings used to do this: “All things are lawful for me”
and “Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food,” implying that we should just let our
appetites have their way. Paul makes pretty quick work of both of these by saying, “Not all things are
beneficial” and by promptly pointing out that there’s something about sexual immorality that goes a
lot deeper than say, the sin of gluttony. He says, “The body is meant not for fornication but for the
Lord, and the Lord for the body.”
There are two things that need to be said about this. First, the word translated as ‘fornication’ is the
Greek work porneia. It’s actually much broader than just intemperate bed-hopping, but applies to all
kinds of sexual impurity. In fact porneia is the root word from which we get the word ‘pornography’.
So it might actually be more accurate to report that Paul’s saying, “The body isn’t meant for sexual
impurity.”
Second, Paul seems to be saying that there’s something about our sexual behavior that is directly
related to our spirits, both with respect to God and to other people. He reminds us that our bodies
are members of Christ. We are Christ’s body on this earth pending his return. “Should I therefore
take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never!” Paul’s saying that this
is not only not acceptable under grace, but it’s a slap in the face of the one who gave us grace in
sacrificing himself for us. We’re dwelling in him and he’s dwelling in us, and by engaging in impurity it’
s almost like we’re dragging him down into the muck. A couple of lines down Paul likens this kind of
behavior to desecrating, vandalizing a holy temple. “Do you not know that your body is a temple of
the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God? Glorify God in your body! Act in ways that will
bring honor to God in your eyes, others’ eyes, and in the eyes of God himself.
There’s another aspect of our sexual behavior as it applies to the participants. And to fully
understand this we have to take it all the way back to creation. God designed sex for specific
purposes, and placed boundaries around those purposes. Broadly, those purposes have to do with
relationship and life itself. The Bible says “God created humankind in his image, in the image of God
he created them; male and female he created them.” Jesus quoted these same words in his
teaching on marriage and divorce.
This brief passage is explosively meaningful. Remember we talked a bit last week about the Holy
Trinity. The nature of the eternal God is relational—a relationship between the persons of the Trinity
from before time. Well, to be created in God’s image is to be relational. In fact the fullness of God’s
image in humanity is completed in the relationship between male and female. Equal, complementary
persons of one human substance.
But it doesn’t stop there. All throughout scripture the ideas of faithfulness and permanence in God’s
bond with his human creation are symbolized by faithfulness and permanence in the union of a
woman and a man. This ideal is of course marred by the realities of a fallen world, but it’s the way
God intended for it to be. Spouses are intended to be faithful to each other, and to be committed for
life. This way of thinking about sex and marriage would have been second nature for Jesus and his
disciples.
It would be second nature, but the faithful would be no less exposed to the temptations common in a
fallen world. And this is what brings this passage into a special relevance for us here today. In
discussing this I have to acknowledge first that it’s no news flash that sex is a pretty powerful
phenomenon. I can’t think of anything that generates stronger temptations. It’s generally very
pleasurable. Any argument there? I didn’t think so. It’s pleasurable because God designed it to be
pleasurable.
But here’s where the problem is (and I’d like you to listen to this closely, because it explains a lot
about why we Christians try to make sense of the boundaries around our sexuality). God knew a
good thing when he designed it. He designed it for beautiful and noble purposes. At its best it’s one
of the wonderful agents that holds a married couple together. The twosome designed in God’s
image finds union and pleasure that, when both are faithful, create trust, closeness and
permanence in the relationship. In fact the scriptures are clear that sex even creates a spiritual
intertwining between people.
And of course sex is also designed to be life-giving. It’s the means designed by God in creation to
bring about the proliferation of life. It brings new life into the world, and with the bonding it inspires it
provides a safe and secure nest within which the new life can experience and learn to share love.
Again, this is when it’s all done rightly—according to the original plan.
Now, I’d like you to do something briefly. I’d like to you to think of what television, magazines, the
Internet, and for that matter, idle conversation, tell us about sex. Think about the magazines at the
checkout stand, and the most popular sitcoms on TV. Think about the attention-grabbing news
banners on your Home Page. You know, “Daring Pics of Brittney’s Bikini Body”, or “Was Halle Berry’
s Skirt Too Much?”
The question is this: How are loyalty, self-discipline, fidelity, permanence, and self-giving love
promoted here? Do you see the point? And don’t get me wrong, this isn’t a new situation. If it were,
Paul would never have had to write about it to the new church in Corinth. Sexual misuse and
confusion have been happening for a very, very long time. But never in history have we been so
pervasively surrounded by images that thoroughly drown out the God-given intent of our sexuality.
We’ve been bludgeoned into insensitivity. What was designed by God for union, love and
procreation has been degraded to a commodity. It’s been reduced to a cheap and addictive high.
Pay your money and get your kicks. Be bold to demean your fellow human being to gratify your
lusts. And if you dare to challenge this degradation be ready for some pretty serious sneering and
name-calling.
It’s to this way of thinking that Paul says: If Jesus is your Lord, if you really have given yourself to
your Creator and Redeemer, the greatest lover of your soul, remember that “You are not your own.
You were bought with a price.” You say that grace means now you’re free to sin; I say that, with God’
s help, grace means now you’re free not to sin. Porneia, sexual immorality, has an enormous social
cost. Divorce. Human trafficking. Child abuse. Even murder. But this social cost is based on spiritual
emptiness. We’re using the wrong things to fill the void. And it’s based on the lie that serving our
own pleasures for their own sake doesn’t have any negative consequences. All we need do is to
honestly look around ourselves and ask ourselves if this is really true. You who’ve been around a
while, can you honestly say that we’re all better off now—that the sexual revolution for instance has
had no negative consequences on our society?
Having said that, I have to say, as believers we’re incredibly blessed. When we do succumb to
temptation and repent, we have the grace of forgiveness. We’re promised eternal life in the midst of
the graveyard of our own fallenness. But even forgiveness doesn’t take us the full way to the
glorious destination promised to every believer. When we hop on the bus to heaven our driver offers
a journey of transformation. It may not always be easy, but he’ll give us his power to live the way he
wants us to live, the way we all know in our hearts that we should be living. We don’t have to settle
for the world’s standards, or its substitutes for the joy that comes directly from a relationship with our
loving God, and with each other, in the way he prescribes. We just have to be willing to let the driver
be the driver. And we need to remember that he’s already paid our fare.
May we hunger to be the people our Lord wants us to be. May we be bold to defend and protect the
people who’ve been injured by the self-serving lies of this world. And most of all, may we remember
that we were bought with a price, and then endeavor to bring honor to the one who sacrificed
himself to bring us new life. Amen.
January 15, 2012
Fr. Dan Tuton
Fr. Dan Tuton
Bought With A Price
(1 Corinthians 6:12-20)
(1 Corinthians 6:12-20)
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