Church Discipline – 1 Corinthians chapter 5 verses 1 to 8
Discipline – the Dirty ‘D’ Word? – at home, at work, at church?
Responding to Sin: verses 1-2 – How NOT to do it, and how it should be done.
Love for the Individual: verses 3-5 – for their everlasting good.
Love for the Church: verses 6-8 – for whom Jesus our good Lord died.
Living out Church Discipline: –
- This is the last step, not the first (Matthew 18)
- Not just moral issues
- With gentleness
- With much prayer
5 It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that even pagans do not tolerate: a man is sleeping with his father’s wife. 2 And you are proud! Shouldn’t you rather have gone into mourning and have put out of your fellowship the man who has been doing this? 3 For my part, even though I am not physically present, I am with you in spirit. As one who is present with you in this way, I have already passed judgment in the name of our Lord Jesus on the one who has been doing this. 4 So when you are assembled and I am with you in spirit, and the power of our Lord Jesus is present, 5 hand this man over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, so that his spirit may be saved on the day of the Lord.
6 Your boasting is not good. Don’t you know that a little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough? 7 Get rid of the old yeast, so that you may be a new unleavened batch – as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. 8 Therefore let us keep the Festival, not with the old bread leavened with malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
1 Corinthians 5:1-8 New International Version – UK (NIVUK) Holy Bible, New International Version® Anglicized, NIV® Copyright © 1979, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.