PRAY: Father, as I listen for your direction today, please show me your will that I may make it my own. Let my thoughts be your thoughts.
READ: 1 Corinthians 5:12–13
MEDITATE:
Anthony Thiselton, in his commentary on 1 Corinthians, makes a profound statement about the special character of the church and its call to remain godly in both composition and mission. He writes, “The church as a whole has a responsibility to formulate its own house rules for the preservation of its unity, holiness, catholicity, and apostolicity as expressing a distinctively Christian (or Christ-like) corporate identity which retains cohesion for its witness, nurture, and mission to the world.” What does this mean for us? It means that should we decide together that it is spiritually appropriate to break fellowship with someone, we ought to be doing it for the following reasons: 1) If we do not, we compromise our unity and ability to live as a community set apart for God’s work. 2) If we do not, we find ourselves in opposition to the teaching of the apostles, whose lives and ministry call us to live together in a specific way that they learned by living with and serving the Lord Jesus. 3) If we do not, the character of our fellowship will have changed so drastically that we no longer naturally do what God calls us to do. 4) If we do not, we affirm this person’s action as acceptable in God’s eyes, thereby cultivating in him or her a lifestyle that is fundamentally contrary to God’s will; in this way we lead both this person and all witnesses away from the Lord instead of to him.
Questions and Application:
- What does this passage say?
- What does this passage mean?
- Given Thiselton’s comment on the church’s identity, how can we ensure that our corporate response to the crisis in the church preserves this identity: holy, catholic, and apostolic?
PRAY: Father, show us what you see and allow us to weigh carefully the costs of action or inaction.