29 June 2005

This section of 1 Corinthians continues to be with us today.

" All things are lawful for me," but not all things are beneficial. "All things are lawful for me," but I will not be dominated by anything. "Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food," and God will destroy both one and the other. (1 Cor. 6:12-13a) The body is meant not for fornication but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. And God raised the Lord and will also raise us by his power. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Should I therefore take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never! Do you not know that whoever is united to a prostitute becomes one body with her?... But anyone who united to the Lord becomes one spirit with him. (1 Cor. 6:13b-17) Shun fornication! Every sin that a person commits is outside the body; but the fornicator sins against the body itself. Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you were bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body. (1 core. 6: 18-20)

Oh how happy are those who can say "I'm no fornicator!" Those are the ones who view sin in degrees and as actions as clear as knowing what it black or white. But sin, when it is seen as a separation from God and from one another, seems to throw all of us into the basket of fornication - as there is no sin greater than any other. When we let our lust for anything drive us and be our purpose for life and our source of energy for the day, we are doomed to be disappointed and to never experience the fullness of life that is promised to all who trust what God says about us and for us...forevermore: You are beloved. But it is much too easy to simply let fornication be that same old same old...sex, sex, sex. When that is the case, we can easily jump to the head of the religious class and receive a reward for our good life not like those who....who....who....fornicate. The Good News in all this conversation about what is not acceptable is the final line: ...you were bought with a price, therefore glorify God in your body. Our life has been redeemed...no matter what is the bumbling debt, we have been bought and secured and that is and will be the word about us. Therefore, we can admit to the many ways we fall down and know that the word for this day is that we can begin as though we are only who God says we are. There is a power in that word that will invite us out of the clutches of any power to which we are willing to be whores...any powers.

Connection: There is Good News even in the middle of words that seem to dwell on what we are not to be. The difficult part is to be able to hear the Good News. That is why we are to hear with ears baptized by the Holy Spirit for new life and not the same old rambling we tend to stumble upon much too often in our self-centered world.

Lord, lift us up to see your gift of new life that you already give to us and promise to have waiting for us at the dawn of each new day. Amen.