1 Corinthians Chapter 5
Make Judgment Calls On Those Within The Church.
You have heard people say, “Judge not lest you be judged.” But verse 12 says we are to “judge” those within the church who claim to be Christians.
There are two types of judgments:
One is done to condemn while the other is to restore. In this chapter Paul is dealing with sexual immorality within the church along with other sins. He speaks specifically about a man sleeping with his father’s wife and bragging about it. He claims to be a Christian and shows no desire to change. If repentance is not an important element of this man’s salvation, that he must be expelled from the church body or he will infect the minds of others. The goal for expelling the person is to see the man repenting and being saved through Christ.
We are to tolerate non-christians and their sins because they don’t know Christ. But once someone comes to know the Lord, we need to encourage each other in our faith walk. So it requires making loving “judgments” or evaluations on how each other are doing, then deal with it. If once you bring to the attention of the person living in sin, you see repentance then you saved their souls. But if they are adamant that change is not necessary then it is important to isolate them from the body of Christ in hopes that they would see their sin, repent, and be saved.
So how are you doing with your faith walk and faithfulness to the Lord? Is there an area that needs to be surrendered so that you are no longer walking in sin?
