Love That Will Not Look Away

Paul has received a report that a man in the church is having a sexual relationship with his father’s wife. This likely means his stepmother. The relationship breaks God’s law and crosses a line that even the surrounding pagan society recognized. Paul is not saying that unbelievers never committed such sins. He is showing how shameful it is for the church to accept this one.

But Paul addresses more than the man’s behavior. He also confronts the church’s pride. Instead of grieving, the believers have carried on as though nothing needs to change. Paul says the man must be removed from their fellowship.

I don’t want us to miss the sorrow that belongs here. Paul is not calling for a crowd eager to punish someone. He is calling for a church that cares enough about God, people, and the damage of sin to stop looking away.

Though Paul is not physically present, he has reached a judgment about this clear case. The church must gather and act under the authority of the Lord Jesus. This is not private revenge or one leader settling a personal complaint. It is a serious action taken by the gathered church.

Handing the man over to Satan means putting him outside the church’s fellowship, into the world where Satan works. The phrase about the destruction of the flesh is difficult. It may point to bodily suffering or to the breaking of his sinful way of life. Either way, Paul states the aim plainly: the man’s final salvation when the Lord comes.

That purpose matters. The church must not make peace with his sin, but neither should it delight in his ruin. This painful boundary is meant to serve his lasting good. God’s grace does not pretend that a path leading toward destruction is safe.

Paul uses a simple picture from bread making. A small amount of yeast spreads through a whole batch of dough. In the same way, accepted sin can shape a whole church. Their boasting is dangerous because the problem will not stay neatly contained in one person’s life.

Paul then turns to Passover, the feast that remembered God’s rescue of Israel from Egypt. During that season, Israel removed yeast from their homes. Paul connects that picture to Jesus, our Passover sacrifice. Christ has given himself to rescue his people, so they must put away the evil that does not belong to their new life.

Notice the order: Christ’s sacrifice comes before their call to live differently. They do not clean themselves up to earn his rescue. They turn from evil because they belong to him. The feast picture points to a whole life marked by honesty and truth, not merely an outward religious celebration.

Paul clears up something he wrote in an earlier letter. His warning about keeping company with sexually immoral people did not mean avoiding all unbelievers who live that way. That would require leaving the world altogether. Christians are not called to shut themselves away from the people who need the gospel.

His warning concerns someone who claims to be a fellow believer while continuing in serious sin. The list includes greed, worshiping false gods, abusive speech, drunkenness, and cheating people. Sexual sin is not the church’s only concern. Paul says not even to share a meal with such a person. Ordinary fellowship must not suggest that everything is fine.

The church must judge conduct within its own community; God judges those outside. I hear both responsibility and restraint in these words. We must not try to police the whole world, but we must take seriously what we accept among those who bear Christ’s name.