Hey Bible readers, I'm Tara Lee Cobble and I'm your host for the Bible Recap.

Today Paul continues his letter to the church he started at Corinth. You may notice

that every time he rebukes them for something or addresses a problem they have, he presents

the gospel in response to it. One of the themes that shows up frequently is that those who follow Christ

should view every aspect of their lives through the lens of the Gospel

and live it out empowered by the work of the Spirit.

This is not what the Corinthians are doing. They're not only living

lives of sexual debauchery, but they're praising it. They do things not even the pagans do, and they try

to use God's grace as an excuse for why it's okay. It's an abuse of grace. We're free in

Christ, they say. But freedom in Christ isn't freedom to sin. Freedom in Christ is

freedom from sin. It means we're no longer enslaved to sin and we actually have the power of the

spirit to help us obey God. Any version of God's grace that treats sin as no big deal

is a crude misrepresentation. Grace is an agent of change. It's God's favor on us to

help us walk according to his ways. It redirects us away from the works of the

flesh and toward the fruit of the spirit. On the other hand, anything that lets us continue

in sin unchecked and carefree isn't grace, it's passive wrath. The Church at Corinth doesn't

get this at all.

One problem with sexual sin is that it dishonors people by disassociating their body from their soul,

using them for our own pleasure.

In short, it's not loving, it's selfish.

He addresses this topic again in Chapter 6 with even heavier words.

He says, if you're a believer, you have the Spirit of God living inside you.

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