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Bible (WNT) NT 07: 1 Corinthians

007:001 I now deal with the subjects mentioned in your letter. It is well for a man to abstain altogether from marriage. 007:002 But because there is so much fornication every man should have a wife of his own, and every woman should have a husband. 007:003 Let a man pay his wife her due, and let a woman also pay her husband his. 007:004 A married woman is not mistress of her own person: her husband has certain rights. In the same way a married man is not master of his own person: his wife has certain rights. 007:005 Do not refuse one another, unless perhaps it is just for a time and by mutual consent, so that you may devote yourselves to prayer and may then associate again; lest the Adversary begin to tempt you because of your deficiency in self-control. 007:006 Thus much in the way of concession, not of command. 007:007 Yet I would that everybody lived as I do; but each of us has his own special gift from God—one in one direction and one in another. 007:008 But I tell the unmarried, and women who are widows, that it is well for them to remain as I am. 007:009 If, however, they cannot maintain self-control, by all means let them marry; for marriage is better than the fever of passion. 007:010 But to those already married my instructions are—yet not mine, but the Lord's—that a wife is not to leave her husband; 007:011 or if she has already left him, let her either remain as she is or be reconciled to him; and that a husband is not to send away his wife. 007:012 To the rest it is I who speak—not the Lord. If a brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, and she consents to live with him, let him not send her away. 007:013 And a woman who has an unbelieving husband—if he consents to live with her, let her not separate from him. 007:014 For, in such cases, the unbelieving husband has become—and is— holy through union with a Christian woman, and the unbelieving wife is holy through union with a Christian brother. Otherwise your children would be unholy, but in reality they have a place among God's people. 007:015 If, however, the unbeliever is determined to leave, let him or her do so. Under such circumstances the Christian man or woman is no slave; God has called us to live lives of peace. 007:016 For what assurance have you, O woman, as to whether you will save your husband? Or what assurance have you, O man, as to whether you will save your wife? 007:017 Only, whatever be the condition in life which the Lord has assigned to each individual—and whatever the condition in which he was living when God called him—in that let him continue. 007:018 This is what I command in all the Churches. Was any one already circumcised when called? Let him not have recourse to the surgeons. Was any one uncircumcised when called? Let him remain uncircumcised. 007:019 Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing: obedience to God's commandments is everything. 007:020 Whatever be the condition in life in which a man was, when he was called, in that let him continue. 007:021 Were you a slave when God called you? Let not that weigh on your mind. And yet if you can get your freedom, take advantage of the opportunity. 007:022 For a Christian, if he was a slave when called, is the Lord's freed man, and in the same way a free man, if called, becomes the slave of Christ. 007:023 You have all been redeemed at infinite cost: do not become slaves to men. 007:024 Where each one stood when he was called, there, brethren, let him still stand—close to God. 007:025 Concerning unmarried women I have no command to give you from the Lord; but I offer you my opinion, which is that of a man who, through the Lord's mercy, is deserving of your confidence. 007:026 I think then that, taking into consideration the distress which is now upon us, it is well for a man to remain as he is. 007:027 Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to get free. Are you free from the marriage bond? Do not seek for a wife. 007:028 Yet if you marry, you have not sinned; and if a maiden marries, she has not sinned. Such people, however, will have outward trouble. But I am for sparing you. 007:029 Yet of this I warn you, brethren: the time has been shortened— so that henceforth those who have wives should be as though they had none, 007:030 those who weep as though they did not weep, those who rejoice as though they did not rejoice, those who buy as though they did not possess, 007:031 and those who use the world as not using it to the full. For the world as it now exists is passing away. 007:032 And I would have you free from worldly anxiety. An unmarried man concerns himself with the Lord's business— how he shall please the Lord; 007:033 but a married man concerns himself with the business of the world— how he shall please his wife. 007:034 There is a difference too between a married and an unmarried woman. She who is unmarried concerns herself with the Lord's business— that she may be holy both in body and spirit; but the married woman concerns herself with the business of the world— how she shall please her husband. 007:035 Thus much I say in your own interest; not to lay a trap for you, but to help towards what is becoming, and enable you to wait on the Lord without distraction. 007:036 If, however, a father thinks he is acting unbecomingly towards his still unmarried daughter if she be past the bloom of her youth, and so the matter is urgent, let him do what she desires; he commits no sin; she and her suitor should be allowed to marry. 007:037 But if a father stands firm in his resolve, being free from all external constraint and having a legal right to act as he pleases, and in his own mind has come to the decision to keep his daughter unmarried, he will do well. 007:038 So that he who gives his daughter in marriage does well, and yet he who does not give her in marriage will do better. 007:039 A woman is bound to her husband during the whole period that he lives; but if her husband dies, she is at liberty to marry whom she will, provided that he is a Christian. 007:040 But in my judgement, her state is a more enviable one if she remains as she is; and I also think that I have the Spirit of God. 008:001 Now as to things which have been sacrificed to idols. This is a subject which we already understand—because we all have knowledge of it. Knowledge, however, tends to make people conceited; it is love that builds us up. 008:002 If any one imagines that he already possesses any true knowledge, he has as yet attained to no knowledge of the kind to which he ought to have attained; 008:003 but if any one loves God, that man is known by God. 008:004 As to eating things which have been sacrificed to idols, we are fully aware that an idol is nothing in the world, and that there is no God but One. 008:005 For if so-called gods do exist, either in Heaven or on earth— and in fact there are many such gods and many such lords— 008:006 yet *we* have but one God, the Father, who is the source of all things and for whose service we exist, and but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom we and all things exist. 008:007 But all believers do not recognize these facts. Some, from force of habit in relation to the idol, even now eat idol sacrifices as such, and their consciences, being but weak, are polluted. 008:008 It is true that a particular kind of food will not bring us into God's presence; we are neither inferior to others if we abstain from it, nor superior to them if we eat it. 008:009 But take care lest this liberty of yours should prove a hindrance to the progress of weak believers. 008:010 For if any one were to see you, who know the real truth of this matter, reclining at table in an idol's temple, would not his conscience (supposing him to be a weak believer) be emboldened to eat the food which has been sacrificed to the idol? 008:011 Why, your knowledge becomes the ruin of the weak believer— your brother, for whom Christ died! 008:012 Moreover when you thus sin against the brethren and wound their weak consciences, you are, in reality, sinning against Christ. 008:013 Therefore if what I eat causes my brother to fall, never again to the end of my days will I touch any kind of animal food, for fear I should cause my brother to fall. 009:001 Am I not free? Am I not an Apostle? Can it be denied that I have seen Jesus, our Lord? Are not you yourselves my work in the Lord? 009:002 If to other men I am not an Apostle, yet at any rate I am one to you; for your very existence as a Christian Church is the seal of my Apostleship. 009:003 That is how I vindicate myself to those who criticize me. 009:004 Have we not a right to claim food and drink? 009:005 Have we not a right to take with us on our journeys a Christian sister as our wife, as the rest of the Apostles do— and the Lord's brothers and Peter? 009:006 Or again, is it only Barnabas and myself who are not at liberty to give up working with our hands? 009:007 What soldier ever serves at his own cost? Who plants a vineyard and yet does not eat any of the grapes? Or who tends a herd of cattle and yet does not taste their milk? 009:008 Am I making use of merely worldly illustrations? Does not the Law speak in the same tone? 009:009 For in the Law of Moses it is written, "Thou shalt not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain." 009:010 Is God simply thinking about the oxen? Or is it really in our interest that He speaks? Of course, it was written in our interest, because it is His will that when a plough-man ploughs, and a thresher threshes, it should be in the hope of sharing that which comes as the result. 009:011 If it is we who sowed the spiritual grain in you, is it a great thing that we should reap a temporal harvest from you? 009:012 If other teachers possess that right over you, do not we possess it much more? Yet we have not availed ourselves of the right, but we patiently endure all things rather than hinder in the least degree the progress of the Good News of the Christ. 009:013 Do you not know that those who perform the sacred rites have their food from the sacred place, and that those who serve at the altar all alike share with the altar? 009:014 In the same way the Lord also directed those who proclaim the Good News to maintain themselves by the Good News. 009:015 But I, for my part, have not used, and do not use, my full rights in any of these things. Nor do I now write with that object so far as I myself am concerned, for I would rather die than have anybody make this boast of mine an empty one. 009:016 If I go on preaching the Good News, that is nothing for me to boast of; for the necessity is imposed upon me; and alas for me, if I fail to preach it! 009:017 And if I preach willingly, I receive my wages; but if against my will, a stewardship has nevertheless been entrusted to me. 009:018 What are my wages then? The very fact that the Good News which I preach will cost my hearers nothing, so that I cannot be charged with abuse of my privileges as a Christian preacher. 009:019 Though free from all human control, I have made myself the slave of all in the hope of winning as many converts as possible. 009:020 To the Jews I have become like a Jew in order to win Jews; to men under the Law as if I were under the Law—although I am not— in order to win those who are under the Law; 009:021 to men without Law as if I were without Law—although I am not without Law in relation to God but am abiding in Christ's Law— in order to win those who are without Law. 009:022 To the weak I have become weak, so as to gain the weak. To all men I have become all things, in the hope that in every one of these ways I may save some. 009:023 And I do everything for the sake of the Good News, that I may share with my hearers in its benefits. 009:024 Do you not know that in the foot-race the runners all run, but that only one gets the prize? You must run like him, in order to win with certainty. 009:025 But every competitor in an athletic contest practices abstemiousness in all directions. They indeed do this for the sake of securing a perishable wreath, but we for the sake of securing one that will not perish. 009:026 That is how I run, not being in any doubt as to my goal. I am a boxer who does not inflict blows on the air, 009:027 but I hit hard and straight at my own body and lead it off into slavery, lest possibly, after I have been a herald to others, I should myself be rejected. 010:001 For I would have you remember, brethren, how our forefathers were all of them sheltered by the cloud, and all got safely through the Red Sea. 010:002 All were baptized in the cloud and in the sea to be followers of Moses. 010:003 All ate the same spiritual food, 010:004 and all drank the same spiritual drink; for they long drank the water that flowed from the spiritual rock that went with them— and that rock was the Christ. 010:005 But with most of them God was not well pleased; for they were laid low in the Desert. 010:006 And in this they became a warning to us, to teach us not to be eager, as they were eager, in pursuit of what is evil. 010:007 And you must not be worshippers of idols, as some of them were. For it is written, "The People sat down to eat and drink, and stood up to dance." 010:008 Nor may we be fornicators, like some of them who committed fornication and on a single day 23,000 of them fell dead. 010:009 And do not let us test the Lord too far, as some of them tested Him and were destroyed by the serpents. 010:010 And do not be discontented, as some of them were, and they were destroyed by the Destroyer. 010:011 All this kept happening to them with a figurative meaning; but it was put on record by way of admonition to us upon whom the ends of the Ages have come. 010:012 So then let him who thinks he is standing securely beware of falling. 010:013 No temptation has you in its power but such as is common to human nature; and God is faithful and will not allow you to be tempted beyond your strength. But, when the temptation comes, He will also provide the way of escape; so that you may be able to bear it. 010:014 Therefore, my dear friends, avoid all connection with the worship of idols. 010:015 I speak as to men of sense: judge for yourselves of what I say. 010:016 The cup of blessing, which we bless, does it not mean a joint-participation in the blood of Christ? The loaf of bread which we break, does it not mean a joint-participation in the body of Christ? 010:017 Since there is one loaf, we who are many are one body; we, all of us, share in that one loaf. 010:018 Look at the Israelites—the nation and their ritual. Are not those who eat the sacrifices joint-partakers in the altar? 010:019 Do I mean that a thing sacrificed to an idol is what it claims to be, or that an idol is a real thing? 010:020 No, but that which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons, not to God; and I would not have you have fellowship with one another through the demons. 010:021 You cannot drink the Lord's cup and the cup of demons: you cannot be joint-partakers both in the table of the Lord and in the table of demons. 010:022 Or are we actually arousing the Lord to jealousy. Are we stronger than He is? 010:023 Everything is allowable, but not everything is profitable. Everything is allowable, but everything does not build others up. 010:024 Let no one be for ever seeking his own good, but let each seek that of his fellow man. 010:025 Anything that is for sale in the meat market, eat, and ask no questions for conscience' sake; 010:026 for the earth is the Lord's, and all that it contains. 010:027 If an unbeliever gives you an invitation and you are disposed to accept it, eat whatever is put before you, and ask no questions for conscience' sake. 010:028 But if any one tells you, "This food has been offered in sacrifice;" abstain from eating it—out of respect for him who warned you, and, as before, for conscience' sake. 010:029 But now I mean his conscience, not your own. "Why, on what ground," you may object, "is the question of my liberty of action to be decided by a conscience not my own? 010:030 If, so far as I am concerned, I partake with a grateful heart, why am I to be found fault with in regard to a thing for which I give thanks?" 010:031 Whether, then, you are eating or drinking, or whatever you are doing, let everything be done to the glory of God. 010:032 Do not be causes of stumbling either to Jews or to Gentiles, nor to the Church of God. 010:033 That is the way that I also seek in everything the approval of all men, not aiming at my own profit, but at that of the many, in the hope that they may be saved. 011:001 Be imitators of me, in so far as I in turn am an imitator of Christ. 011:002 Now I commend you for remembering me in everything, and because you hold fast truths and practices precisely as I have taught them to you. 011:003 I would have you know, however, that of every man, Christ is the Head, that of a woman her husband is the Head, and that God is Christ's Head. 011:004 A man who wears a veil when praying or prophesying dishonors his Head; 011:005 but a woman who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her Head, for it is exactly the same as if she had her hair cut short. 011:006 If a woman will not wear a veil, let her also cut off her hair. But since it is a dishonor to a woman to have her hair cut off or her head shaved, let her wear a veil. 011:007 For a man ought not to have a veil on his head, since he is the image and glory of God; while woman is the glory of man. 011:008 Man does not take his origin from woman, but woman takes hers from man. 011:009 For man was not created for woman's sake, but woman for man's. 011:010 That is why a woman ought to have on her head a symbol of subjection, because of the angels. 011:011 Yet, in the Lord, woman is not independent of man nor man independent of woman. 011:012 For just as woman originates from man, so also man comes into existence through woman, but everything springs originally from God. 011:013 Judge of this for your own selves: is it seemly for a woman to pray to God when she is unveiled? 011:014 Does not Nature itself teach you that if a man has long hair it is a dishonor to him, 011:015 but that if a woman has long hair it is her glory, because her hair was given her for a covering? 011:016 But if any one is inclined to be contentious on the point, we have no such custom, nor have the Churches of God. 011:017 But while giving you these instructions, there is one thing I cannot praise—your meeting together, with bad rather than good results. 011:018 for, in the first place, when you meet as a Church, there are divisions among you. This is what I am told, and I believe that there is some truth in it. 011:019 For there must of necessity be differences of opinion among you, in order that it may be plainly seen who are the men of sterling worth among you. 011:020 When, however, you meet in one place, there is no eating the Supper of the Lord; 011:021 for it is his own supper of which each of you is in a hurry to partake, and one eats like a hungry man, while another has already drunk to excess. 011:022 Why, have you no homes in which to eat and drink? Or do you wish to show your contempt for the Church of God and make those who have no homes feel ashamed? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you? In this matter I certainly do not praise you. 011:023 For it was from the Lord that I received the facts which, in turn, I handed on to you; how that the Lord Jesus, on the night He was to be betrayed, took some bread, 011:024 and after giving thanks He broke it and said, "This is my body which is about to be broken for you. Do this in memory of me." 011:025 In the same way, when the meal was over, He also took the cup. "This cup," He said, "is the new Covenant of which my blood is the pledge. Do this, every time that you drink it, in memory of me." 011:026 For every time that you eat this bread and drink from the cup, you are proclaiming the Lord's death—until He returns. 011:027 Whoever, therefore, in an unworthy manner, eats the bread or drinks from the cup of the Lord sins against the body and blood of the Lord. 011:028 But let a man examine himself, and, having done that, then let him eat the bread and drink from the cup. 011:029 For any one who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgement to himself, if he fails to estimate the body aright. 011:030 That is why many among you are sickly and out of health, and why not a few die. 011:031 If, however, we estimated ourselves aright, we should not be judged. 011:032 But when we are judged by the Lord, chastisement follows, to save us from being condemned along with the world. 011:033 Therefore, brethren, when you come together for this meal, wait for one another. 011:034 If any one is hungry, let him eat at home; so that your coming together may not lead to judgement. The other matters I will deal with whenever I come. <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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