I Corinthians 6:12-13

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I Corinthians 6:12-13

"Everything is permissible for me" — but not everything is beneficial. "Everything is permissible for me" — but I will not be mastered by anything. "Food for the stomach and the stomach for the food" — but God will destroy them both. The body is not meant for sexual immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body (NIV).

The broadest of freedom is being able to do what you want, when you want to do it, and wherever and however you want to do it. Freedom is being able to control our lives to do what pleases us, or what we think is going to give us the highest amount of pleasure. It is the freedom to choose anything, without any restrictions, and it is what every single person wants. But there is a more narrow form of freedom, the freedom to choose, not just anything, but the right thing. I believe this was the case in the church in Corinth concerning this passage.

The church in Corinth was a young church that Paul established when he was there and was having problems with their new-found freedom. The Corinthian Christians were not sure which laws, if any, applied to them because of the freedom from the law they have in Jesus. The letter was written to the church to advise them on how to handle the problems. Some problems were spiritual arrogance, wrong-doings against other believers, sexual immorality, and misunderstanding on Christian beliefs.

In these two verses, 1 Corinthians 6:12-13, Paul is addressing the immorality of their sexual practices. The city of Corinth is a sex-crazed society, where sex outside marriage is lawful, but not in God's law. Mathew Henry comments, "the maxim of lawful liberty to countenance the sin of fornication, though it might be allowed by the Corinthian laws, was a trespass upon the law of nature, and utterly unbecoming a Christian" (page #). Their freedom is under a new standard of law.

Our bodies are the only thing we have 100 per cent control of when it comes to what we do with our bodies, not even God has control of it. In this passage Paul is saying that I can choose to do whatever I want, regardless, but not everything I choose is good for me. I have control over all my choices, but I won't allow my choices to control me. Paul makes an analogy of the food and its relationship to the

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