Paul rebukes believers for taking one another before unbelieving courts. He argues that the saints will judge the world and angels, so they should be able to handle ordinary disputes within the church. Their lawsuits already reveal defeat, and they should rather suffer wrong than defraud one another.
1 Corinthians 6:1-8
1 Dare any of you, having a matter against his neighbor, go to law before the unrighteous, and not before the saints?
2 Don’t you know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world is judged by you, are you unworthy to judge the smallest matters?
3 Don’t you know that we will judge angels? How much more, things that pertain to this life?
4 If then you have to judge things pertaining to this life, do you set them to judge who are of no account in the assembly?
5 I say this to move you to shame. Isn’t there even one wise man among you who would be able to decide between his brothers?
6 But brother goes to law with brother, and that before unbelievers!
7 Therefore it is already altogether a defect in you, that you have lawsuits one with another. Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be defrauded?
8 No, but you yourselves do wrong and defraud, and that against your brothers.
Paul warns that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God and lists representative sins that characterize such unrighteousness. He then reminds the Corinthians that some of them once lived this way, but they were washed, sanctified, and justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of God.
1 Corinthians 6:9-11
9 Or don’t you know that the unrighteous will not inherit God’s Kingdom? Don’t be deceived. Neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor male prostitutes, nor homosexuals,
10 nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor slanderers, nor extortionists, will inherit God’s Kingdom.
11 Some of you were such, but you were washed. But you were sanctified. But you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and in the Spirit of our God.
Paul addresses Corinthian slogans about freedom and bodily appetite. He counters by teaching that not everything permissible is beneficial, that believers must not be mastered by anything, and that the body is not for sexual immorality but for the Lord, who will also raise the body.
1 Corinthians 6:12-14
12 “All things are lawful for me,” but not all things are expedient. “All things are lawful for me,” but I will not be brought under the power of anything.
13 “Foods for the belly, and the belly for foods,” but God will bring to nothing both it and them. But the body is not for sexual immorality, but for the Lord; and the Lord for the body.
14 Now God raised up the Lord, and will also raise us up by his power.
Paul argues from union with Christ, Genesis covenant language, and temple theology. Believers’ bodies are members of Christ and temples of the Holy Spirit. Therefore they must flee sexual immorality and glorify God in their bodies, because they have been bought with a price.
1 Corinthians 6:15-17
15 Don’t you know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? May it never be!
16 Or don’t you know that he who is joined to a prostitute is one body? For, “The two”, he says, “will become one flesh.”
17 But he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit.
18 Flee sexual immorality! “Every sin that a man does is outside the body,” but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body.
19 Or don’t you know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God? You are not your own,
20 for you were bought with a price. Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.