1 Samuel 3:1-10 (11-20)

1 Corinthians 6:12-20

John 1:43-51

The first of 2 weeks on sexual issues in the Bible.

I hate when the idea “your Body is a temple of the Holy Spirit” (1 Corinthians 6:19) is used to deal with smoking, gluttony, or other sins in the body. Paul is not talking about any of those. I think a more relevant Scripture to those types of issues is a few verses earlier in verse 12: “I will not be enslaved by anything”. But Paul, who was familiar with what we could term addictive sins (food, alcohol, psychoactive drugs), says that sexual sin is the only sin against the body.

Why are sexual sins the only sins against the body? Because God created humanity to live as a couple – the two become one flesh. God created humanity in His image: male and female He created them (Genesis 1:27). God created us relationally: as God is three persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, God desires that part of His image in us is that we are relational. Food doesn’t change that, smoking doesn’t either. Sexual sin breaks a foundational purpose of our bodies – to be united with another in love and commitment.

There are other ways that we are created in God’s image: creativity, reproductive, dominion, etc. but Paul here is dealing with the issue of the break in the husband-wife bond, two becoming one. Since Paul sees this sin as the only sin against the body, he deems sex to be important. Sexuality is something that we in the church need to understand and develop in healthy ways.

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Recently we received a request from a Christian magazine to support their efforts. It is a reputable magazine that we enjoy very much. When I looked at their donation sheet they had a Scripture quote: “The Lord gave the word: great was the company of those that published it.” Psalm 68:11 (KJV). This really gets my goat – misusing a Scripture as a way to gain money!

Now, I don’t know how they intended this Scripture to be taken but the way it reads to me is: they are a great company because they publish God’s word. I don’t know if they intended it to be a humorous almost tongue in cheek chuckle for the sake of fundraising.

Nevertheless, it irked me and made me laugh at the same time.

Here are the three words that get me in how they we used:

Great – used to mean “awesome, super”, true meaning “many”

Company – used to mean “corporation” (specifically “us”), true meaning “group, army”

Published – used to mean “publish as a magazine”, true meaning “announce”

So anyway, this is my rant about something quite small.

Ok. This is my first pet peeve. What are yours?

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