For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge?
God judges those outside. “Purge the evil person from among you.”
When one of you has a grievance against another, does he dare go to law before the unrighteous instead of the saints?
Or do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world is to be judged by you, are you incompetent to try trivial cases?
So if you have such cases, why do you lay them before those who have no standing in the church?
I say this to your shame. Can it be that there is no one among you wise enough to settle a dispute between the brothers,
Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality,
nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.
And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
“Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food”—and God will destroy both one and the other. The body is not meant for sexual immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body.
And God raised the Lord and will also raise us up by his power.
Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never!
Or do you not know that he who is joined to a prostitute becomes one body with her? For, as it is written, “The two will become one flesh.”
But he who is joined to the Lord becomes one spirit with him.
Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body.
Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own,
Now concerning the matters about which you wrote: “It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman.”
But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband.
The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband.
For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. Likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does.
To the unmarried and the widows I say that it is good for them to remain single, as I am.
To the married I give this charge (not I, but the Lord): the wife should not separate from her husband
(but if she does, she should remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband), and the husband should not divorce his wife.
To the rest I say (I, not the Lord) that if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, and she consents to live with him, he should not divorce her.
For the unbelieving husband is made holy because of his wife, and the unbelieving wife is made holy because of her husband. Otherwise your children would be unclean, but as it is, they are holy.
But if the unbelieving partner separates, let it be so. In such cases the brother or sister is not enslaved. God has called you to peace.
Only let each person lead the life that the Lord has assigned to him, and to which God has called him. This is my rule in all the churches.
Was anyone at the time of his call already circumcised? Let him not seek to remove the marks of circumcision. Was anyone at the time of his call uncircumcised? Let him not seek circumcision.
For neither circumcision counts for anything nor uncircumcision, but keeping the commandments of God.
Each one should remain in the condition in which he was called.
Were you a bondservant when called? Do not be concerned about it. (But if you can gain your freedom, avail yourself of the opportunity.)
For he who was called in the Lord as a bondservant is a freedman of the Lord. Likewise he who was free when called is a bondservant of Christ.
Now concerning the betrothed, I have no command from the Lord, but I give my judgment as one who by the Lord's mercy is trustworthy.
I think that in view of the present distress it is good for a person to remain as he is.
This is what I mean, brothers: the appointed time has grown very short. From now on, let those who have wives live as though they had none,
and those who deal with the world as though they had no dealings with it. For the present form of this world is passing away.
I want you to be free from anxieties. The unmarried man is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to please the Lord.
But the married man is anxious about worldly things, how to please his wife,
and his interests are divided. And the unmarried or betrothed woman is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to be holy in body and spirit. But the married woman is anxious about worldly things, how to please her husband.
I say this for your own benefit, not to lay any restraint upon you, but to promote good order and to secure your undivided devotion to the Lord.
A wife is bound to her husband as long as he lives. But if her husband dies, she is free to be married to whom she wishes, only in the Lord.
Yet in my judgment she is happier if she remains as she is. And I think that I too have the Spirit of God.
Therefore, as to the eating of food offered to idols, we know that “an idol has no real existence,” and that “there is no God but one.”
yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.
But take care that this right of yours does not somehow become a stumbling block to the weak.
And so by your knowledge this weak person is destroyed, the brother for whom Christ died.
Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are not you my workmanship in the Lord?
If to others I am not an apostle, at least I am to you, for you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord.
Do we not have the right to eat and drink?
Do we not have the right to take along a believing wife, as do the other apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas?
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