Study Desk

For what business of mine is it to judge outsiders? Is it not for you to judge those who are within the Church

Food of all kinds is meant for the stomach, and the stomach is meant for food, and God will cause both of them to perish. Yet the body does not exist for the purpose of fornication, but for the Master's service, and the Master exists for the body;

Or do you not know that a man who has to do with a prostitute is one with her in body? For God says, "The two shall become one."

And you are not your own, for you have been redeemed at infinite cost. Therefore glorify God in your bodies.

I now deal with the subjects mentioned in your letter. It is well for a man to abstain altogether from marriage.

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.

But I tell the unmarried, and women who are widows, that it is well for them to remain as I am.

If, however, they cannot maintain self-control, by all means let them marry; for marriage is better than the fever of passion.

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.

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?

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.

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.

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.

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.

and those who use the world as not using it to the full. For the world as it now exists is passing away.

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.

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--

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.

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?

Why, your knowledge becomes the ruin of the weak believer--your brother, for whom Christ died!