Dear friends,
We come at last to what appears to be the end of the discussion, which started in chapter 8 of 1 Corinthians on food offered to idols. Here, with the background of thinking about the existence of idols in chapter 8, the priority of other people’s salvation in chapter 9, and then the prophetic warning against all idolatry in the first half of chapter 10, we finally reach the concluding discussion on food offered to idols. Whether in the idol temple at the time of offering, buying meat already so offered, or eating the meat in somebody’s home, the question of our participation is critical.
I hope you profit from this discussion on Christian freedom and responsibility.
Yours,
Phillip
Phillip Jensen: Today, we will be discussing 1 Corinthians 10, which is essentially the climax of this great passage which leads us through to chapter 11. The broad context of this passage is still that of food offered to idols, be it in the temple, the marketplace, or at a private dinner. What should you do as a Christian with food that has been offered to idols? This was a pressing problem for the Corinthians, but the central point that Paul makes is about caring for others, even to your own detriment, especially for their salvation. Integral to his response is the fact that there is only one true God and that he has made all things. From that great theological viewpoint, all manner of ideas flow. And so, for example, the ascetic idea of worshipping by fasting, or through abstaining from sex within marriage in order to get closer to God, is inconsistent with the God of the Bible—just as worshipping other gods is inconsistent with the God of the Bible.
1 Timothy 4:3–5 tells us that it’s the doctrine of demons
Who forbid marriage and require abstinence from foods that God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth. For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is made holy by the word of God and prayer.
Yet in the worship of God, we keep seeing people deny this fundamental great truth in different ways.
Peter Jensen: 1 Corinthians 10:14–22
Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry. I speak as to sensible people; judge for yourselves what I say. The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread. Consider the people of Israel: are not those who eat the sacrifices participants in the altar? What do I imply then? That food offered to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything? No, I imply that what pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God. I do not want you to be participants with demons. You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons. Shall we provoke the Lord to jealousy? Are we stronger than he?
The theme of this entire passage is laid out in 10:14, “Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry.” We have just been reminded of how idolatry led to the downfall of Israel. The Israelites were all rescued from Egypt, yet only 2 of them made it to the Promised Land. The rest fell, whether by worshipping false gods, or by using idols of the true God, not least the use and abuse of food.
Phillip: What we have here is interesting because, having given us that terrible Old Testament warning that we saw last week, in this passage he’s not talking about the Old Testament; he addresses us as ‘sensible people’. It may be better to translate it to ‘people of wisdom’ or ‘wise people’. Nevertheless, they’re called upon to judge for themselves. The key words here are ‘participate’, and ‘partake’, which both appear frequently in the passage. The Ancient Greek word for ‘participation’ is ‘koinonia’, which also means ‘fellowship’. So what he says here is that we are participating in this meal together, but the meal of which he speaks is symbolic. We have many symbolic meals on occasions such as weddings, Christmases, and birthdays. The significance of the meal is that you eat it together. Teenage boys don’t necessarily eat meals; they stand in front of the refrigerator and graze. But when you eat a meal, you fellowship in that meal together. That’s why it’s so rude to read a newspaper, or today, to look at your phone during a meal.
The art of the fellowship is so important. We wait for each other to sit at the table so that we all start together, and we say grace to thank God, both for the food and for the reason that we are sitting at the meal table together. Our fellowship is in the body and blood of Christ. Like Israel’s fellowship in the temple sacrifice, or like the pagan’s fellowship in the idol sacrifice, the meal that the Corinthians are eating has to do with the God that they’re worshipping, or the great work that God has done for us in the forgiveness of our sins. Israel experienced this forgiveness in the temple sacrifice, but we know it in the body and blood of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Peter: Does that mean that the body and blood of Christ have to be present with us in order for us to truly partake?
Phillip: No, the focus is on the participation, not on the substance. The purpose of the meal is not the food, but the fellowship we have in the meal. I can graze in front of the refrigerator any time, but when I’m having a meal, I’m fellowshiping with the participants. To focus, especially as people have done in the Lord’s Supper, upon the bread and the wine, is to miss the whole point of our fellowshiping together in the death and resurrection of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. The key is our fellowship, not the bread and the wine. As we go into 1 Corinthians 11 next week, we will see that the failure in the Lord’s Supper that occurs is due to the lack of love between the participants. That is the failure to recognise the body of Christ, namely the church. But more on that next week.
Peter: It is also the failure to recognise the fellowship with him and thus the fellowship with the others who gather. So it’s not that idols are no longer important because they represent gods that don’t actually exist. In fact, idol worship, which is intended to be the worship of a particular god, is used by the demonic. It is a pathway into the power of evil. So there is an incompatibility between eating at the Lord’s table and at the table of demons. It’s interesting that God not only forbids false gods and idols, but also the making of representations of him, which is what Israel attempted to do with the golden calf. Do you have any thoughts on the question of that which allegedly represents God in some way, in some concrete fashion?
Phillip: The golden calf is a classic example, but all portrayals, all visual portraits of God, are always a misrepresentation of God. A statue misrepresents God because the statue is stationary. The statue is dumb, dead, and has no power, but God fundamentally is alive. He speaks, he hears, he moves, and he is in control. The great truths of God are always misrepresented by statues. This is why Moses was so adamant that on Mount Sinai, they heard the voice of God, but they didn’t see any form.
The other point about these demons is important, because as we know, the devil is a liar, and the demons are his messengers. So the devil lies about the gods of this world, and he teaches people false gods and false worship. People think they’re doing what is right by God, when in fact the devil has distorted the truth of the true and living God in these false gods. At best you can think that these false gods are nothing, but in fact, even this is not right, for it is devil worship. You don’t recognise him because he doesn’t come with a horn and pitchfork and cape, but he comes in the forms of the gods of this world that idolaters are worshipping.
Peter: Last week, we were discussing the way in which God actually does reveal himself, which is through word rather than through immovable statues. So you don’t see God, but it’s interesting that the incarnation of God has come among us. How do we think of that?
Phillip: We are created as the idols. We are the image of God, because the Lord Jesus Christ is, Colossians 1:15, “the image of the invisible God.” So for God to come in an image, he comes as human in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is alive, he is powerful, he speaks. He does the things that God does. He is like God, but he is more than human, for in the words he speaks is life itself. He exercises power in raising the dead. Jesus is indeed the image of the invisible God.
Peter: And the Word of God.
Phillip: John 1:1, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” And then, John 1:14, “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us,” in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Peter: Moving on to 1 Corinthians 10:22–11:1
Shall we provoke the Lord to jealousy? Are we stronger than he?
“All things are lawful,” but not all things are helpful. “All things are lawful,” but not all things build up. Let no one seek his own good, but the good of his neighbor. Eat whatever is sold in the meat market without raising any question on the ground of conscience. For “the earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof.” If one of the unbelievers invites you to dinner and you are disposed to go, eat whatever is set before you without raising any question on the ground of conscience. But if someone says to you, “This has been offered in sacrifice,” then do not eat it, for the sake of the one who informed you, and for the sake of conscience—I do not mean your conscience, but his. For why should my liberty be determined by someone else’s conscience? If I partake with thankfulness, why am I denounced because of that for which I give thanks?
So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. Give no offense to Jews or to Greeks or to the church of God, just as I try to please everyone in everything I do, not seeking my own advantage, but that of many, that they may be saved.
Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.
“All things are lawful,” is a quote. That is, there is one God, the creator of all things, and food and sex are his gifts to be received with thanksgiving and joy. But there is a key to understanding the law, and that law is the law of love. A thing may be permissible in letter, but not by spirit, not by love. So you may be permitted to do something by the law, but you may still not do it because of love for another person who would be affected by it, especially your fellow believers with whom you are in fellowship. So all meat is meat, owned by the one God of all. 10:25–26, “The earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof.” But care has to be exercised for the other person’s sensitive conscience, lest your behaviour leads them away from faith in God. It is because of their misunderstanding, but that needs to be dealt with in its own good time.
So we come to, in verse 28, the word ‘determined’ in the ESV, though the word really is ‘judge’. He seems to have been denounced, perhaps, seen in this “all things are lawful” phrase, because of his freedom in eating. But he’s not giving himself complete freedom. What is that about?
Phillip: He speaks about that “all things are lawful” point back in chapter 6. It seems that this is a catch cry of the Corinthians that picks up Paul’s freedom from the law that comes through justification. But it’s not lawlessness; as you say, it’s the love that goes beyond what the law requires. I am free to do something, but what I do is not necessarily helpful to the other person, and my love for the other person, especially for the sake of their salvation, means that I should restrict my freedom. The meat on the table is not what the meal is about; it is about the fellowship at the table. If my actions in eating the meat are going to cause another person’s downfall, then my action is a wrong action. So Paul’s freedom lies in the restriction that love places upon him.
Peter: That’s exactly what Christian freedom is, and the joy of Christian freedom in so many ways. It’s not an unimportant point in the world in which we live, which is so besotted with freedom. This is so ironic, because governments and institutions are so busy passing laws which take away our freedoms, forgetting that we are sinful people. Some laws are important for that reason, but true freedom has to be exercised with love for the other. You can’t pass a law which says you must love your neighbour. That’s got to come from your relationship with God. So there’s clearly a sort of an evangelistic imperative in Paul’s actions here. What would you say to that?
Phillip: The salvation of others is what governs this passage. At the end of chapter 9, we see the way he subjects himself for the salvation of others. The way that he’ll only eat vegetables, at the end of chapter 8, for the sake of the salvation of his brother. So the Corinthians, like so many people, are wound up about the meat, when in actual fact they should be concerned about the brother. One time, we had the Lord’s Supper in our church, and a man came to me afterwards and complained bitterly because we used bread with yeast in it. He said that we should not be doing that, because that’s not the Lord’s Supper. As I found out, the man, who was trying to join our church, was an adulterer who had just left his wife for another woman. How can you be worried about yeast in the bread, when you’re not living in the Word of God?
But this last paragraph is just so important, because it’s the summation of these three chapters. But it’s more than that, for it captures Paul’s way of life, of giving no offence to anybody, Jew or Greek. He’s a ‘man-pleaser’, not in the way in which other man-pleasers please men, for their own benefit, but for the other person’s benefit. The evangelistic lifestyle is of laying down your life for the salvation of other people, and in that, you are just like Christ. And in that, he says, this is how we should all live: “Be imitators of me.” In this way we live for the salvation of other people.
Peter: That’s confronting. But we live in a world in which it is so easy to forget the need for the salvation of others, and so we simply don’t pray for and care for others. We don’t think of ways in which to help others to see the gospel. I am speaking of myself here. But what a challenge we have. It’s not just a challenge of following Paul, but a challenge of imitating Christ.
Phillip: Therefore it’s fundamental to being Christian. If I’m not concerned for the lost, then I most likely am one of the lost. Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. How can I be like Christ and be unconcerned for the lost? It doesn’t make sense.
Peter: To conclude, give us a one-sentence, 10-word answer to the question of how this applies to us in modern Australia.
Phillip: You can’t be a gospel person without gospelling to others.
Scripture quotations are from The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Links & Recommendations
For more on this topic, check out this talk called The Great Apostle.
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