1 Corinthians 10
10
Warnings from History
1For I do not want you to be ignorant, brothers and sisters, that our fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea.
2They all were immersed into Moses in the cloud and in the sea.
3And all ate the same spiritual food,
4and all drank the same spiritual drink—for they were drinking from a spiritual rock that followed them, and the Rock was Messiah.
5Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them, for they were struck down in the desert.
6Now these things happened as examples for us, so we wouldn’t crave evil things, just as they did.
7Do not be idolaters, as some of them were. As it is written, “The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play.”
8And let’s not commit sexual immorality, as some of them did—and in one day 23,000 fell.
9And let’s not test the Lord, as some of them did—and were destroyed by serpents.
10And let’s not grumble, as some of them did—and were destroyed by the destroying angel.
11Now these things happened to them as an example, and it was written down as a warning to us—on whom the ends of the ages have come.
12Therefore let the one who thinks that he stands watch out that he doesn’t fall.
13No temptation has taken hold of you except what is common to mankind. But God is faithful—He will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you can handle. But with the temptation He will also provide a way of escape, so you will be able to endure it.
Feast with the Lord—Not with Idols
14Therefore, my dearly loved ones, flee from idolatry.
15I speak as to sensible people—judge for yourselves what I say.
16The cup of blessing that we bless—isn’t it a sharing of Messiah’s blood? The bread which we break—isn’t it a sharing of Messiah’s body?
17Since there is one bread, we who are many are one body—for we all partake of the one bread.
18Consider physical Israel. Those who eat the sacrifices—aren’t they partners in the altar?
19What am I saying then—that an idol sacrifice is anything, or that an idol is anything?
20No, I’m saying that what the pagans sacrifice is to demons and not to God, and I don’t want you to become partners with demons.
21You 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.
22Or do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? We are not stronger than He, are we?
23“Everything is permitted”—but not everything is helpful. “Everything is permitted”—but not everything builds up.
24Let no one seek his own good, but the good of his neighbor.
25Eat whatever is sold in the meat market, without raising questions of conscience.
26For “the earth is the Lord’s, and its fullness.”
27If an unbeliever invites you over and you want to go, eat whatever is set before you, without raising questions of conscience.
28But if anyone says to you, “This is from an idol sacrifice,” do not eat it, for the sake of the one who informed you, and for the sake of conscience—
29not your own conscience, I mean, but the other person’s. For why is my freedom judged by another’s conscience?
30If I partake with thankfulness, why am I denounced because of something I give thanks for?
31Therefore, whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.
32Give no offense either to Jewish or Greek people or to God’s community—
33just as I also try to please everyone in everything, not seeking my own benefit but the benefit of many, so that they may be saved.
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Copyright © 2014 - Messianic Jewish Family Bible Society
1 Corinthians 10
10
1-5Remember our history, friends, and be warned. All our ancestors were led by the providential Cloud and taken miraculously through the Sea. They went through the waters, in a baptism like ours, as Moses led them from enslaving death to salvation life. They all ate and drank identical food and drink, meals provided daily by God. They drank from the Rock, God’s fountain for them that stayed with them wherever they were. And the Rock was Christ. But just experiencing God’s wonder and grace didn’t seem to mean much—most of them were defeated by temptation during the hard times in the desert, and God was not pleased.
6-10The same thing could happen to us. We must be on guard so that we never get caught up in wanting our own way as they did. And we must not turn our religion into a circus as they did—“First the people partied, then they threw a dance.” We must not be sexually promiscuous—they paid for that, remember, with 23,000 deaths in one day! We must never try to get Christ to serve us instead of us serving him; they tried it, and God launched an epidemic of poisonous snakes. We must be careful not to stir up discontent; discontent destroyed them.
11-12These are all warning markers—danger!—in our history books, written down so that we don’t repeat their mistakes. Our positions in the story are parallel—they at the beginning, we at the end—and we are just as capable of messing it up as they were. Don’t be so naive and self-confident. You’re not exempt. You could fall flat on your face as easily as anyone else. Forget about self-confidence; it’s useless. Cultivate God-confidence.
13No test or temptation that comes your way is beyond the course of what others have had to face. All you need to remember is that God will never let you down; he’ll never let you be pushed past your limit; he’ll always be there to help you come through it.
14So, my very dear friends, when you see people reducing God to something they can use or control, get out of their company as fast as you can.
15-18I assume I’m addressing believers now who are mature. Draw your own conclusions: When we drink the cup of blessing, aren’t we taking into ourselves the blood, the very life, of Christ? And isn’t it the same with the loaf of bread we break and eat? Don’t we take into ourselves the body, the very life, of Christ? Because there is one loaf, our many-ness becomes one-ness—Christ doesn’t become fragmented in us. Rather, we become unified in him. We don’t reduce Christ to what we are; he raises us to what he is. That’s basically what happened even in old Israel—those who ate the sacrifices offered on God’s altar entered into God’s action at the altar.
19-22Do you see the difference? Sacrifices offered to idols are offered to nothing, for what’s the idol but a nothing? Or worse than nothing, a minus, a demon! I don’t want you to become part of something that reduces you to less than yourself. And you can’t have it both ways, banqueting with the Master one day and slumming with demons the next. Besides, the Master won’t put up with it. He wants us—all or nothing. Do you think you can get off with anything less?
23-24Looking at it one way, you could say, “Anything goes. Because of God’s immense generosity and grace, we don’t have to dissect and scrutinize every action to see if it will pass muster.” But the point is not to just get by. We want to live well, but our foremost efforts should be to help others live well.
25-28With that as a base to work from, common sense can take you the rest of the way. Eat anything sold at the butcher shop, for instance; you don’t have to run an “idolatry test” on every item. “The earth,” after all, “is God’s, and everything in it.” That “everything” certainly includes the leg of lamb in the butcher shop. If a nonbeliever invites you to dinner and you feel like going, go ahead and enjoy yourself; eat everything placed before you. It would be both bad manners and bad spirituality to cross-examine your host on the ethical purity of each course as it is served. On the other hand, if he goes out of his way to tell you that this or that was sacrificed to god or goddess so-and-so, you should pass. Even though you may be indifferent as to where it came from, he isn’t, and you don’t want to send mixed messages to him about who you are worshiping.
29-30But, except for these special cases, I’m not going to walk around on eggshells worrying about what small-minded people might say; I’m going to stride free and easy, knowing what our large-minded Master has already said. If I eat what is served to me, grateful to God for what is on the table, how can I worry about what someone will say? I thanked God for it and he blessed it!
31-33So eat your meals heartily, not worrying about what others say about you—you’re eating to God’s glory, after all, not to please them. As a matter of fact, do everything that way, heartily and freely to God’s glory. At the same time, don’t be callous in your exercise of freedom, thoughtlessly stepping on the toes of those who aren’t as free as you are. I try my best to be considerate of everyone’s feelings in all these matters; I hope you will be, too.
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THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved. Used by permission of NavPress. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers.