Settle Issues Within the Church
Tom Shrader walks through 1 Corinthians 6:1-11, where Paul expresses moral outrage that Corinthian believers were taking legal disputes against one another into secular courts rather than resolving them within the church. Shrader explains that Paul sees this as both an embarrassment to the body of Christ and evidence of the same pride and greed driving other sins in Corinth, and that Christians are better off absorbing a financial loss than dishonoring God before the world. The passage closes with Paul's list of sins whose practitioners will not inherit the kingdom of God, followed by the reminder that such were some of the Corinthians — now washed, sanctified, and justified in Christ.
“Your deepest need is not to quit drinking. Your deepest need is not to get sexually pure. Your deepest need is to come to Christ in repentance and faith.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: 1 Corinthians
Recorded: 2001 at East Valley Bible Church
Duration: 1 hr 1 min
Themes: conflict resolution, lawsuits, church unity, pride, greed, forgiveness, integrity, worldliness, navigating conflict, struggling with greed, feeling wronged, new believer, church member, dealing with a lawsuit, struggling with pride, seeking justice
Scripture: 1 Corinthians 6:1-11, 1 Corinthians 5:1, 2 Peter 2:4, Jude 1:6, Titus 3:5, 1 John 2:15
Theological Themes: ecclesiology, church discipline, sanctification, justified in christ, kingdom of god, body of christ, biblical ethics, redemption
Full Transcript
Introduction: An Uncomfortable Topic
Open your Bible to the book of 1 Corinthians, chapter 6. That is where we are this morning. Paul deals with a topic that is probably not frequently discussed among Christians or in church. Last week we talked about church discipline, and so many of you said we rarely hear about it, we seldom hear anything taught about it, and we never see anything done about it. As rare as that subject may have been, what we are going to look at this morning is even more unique.
What Paul is going to talk about in 1 Corinthians chapter 6, verses 1 through 8, is lawsuits among Christians. Let me give you the punchline up front. He is going to say they should be resolved in the church, and that it is to the embarrassment of the individuals and to the embarrassment of the body of Christ when you take those legal situations into a secular court.
The Historical Context: Jews, Greeks, and Litigation
Paul is writing to a church that is primarily Greek. The Jews understood this matter well. By law, the Jews understood that going into a secular court was blasphemy against the divine law of God, and so they dealt with these matters among themselves. The Greeks, however, were a very litigious society. They were frequently involved in lawsuits, so much so that virtually everyone in Corinth became, in effect, a lawyer — dealing with these issues among themselves in the secular system, sometimes even being called into a jury to hear evidence and render a verdict.
Paul now writes about this practice going on in the church at Corinth. This may seem a little odd, because he has been talking about pride, and then about sexual immorality — and in fact, as you look at verses 9 through 12 and through the rest of the chapter, he returns to immorality again. But there is this parenthetical insert in verses 1 through 8 where he addresses these legal issues, these lawsuits. These were lawsuits often prompted by greed or even a desire to defend one's own rights.
Paul said these ought to be resolved among yourselves. What Paul is saying is that this is further evidence of how immature, how selfish, how prideful, and how arrogant this church had become.
Reading the Text: "How Dare You?"
I want to tell you up front that for many of you, this will be new material. Your mind is quickly going to be looking for all the exceptions, all the ways out, some rationalization for how your situation is different from everybody else's. But just listen to what Paul says. There are wrinkles and ramifications, and after the first service I had three or four questions about different situations. But so often, this is ultimately going to come down to a matter of personal wisdom, and you are going to have to resolve these things. What we can give you this morning are the principles.
Beginning in verse 1, Paul says this: "Does any one of you, when he has a case" — and that word *case* is a compound word, three Greek words, a noun, a verb, and a preposition, that really means *lawsuit* — "dare to go to law before the unrighteous and not before the saints?" You will see the word *case* and the phrase *law court* throughout this passage, and both refer to a lawsuit. The question is: when he has a lawsuit against a neighbor — and a better translation of that word is *brother*, because this is Christian against Christian — how can he dare to go before the unrighteous?
By *unrighteous*, Paul means those who are not Christians. You sense in Paul his shock at this, his moral outrage. He is saying, "How dare you do this?" Remember chapter 5, verse 1? He said, "There is sin among you that the Gentiles don't have." He was thunderstruck that a pagan fraternal organization would not allow this, and yet here it is in the church. He simply continues that same thought here.
The Real Issue: Disrespect for the Church's Authority
Notice that Paul's concern is not that they would receive an unfair trial in a secular court. His concern is that by taking the case to the world rather than to the church, they are demonstrating a disrespect for the church's authority and its ability to settle these disputes. They are going outside the family.
Think of it this way. There is a circle. You resolve things inside the circle — but they are going outside the circle. In my own personal life and in our family, I frequently tell the girls and Susan: this is family business. When we are talking back and forth about something, it stays among us. I do not want to hear it back from somebody else. It has always been a strong conviction for me — in our family, in the church, and in relationships. We understand that personal business is resolved among ourselves.
Paul now widens that principle a little. If you have a situation where you have brother against brother, you have —
Settling Disputes Within the Church
If you have been wronged, defrauded, or exploited by someone, you resolve that within the church. Whatever that means — getting three or four men together, pursuing Christian arbitration, which is available widely — somehow you deal with it at that level.
As you look at these seven verses, one helpful practice is to use a yellow marker or a pen and circle the question marks. There is a clear pattern: Paul asks eight questions in seven verses. He begins with "Do you not know?" — which implies that they should already know the answer.
Eight Questions, One Argument
"Do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world is judged by you, are you not competent to constitute the smallest lawsuit?" Here is what Paul is saying: you will somehow be part of Christ's reign, participating in the ruling and judging of the world. If you can do that, you can certainly resolve the smallest of lawsuits.
Then in verse 3 he continues: "Do you not know that you will judge the angels? How much more matters of this life?" Twice in the New Testament — 2 Peter 2:4 and Jude 1:6 — the Word of God makes reference to the fact that the angels will be judged. We are also told that we will participate in that somehow. John MacArthur writes: "No one can be dogmatic, but I am inclined to think that the glorified believers will help judge the fallen angels and exercise some rule over the holy angels."
Regardless of what that means precisely, here is Paul's point: if you are going to participate in God's supreme court to judge the world and to judge the angels, you ought to be able to handle this.
No Standing in the Church
Verse 4: "If then you have lawsuits dealing with matters of this life, do you appoint them as judges who are of no account in the church?" Paul is asking: if you have a lawsuit, why do you go outside and take it to judges who have no standing in the church? Those judges may be highly esteemed, and as part of yielding and submitting to government we would esteem them in their positions. But they have no standing in the church.
What Paul is implying here is that the least educated, least sophisticated Christian — armed with the indwelling Holy Spirit and the Word of God — has the ability to decipher and deal with these matters.
Verse 5: "It is to your shame." There is the theme. Paul is saying: how dare you go outside the church? This is embarrassing. This is a shameful thing to do.
The Tool of Sarcasm
Now Paul employs a tool we have seen twice before and will see again. When we get to 1 Corinthians 12, 13, and 14 and begin discussing speaking in tongues, it will be important to understand that Paul uses this tool regularly. The tool is sarcasm. Here it is: "Is it so that there is not among you one wise man who will be able to decide between his brothers? But brother goes to law with brother and that before unbelievers?"
Paul is saying: you are telling me you cannot find even one man who can resolve this? He cannot fathom it. He knows the basic truth — that indwelt by the Holy Spirit, we have wisdom, understanding, and discernment. We have the Word. We ought to be able, better than any court of law, better than the Arizona Supreme Court, to resolve these things.
Already a Defeat
Paul then says: "Actually then it is already a defeat for you that you have lawsuits with one another." That word "defeat" is the very word used for the verdict handed down to the loser in a legal case. Before they even hear the case, before the trial begins, you have already lost. The reason you lose is that you have gone contrary to what God would have you do. You have made an embarrassment of the church before the whole world.
Now, I know how you think — because I think the same way. "But this person took advantage of me. This person wronged me. He defrauded me." Or, if you want to be more sophisticated about it: "It is a matter of principle." Whatever you say, at bottom it is a matter of money. That is what it is about. It is not principle.
Why Not Rather Be Wronged?
Here is what Paul says: "Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be defrauded?" In other words, absorb the loss. If you have a complaint against a Christian, you try to resolve it within the body of Christ — but you are better off losing whatever it is than taking the matter before a secular court and becoming an embarrassment to the body.
"On the contrary, you yourself are wrong and you defraud — and that, brethren." What Paul is saying throughout this whole passage is that we lose the moment we step into that secular setting.
Situations Beyond Your Control
Now, there are inevitably situations in life that require legal action and over which you have no control. Someone sues you — there is nothing you can do about that. You are a Christian and an unbelieving or rebellious spouse divorces you — there is nothing you can do about that. We understand the criminal side of things as well. That is not what Paul is addressing here.
What he is addressing is what appears to have been a major problem in that church: greed on the part of Christians. They were battling for their rights and their possessions, and in doing so they were sacrificing their witness before the world.
One author writes this: an attorney friend of his says that over the years he has counseled dozens of Christians to drop lawsuits against each other. In some ninety percent of those cases he was successful, and he reports that without exception those believers —
Settling Disputes Within the Church
Without exception, those who have been blessed resolved their disputes outside of court. Also without exception, those who insisted on resolving their disputes in court became bitter and resentful whether they won or lost their case. If they went to court, they always lost spiritually, and that is the principle.
So in those eight verses, here is what he is addressing. If you have a brother and he defrauds you, you try to resolve it in the church. You try to get a group of three or four people to listen to the case, or Christian arbitration is involved — a formal setting where men who are in fact lawyers come together in a Christian setting and deal with the matter in arbitration — or you take it to the elders. Somehow you try to resolve it in the church. If you cannot, that is the end of it. That is what he says. That is tough, but that is what he said. To me that is far more difficult and far more rare than what we talked about last week.
What he is talking about in all of these settings, beginning in chapter 1 verse 1 all the way through what we have seen, is pride and greed and lust. Now he begins, it seems to me, to tie this together.
The Unrighteous Will Not Inherit the Kingdom of God
He says this: if you have been wronged or defrauded — that same word appears translated differently in verse 9 — "Or do you not know that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God?" In other words, when we talk about people who are truly saved, when we talk about people who honestly have heaven as their eternal destination, the unrighteous will not be part of that group. Do you not know that is going to be the case?
Now, do not be deceived. This is an important point: we do not ever know if he is addressing a case that actually exists in the congregation or if he is issuing a warning. We do not know if these things are taking place and this is the condition in that church, or if he is saying, make sure, be on your toes. I tend to think he has these battles going on in the church, and he says, "Do you not know?" And then he lists sins.
He lists fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, the effeminate, homosexuals, thieves, the covetous, drunkards, revilers, swindlers — these will not inherit the kingdom of God. What he is doing here is not listing exclusively and exhaustively all the sins that would disqualify someone. Nor is he saying that if you have been involved in those sins you are losing your salvation — we know that is not the case. Nor is he saying that if you are involved in those things you cannot be saved. We meet people all the time who say, "I am so immersed in this sin that there is no way God could forgive me." That is not what he is saying here.
He is saying that apparently there are people who have adopted these things as a lifestyle. If they do so on a continuing, ongoing basis, we know they have no biblical assurance of their salvation.
Examining the Sins on the List
Let us look at this list. The other thing that strikes me is that almost all of these things are considered acceptable by the world. Almost all of them the world says are all right.
Fornicators. These are people involved in sexual immorality, especially those who are not married. If you are not married and you are sexually active, you are a fornicator — that is the formal word. As a society we seem to be somewhat uncomfortable with twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, or sixteen year olds being sexually active. But if you watch situation comedies or movies, you will see teenagers frequently struggling with being sexually active, and the question presented is not "let's wait until marriage" but "let's wait until I find the person I love," whatever that means. Here is what we say: sex outside of marriage is wrong — whether you are thirteen, thirty-three, fifty-three, seventy-three, or, God forbid, a hundred and three. It is just wrong. I find this issue in Priority Living studies as well. Someone would be outraged if their thirteen-year-old sister were sexually active, but at twenty-three they think it is acceptable for themselves. There is a line, and that line is crossed only when you are married.
Idolaters. The city of Corinth was dominated by the Temple of Aphrodite. All around the city people worshiped false gods and practiced false religions. Adulterers are those who are married yet are sexually involved with someone other than their spouse. That is wrong.
Effeminacy and Homosexuality
Two words appear together on the list: effeminate and homosexual. The word effeminate is a difficult word. It refers primarily to men who have abandoned normal male-female roles and relationships — transvestites, those who pursue sex changes, and related perversions all come together under that term. In that society, and it was not at all unusual, men would sometimes castrate themselves or serve as male prostitutes to other men. That is what he is talking about when he uses the word effeminate.
Homosexuality, in every reference we find in Scripture, is condemned. I did a series in Priority Living a couple of years ago on sex titled "Sexuality by Design," which ran for eight weeks. One week addressed abortion and the following week addressed homosexuality.
In Priority Living through the week, particularly at the Thursday noon gathering in the marketplace, probably half the people present are women, and a good portion of those women are not Christians. When I addressed abortion, I took the position you would expect — that it is wrong — and then I took it to what I believe Scripture teaches.
Such Were Some of You
In all of these references to homosexuality, we see that it is always painted as a debauchery. We are not singling it out, and we are not homophobic. We are dealing with the list. It is right in there with these other sins, but we cannot pretend it is not there. In that environment, in that day, they really had to deal with it, much more so than we do.
Let me read to you from William Barclay. "There were those who were homosexuals. This was the sin which had swept like a cancer through Greek life, and which from Greece now invaded Rome. We can scarcely realize how riddled the ancient world was with homosexuality. Even so great a man as Socrates practiced homosexuality. Plato's dialogue, the Symposium, is always said to be one of his greatest works on love in the world, but its subject is not natural, but unnatural love. Plato speaks very positively about homosexuality."
Barclay continues: "14 out of the first 15 Roman emperors practiced homosexuality. At this very time, Nero was emperor. He had taken a boy, Sporus, and had him castrated. He then married him with a full marriage ceremony and took him to his home in a procession to the palace and lived with him as a wife. With an incredible viciousness, Nero married another man and called him his husband. When Nero was eliminated, Otho came to the throne, and one of the first things he did was take possession of Sporus. Much later, this emperor, Hadrian's name, will ever be associated with a young man named Antinous. He lived with him inseparably, and when he died, he deified him and covered the world with statues immortalizing him. In this particular vice, in the time of the early church, the world was lost to shame. There can be little doubt that that was one of the main causes of its degeneration and final collapse of its civilization."
Paul was writing to a society that was inundated with this. You may think it is all around you today, but it was on an entirely different scale in their world. It was institutionalized there, much as it is beginning to become here, but not nearly to that extent.
The Full List of Sins
The list also includes thieves and the covetous, which deals with the ongoing problem of greed. Drunkards refers to those who abused alcohol, and the principle extends to include drugs or whatever substance applies. Revilers are those who would never punch, stab, or shoot you, but would think nothing of character assassination and destroying you with their tongue. And slanderers were those who were out to steal reputation and standing.
There is a great tendency to look at this list and say, "Oh, that is awful — we would not have any of that around here." But that is precisely what makes what Paul says next so important. Paul says, "and such were some of you." It is so beneficial — not to be held captive by it, but to remember how lost you were.
I am absolutely confident that we could put that very same list up and say to this church, East Valley Bible Church, Tempe: "and such were some of you." It is so helpful to remember how lost you were, how far you had been immersed in sin when God reached down and pulled you out of it. Notice the past tense. Such were some of you. You are not that anymore. You do not live that way any longer.
A Personal Testimony
I became a Christian in March of 1980, and among the many things that were issues for me, I come back to the drinking and the drunkenness. That was an ongoing battle. I would drink, and I would stop. One time I stopped for a year, and then I felt I had proven I could stop, so I started again. After becoming a Christian, I began to drink a little less, but periodically I would retreat to my old ways.
December 11th of 1980, I went to a Christmas party. I had lectured several friends earlier that evening — told them they did not want to get drunk that night, that it was not appropriate. Then I arrived, had one drink, then another, then another. When everybody went to dinner, I got three gin and tonics and three scotch and waters, went into a room by myself on the top floor of what was then the old Oxford Tower at Central and Osborne, and sat up there alone with those six drinks, looked out over the city, relaxed, and drank a little more.
That night, the centerpieces were a donkey stuffed with greens and cranberries, and there was a drawing — whoever won got the centerpiece. The next morning I woke up wrapped around one of those centerpieces with cranberries in my ears. Cranberries everywhere. I said, "God, You have to get rid of this. My sense is this is going to hurt my testimony a little bit. This has got to go." I said, "God, I have a lot of sins, and I could list them for You, but this seems to be the biggest. Take it away."
It was December 11th of 1980, and that was the last day I had a drink. I have not even had a desire to have a drink since. Such were some of you. It is important to remember that.
Oswald Chambers has a great line on this. It is not that God gives us the power to overcome. It is that God gives us power as we overcome. Such were some of you. That is what you were.
You Were, But You Are No More
Perhaps you never struggled with that particular sin. I don't know what it was, but that is what you were. There is a great word in that passage. Do you see it? Paul uses it three times. It is a great little word, and almost every time we see it in Scripture, we smile and rejoice. Look at it: *but*. There is the contrast. That is what you were, but you are not anymore. You used to be a reviler. You used to slander. You used to gossip. You used to cheat. But not anymore.
Three things happened to you. You were washed — that is regeneration, cleansing, being born again. I find people who are offended by the term "born again," but there is no need to be. Jesus used it. In fact, He said you *must* be born again, regenerated. You are a new creature.
You were also sanctified. You move from sinner to saint. There is now a holiness in your life. Titus 3:5 says, "He saved us, not on the basis of deeds, which we've done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Spirit." We are new creatures with new behavior, and we have a new standing before God. We are justified.
Saints, Not Sinners
We may look like a ragtag group of sinners huddled together on West Elliott Road in Gilbert, but we are saints. I was raised in a religion that said a saint is someone who went through a formal process, was canonized, and received the little halo. But that is not what the Bible says. The Bible says that if you are a believer and a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ, you are a saint — and saint means someone who is set apart.
We come back to this truth over and over again, so let me close with it. "If any man is a new creature in Christ, the old things have passed away; he has become new." Let me read this from the New Living Translation: "What this means is that those who become Christians become new persons. They are not the same anymore. The old life is gone. A new life has begun."
If any man is in Christ — that is my standing. If Jesus Christ is my Lord and my Savior, and I know that, my security is there. My identity is there. I am in Christ. We had a baptism in the first hour this morning and again tonight at six. I go down into the water — there is symbolism in that. I go down, my sin is washed away, and I come out resurrected with Christ, in Christ. That is my standing. He is pleased with me. If I am in Christ, I am a new creature.
The Old Has Gone, The New Has Come
Here is what that means. It means I have been forgiven, and my sin has been paid for. You might have come in this morning saying there is no way God could forgive you. One of the saddest conversations I have ever had was with a man in a poverty living study. He said, "I can't begin to tell you the sins I've committed. There is no way that God could forgive me." Then he said, "Let me give you one instance," and he laid it out and began to cry and weep.
I said, "That is awful. That is really bad. It is a good thing you have a great God who died to forgive all the sin of His people." And so you come to Him, and the old things pass away. The old value systems, the old priorities, the old beliefs, the old loves, the old plans — they are gone. The things you used to love to do, the things you used to think about, the things you used to plan for — those are replaced by a new system.
That is why John says if you love the world and the things of the world, the love of the Father is not in you. The love of the world, its systems, its priorities, its entire package of values — those are counterculture to what God teaches. The world says love yourself, look out for yourself. God says look out for others.
We had a meeting just yesterday with the organizational team for the Outreach Ministry to the Poor, and we were working through these things. Some of these thoughts are so deeply counterculture that it makes you wonder, even as believers, how immersed we are in the world and the things of the world — so much so that when we see the call of God on our lives, we look for ways to avoid what He calls us to do.
Men and women, you are new creatures. Now look like it. Now act like it. There should be a difference about us.
The Summary: Resolve It, Release It, Live It
Here is the summary. There should be a difference in all areas of our lives, and apparently that includes the area of lawsuits, which were plaguing that litigious society. Paul says if you have a problem with a brother, resolve it within the church. And if you cannot get it resolved, let it go.
Understand this: unrighteous people — all of those sins we looked at, and others; those are just some, typical of greedy people — if that is my lifestyle, if that is where I live, I will not be saved.
An Invitation to Begin Again
Maybe you are here and you do not even know why. Someone brought you — a friend, a family member — and you came in reluctantly, or puzzled, because your life is a mess and you know it. You may try to put on the same facade the rest of the world wears, pretending you are really together and have it all figured out. But you know you do not. Deep inside you know you are empty and troubled.
There is a solution for that. Talk to the person who invited you and ask them what it means to know Christ. Because when you become a Christian, the old things are gone. You start over as a new creature, and you will see the world differently than ever before. If that person cannot answer your questions, come to us. Or perhaps no one invited you — you just showed up. We are here to help you answer that question.
Your deepest need is not to quit drinking. Your deepest need is not to become sexually pure. Your deepest need is to come to Christ in repentance and faith. And the rest of that starts to fix itself.