Flee fornication. [As Joseph did-- Genesis 39:12] Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body. [Paul notes the mutual adaptation or correlation between the belly and food, but asserts that this correlation is transient, and will be demolished by death. A subservient correlation also exists between husband and wife, for they twain become one flesh, and the innocency of their union does not interfere with the relation of either to God, which is the body's supreme correlation. But there is no lawful correlation between the body of the Christian and that of the harlot, and such a correlation can not be subservient to the body's supreme correlation, but is repugnant to it. The correlation between the stomach and food is transient, ending at death; but that between the body and the Lord is made eternal by the resurrection. Now, other sins, even drunkenness and gluttony, are sins without the body; i. e., sins against those parts of the body that shall not inhere to it in the future state (Revelation 7:16), and hence do not strike directly at that future state; but fornication joins the whole body in sinful union to a body of death, so that it becomes one flesh with the condemned harlot, thereby wholly severing itself from the mystical body of life in Christ, and thus it does strike directly at the body's future state.]

Continues after advertising
Continues after advertising

Old Testament