In the World but not of the World

By:  Dale Weckbacher

1 Corinthians 5:9-11

When I wrote to you before, I told you not to associate with people who indulge in sexual sin. ¹⁰ But I wasn’t talking about unbelievers who indulge in sexual sin, or are greedy, or cheat people, or worship idols. You would have to leave this world to avoid people like that. ¹¹ I meant that you are not to associate with anyone who claims to be a believer^[a]yet indulges in sexual sin, or is greedy, or worships idols, or is abusive, or is a drunkard, or cheats people. Don’t even eat with such people.

(NLT)

Some have erroneously interpreted 1 Corinthians 5:9 to believe we as believers in Jesus Christ are never to associate with sinners.  The reason I claim this belief is erroneous is that in the very next verse Paul states that to avoid unbelievers we would have to leave this world and since God does not immediately transport us to heaven upon our salvation, avoidance of unbelievers is impossible.  Instead the Apostle Paul is telling us to not associate with believers participating continuing to live a sinful lifestyle.  We therefore face the challenge in our walk with the Lord of balancing a life physically lived in this world while learning to live in a manner that is different from the world. 

The fact that the evil and sin we see around abhors us means that our hearts have been changed by the Spirit of God that indwells us when we are saved.  This abhorrence in our hearts puts us at odds with unbelievers in the world that we must work with, do business with, and even live with if they are part of our family.  While our initial reaction to someone’s abhorrent behavior may be to lash out in condemnation we must remember Jesus Himself did not come to this world to condemn it, but to save it (John3:17).  We therefore must learn to react to abhorrent behavior out of love.  This, however, does not mean we condone the behavior but extend a hand of grace and love to the sinner just as Jesus did when he died on the cross for them.

While we presently live in a time of grace free from the condemnation of God, a day is coming when Jesus Christ will return to earth, not as a suffering savior, but as a conquering King with a mission of riding the world of evil.  However, God is delaying the return of Jesus as judge to give everyone a chance to escape the judgement of God and eternal separation from God.  This represents the primary reason God leaves us in this world after our salvation.

We are ambassadors for Christ on this earth (2 Corinthians 5:20).  Just as an ambassador to a foreign country has the duty of representing his country’s interest in a foreign, and sometimes unfriendly, country, we too have a duty to represent our Lord in this world by learning to live in the world while living in a manner different from those in the world bringing glory to God.  We can accomplish this by,

1)      Speaking out against sin while associating with sinners as Christ did (Matthew 9:10-13) – The Pharisees of the time of Christ were men full of selfish pride.  They believed their position afforded them special privileges from God and therefore looked down on anyone not a Pharisee.  In order to preserve this prideful image of holiness, they took care never to associate with known sinners.  Jesus, however, shook this all up by not only dining with sinners and abhorrent tax collectors, but he even had the audacity to make a tax collector one of his disciples (Matthew 9:9-13).  We too can become like the Pharisees with the message of the Gospel by placing ourselves on a pedestal of righteousness. (1)  Instead, we must learn to speak out against sinful behavior while lovingly pointing the sinner to Christ, the source of their salvation.

2)      Changing our behavior – We have all sinned and fallen short of God’s righteous standard (Romans 3:23).  In fact, even after making Jesus our Savior and having our sins forgiven, we may sin and need to seek God’s forgiveness.  The good news is that we can do that whenever we sin (1 John 1:9).  When we as Christians lash out in condemnation at unbelievers living in sin instead of just condemning their behavior, we may feel vindicated but what they see is a hypocritical sinner.  Just as Jesus condemned the hypocrisy of the Pharisees, unbelievers will reject the Gospel when they see Christians standing on a pedestal of righteousness with sin in their lives.  Sharing the Gospel is not our putting ourselves on some pedestal of righteousness but instead pointing unbelievers to Jesus, the source of their salvation.

3)      Letting unbelievers in our life know we are praying for them and their needs – Nobody likes to be preached at or lectured to and when we as well-meaning believers keep preaching at the unbelievers in our lives, they turn us off and do not hear what we are saying.  The truth is that these unbelievers have needs in their lives, especially their need to accept Jesus as their savior.  I have a friend whose wife is going through some major health problems at the moment.  To my knowledge, they are not believers but instead of preaching at them out of a sense of urgency, I let them know I am praying for them.  Part of my prayer for them is praying for God to provide an opportunity to share the message of the Gospel with them. 

4)      Not being ashamed of our faith – Nobody likes rejection and when we accept Jesus as our savior and let Him change how we speak and behave, we also open ourselves up to rejection.  At this moment, we can either back off by remaining silent or worse yet, begin behaving like the unbelievers we associate with or we can incur rejection by not being ashamed of our faith. 

We as Christians live in an ungodly world that is actually infuriated (Psalm 112:9-10) by our faith.  Our challenge is learning to live among those infuriated by our faith while living in a manner that brings glory to Christ.  This may mean suffering rejection or in extreme cases physical harm for our faith.  The question we must ask ourselves is are we up to the challenge?

1. Needham, Kelly. Four Marks of A Pharisee. kellyneedham.com. [Online] May 20, 2013. [Cited: June 10, 2017.] https://kellyneedham.com/posts/2013/05/20/four-marks-of-a-pharisee.