The Ignatius Catholic Study Bible New Testament (179 page)

6
 I have applied all this to myself and Apol'los for your benefit, brethren, that you may
learn by us
not to go beyond what is written, that none of you may be puffed up in favor of one against another.
⁷
For who sees anything different in you? What have you that you did not receive? If then you received it,
why do you boast
as if it were not a gift?

8
 
Already you are filled
! Already you have become rich! Without us you have become kings! And would that you did reign, so that we might share the rule with you!
⁹
For I think that God has exhibited us apostles as last of all, like men sentenced to death; because we have become a
spectacle
to the world, to angels and to men.
¹⁰
We are fools for Christ's sake, but you are wise in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You are held in honor, but we in disrepute.
¹¹
To the present hour we hunger and thirst, we are poorly clothed and buffeted and homeless,
¹²
and we labor, working with our own hands. When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure;
¹³
when slandered, we try to conciliate; we have become, and are now, as the refuse of the world, the dregs of all things.

Fatherly Admonition

14
 I do not write this to make you ashamed, but to admonish you as my beloved children.
¹⁵
For though you have countless guides in Christ, you do not have many fathers. For
I became your father
in Christ Jesus through the gospel.
¹⁶
I urge you, then, be imitators of me.
¹⁷
Therefore I sent
^g
to you Timothy, my beloved and faithful child in the Lord, to remind you of my ways in Christ, as I teach them everywhere in every church.
¹⁸
Some are arrogant, as though I were not coming to you.
¹⁹
But I will come to you soon, if the Lord wills, and I will find out not the talk of these arrogant people but their power.
²⁰
For the kingdom of God does not consist in talk but in power.
²¹
What do you wish? Shall I come to you
with a rod
, or with love in a spirit of gentleness?

Sexual Immorality Defiles the Church

5
  
It is actually reported
that there is
immorality
among you, and of a kind that is not found even among pagans; for a man is living with his father's wife.
 
*
²
And you are arrogant
! Ought you not rather to mourn? Let him who has done this be removed from among you.

3
 For though absent in body I am present in spirit, and as if present, I have already
pronounced judgment
⁴
in the name of the Lord Jesus on the man who has done such a thing. When you are assembled, and my spirit is present, with the power of our Lord Jesus,
⁵
you are to
deliver this man to Satan
 
*
for the destruction of the flesh, that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.
^h

6
 Your boasting is not good. Do you not know that a little
leaven
leavens all the dough?
⁷
Cleanse out the old
leaven that you may be new dough, as you really are unleavened. For Christ, our Paschal Lamb, has been sacrificed.
⁸
Let us, therefore, celebrate the festival, not with the old leaven, the leaven of malice and evil, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

Immorality and Judgment

9
 I wrote to you in
my letter
not to associate with immoral men;
 
*
¹⁰
not at all meaning the immoral
 
*
of this world, or the greedy and robbers, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world.
¹¹
But rather I wrote
ⁱ
to you not to associate with any one who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of
immorality
 
§ or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or robber—not even to eat with such a one.
¹²
For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the Church whom you are to judge?
¹³
God judges those outside. "
Drive out the wicked
person from among you."

Lawsuits among Believers

6
  
When one of you
has a grievance against a brother, does he dare go to law before
the unrighteous
 
*
instead of the saints?
²
Do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world is to be judged by you, are you incompetent to try trivial cases?
³
Do you not know that we are
to judge angels
? How much more, matters pertaining to this life!
⁴
If then you have such cases, why do you lay them before those who are least esteemed by the Church?
⁵
I say this to your shame. Can it be that there is
no man among you wise
enough to decide between members of the brotherhood,
⁶
but brother goes to law against brother, and that before unbelievers?

7
 To have lawsuits at all with one another is defeat for you. Why not rather suffer wrong?
Why not rather be defrauded
?
⁸
But you yourselves wrong and defraud, and that even your own brethren.

9
 Do you not know that
the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God
? Do not be deceived; neither the immoral,
 
* nor idolaters, nor adulterers,
nor homosexuals
,
^j
 
*
¹⁰
nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor robbers will inherit the kingdom of God.
¹¹
And
such were some of you
. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.

Glorifying God in the Body

12
 "
All things are lawful for me
," but not all things are helpful. "All things are lawful for me,"
 
§ but I will not be enslaved by anything.
¹³
"Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food"—and God will destroy both one and the other.
The body
is not meant for immorality,
 
*
but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body.
¹⁴
And God raised the Lord and will also raise us up by his power.
¹⁵
Do you not know that your bodies are
members of Christ
? Shall I therefore take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never!
¹⁶
Do you not know that he who joins himself to a prostitute becomes one body with her? For, as it is written, "
The two shall become one
."
^k
17
But he who is united to the Lord becomes
one spirit with him
.
¹⁸
Shun immorality.
 
*
Every other sin which a man commits is outside the body; but the immoral man sins against his own body.
¹⁹
Do you not know that
your body is a temple
of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God? You are not your own;
²⁰
you were
bought with a price
. So glorify God in your body.

Concerning Marriage

7
  
Now concerning
the matters about which you wrote. It is well
for a man not to touch a woman
.
²
But because of the temptation to immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband.
 
*
³
The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband.
⁴
For the wife does not rule over her own body, but the husband does; likewise the husband does not rule over his own body, but the wife does.
⁵
Do not refuse one another
except perhaps by agreement for a season, that you may devote yourselves to prayer; but then come together again, lest Satan tempt you through lack of self-control.
⁶
I say this by way of concession, not of command.
⁷
I wish that all were
as I myself am
. But each has his own special gift from God, one of one kind and one of another.

8
 To the unmarried and the widows I say that it is well for them to remain single as I do.
⁹
But if they cannot exercise self-control, they should marry. For it is better to marry than to be
aflame with passion
.

10
 To the married I give charge,
not I but the Lord
, that the wife should not separate from her husband
¹¹
(but if she does, let her remain single or else be reconciled to her husband)—and that the husband should not divorce his wife.

12
 To the rest
I say, not the Lord
, that if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, and she consents to live with him, he should not divorce her.
¹³
If any woman has a husband who is an unbeliever, and he consents to live with her, she should not divorce him.
¹⁴
For the unbelieving husband is consecrated through his wife, and the unbelieving wife is consecrated through her husband. Otherwise, your children would be unclean, but as it is they are holy.
¹⁵
But if the unbelieving partner
desires to separate
, let it be so; in such a case the brother or sister is not bound. For God has called us
^l
to peace.
¹⁶
Wife, how do you know whether you will save your husband? Husband, how do you know whether you will save your wife?

Leading the Life the Lord Has Assigned

17
 Only, let every one lead
the life which the Lord has assigned
to him, and in which God has called him. This is my rule in all the churches.
¹⁸
Was any one at the time of his call already circumcised? Let him not seek to
remove the marks of circumcision
. Was any one at the time of his call uncircumcised? Let him not seek circumcision.
¹⁹
For
neither circumcision
counts for anything nor uncircumcision, but keeping the commandments of God.
²⁰
Every one should remain in the state in which he was called.
²¹
Were you
a slave
when called? Never mind. But if you can gain your freedom, avail yourself of the opportunity.
^x
22
For he who was called in the Lord as a slave is a freedman of the Lord. Likewise he who was free when called is a slave of Christ.
²³
You were bought with a price; do not become slaves of men.
²⁴
So, brethren, in whatever state each was called, there let him remain with God.

More concerning Marriage

25
 
Now concerning the unmarried
,
 
^x2
I have no command of the Lord, but I give my opinion as one who by the Lord's mercy is trustworthy.
²⁶
I think that in view of the
impending distress
^m
it is well for a person to remain as he is.
²⁷
Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to be free. Are you free from a wife? Do not seek marriage.
²⁸
But if you marry,
you do not sin
, and if a girl
 
^m2
marries she does not sin. Yet those who marry will have worldly troubles, and I would spare you that.
²⁹
I mean, brethren, the appointed time has grown very short; from now on, let those who have wives live as though they had none,
³⁰
and those who mourn as though they were not mourning, and those who rejoice as though they were not rejoicing, and those who buy as though they had no goods,
³¹
and those who deal with the world as though they had no dealings with it. For the form of
this world is passing away
.