'Everything is permissible but not everything is beneficial'
In 2014 Susan, the kids and I went down to Montana. We saw Pompey’s Pillar. Do you know what that is? You know Lewis and Clark – the 2nd or 3rd explorers to travel across North America to the Pacific Coast; Mackenzie was first and Thompson may have been second. Lewis and Clark, we’ve heard of them, right? We saw a rock that Clark famously signed in the 19th Century as he was traveling through. It was really quite interesting. We also saw the Little Bighorn. We are all familiar with the Battle of the Little Bighorn right? That is where the Sioux had their last successful resistance to American conquest and US General Custer famously had his last stand. As we were leaving that area, we stopped by the gift store and Rebecca showed me this bumper sticker:
Our adventure was quite an enjoyable time – at least in the daytime. The nights were an entirely different story. As Susan mentioned last week to those of you who were here, the nights were quite dramatic. To recap: Night Number 1 at the campground, Rebecca and I managed to set up our giant three-room, 15-man tent in the rain and everyone managed to get to sleep only to awaken when one person wets not only her sleeping bag but many other things in the tent as well. So we toss the items out in the rain and walk down to the Laundromat first thing in the morning to wash everything.
Night Number 2, there is a horrible wind and rainstorm and one person wakes up terrified and another wakes up vomiting not only on her sleeping bag but also on many other things in the tent. So we toss the items out in the rain and walk down to the Laundromat first thing in the morning to wash everything.
Not quite Night Number 3, there is a terrible storm with hailstones twice the size of quarters and a powerful enough wind to drive those stones with force at anything caught outside. We head back to the campground and the campsite to where we pitched the tent… it is not there. The ropes from the tent are still tied to the tree and to the pegs in the ground but the tent has been torn apart and blown over a building and/or some trees and landed – with our stuff mostly still in it – in a culvert outside the campground.
As the hail turns to rain, I stand straddling the culvert and steadying the tent as we lower Rebecca down into the remains of our tent to salvage whatever can be salvaged. We save most items – not our tent though. Now we had paid for one more night at the campground and we could stay there longer but we thought, ‘enough is enough’ and after we load the car, we head towards home and stop in a nice hotel room for our last night on the road so we can all get some much needed rest. We all get to sleep nicely in a bed… only to awaken when one person vomits all over the carpet and the side of a bed. I wash the items in the bathtub, scrub the carpet, and clean up. It was nice to be home from our trip.
When we had reached the penultimate night of our trip, because we had already paid for it, of course we were permitted to stay for one more night but – as it was storming and we were without a tent - it was not beneficial to do so. The Apostle Paul says that everything in life is like that. Everything – he says – is permissible but not everything is beneficial and he puts this in a number of different ways in Chapter 6-10 of this letter to the Corinthians.
Paul talks about our response to the storm that is hitting the 1 Corinthian tent in a number a different ways. He reminds us that it is permissible to stay in the metaphorical tent but not really beneficial with everything that is blowing around out there. As recorded in Chapter 6:9-15, Paul says pertaining to this and specially referring to the storms of idolatry and sexual sin:
…do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
[Everything is permissible.] “I have the right to do anything,” you say—but not everything is beneficial. “I have the right to do anything”—but I will not be mastered by anything. You say, “Food for the stomach and the stomach for food, and God will destroy them both.” The body, however, is not meant for sexual immorality but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. By his power God raised the Lord from the dead, and he will raise us also. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ himself? Shall I then take the members of Christ and unite them with a prostitute?
In Chapter Six of this letter here, Paul speaks about our quote – ‘everything is permissible for me but not everything is beneficial’ – encouraging us to avoid sin. Referencing the body: implying, inferring, alluding to, and acknowledging that it may be permissible to do anything even something as drastic as chopping your hand off but then you have to realize that you won’t have a hand. It is permissible to overeat and eat bad foods but then you have to accept that you might get fat, get diabetes, have a heart attack, and die. If you treat your body improperly it won’t work and - as you are a part of Christ’s body (which is the church) - if you abuse the body, the church won’t work. In Chapter 3, Paul comes right out and says that those people who do destroy the church will be destroyed themselves.[1] If we destroy ourselves then we will be destroyed.[2] Everything is permissible but not everything is beneficial. That makes sense, right?
The example Paul gives is that we are a part of Christ’s body. Should we then join Christ sexually with a prostitute or with someone else in sexually destructive ways? Even more than that: how can we be both a part of both the body of Christ and the body of sexual sin?[3] How can we be a part of the ocean and a part of the prairie at the same time? How can we be a part of the wind and a part of the doldrums? How can we be a part of the sky and a part of the land? How can we be a part of the body of sin and a part of the body of salvation? It may even be allowed – Paul says – but that doesn’t make it possible and even if it is possible, it certainly doesn’t benefit the body of Christ; and anything that destroys the body of Christ (the church) like spiritual junk food, metaphorical overeating or excessive drinking, symbolic STDs, etc.; Christ says He will ultimately destroy, as amputating a limb to save the body. So while some things may be possible to do - or even permissible to do - in our culture that doesn’t make them useful, helpful, or even non-destructive. You are allowed to go for a long walk in the prairie summer in a snowsuit but it may not be your best option; you are allowed to go for a long walk in the winter prairie wearing only your bathing suit but it might not be your best option and really, it will impede your salvation; you might not survive. If you destroy yourself, you will discover that you are destroyed. Paul uses this expression, “everything is permissible for me but not everything is beneficial”, to point out to us that there are some things that we really should not do. This all makes sense so far, right? But just when we think we have this whole thing sorted, Paul comes back to this thought in a little bit more puzzling way.
Paul speaks about some other important items and then he comes back to this idea in Chapter 8:1-12 and he comes back to the same phrase again in Chapter 10:14-30: “everything is permissible for me but not everything is beneficial”; he uses the phrase this time to more thoroughly address food sacrificed to idols. And some have pondered potential contradictions in these thoughts.[4]
1 Corinthians 8:4-6&8, Paul says reassuringly and almost nonchalantly to the Corinthians: So then, about eating food sacrificed to idols:
We know that “An idol is nothing at all in the world” and that “There is no God but one.” For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth as indeed there are many “gods” and many “lords”, yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live…. But food does not bring us near to God; we are no worse if we do not eat, and no better if we do.
But a few moments later as we read on, we come to 1 Corinthians 10:14-15: “… my dear friends, flee from idolatry. I speak to sensible people; judge for yourselves what I say.”
In one moment Paul is saying, “What does it matter if we eat food sacrificed to imaginary idols? They don’t exist anyway;” and in the next he is saying, “Flee idolatry! Run away from it!” One moment he says that an idol is nothing at all in the world (1 Corinthians 8:4). 1 Corinthians 10:19-20a: “Do I mean then that food sacrificed to an idol is anything, or that an idol is anything? No …”
Then – Verses 21-22 - Paul continues on in seemingly a completely different vein – “ but the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons. You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons too; you cannot have a part in both the Lord’s Table and the table of demons. Are we trying to arouse the Lord’s jealousy? Are we stronger than He?”
And then Paul says, [but] Verse 23, “Anything is permissible for me but not everything is beneficial.” So what does Paul mean? Verse 23, “‘I have the right to do anything,’ you say—but not everything is beneficial. ‘I have the right to do anything’—but not everything is constructive.” What does Paul mean when he says, 10: 21, “You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons too; you cannot have a part in both the Lord’s table and the table of demons” when he also says 4:8, “But food does not bring us near to God; we are no worse if we do not eat, and no better if we do.” When Paul said “anything is permissible for me but not everything is beneficial” in Chapter 6, he is doing so to encourage us NOT to partake in sexual sin and idolatry and now as he uses this phrase further in relation to idols, is he saying that we should or that we should NOT partake of idol food; is he saying that it really matters or is he saying that it really doesn’t matter because idols are nothing anyway? He seems to be saying both things; so what is he saying?[5]
I do invite you to keep your fingers in all the passages we have read here today where Paul is speaking about this same matter in this letter: 1 Corinthians 6:9-15, 8:1-13, 9:18-23, 10:14-31. It is important: Paul in the same letter is not going to be disagreeing with himself and changing his mind. He is making the same point so what is the point?
I think there are two bits of cultural-historical information pertaining to meat sacrificed to idols that we need in order to fully grasp the meaning attached to this discussion. One is this: almost all meat sold in the marketplace was meat sacrificed to idols.[6] If there was a Safeway or a Co-op in Corinth of Paul’s day, much of the meat there would have been sacrificed to idols and they didn’t label their packages so you would have no idea if the package that you were buying was meat sacrificed to a pagan idol or not. Just like Israelites and Judeans sacrificed animals to God in ancient times, so too did pagans. And priests were the butchers in ancient Corinth; so just like people bring animals to the butcher shop today, people then and there would bring their animals to the temple to be butchered for eating; they would bring their sacrifice to the pagan temples and the priests would dedicate the animal to a pagan deity and the priest would then butcher the animal. The family would eat some, the priests would eat some, but inevitably there would be a lot of meat left over and that meat would wind up in the marketplace. Paul knows that if anyone buys meat in the marketplace, they will have a really good chance of eating meat sacrificed to idols.[7] The only way that they can avoid eating meat sacrificed to pagan idols is to become vegetarians and Paul is definitely NOT promoting that here. He says, Chapter 10 Verse 25-26, “Eat anything sold in the meat market without raising questions of conscience, for, ‘The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it.’”
So then, why in the next breath of Chapter 10 (V.28) does Paul say, “do not eat meat sacrificed to idols”? As we look at Verses 27-31, I think we will see what is the difference. Verses 25-26 are talking about buying food at the market or even eating food in the restaurant (early restaurants were in pagan temples as well!) Paul is saying that it doesn’t matter if you eat that food because the other so-called gods are just make-believe anyway. Verses 27-31, on the other hand, speak to going to eat at someone’s home for dinner. This, we see has the potential to be quite different. Verse 27-29a:
If an unbeliever invites you to a meal and you want to go, eat whatever is put before you without raising questions of conscience. But if someone says to you, “This has been offered in sacrifice,” then do not eat it, both for the sake of the one who told you and for the sake of conscience. I am referring to the other person’s conscience, not yours.
Paul, Verse 24, says, “No one should seek their own good, but the good of others.” And Verse 31, “So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.”
Do you see the difference? Paul is saying that, “everything is permissible for him but not everything is beneficial.” And the criterion that he is using here to help him determine whether or not something is beneficial seems to be the life and the soul of the people around him.
We don’t have a lot of meat sacrificed to idols around here – though in Vancouver it would not be uncommon to see a Buddha or a Buddhist cat statue in many local restaurants. Here and now, especially for those of us in The Salvation Army, I think one of many examples as to how this relates to us is the following way. Soldiers in The Salvation Army do not drink– not that I believe that there is anything inherently scripturally wrong with drinking strictly speaking. The potential problem arises in that many people who come to The Salvation Army have struggled and are struggling with addiction. Can you imagine if God uses you to lead your friend to the Lord and the Lord delivers him from alcoholism and then your friend sees you in the pub having a pint? What might that do for them relating to their addiction? And more importantly what might that do to them relating to their salvation/holiness? What might that tempt them to do or think relating to their faith? Paul says, 1 Corinthians 9:18-19, about putting aside his freedom to eat and drink what he wants, he says, “What then is my reward? Just this: that in preaching the gospel I may offer it free of charge, and so not make full use of my rights as a preacher of the gospel. Though I am free and belong to no one, I have made myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible”
And so it should be for us as well. Though we are free in this culture to do so much, some things are quite frankly - like Chapter 6 records - very harmful for us and so we should avoid them for that purpose; and some things – even though they are not inherently harmful to us – some things are very harmful to others and so we should avoid them for that purpose: to make straight the path to salvation. I would hate for my freedom to be used to condemn anyone to bondage in sin. Though I am free and belong to no one, I would rather be myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible.
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Presented to Swift Current Corps of The Salvation Army, 01 June 2014 by Captain Michael Ramsay
[1] Cf. Captain Michael Ramsay, 1 Corinthians 3:9-17: Building the Building. (Swift Current, SK, Sheepspeak, 04 May 2014): http://sheepspeaks.blogspot.ca/2014/05/1-corinthians-39-17-building-building.html
[2] Cf. Leon Morris, 1 Corinthians: An Introduction and Commentary. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1985 (Tyndale New Testament Commentaries 7), S. 98
[3] Cf. W. Harold Mare, The Expositor's Bible Commentary, Pradis CD-ROM:1 Corinthians/Exposition of 1 Corinthians/VI. Paul's Answer to Further Reported Problems in the Church (5:1-6:20)/B. Christian Morality Applied to Legal and Sexual Matters (6:1-20)/2. Christian morality in sexual matters (6:12-20), Book Version: 4.0.2
[4] Cf. R. Simon J. Kistemaker, ‘1 Corinthians’ in New Testament Commentary, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Academic, 2007), 62-63., 69-71
[5] Richard B. Hays, 'First Corinthians' in Interpretation, ed James L. Mays, et. al. (Louisville, Kentucky: John Knox Press, 1997), 169: among other things he argues quite convincingly that this pericope is not so mauch speaking of pagans sacrificing to demons as Israelites.
[6] Cf. N.T. Wright, '1 Corinthians' in Paul for Everyone, (Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press, 2004), 98.
[7] Cf. N.T. Wright, '1 Corinthians' in Paul for Everyone, (Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press, 2004), 98.
[8] J. Paul Sampley, ‘1 Corinthians’ in The New Interpreter's Bible, Vol. 10, ed Leander E. Keck, et. al. (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 2002), 918.
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