“Don’t be so openminded that your brains fall out.” This was the case with the spiritual discernment of the church at Corinth. Desiring a permissive culture’s approval, their tolerance of sin reached epic and ungodly proportions, as they allowed fornication that was not even mentioned among the Gentiles.
Whether the man under consideration was involved with his mother or stepmother is not as material as the fact that it appears that the father was still living and enduring this wrong as a Christian.
In 2 Corinthians 7:12, in what is certainly a reference to the instruction to withdraw from the sinful brother in 1 Corinthians 5, we find Paul’s statement of “him who had done the wrong” and the one “who had suffered wrong.”
Who could imagine a church that would tolerate a man in such a relationship without any manner rebuke or discipline? It reminds me of Absalom, who pitched a tent on top of the king’s house and proudly went in to his father’s concubines “in the sight of all Israel” (2 Sam 16:22, cf “the Phinehas incident” Num 25:6).
Christendom in America is infected with “terminal open-mindedness.” The Methodist convention earlier this year (Feb 2019) serves as a prime example. In the name of “tolerance” and “inclusion,” the practice of homosexuality was repeatedly identified as acceptable and homosexual unions as blessed by God.
Think for a moment, one of the greatest perversions of God’s creation was almost VOTED IN as if God had not spoken on the matter or there was no mountain of testimony to God’s view of the matter.
But homosexuality is only the latest casualty among American religionists. Finding a church that teaches what God says about women in church leadership positions or divorce and remarriage is becoming increasingly rare, except perhaps in the region where I live in the Bible Belt. But even now many are “re-thinking” their views on these matters for the sole purpose of appeasing our increasingly permissive and ungodly culture. We are letting our spiritual brains fall out!
Spiritual discernment is required of those who would be mature in Christ. We must have our senses exercised to discern what is good and evil (Heb 5:14).
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