Moral Failure in the Church

If you have your Bibles, and I hope you do, let me invite you to open with me to 1 Corinthians, and while you are turning there, to pull out those notes from the Celebration Guide that I referenced earlier. I stand this morning before you with a heavy heart. I assume that most, if not all, of you are aware of the confession of moral failure that has come out this last week regarding a former pastor at Brook Hills.

Without question, this causes a great bit of pain and sorrow across many families. Obviously, for this pastor and his family, the family of the woman who was involved, members of this faith family across this room whose lives have been affected by him and his ministry. Not just in this room, but the platform God has entrusted to him that has influenced so many people across our country. Even if you don’t know this pastor, have not been under his life and ministry in your life, there is still a certain level of disillusionment that comes whenever you hear something like this.

So, across the board, there is a sense of, “What do you do? What do you feel? What do you think?” What I would like to do this morning is to take some time to dive into the Word and ask the question in the Word, “How do you respond to moral failure in the church?” I want to say from the very beginning that this question is much broader than any one situation. This is a question that is huge across the church in America today. “How do you respond to moral failure in the church?”

I don’t want you to see this in any way as a sermon about one pastor. This is a sermon about our faith family, and how we respond to moral failure in the church. Truths that we are addressing are heavy truths. My prayer is that God would use me to communicate His truth with clarity, with humility, with boldness and with great comfort to our lives.

And so to that end, let’s pray together. God, we bow before you this morning to praise you for your grace and your mercy. We praise you because you are holy, and we praise you that the blood of Jesus Christ covers our sins. We praise you that when we confess our sins, you are faithful and just, and you forgive us our sins, and you cleanse us from all unrighteousness. God be praised for the way you forgive us.

God, we pray this morning for our former pastor, for his family. We pray for the family of this woman and her. We pray for families across this room and outside of this room that have been affected by this news this last week. God, we pray for this community. God, we pray that you would glorify yourself even in this situation in this community. God, we pray for people in this community who do not know Christ, that they would see Christ in your church during this time. God, I pray for our time together in this room this morning. I pray for your anointing on all of us, not just on me, but you would anoint us all to hear your Word. God, I pray that you would help me to get the text right. Help me to communicate your truth clearly and accurately in a way that brings honor to you and comfort and guidance to your people. We humbly ask these things in your name, Amen.

We’re going to do something a little different, even text-wise. Normally, we dive into one particular text and then see other parts of Scripture and how they relate to that text. We are not going to have one main text this morning. You might look at your notes and see the text is 1 Corinthians. That is sixteen long chapters, and so that is not going be one main text. What I believe God has led me to do in preparation the last day or two is to take the book of 1 Corinthians, which was written by Paul to a church that was going through a lot of struggle. One of which…not limited to, but one of which was moral failure.

So, what I have tried to do is take the book of 1 Corinthians, and what God shows us through His Holy Spirit in this book and look for truths that are there that relate to the situation that we are addressing this morning. What you have there in front of you are a list of ten ways to respond to moral failure in the church. I have not put in your notes the exact verses for each one of these, so let me encourage you as you take notes to write down the verses that we reference for each one of these, so that you can go back and reference that in your own time with the Lord.

Find your comfort in prayer.

First, you find your comfort in prayer; you find your comfort in prayer. I want us to start in 1 Corinthians 1. Here’s the verses for that: 1 Corinthians 1:1—9. Let’s look at the introduction to this book.

Paul, called to be an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and [There it is again] our brother Sosthenes, To the church of God in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus and called to be holy, together with all those everywhere who call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ – their Lord and ours:Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I always thank God for you because of his grace given you in Christ Jesus. For in him you have been enriched in every way – in all your speaking and in all your knowledge – because our testimony about Christ was confirmed in you. Therefore you do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to be revealed. He will keep you strong to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God, who has called you into fellowship with his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, is faithful.

What I want you to see in these opening verses of the book of 1 Corinthians are some characteristics of God that are highlighted to set the stage for the rest of the book that, I believe, we need to be reminded of when it comes to finding our comfort in prayer. Who is the God that we pray to?

1 Corinthians teaches us God is holy.

Three Characteristics: God is holy; He is holy. You see it from the very beginning, verse 2. “To the church of God in Corinth, to those sanctified…” Literally, “made holy”. “…in Christ Jesus and called to be holy…” It’s redundant; he reiterates it: Those who are made holy and called to be holy.

This is rooted way back in the Old Testament, when God said from the very beginning to His people, “Be holy, because I am holy.” (Leviticus 11:44) The only way God’s people can be holy is based on the holiness of God. God is holy. This means that God is completely without sin. He is without fault. The integrity of God is unquestioned. He is whole, complete, and infinitely good. He is holy.

Now, this is extremely important, because there is a tendency, when you hear news like what has come out in this last week, or news like that anywhere else, there is a tendency for us to, whether we say it or just think it a little bit, to start to think, “You know, with all the inconsistency and worldliness and hypocrisy that we perceive in church leaders”, there is a tendency just to step back and just stamp a big question mark over Christianity altogether and say, “Is any of it real? Is the church real? Are the church leaders real or is it all just a fake? Is Christianity just fake?” And if you are there, if that’s been a thought…because that thought will slowly drive us away from God. We start to think, “Is it real at all?”

But I want to remind you this morning that, based on the holiness of God, I can say to you that God hates hypocrisy ten thousand times more than you do. It is abhorrent in His eyes. If you don’t believe me, go back and look in Malachi 2:1—9, where He boldly addresses the hypocrisy of the priests in that day. The language there is stronger than any language I could use today. So, I want to urge you, if the hypocrisy that you perceive or inconsistency or worldliness you see in the church begins to drive you away from God, I want to encourage you to actually let it drive you to God, because He hates it more than all of us in this room combined. God is holy.

1 Corinthians teaches us God is present.

God is present; God is present. The first five verses in 1 Corinthians, you see “in Christ” mentioned three times. It’s constantly showing us we are in Christ; Christ is with us. Then, you get down to verse 8, and it says, “He will keep you strong to the end…” He is with you; He is going to enable you in this whole thing.

This is big, and some of you may be thinking, “Well, why is that so important?” Well, just for the sake of time, I won’t ask you to turn there but let me read to you Matthew 18. This is a passage that may be familiar to you. It’s a passage talking about church discipline. Jesus is talking about what to do to confront your brother in sin. “If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you…” Then, take another person along with you. I want you to hear what He says at the very end of this though. Matthew 18:19 says, “Again, I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything you ask for, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them.”

Now, I am convinced that this passage is one of the most…well, it’s quoted out of context almost more than almost any other in a contemporary church world. It is just abused. When we come into a worship service and someone says, “Well, welcome to worship. Where two or three are gathered, there He is, so thankfully, He is here.” And some people are sitting there thinking, “Well, I had a quiet time this morning. Does that mean God wasn’t there with me then? Did I need somebody else there in order to get God here?” Absolutely not! That is not what this passage is teaching, nor is it saying that if two of you agree that you need something in particular, that all of a sudden, the Father in heaven will give it to you. Absolutely not! What Jesus is saying here is He’s telling them, “In the middle of the most difficult thing the church has to do, confronting each other in their sin…in the middle of that struggle, I want to remind you that I am right there with you.” So, the reminder for us today is that Christ is right in the middle of His church today. Christ is with every single one of His followers as they navigate through the thoughts and emotions that they wrestle with. You are not alone; we are not alone.

1 Corinthians teaches us God is faithful.

God is holy, God is present, and God is faithful. My favorite part of this opening introduction in 1 Corinthians, you get down to verse 9, and Paul says, “God, who has called you into fellowship with his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, is faithful.” God is faithful. Ladies and gentlemen, people will let you down in this world, but God will never let you down. Never! Guaranteed! He will never let you down; He is faithful.

Now, this is extremely important because there are many of you in this room who have been greatly influenced by this pastor and his ministry. He led some of you to Christ. He’s baptized many of you. He has counseled you through this or that. He has helped you in this or that part of your relationship with God. When you think of spiritual markers in your life, he is there in a lot of them, if not all of them, and you are wondering what to think about all those things in light of the news that you hear. What I want to remind you of this morning, is that if you have put any trust in God as a result of this pastor’s influence in your life and his ministry, then your trust is still good because God is still faithful. There is absolutely no reason to doubt your salvation or ask, “Is my baptism real? Is the Word real? Is the ministry real? Is this church real?” There is no reason to ask those questions because God is behind your salvation. God is behind your baptism. God is behind His Word. God is behind this ministry and this church and God is still faithful. God is still working in your life and your family just like He has been working in your life and this faith family for the last fifteen-plus years. He is faithful.

Find your direction in the Word.

Find comfort in prayer. Find your direction in the Word; find your direction in the Word. Go over to 1 Corinthians 2:4—5. The trouble here is that we are going to be looking at all these texts, and they are so rich. There is so much here. So, I will try my best not to preach ten different sermons, I promise. I am going to try my best, but these texts are just so rich. I want you to see verses 4 and 5. Paul is talking about his preaching, his ministry here. He says, “My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on men’s wisdom, but on God’s power.”

What Paul is saying here is he is describing his preaching ministry, and he said, “The reason I exalt the Word in my ministry is because, if you trust in my wisdom and my opinions and my thoughts, then it is like building a house on sand. But if you trust in God’s wisdom and the power of God that is seen in His Word, then you have built your house on a rock. So that is why I exalt the Word.” So, it is a reminder to us to find our direction in the Word. God has given us His Word to help us walk through this kind of question.

1 Corinthians tells us God guards us by His Word.

God does different things to His Word. I want to point out two. Number one: God guards us by His Word. And this is extremely important because it is in times of suffering and in trial when we begin to say things in the church that are just plain bad theology and completely unbiblical, but we say them because that is our spiritual or religious hunch or opinion that we have and we use that to comfort ourselves and to comfort each other, and we have got to guard against that, because your opinion is not what brings comfort during this time. Your thoughts and your feelings are not the determinants of how to respond to this. God has spoken. He has given us His Word to help guard our hearts and our minds and make sure we don’t put our faith in something that’s going to fall apart. That is why He has given us His Word.

God guides us by His Word.

God guards us by His Word so we would pay attention to His Word. Second, God guides us by His Word; God guides us by His Word. The Word has truths that help us answer this question. Now, it’s not spelled out plain and simple all the time. I wish there was a book like 1 Corinthians that was titled, “How do you respond to moral failure in the church” book. That would be a great tool for a pastor during this time, and a great tool for us to have as we walk through this. Well, we don’t have that, but what we do is we look into the Word, and we look for foundations and truths that we can hold on to, and we let those truths affect the way we talk, think, live and feel. So, that is what we are doing. God guides us by His Word. The good news is God has not left His church in the dark on how to deal with questions like this. Find your direction in the Word.

Find your wisdom in the cross.

Find your wisdom in the cross; find your wisdom in the cross. Go back to 1 Corinthians 1 with me, verses 17 and 18. Some say that these are the theme verses of the entire book of 1 Corinthians; potent verses. Look at 1 Corinthians 1:17. Paul says, “For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel – not with words of human wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power. For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”

The rest of this chapter is a description of how the cross looks like foolishness to the rest of the world, but it is actually the wisdom of God. If you want to see the wisdom of God, look at the cross, and everything that’s called wise in the world begins to look like foolishness. So, that’s what he is saying there; find your wisdom in the cross.

The cross displays the severity of sin.

What does that mean? I want you to consider with me two implications of the cross for how to address this kind of question. Number one, the cross displays the severity of sin; the cross displays the severity of sin. Get the cross in your mind, and there is no clearer picture of the ugliness and brutality and horror and consequence of sin. Death! See Jesus crying out,

“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” And you realize that sin is not a mistake, sin is not a slip, but sin is an offense against a holy God that is cause for separation from Him completely. That is the severity of sin.

Now, we need to see this because, when we face a question like this, we’ve got to realize that it is not biblical in any way to minimize the severity of sin. It is extremely serious, and if we do not focus on the severity of sin, then we are fools. Now, I know that goes against the grain of everything in our culture…relativism and pluralism, where tolerance is the word of the day. I am convinced that the greatest moral danger facing the church today is exactly that, the toleration of sin that avoids its severity completely.

The cross displays the wonder of grace.

The cross is a picture of the severity of sin, but second, the cross displays the wonder of grace; the cross displays the wonder of grace. When you look at the cross, yes, you see the seriousness of sin, but you also see the beauty of grace from a God who gave His life so that you would not have to pay the consequence of sin, death, so that it would never be heard from your mouth for all of eternity in hell, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” It is grace, maximum grace, that is there, and so when we approach an issue like this, if there is not grace in our words and our thoughts and our feelings, then we are fools as well. There is a balance between the two, and they are both there. I am not saying it is an easy balance, but they are both there. Look at the cross. They are both there, and we have got to make sure that both are emphasized.

One illustration of this: Remember back in the Old Testament, one of the examples is most often brought up in a situation like this is David. His moral failure: His adultery with Bathsheba. And I think it is often abused, that picture, because I have heard it said, “Well, David was a man after God’s own heart. He sinned in adultery. He was still a man after God’s own heart.” They say this, almost as if to say, “It did not affect his relationship with God.” Who are we kidding? No question: Grace. To describe David, adulterer, and as a result, a murderer, as a man after God’s own heart. No doubt: Grace.

But do you see the severity of sin there? Were there consequences to his sin? There was death in that picture. You look at the rest of David’s life, and it is never the same. The rest of his life and his leadership is dramatically affected by that sin. And so, we have got to remember that, in focusing on grace, grace does not mean that things are made just like they were before, and everything is fine like nothing happened.

That is not grace because that misses out on the severity of sin. Don’t miss it! If we avoid the severity of sin, we cannot get a picture of biblical grace. It is only when we see the severity of sin and the grace that covers the ultimate consequence, death, that we start to see a picture of the wisdom of God. So, they are both there, and we have got to keep attention on the wonder of grace.

Find your support in the church.

Find your comfort in prayer, your direction of the Word, and your wisdom in the cross. Number four: Find your support in the church; find your support in the church. I want you to turn with me over to 1 Corinthians 5, the verses here.

1 Corinthians 5:1—5, and while you are turning there, I mentioned it earlier, but this whole book is about the church. It’s about the church coming together. One of the biggest themes is being united together as a church; finding support in the church. I want you to hear what Paul says to the church when he is addressing sexual sin that was in their presence. Listen to these words: 1 Corinthians 5:1:

It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that does not occur even among pagans: A man has his father’s wife. And you are proud! Shouldn’t you rather have been filled with grief and have put out of your fellowship the man who did this? Even though I am not physically present, I am with you in spirit. And I have already passed judgment on the one who did this, just as if I were present.

When you are assembled in the name of our Lord Jesus and I am with you in spirit, and the power of our Lord Jesus is present, hand this man over to Satan, so that the sinful nature may be destroyed and his spirit saved on the day of the Lord.

So, here is the picture: You’ve got rampant sexual sin in the church in Corinth. Corinth was known for that. The whole city was known for that, for its sexual immorality. In fact, the word “to Corinthianize” was a vulgar term. It was used to describe you participating in that kind of action, and it had infiltrated the church. Paul addresses the church, and he says, “The way you have responded to this has completely missed the point.”

We are accountable to God.

And he hits…there are so many things that we could discuss at this point, but he hits on three main truths that I think come to bear on what we’re asking here. Number one: We are accountable…at the church, we are accountable to God. We are accountable to God for the way we do or do not reflect His holiness in the church.

Paul says, “What are you doing? You are the people who are sanctified in Christ Jesus”, 1 Corinthians 1:2. “You are called to be holy, and sin is running rampant in the church, and you are doing absolutely nothing about it. Don’t you realize that you have a responsibility before God to treat sin seriously?” We are accountable to God together to treat sin seriously in the church.

We are responsible to each other.

Not only that, but number two, we are responsible to each other; we are responsible to each other. Do you hear what Paul is saying about this guy who is guilty of this particular sin? He says, “Get him out of the church.” Why? Why take that step? So that he will see his sin, and he will see the devastation that his sin causes in his own life and in the church, and he will repent, and his spirit will be saved, so that he will be brought back to Christ.

You have a responsibility to the one who is guilty in his sin. You have a responsibility, not to sweep it under the rug, but church, we in our own lives have a responsibility to make sure that we nurture and protect the holiness of God, not just in ourselves but in each other.

Now, this doesn’t mean that we are on sin patrol all the time, and we are going out in each other’s lives looking for everything that is wrong. That is obviously against what Scripture is saying, but it is saying this: Your holiness before God should be just as important to me as my holiness before God. Did you catch that? That is completely foreign to our individualistic culture, to care for each other like that, but that is what the church does. We are responsible to each other. We cannot sweep sin under the rug and pretend it is not there.

We are visible to the world.

We are accountable to God, we are responsible to each other and, number three, we are visible to the world; we are visible to the world. Did you hear what Paul said in the very beginning of verse 1? “It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that does not occur even among pagans…” I am convinced what angered Paul most…he made it clear that he doesn’t see the church’s job to address sexual sin outside the church.

What angered Paul most was the fact that the church was shocking the world with the way they handled this immorality, because they were doing nothing about it. And that which is holy, called to be holy and sanctified in Christ Jesus, looked just like the world; worse than the world.

I believe there is a word here for us. Not just our faith family, because I believe sexual sin among leaders in the church is an epidemic problem across the American church. As I come to 1 Corinthians 5, I can’t help but to think, if one of the reasons it is so rampant and so epidemic is because we have not faced the seriousness of it and addressed it in our lives and in the church. We are accountable to God. We are responsible to each other and, if for nothing else, we are visible to the world. We are the display of the glory of Christ. God may that not be compromised with the way we treat sin casually. Find your support in the church.

Find your examples in church leaders.

Find your examples in church leaders; find your examples in church leaders. I want you to come back with me to 1 Corinthians 4. Look at the very beginning. This is an incredible chapter. I want us to read 1 Corinthians 4:1—5 and then a couple of other verses in this chapter. I want you to see how Paul talks about leaders in the church. The whole chapter is about leaders…apostles or leaders in the church. He says,

So then, men ought to regard us [leaders] as servants of Christ and as those entrusted with the secret things of God. Now it is required that those who have been given a trust must prove faithful. I care very little if I am judged by you or by any human court; indeed, I do not even judge myself. My conscience is clear, but that does not make me innocent. It is the Lord who judges me. Therefore judge nothing before the appointed time; wait till the Lord comes. He will bring to light what is hidden in darkness and will expose the motives of men’s hearts. At that time each will receive his praise from God.

Now, skip over to verse 14. Paul continues this idea of finding your example in church leaders. Listen to this, verse 14:

I am not writing this to shame you, but to warn you, as my dear children. [Listen to this verse.] Even though you have ten thousand guardians in Christ, you do not have many fathers, for in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel. Therefore I urge you to imitate me. For this reason I am sending to you Timothy, my son whom I love, who is faithful in the Lord. He will remind you of my way of life in Christ Jesus, which agrees with what I teach everywhere in every church.

So, here is the picture: God has set up leaders to be examples in the church. Now the reason this is so important in response to this question is because, once again, whether we admit to it or not, one of the thoughts that comes into our minds when we hear news like this is to begin to doubt the integrity of other leaders in the church. “Who are you David? What are you hiding? What is going to come out about you next week or next month or next year?” To look at sixty members of the staff at The Church at Brook Hills, “Who is hiding what? Who is going to fall next?” There creeps in this cynicism about church leadership.

What I want to say to you this morning based on this text and not on my desire to be liked, but I want to say to you that that kind of cynicism is completely unbiblical. We are called by God to look to our leaders as examples, He has set them up as such, and to respect and honor those leaders for a couple of reasons.

God has appointed us for our service.

God has appointed us…and I am using us here as me being a part of the church leadership…God has appointed us for our service, for us to serve. From the very beginning in 1 Corinthians 4:1, “…men ought to regard us as servants of Christ…”, we are His servants that He has put us in this place. God has put us here for a reason. God has put leaders in His church. We have talked about this. God has given the church servant leaders for a reason.

That’s why, when you get over to 1 Timothy 5:17, it says, “Elders, servant leaders in the church, are to be given double honor, to be respected highly.” There is a price that comes with that because, if you keep going in 1 Timothy 5, and you get down to verses 19 and 20, and it says, “If an accusation is brought against an elder that has two or three witnesses…” In other words, it is credible. “…then that elder, that leader, is to be brought before the church.” This is not my words; 1 Timothy 5:20. “…brought before the church and rebuked publicly so that it would be a warning to others.”

Now, there is a tendency at this point for people to say, “Well, you know church leaders are just like other people. They fall just like other people, and so we should let church leaders handle this privately.” That is not what Scripture is saying.

As the pastor of this church, I cannot embrace the public platform that God has entrusted to me to be an influence and an example in this faith family as long as things are going good, but when something goes bad, I go into hiding. That is not an option for church leaders. God has designed it so that church leader’s lives are put on display.

That is what it says all throughout the New Testament. Hebrews 13, “Look at your leaders, consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith…” That’s why 1 Timothy 5:20 says, “They should be rebuked publicly so that it would be a warning to others.” I can’t embrace this platform when I am doing everything right, and then when I mess up, try to jump off the platform. That is not the picture in Scripture. We are servants that are put in church leadership for a reason.

God will judge us for our stewardship.

Not only that, but God will judge us for our stewardship. As servants of Christ, he says; as those entrusted with the secret things of God. Given a trust, and they must prove faithful. I’ll be honest with you.

This passage right here, this chapter, is one of the pivotal chapters, passages of Scripture, for me as I walked through the journey of praying about coming here to be pastor. It was the week before I said yes to the pastor search team that I was diving into this text and overwhelmed by the trust that is given a leader in the church. God, may we prove faithful. We will be judged…we will be judged before God. So, find your examples in church leaders. Don’t run from church leaders; find your examples in them.

Recognize the extremely serious nature of sexual sin.

What I want us to do is shift gears. It is going to be a pretty dramatic shift, and I want us to think of these last five in terms of our response personally in our relationship with God to moral failure in the church. Recognize the extremely serious nature of sexual sin; recognize the extremely serious nature of sexual sin. I want to preface what I am about to say by letting you know that I am going to make some strong statements that I know go against the cultural grain. I also know that cultural grain has infiltrated the church, and so, may go against the grain of even what we think sometimes in here.

So, I want to ask you to just stay with me and pay attention close so that I am not misunderstood. Recognize the extremely serious nature of sexual sin. I am convinced that we are so inundated in our culture with sexual sin, inside the church and outside the church, that our sensitivity to it has completely been dulled to where we are not shocked sometimes by the sexual sin we see around us. This is a very dangerous place for us to be. It is right where the church at Corinth was, and I want you to hear what God said to them through Paul. 1 Corinthians 6:12, the verses we are going to look at are verses 12 through 20.

“Everything is permissible for me” – but not everything is beneficial. “Everything is permissible for me” – but I will not be mastered by anything. “Food for the stomach and the stomach for food” – but God will destroy them both. The body 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? Never!

Do you not know that he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her in body? For it is said, “The two will become one flesh.” But he who unites himself with the Lord is one with him in spirit. Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a man commits are outside his body, but he who sins sexually sins against his own body. Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body.

Sexual sin is different.

Recognize that sexual sin is extremely serious in the eyes of Christ. It is at this point that I want to address the thought or the words that are often said in circumstances like this. They’d say, “Well, you know, sexual sin is just like any other sin. He’s guilty of this or she’s guilty of this, but I am guilty of this over here, so what’s the difference?” What I want you to hear, based on the Word of God this morning, is that those kinds of statements are unbiblical. Sexual sin is different! Sexual sin is different!

Now, here me out. I am not saying sexual sin separates me from God while another sin doesn’t. All sin is the same in that it separates us from God. No question about that in Scripture, but did you hear 1 Corinthians 6:18? “All other sins a man commits are outside his body, but…” Here’s the difference: “…he who sins sexually sins against his own body.”

There is a difference here.

Now, what we are not clear on…we are crystal clear there is a difference, but we are not exactly clear on what Paul means by that. Even if we were to study this passage, there’s still a little ambiguity there, and we can take a hold of Scripture and see over and over again, God has chosen to judge sexual sin very harshly. Deuteronomy 22—24; Leviticus 19; Leviticus 21; Proverbs 5, 6, 7, 9. Here: Ephesians 5; 1 Thessalonians 4; Revelation 2; it’s all over Scripture. What’s the difference?

Here’s what we do know. Paul is undoubtedly pointing out that sexual sin is so harmful and so controlling and so dominating, maybe even more that other sins. You saw from the very beginning, “…not mastered by anything.” This sin is so deep; it penetrates so deep in our hearts and our lives. It dominates and controls us. There is that compulsion, that inner desire there, that absolutely shatters our lives and shatters our relationships, and shatters any trust we have with the people that are closest to us. This sin is profound and penetrating and, as a result, any attempt to treat this kind of sin, sexual sin, lightly is extremely, very, very, dangerous.

Sexual sin is devastating.

Not only is it different, but it is devastating, and I want you to see how that unfolds in 1 Corinthians 6. Do you see the picture here? The whole Trinity is involved in this thing. He starts with God the Father, up there in verse 13, “The body is not meant for sexual immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body…” Ladies and gentlemen, if you are a Christ-follower, your body does not belong to you; it belongs to the Lord! He sent His Son to die for it! That means that you and I are not free to do what we will with our bodies.

He brings God the Son in, verse 15, “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? Never!” Did you catch that? Your bodies are members of Christ. This is a picture of how your body is united with the Lord Jesus Christ Himself in the closest, most intimate of ways.

You are one with Him, and what that means is that when you take your body, and you commit sexual sin, then you have taken the very body of the Lord Jesus Christ and involved Him in ilicit sexual activity. You have united the body of Christ with a prostitute. Paul says, “This is unthinkable, unfathomable. Never! No! No!” He said at the end verse 15, “Why would you ever do that?”

Then, he brings the Holy Spirit in, verse 19, “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit [of God]…” Sexual sin is not a mistake or a slip up. It is not a biological act. It is a desecration of God Himself. That is the picture of sexual sin here. I can’t help but to think, with the way we have treated it lightly in the church, that many people go into sexual sin simply thinking, “Well, it’s forgivable”, but giving no thought to the deep, painful consequences, not just for them, but for the body of Christ Himself and for the relationships that are shattered, and the life that is devastated completely by that one act.

Ladies and gentlemen, our bodies belong to the Lord. Let’s embrace that. Unite ourselves with Christ with His Spirit indwelling us. If we have any love for God and any concern for His glory and Him personally in our lives, then let us avoid this kind of sin with everything we have. Let’s run from it. Flee from it. Let it get nowhere near your lives, because it is that serious.

Recommit yourself to wholehearted love for your spouse or future spouse.

Number seven: Based on that and what Paul flows right into, recommit…ladies and gentlemen, recommit yourselves today to wholehearted love to your spouse or future spouse. There, Paul begins to talk about the beauty of a marriage. He kind of begins to talk about it. He says, “You know it is not for me, but if it’s for you, if you like that, then here’s what you do.” Look at in verse 2;

Since there is so much immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband. The husband should fulfill his marital duty to his wife and likewise the wife to her husband. The wife’s body… [Up the stakes here] …the wife’s body does not belong to her alone but also to her husband. In the same way the husband’s body does not belong to him alone but also to his wife.

Recommit yourself. If you are married in this room, the way you respond to moral failure in the church that you have seen this week…the way you respond is you recommit yourself to your wife, and you recommit yourself to your husband into loving them wholeheartedly. If you are not married, if you are a student who is being affected by this, wrestling with this question, then today is the day for you to say, “As I go into the future, I am going to be wholeheartedly committed to one person in my life.” Recommit yourself to that today.

The covenant of marriage is too precious.

That is how we respond to this for a couple of reasons. Because the covenant of marriage is too precious…because the covenant of marriage is too precious. I remind you, gentlemen, that you made a covenant, a commitment, before God and your wife to give her yourself completely and no one else. You belong to her and no one else. Your thoughts, your body belongs to her and no one else. Ladies, you belong to your husband and no one else. Those of you looking forward to marriage in the future, you belong to that person and no one else. The covenant of marriage is precious. We’ve got to guard it. We’ve got to put all the walls we can up around our marriages.

The picture of marriage is too valuable.

Not only is the covenant of marriage too precious, but the picture of marriage is too valuable. You do realize that when God created man and woman and ordained this institution of what we call marriage, He didn’t just roll the dice and say, “Well, we’ll do it this way.” He set it up purposely from the very beginning, that this relationship between a man and a woman in marriage would be the picture…I’m convinced, the clearest picture on this earth of Christ’s love for His bride, the church.

Now, that really raises the stakes. When, men, you realize that the way you love your wife this week is a reflection of the way that Christ loves His church, and ladies the way you love your husband is a reflection of the relationship between the church and Christ…all across our culture this idea has been thrown out the window. God, help us not to throw it out the window with the way we handle marriage in the church. Recommit yourself today to wholehearted love for your spouse or your future spouse.

Repent of any and all sins that you are hiding.

Number eight: Before I say number eight, let me just add one thing. I know that in this room right now, within the sound of my voice, there are some marriages and some couples who are struggling and on the rocks, maybe small and maybe pretty big, and I want you to let this serve as a wake up call to lay down your life for the person that God has given you. Repent; repent of any and all sins that you are hiding. Come to 1 Corinthians 10 with me.

The verses here, 1 Corinthians 10:11—13. Repent of any and all sins that you are hiding. Listen to what Paul says. He has been talking about the disobedience in the history of the people of God; people of Israel. He said, “These things happened to them as examples and were written down…” We’ve got the Word; we’ve got the accounts of sin in the Old Testament. “…as warnings for us, on whom the fulfillment of the ages has come. So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful…” Hear this verse! For any one of us, if the thought has come anywhere near our minds this morning, “I’m glad it is not me. I am glad I am not in that situation”, “…if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall…” Take heed lest you fall, as some translations say. “No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.” Repent of any and all sins that you are hiding.

Compartmentalization is a dangerous thing.

Ladies and gentlemen, compartmentalization is a dangerous thing. Now, what I mean by that is this: Believing the lie from the Adversary that you can sin in this area of your life, and it not affect all of these areas of your life. Because as soon as you believe that, then you begin to live in two different worlds, and each world begins to justify the other. “Well, it’s okay for me to do this, because I’m doing this over here.” Or, “I need to do this because I am committed to this over here.” That is an extremely dangerous way to live and is not an option for those of us who call ourselves Christ-followers. We cannot compartmentalize our lives. He is Lord of it all.

Cover-ups are always temporary.

Not only compartmentalization but be aware of cover-ups. Cover-ups are always temporary. Please, please, every person in this room; please hear this. Based on the authority of God Himself, you cannot cover up your sin! You can’t do it. Now, there is an Adversary that is doing everything he can to convince you otherwise, and he has got many of you in this room convinced that those couple of things over there or that one thing over there is never going to be found out. That is a lie! It will be found out.

Temporarily, maybe you can cover it up. Ultimately, absolutely not. The enemy is clever. He will even lead us to let a little bit of that out and convince us that it is okay that we have left that out, and he will delight in seeing your lives go on like everything is right, and okay, with this thing hidden back there knowing that there is coming a day when it will be exposed, and your life will be shattered to the devastation of as many people as possible. That is his strategy, and he delights in seeing us go on like everything is okay.

And I remind you, religion…I am convinced of this: All throughout Scripture, religion is the biggest cover-up for disobedience in our lives, because it is possible to go through the perfunctory motions of Sunday-in and Sunday-out. It is possible for me to preach the Word Sunday-in and Sunday-out and use that as a cover-up for something back here. Cover-ups are always temporary.

Run away from any and all temptations that you are entertaining.

Our pride is subtle.

Run away from any and all temptations that you are entertaining. How do you respond to moral failure in the church? You run away from any and all temptations that you are entertaining. Now, this is where we see, in this passage, verse 13 especially, the danger of temptation. Yes, we see the victory. We are able to stand up under it, but don’t miss the danger of it in a couple of ways.

Our pride…our pride is subtle. Hear this warning from the Word. Our pride is subtle. “What do you mean by pride, Dave?” Pride is the attitude, the thought, the belief that says, “You know, that is not a problem for me. You know, I am not going to give in to that. I am above that right there. I struggle with this over here. I am above this over here.” That kind of pride misses the whole point of Scripture.

The whole point of Scripture is to give you a picture of the fact that you are not above anything apart from the power of Jesus Christ. It’s only in Christ that you are above anything. So, we humble ourselves, and we get rid of pride. Pride suddenly says, “You’ve only blocked a couple of pictures on the Internet; you only had one intimate conversation; you’ve only thought about it; you’d never act on it, you’ve just thought about it; you are fine.” Pride is subtle.

Our lives are all susceptible.

Not only is pride subtle, but our lives are all susceptible; our lives are all susceptible. This is the reason that I did not add and still do not want to be standing in front of you preaching this sermon. Because there is no question of this truth, that has stared me in the face with everything I have studied in God’s Word, is the fact that I am susceptible to any of the warnings that I have given you today.

When we heard news this last week, I shared it with Heather, and she just wept, and I held her in my arms, and as we sat there, and we got to talk about it, the weeping was for this pastor and his family. It was for you, but it was also for us, because we know that apart from the grace of Christ, our lives are susceptible to the exact same thing. Take heed lest you fall. That means you look at any temptations you are entertaining and run away. Run away from anything you are entertaining in your life.

Rejoice that sin will not have the last word.

Nine truths give us a pretty heavy picture deliberately in the Word, but thankfully, 1 Corinthians doesn’t stop at nine truths for us in answering this question. I want you to see number ten. Number ten is this: Ladies and gentlemen, rejoice that sin will not have the last word. That is how we respond to moral failure.

We rejoice that sin will not have the last word. Turn over to the next to last chapter, 1 Corinthians 15. This is the last text we will look at. This is actually, in a sense, kind of the conclusion Paul gives. In 1 Corinthians 16, he gives some final greetings and words that are important, but he almost seems to conclude things. Listen to this. 1 Corinthians 15. We are looking at verses 50—58. Listen to this. Rejoice that sin will not have the last word. Verse 50,

I declare to you, brothers, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed – in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable and the mortal with immortality.

When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.” “Where, O death is your victory? Where, O death is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.

The victory of Christ ensures our vindication.

This is where it all culminates. The reason we see the seriousness of sexual sin, and we recommit ourselves to our spouses, and we repent, and we run away from sin is because there is coming a day when sin will not have the last word. That is why you stand firm. Don’t miss the picture here. The victory of Jesus Christ ensures our vindication. Let that soak in for a second. The victory of Christ ensures our vindication.

It is at this point that I want to address specifically those of you who may be here this morning who are guilty of sexual sin or other moral failure along those lines, and the weight of that guilt has been extremely heavy as we have talked about this.

But I want to remind you that as you trust in Christ…if you trust in Christ, when you trust in Christ, I want to remind you that there is coming a day when you will stand before Christ, stand before the Father in heaven, and He will not take the account of all your sexual sin and moral failure and put it in your face to condemn you. He will put it in the palm of His Son, Jesus Christ, that was nailed to a cross, and He will look at you, and He will say, “Not guilty”. Vindicated! Christ took your place, and He conquered sin when you couldn’t.

The resurrection of Christ guarantees our restoration.

Not only does the victory in Christ ensure our vindication, but some of you are thinking, “Well, I still have the consequences and the pain to deal with, pain and consequences that likely will not end in this life.” I want to remind you that the resurrection of Christ guarantees our restoration.

That there is coming a day when your salvation and my salvation will be complete, and we will stand before God, and there will be no more pain and no more consequences and, ladies and gentlemen, I proudly announce to you that we will never have to deal with moral failure in the church on that day, because the old will have passed away and the new will have come. Everything will be changed. Rejoice! Rejoice when you hear of moral failure in the church because sin is not going to have the last word.

As you take your notes and put them away, I want to invite your attention…the attention of everybody in this room…I know we have gone longer than normal and we have looked at a lot of heavy things, but I want to remind you that the primary issue in this room for you is not one pastor’s sin. The primary issue for you in this room is your sin. That is the ultimate issue here. Satan would love to get us so focused on his sin that we miss out on ours, and I want to remind you that one day, you will stand before God, and you will not have to give ultimate account for the sin of another person.

But one day, you will stand before God to give ultimate account for everything in your life. It will be exposed before Him. This is how we respond to moral failure in the church. We come before God with our sin, and we take these truths to heart. We come clean, and we stop covering up. Get honest with the temptations we have been entertaining, and we lay them before God. We say, “I need you. I need you to forgive me, I need you to enable me, I need you to empower me”, whatever it is.

So, that is what I want us to do this morning. Not to sit here and talk about moral failure in the church as if it’s a distant issue, but to come face to face with it. In just a second, we’re going to pray, and I’m going to open up this area in the front for men, women, and students all across this room to come clean before God.

Whether that is some confession that needs to happen in your life, some repentance, or maybe just some running from some things that you’ve been playing with over here and entertaining. I want to invite you to come clean before Christ. Let Him have reign in your life, maybe for the first time…maybe for the first time in a while.

God, I pray for the next couple of minutes…there’s all kinds of things on people’s minds across this room…I pray that you would keep the thing from people’s minds of thinking, “Well, what’s next?”

God, I pray that you would help us across this room with all the different lives that we represent, to come face to face before you with our sin and with our need for you, that we might see its severity, and that we might realize the wonder of your grace. I pray that you would be honored as we repent, as we confess and as we experience restoration now in our relationships with you. Give us grace to not cover up anything, God. In Jesus’ name. Amen.