Heaven’s Mandate and Kingdom Dictate
1 Corinthians 6:1-10 Amplified Bible (AMP)
1DOES ANY of you dare, when he has a matter of complaint against another [brother], to go to law before unrighteous men [men neither upright nor right with God, laying it before them] instead of before the saints (the people of God)? 2Do you not know that the saints (the believers) will [one day] judge and govern the world? And if the world [itself] is to be judged and ruled by you, are you unworthy and incompetent to try [such petty matters] of the smallest courts of justice? 3Do you not know also that we [Christians] are to judge the [very] angels and pronounce opinion between right and wrong [for them]? How much more then [as to] matters pertaining to this world and of this life only! 4If then you do have such cases of everyday life to decide, why do you appoint [as judges to lay them before] those who [from the standpoint] of the church count for least and are without standing? 5I say this to move you to shame. Can it be that there really is not one man among you who [in action is governed by piety and integrity and] is wise and competent enough to decide [the private grievances, disputes, and quarrels] between members of the brotherhood, 6But brother goes to law against brother, and that before [Gentile judges who are] unbelievers [without faith or trust in the Gospel of Christ]? 7Why, the very fact of your having lawsuits with one another at all is a defect (a defeat, an evidence of positive moral loss for you). Why not rather let yourselves suffer wrong and be deprived of what is your due? Why not rather be cheated (defrauded and robbed)? 8But [instead it is you] yourselves who wrong and defraud, and that even your own brethren [by so treating them]! 9Do you not know that the unrighteous and the wrongdoers will not inherit or have any share in the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived (misled): neither the impure and immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor those who participate in homosexuality,10Nor cheats (swindlers and thieves), nor greedy graspers, nor drunkards, nor foulmouthed revilers and slanderers, nor extortioners and robbers will inherit or have any share in the kingdom of God.
I read an article some months back by a Christian artist who had fallen and had fallen into an adulterous affair and fathered a child outside of his marriage. As I began to read the article I was moved with compassion to pray, as I moved further into the article, I realized that prayer was not the only element needed, because this artist attempted to excuse his behavior by saying people do not understand, the pressures of a gospel artist, because they have people saying they want to have their baby every day and telling them how sexy they are. My heart sank and tears welled up in my eyes, because I could hear, there are other artist that don’t stray, there are other Christians that are in high profile arenas that never fall, why do we continue to live by the standard of the world, instead of the mandate of Heaven and the dictates of the Kingdom? Why do we rely on what is acceptable in the sight of man, and we excuse it away by saying we are human, lacking the repentance and the truth that it was choice and willful disobedience? Because it becomes easier to absolves ourselves and renounce our accountability to God and His law, but if we really understood we are not alone, everyone has stuff, we could use these moments to overcome and to get back on track, and encourage others to stay on track.
In Romans 6:1-6 it reads as follows: “WHAT SHALL we say [to all this]? Are we to remain in sin in order that God's grace (favor and mercy) may multiply and overflow?2Certainly not! How can we who died to sin live in it any longer?3Are you ignorant of the fact that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?4We were buried therefore with Him by the baptism into death, so that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glorious [power] of the Father, so we too might [habitually] live and behave in newness of life.5For if we have become one with Him by sharing a death like His, we shall also be [one with Him in sharing] His resurrection [by a new life lived for God].6We know that our old (unrenewed) self was nailed to the cross with Him in order that [our] body [which is the instrument] of sin might be made ineffective and inactive for evil, that we might no longer be the slaves of sin.” The Bible gives us clear instruction and identification that being buried with Christ we identify with Him and should live to sin no more. God gives us His strength in our weakness, and if we allow Him true access and identification He is make perfect in our imperfection, but we must choose to accept it. He tells us that we are to look to His people, those who know Him and abide in Him as a standard and they will judge and assess, even here in the earth, Paul did with Timothy, and with the churches at Corinth, Ephesis, and Philipi.
As I read a book called “How to Help People Change,” Dr. Adams identified that it is because of sin that we find ourselves not wanting to change, because we have not made the choice to identify sin in us and our need for God and reconciliation to God. We have learned to live under grace so much that it has become the security blanket that we use to shield us from the responsibility of living a Christian existence. Just because we once lived according to sin that does not mean we excuse it now. Bishop preach some months back about our citizenship, being of God’s kingdom, but we live according to the world system, because we do not recognize we are not citizens here, of the earth, this is only a temporary address. But we choose to place more weight upon what goes on here than doing what is a dictate of the Kingdom and a mandate to reside in Heaven.
God’s desire is for us to be different, a peculiar people that are vastly different than those we live around that do not proclaim Him as Lord. If we are conducting ourselves as everyone else does and using terms that man has formulated to excuse behaviors and shut down those who choose righteousness (like so heaven bound we are no earthly good, too holy for your own good, and I thought Christians weren’t supposed to judge), what makes us a witness, what makes us any different than anyone else, what make us identified with Christ? Salvation is wrought by love, God’s grace and mercy, but it comes to us with responsibility to live a life of obedience and to ever strive to please God and to conduct ourselves according to the mandate of Heaven and the dictate of the Kingdom. But as I have said many times the choice is ours to make, and God’s to ultimately evaluate and hand out pronounce judgment on!
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