The Christians at Corinth had written to Paul regarding a question of the rightness or wrongness of marriage. They knew that he was unmarried, and this Epistle as well as 1 Thessalonians shows that the Greeks of that day were the victims of depraved habits; immorality was widely prevalent. In 1 Thess. 2:3 the apostle wrote to those young Christians from whom he had not long before parted in Thessalonica.
“For our exhortation was not of deceit, nor of uncleanness, nor in guile”; and further, in the 4th chapter,
“For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication; that every one of you should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honor; not in the lust of concupiscence (or passionate desire) even as the Gentiles (or nations) which know not God... for God hath not called us unto uncleanness, but unto holiness.”
Marriage is an institution of God, provided in Gen. 2; and the apostle has quoted from that passage (verse 24) in the 6th chapter, verse 16. In Heb. 13:4 he afterward wrote,
“Let marriage be held every way in honor, and the bed be undefiled; but fornicators and adulterers will God judge” (N. T.).
In this day, when moral restraints are being laughed at, it is well that Christians have God’s unchanging Word to guide them.
“Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way? By taking heed thereto according to Thy Word.” Psa. 119:9.
What then is the will of God in these days with regard to the relationship between man and woman? The apostle answers in this chapter, and what he says is, of course, in fullest accord with the Lord’s words in Matt. 19:3-12. That the highest state, if one be equal to it, is to remain unmarried (verses 1, 7, 8, 32-34, 37, 38, 40) follows from what the Christian is while here on earth, as is brought out in the latter part of the 6th chapter, and summed up in the last two verses.
It is not that a greater measure of holiness (which some claim) is attained by remaining unmarried, but as another has said,
“They do well who remain outside of this relationship in order to walk with the Lord according to the Spirit, and not to yield in anything to their nature. God had instituted marriage-woe to him who should speak ill of it; but sin has come in, and all that is of nature, of the creature, is marred. God has introduced a power altogether above and outside nature-that of the Spirit. To walk according to that power is the best thing; it is to walk outside the sphere in which sin acts. But it is rare; and positive sins are for the most part the effect of standing apart from that which God has ordained according to nature.”
The divine approval of marriage is accordingly again affirmed in the 2nd verse, where the translators have somewhat weakened the force of the original text by inserting “to avoid” where the true sense is “on account of” the immorality prevalent in that day, and always a danger in this present world.
What follows is a striking example of the difference between the Old and New Testaments in the revelation of the mind of God. Nothing like the instruction given in verses 3 to 5 is found anywhere from Genesis to Malachi. But when the blood of Christ has been shed (redemption’s awful price!), and He is risen and ascended; and the Holy Spirit has come down, forming a new thing,-the Church which is Christ’s body, out of those who were sinners, now saved by grace, and putting His seal upon them unto the day of redemption; it is then that God communicates to His saints His purposes as never before, and reveals His thoughts concerning what they should be in both large and small details of their lives.
Accordingly, that two are become one by marriage is given in Gen. 2:24; but that in that relationship, being one, involves that each partner should render to the other what is due (“benevolence” in verse 2 appears to be an unwarranted addition); and that as to the body the husband belongs to his wife, and the wife to her husband, is blessed instruction in conduct given for Christians. Happiness comes from obedience to the Word of God, as surely every Christian knows.
Verse 6: The expression, “by permission” means “as consenting to”, or as giving permission, and not by way of command. The apostle wished all men to be even as him-self (unmarried), but acknowledges that every one has in this respect his own gift from God; one man thus, and another thus. To the unmarried and widows he says that it is good for them that they remain as he was. But if they have not control over themselves, let them marry.
Verses 10-11: “But to the married, I enjoin, not I, but the Lord, Let not wife be separated from husband (but if also she shall have been separated, let her remain unmarried, or be reconciled to her husband) and let not husband leave wife” (N. T.).
Divorce because of the trivial grounds often alleged in these days, is contrary to Scripture, as is remarriage of persons so separated. Wife is not to be separated from husband, but if she shall have been separated, she is to remain unmarried, or be reconciled to her husband. Husband is not to leave wife.
It is good to have the mind of the Lord about these things in a day like the present when the laws of men are arranged to meet popular demand, so that what is altogether legal under state or national laws, may be sin before God. And it is His Word that is the rule for the believer.
Verses 12-14. When husband or wife is converted, and the other remains in unbelief, if the unbeliever consents to live with the believer, the union is not to be broken, the Christian partner is not to leave nor put away the unbelieving. This is the contrary of what was required of Israel; and Ezra (chapters 9 and 10), tells of what had happened through neglect of God’s law, and the anguish that it must have brought when Israelites had to put away their Gentile wives and the children they had begotten with them. Under grace the unbelieving husband is sanctified, not by, but in the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified in the husband; their children are holy; family ties forbidden by the law of Moses, are allowed in the order of divine grace in which God is now dealing with man. Sanctification here, and holiness, are of course not the inward work of the Holy Spirit; God has been pleased to attach an outward sanctification to the unbelieving members of the mixed household, so that contrary to the requirement of the law, there need be no breaking of family ties when one only of the married couple is saved. (But what sorrow the Christian heart must feel because of the unequal yoke!).
Verses 15-17. What if the unbelieving husband or wife separates, refusing to continue in a union with the Christian partner which has become distasteful? In such a case the believer is not to try to force the other to return. But God has called us in peace; the Christian is not to seek such a release; it might indeed be that through the godly life and testimony of the believing wife or husband the unbelieving one would be saved. What a joy that would be! However,
“As the Lord has divided to each, as God has called each, so let him walk; and thus I ordain in all the assemblies.” verse 17, (N. T.). Thus we are to go on in subjection to God, owning Him in the circumstances in which we find ourselves.
Verses 18-24. In these verses Christians are instructed further on the subject with which the 6th chapter closed:
“All things are lawful unto me; but all things are not profitable; all things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any... Now the body is... for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. And God hath both raised up the Lord, and will also raise up us by His own power. Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ?... What? Know ye not that he which is joined to an harlot is one body? for two, saith He, shall be one flesh. But he that is joined to the Lord is one spirit... What, know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body.” (omitting the last words of the chapter which are not in the best copies) (chapter 6:12-20).
In view of these weighty words, present advantage is seen to be of little account; I am to seek instead to have God before my soul. He who was a Jew when God had called him, and he who was a Gentile when called, need give their former state no consideration; what is important is the keeping of God’s commandments.
“Servant,” in verses 21, 22, 23, is really “bondman,” in substance a slave. The Christian slave need not worry about his condition, but if there was a way whereby he might gain his freedom, become a freeman, he should take advantage of it. For he that is called in the Lord, being a bondman, is the Lord’s freeman; likewise, he that is called, being a freeman, is Christ’s bondman.
We are bought with a price; so are we again reminded; we belong to the Lord; let us not become the bondmen of men; such we shall be if led away from simple dependence in the path of obedience into following leaders who serve not God but their own selves.
The subject is closed with a needed guard against indifference as to what Christians go on with. We are to abide in our line of things with God.