Does Porn Really Hurt Anyone?
I hope you have been enjoying our walk through the letter that Paul wrote to the church in Corinth. One of the advantages of sitting in a book like 1 Corinthians is that you get more of a feel for the background of the people and why they are doing what they are doing. We also get to be reminded that what was true for/about them is true for/about us.
I had a guy come up to me in Kroger one time and say – “Hey, you’re that preacher at the church aren’t you? You are darn funny!”
Except he didn’t say darn.
I didn’t quite know what to do.
So I said, “Thanks.”
Is it ok for me to admit that I love that? I don’t want to be a part of a church that is full of sanitized, mature believers; nor the opposite, a lot of immaturity. There needs to be some growth and maturity going on, and Paul recognized this. I think at times you and I need to be reminded of it as well, that growth is a process.
Sometimes we need to grow up.
And sometimes we need to grow young.
We’re all in process, regardless of where we are with Jesus, but at the same time we shouldn’t excuse away prolonged immaturity.
They were relatively new Christians trying to figure out not only how to follow Christ, but also how to be a church. That’s a very difficult thing and so they were struggling. They were wrestling with some of their former ways of thinking. Paul is trying to correct that.
One of the areas they were confused about was sex. So we’re going to talk about that this week and next week. I’ve made a big deal out of the Temple to Aphrodite (Venus), the goddess of love, being in Corinth. In chapters 5 through 7 Paul talks to us, through what he writes to them (and again, keep in mind they are new to church) and in these chapters his primary focus is sexual immorality.
This past Sunday, in chapter 5, we saw one of the issues that was tied to it. The next 2 weeks we will see that sin connected to sex was not just one person’s problem.
And I will remind you that what was true of their culture is true of ours.
This week I’m looking forward to walking through what Paul said about what is happening in our culture. I’ve asked Mark Graham to join me as we look at the impact porn has in our homes and what it has to do with sex trafficking.