6 Your boasting is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough?
7 Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. For Christ our Passover also has been sacrificed.
8 Therefore let us celebrate the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
V. 6 - “Your boasting is not good” - What do they have to boast about? Could they be boasting about how forgiving they are to the offending man (see verses 5:1-5, above)? Could they be proud they are not being judgmental? Are they proud they have no lower limits to what they will tolerate?
“Look, see how forgiving and tolerant we are!”
Survey says, "Braaaack! Wrong!”
“A little leaven...” - It doesn’t take much evil to corrupt a spiritual life. It only takes one person committing sin in a church, and the enemies of the church paint ALL believers as hypocrites and failures.
I have started to bake bread (Yes, it is easier to buy a loaf from the store, but not as satisfying!). When measuring out the ingredients for bread, the proportions are about 800 gm of flour and 4 gm of yeast (that is about 4 cups flour and 5 tsp yeast) to make two loaves of bread. The yeast is about 1/200th the amount of flour. The admixture of yeast (that is “leaven”) and flour in bread is symbolic of something pure being tainted. This is a vivid picture because most of us love bread, doughnuts, and pastry, and do not tend to think of the bread as evil.
In the Old Covenant, “unleavened bread” - i.e., bread made without yeast - was the only bread acceptable for sacrificial offerings in the Tabernacle or Temple. Perhaps the reason God stipulated unleavened bread was as a continual reminder that purity or perfection is required to come before Him. Likewise the animals sacrificed on the altar had to be without blemish.
A little spot of sin, blackens the whole person. Only sinless perfection can stand before the Lord. Jesus Christ is the source of that sinless perfection. We can receive His nature when we accept and believe in Him as Lord and Savior. All will be judged at the final judgment. Those who have rejected Christ will be cast away. Those who have believed in Jesus, will be defended by Him - they are forgiven, and have received newness of life, the life of Jesus Christ. There is no condemnation for us, because He took it all upon Himself. There will be no spot or stain in or on us. Not because we are worthy, but because He took our sin upon Himself.
V. 7 - “Clean out the old leaven” - Paul here likens “a little sin” in the church to leaven. It only takes a little to change the nature of the body. Get rid of the offending situation. Scrape the bowl clean! Wash it. The new dough in the clean bowl will be clean and pure. Do not allow sinful behavior by church members be the definition of the Christian church the world sees.
“You are in fact unleavened” - You are Jesus’ own people, or body. You are as pure as He is pure. Believe it and live it. You are unadulterated. Demonstrate that to the whole world. A stained church allows the world to believe that Christ Himself may be stained and not worth the faith in Him. It doesn't take much to cause problems.
An example: One of our sons has decided he no longer believes in Christ (we continually pray for his return). He also hates Donald Trump. He told us that he was doubting our Christian faith because we supported Trump for President. How could a Christian support such an evil person? It made no difference to him that we were not looking to Trump as a church pastor, leader, or savior - only as the best choice for the secular job of President running in 2020. There were only two choices - both were flawed men. I realized as we talked with him that we and he were operating on different sets of information. His information painted Trump as an evil, corrupt villain. We knew he is not perfect, but the data we had showed him to be a far better )choice than the alternative. So, the conclusion I drew was he considered that my choice of political candidate meant my Christian faith was suspect.
“Christ our Passover also has been sacrificed” - The lamb without blemish was sacrificed to free the Israelite families from bondage in Egypt. (Exo 12:21ff) The lambs sacrificed on the altar of the Tabernacle or Temple washed the sins that had been committed for the past year. The Israelites also brought a sacrifice to cover sins they had committed, not just at Passover. (Lev 4, 5) Christ, being the Lord’s Passover Lamb, was a perfect sinless sacrifice for all sin for all time. The Israelites had to present the sacrifice to have their sins forgiven. They could not ‘piggyback’ on their neighbor’s sacrifice - they had to do it themselves. Similarly, you and I cannot expect to receive forgiveness of sin based on Christ’s sacrifice if we do not believe and accept it into our own lives. Our parents cannot do it for us; our brothers or sisters cannot. Eternal life and forgiveness of sin is available to all, but only efficacious for the few. (Mat 22:14)
V. 8 - “Therefore let us celebrate the feast” - Not talking about a meal here. Although there will be a big celebration when Christ returns and we are all assembled with Him and the Father. See: “Then he said to me, ‘Write: Blessed are those invited to the marriage feast of the Lamb!’ He also said to me, ‘These words of God are true.’” (Rev. 19:9).
This could be a hint toward taking communion, where we celebrate or remember His death and resurrection.
Personally, I think this is an image of the joy we should be sharing because we are in Christ. We have eternal life in Him. We are free from sin in Him.
“the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth” - There can be no true celebration of Christ’s wondrous gift of salvation if we are tainted by malice and wickedness. If we hold grudges with hatred and anger toward someone, how can we be filled and controlled by the Holy Spirit? Not possible. If you have ill-will toward someone, and want to see them hurt or suffer - the love of God, the power of the Holy Spirit is not in you.
This verse is addressed to the church in which the offending person (see verses 6:1-5) is being chastised or removed from fellowship because of sinful behavior. The church must take this action with seriousness, reverence, and maybe a little fear of the Lord. It does no good for the church members to get angry and wish harm on the offender. The body of Christ suffers when one of the believers is mired in sinful behavior. That destroys the witness to the unsaved world. If the church does not have better morals than the world, why take on the ‘baggage’ of the church? So: the church cannot abide by immoral behavior (in the Corinthian church it was a man and his mother acting like lovers (that just kind of makes me go, “Ewwww!”). The church must remove that person, or lead them to repentance. If repentance is rejected and there is no change of heart or action, those people must be removed from fellowship in the church.
That is where is this verse begins to take on meaning. Sincerity and truth must guide the church body as it disciplines the offender. Anger has no place here, wickedness would take precedence, rather than a spirit of humility and grace. The desire to punish would overwhelm love and discipline.
Wickedness has no place in the church - whether in immoral behavior, or hard hearts and evil attitudes. Malice has no place in the church - whether between individuals or between the church body and an individual.
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