< 1 Corinthians 5 >

1 There is a wide-spread report respecting a case of immorality among you, and that, too, of a kind that does not occur even among the Gentiles – a man, I hear, is living with his father’s wife! 2 Instead of grieving over it and taking steps for the expulsion of the man who has done this thing, is it possible that you are still puffed up? 3 For I myself, though absent in body, have been present with you in spirit, and in the name of our Lord Jesus I have already passed judgment, just as if I had been present, on the man who has acted in this way. 4 I have decided – having been present in spirit at your meetings, when the power of the Lord Jesus was with us – 5 to deliver such a man as this over to Satan, that what is sensual in him may be destroyed, so that his spirit may be saved at the day of the Lord. 6 Your boasting is unseemly. Don’t you know that even a little yeast leavens all the dough? 7 Get rid entirely of the old leaven, so that you may be like new dough – free from leaven, as in truth you are. For our passover lamb is already sacrificed – Christ himself; 8 therefore let us keep our festival, not with the leaven of former days, nor with the leaven of vice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. 9 I told you, in my letter, not to associate with immoral people – 10 not, of course, meaning people of the world who are in immoral, or who are covetous and grasping, or who worship idols; for then you would have to leave the world altogether. 11 But, as things are, I say that you are not to associate with anyone who, although a follower of Christ in name, is immoral, or covetous, or an idolater, or abusive, or a drunkard, or grasping – no, not even to sit down to eat with such people. 12 What have I to do with judging those outside the church? Is it not for you to judge those who are within the church, 13 while God judges those who are outside? Put away the wicked from among you.

< 1 Corinthians 5 >