You say, “I am allowed to do anything” — but not everything is good for you. And even though “I am allowed to do anything,” I must not become a slave to anything. You say, “Food was made for the stomach, and the stomach for food.” (This is true, though someday God will do away with both of them.) But you can’t say that our bodies were made for sexual immorality. They were made for the Lord, and the Lord cares about our bodies. And God will raise us from the dead by His power, just as He raised our Lord from the dead.
1 Corinthians 6:12-14
This attitude was prevalent in the church in Corinth so Paul addressed it. From this attitude stems a lot of their problems with sin. But why does Paul bring up the issue of food and stomachs? Is this another topic or part of his argument? There are many times we are confused by Scripture because we don’t take the time to see where the thread of thought or argument is going. This is especially true of Paul. Many times it seems that Paul has dropped on us a totally unrelated thought which leave us confused. Jesus appears to do the same thing at times.
So stop and look at the passage before us and figure out what Paul is doing. How you ask? Just take the time to read it through a number of times. I was taught by Basil Brown, my Greek Professor at Bible College, to read a passage through 7 times to get the sense of it. He always said that with a smile on his face. He was alluding to the significance of the number seven being the number of perfection. In other words read it through until you “perfect it” – i.e. you understand it. G Campbell Morgan says 50 times. You choose the number you want but my advice is 7, it is more realistic to do before the next Gem. The more you spend time looking at the big picture; the easier it is to work out the little pieces – like doing a jigsaw puzzle. Happy puzzling.
The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be kindled.
Plutarch
Age is an awfully high price to pay for maturity.
Anon
Aspire to inspire before you expire.
Anon