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1 Corinthians 6:13 NASB

Food is for the stomach and the stomach is for food, but God will do away with both of them. Yet the body is not for immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord is for the body.

After describing Christian liberties including food consumption Paul switches to sexual immorality at length. Is there a connection between sexual immorality and food consumption?

1 Corinthians 6:15-18 NASB

15 Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take away the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? May it never be! 16 Or do you not know that the one who joins himself to a prostitute is one body with her? For He says, “The two shall become one flesh.” 17 But the one who joins himself to the Lord is one spirit with Him. 18 Flee immorality. Every other sin that a man commits is outside the body, but the immoral man sins against his own body.

How can we understand the above texts?

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  • Though food, and drink, and physical intimacy are allowed, excesses (whether of food, or of drink, or of anything else) are not. Compulsions are a form of idolatry, which is why pagan practices oftentimes included orgiastic expression, mentioned elsewhere in the same epistle.
    – Lucian
    Jul 2, 2020 at 22:02

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How is food connected to sexually immorality in 1 Corinthians 6:13-18?

1 Corinthians 6:13 NASB

13" Food is for the stomach and the stomach is for food, but God will do away with both [i]of them. Yet the body is not for immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord is for the body."

Paul is contrasting food for the stomach and the body for immorality. God has given us our stomach for food, and not as an encouragement to drunkenness and gluttony, likewise sex was for enjoyment and reproduction by married couples and not as an inducement to commit fornication.

1 Thessalonians 4:3 (NET Bible)

3 For this is God’s will: that you become holy,[a] that you keep away from sexual immorality,

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“All things are lawful (permissible) for me, but not all things are profitable (beneficial). All things are lawful for me, but I will not be mastered by anything. Food is for the stomach and the stomach is for food, but God will do away with both of them.” 12-13

This is not an argument for universal license to do as one may please in any category of behavior. Paul is not defending one's participation in things that are forbidden. What he is talking about is the exorcise of Christian rights. Even those things that are in themselves good and right for the Christian, must be limited by revealed principles. The exorcise of our rights must be tempered by discretion. One must consider, is it permissible, is it expedient, is it enslaving, is it edifying, is it loving?

Even those things that are permissible can become sin when the exorcise of those things violate other revealed principles such as allowing one's self to be enslaved to it. Paul uses the simple illustration of eating foods. Eating is good, enjoyable, and beneficial to the body but when eating become enslaving or as Paul says, when it becomes the master, then it becomes a problem. Self-control and proper judgment must be exorcised in all things. Even in those things that are permissible for us.

Immorality is one of those things that is divinely forbidden, 12-20.

“Food is for the stomach and the stomach is for food, but God will do away with both of them. Yet the body is not for immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord is for the body. Now God has not only raised the Lord, but will also raise us up through His power. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take away the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? May it never be! Or do you not know that the one who joins himself to a prostitute is one body with her? For He says, 'The two shall become one flesh.' But the one who joins himself to the Lord is one spirit with Him. Flee immorality. Every other sin that a man commits is outside the body, but the immoral man sins against his own body. Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price: therefore, glorify God in your body.”

God has made our bodies to desire foods and to accommodate the eating of foods. They were designed for one another, but eating meats has no more than a temporal, biological effect on the body. When the body dies, so also dies the bodies need for the meat and the meat has no effect on the body or the soul.

This is not true of fornication. Unlike the meats for the stomach, our bodies were not made for fornication. Fornication is a contradiction of divine intent for the body. It is a violation of function and a sin against one's own body. The consequences of fornication not only follow us beyond this world but also affect the man in this live as well. The sin of immorality is unique in that this sin is a violation of our own body because it unites the body that belongs to the Lord to another in a relationship that God has forbidden. You do not give the temple of God to a prostitute. The best way to avoid immorality is to “flee from it.”

The principle then that we find here concerning Christian liberties and things that are lawful and expedient are those things that are matters of complete indifference, things that we are free to determine by our own will. Fornication is not one of our Christian liberties. We are quite free to decide for ourselves which food we will eat. It makes no difference because both will eventually be destroyed; but whether or not we are free to engage in immorality is a decision that has been made by the Lord and it is not up for discussion. Unlike the foods for the stomach that only fulfill a temporal need, immorality carries with it, eternal consequences.

Immorality was the problem in chapter five. It is a forbidden behavior. Sexual activity is good, enjoyable, and it is proper in its assigned context of marriage between a man and a woman, but when it is perverted into any form of immorality then it has become an enslaving sin.

Our bodies are not our own to do with as we please. We have been bought with at extreme cost and we owe the allegiance of our bodies to the one who has bought us. Our bodies are to be used for the expressed function of glorifying God. Our bodies belong to the Lord and he decides what is good and proper conduct, and it does not matter how strongly one's feeling may be invested in the matter.

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Biblically, there are three principal categories of sin.

  1. Lust of the flesh
  2. Lust of the eyes
  3. Pride of life

For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. (1 John 2:16, KJV)

It was upon these three categories of sin that Jesus was tempted in the wilderness.

Lust of the flesh includes the fleshly appetites of every sort, whether of indulging oneself in areas of eating, sexuality/sensuality, sleep/laziness, drunkenness, or any other activity that appeals to physical comforts and pleasures. All of these sins are part of the "lust of the flesh" category, and it is often true that one who is weak on one of these may experience weakness in another sin of the same sort.

As an illustration, consider cheating in school: studies have shown that those who cheat in school are more likely to cheat in other areas of life in the future, including sexually, on their taxes, etc. The basic weakness carries over to these other areas, and the cheater who believes he or she will not get caught--thinking it is a sin which can be hidden--will be more likely to "cheat" in other areas where this same false belief may be held.

Many who indulge their appetites for food will also be weak in the area of their sexual appetites.

The word "immoral" itself, while often used nowadays with a sexual application, does not strictly refer only to sins of a sexual nature. It implies any sin which violates the standard of principle, particular with respect to those standards commonly held by society. Thus, overeating is a potential sin of "immoral" category: consider issues with obesity, anorexia, and bulimia, and how these appear to society in general.

Yet the Greek word translated here as "sexual immorality" is actually "πορνεύων/porneuon"--of the same root from which stems our modern "pornography." The KJV translates it as "fornication"--a word with clear sexual connotations.

Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body. (1 Corinthians 6:18, KJV)

However, it should be remembered that this word also addresses spiritual forms of adultery, e.g. idolatry; and in many of the pagan, idolatrous or hedonistic practices, food festivals featured prominently. All of these gluttonous and lustful indulgences are denounced in Paul's words.

Conclusion

There is certainly a physical connection between gluttony and lust--both being appetites of the flesh; weakness in the first area will create greater temptation in the latter, just as drinking alcohol often precedes the loss of one's virginity. But there is a spiritual application as well: indulgence to excess in even the necessaries of life will weaken our stance against spiritual adultery--even the food itself can become an idol, and cause us to be led astray, committing "fornication" against God.

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