You Are Not Your Own

A Few Thoughts to Consider

Do you view your body as your own?

In 1 Corinthians 6:15-20, the Apostle Paul addresses the Christian community in Corinth, a city renowned in the ancient world for its pervasive sexual immorality and the practice of temple prostitution, primarily associated with the worship of Aphrodite, the goddess of love. Corinth's cosmopolitan atmosphere and acceptance of such practices presented significant moral challenges for new believers who were accustomed to a culture where engaging with prostitutes was socially and religiously acceptable. To the church at Corinth, Paul wrote,

¹⁵ Don’t you know that your bodies are a part of Christ’s body? So should I take a part of Christ’s body and make it part of a prostitute? Absolutely not! ¹⁶ Don’t you know that anyone joined to a prostitute is one body with her? For Scripture says, The two will become one flesh. ¹⁷ But anyone joined to the Lord is one spirit with him.

¹⁸ Flee sexual immorality! Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the person who is sexually immoral sins against his own body. ¹⁹ Don’t you know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, ²⁰ for you were bought at a price. So glorify God with your body.

That our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit isn't just a figure of speech; it's a profound truth. Adam Clarke writes, “As truly as the living God dwelt in the Mosaic tabernacle, and in the temple of Solomon, so truly does the Holy Ghost dwell in the souls of genuine Christians.” He adds, “And as the temple and all its utensils were holy, separated from all common and profane uses, and dedicated alone to the service of God, so the bodies of genuine Christians are holy, and all their members should be employed in the service of God alone.”^[1]

Paul wanted believers to realize that they were not in charge. In an age when people were saying the equivalent of “My body, my choice,” Paul would reply, “God’s body, and God’s choice.” This is what it meant to walk in The Way of Jesus.