The Chosen Key Word in this Chapter is “Leaven” it comes from the Greek Word “zyme” which means “leaven, a corrupting influence.”
Paul confronts a scandal the Corinthian church has been shockingly comfortable ignoring. Welcome to Bible Life Basics Chapter Reviews, I am Chris and this is 1 Corinthians 5.
Paul addresses a serious report reaching him, that sexual immorality exists among the Corinthians of a kind not even named among the Gentiles, a man having his own father’s wife, and rather than mourning over this, the church remains “puffed up,” having failed to remove this person from among them. Paul, though physically absent, has already judged the matter, instructing them to gather together in the name of the Lord Jesus, and, with his own spirit joined with theirs, to deliver this man to Satan “for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.”
Paul warns that their boasting about this situation is not good, using the familiar image that “a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump,” “zyme” in Greek, urging them to purge out the old leaven entirely, since Christ, their Passover, has already been sacrificed for them. He calls them to keep the feast, not with the old leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
Paul clarifies an earlier instruction he had given them, that he did not mean they should completely avoid all immoral people in the world generally, since that would require leaving the world altogether, but specifically that they should not associate closely with anyone calling themselves a brother who lives in open, unrepentant sin, “not to keep company, no not to eat” with such a person. He explains plainly that judging those outside the church is not his responsibility, but that they are responsible to judge those within, quoting Deuteronomy directly, “Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person.”
The Corinthians’ tolerance of open, unrepentant sin within their own community wasn’t a sign of admirable grace, as they may have assumed, but a serious failure that Paul confronts head-on. Genuine love for a struggling brother, this chapter shows, sometimes requires the hard, unpopular step of clear boundaries rather than comfortable, indefinite tolerance.
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