A little goes a long way...

Seeing the sins of the Corinthian church, one may wonder how they could allow for something like this to happen. Paul alludes to the pride of the Corinthians, a pride that, rather than cause them to mourn over the shocking sin, allowed them to tolerate such a sinner in the congregation. Put yourself in their position. What excuses could you come up with for them? Maybe they appealed to grace, to mercy. Maybe they thought "look at how we're so tolerant of people"...

But could Paul understood that they were playing a dangerous game. He knew that for the Corinthian church to go undisciplined would affect the attitude of the entire Christian community toward sin—“a little yeast works through the whole batch of dough.” The church is to get rid of the old yeast—“the sin that so easily entangles” (Heb 12:1)

In the OT, the Israelites were to remove the leaven (v. 7) from their houses in preparation for Passover (Ex 12:1–30), the remembrance of their freedom from Pharaoh’s bondage. Christ, crucified and risen, is our Paschal lamb, our Passover. United to Him in baptism, our life becomes an unending deliverance from evil. Since our life in Christ includes keeping the feast (v. 8), Passover fulfilled in Communion, the old leaven wickedness must be continually removed from us personally and within the Body of Christ. We're to live on the basis of the unleavened principles of sincerity and truth. Therefore, such sins as sexual immorality or anything that may compromise the purity of the Bride of Christ cannot be tolerated or left undisciplined.

To be clear, v9-10 clarifies that the sexually immoral should not be a part of the church community, not that contact with sinners should cease. Otherwise, Christians can't participate with the rest of humanity. "This world” (the secular world system) establishes that they are not to be included as a part of the church community.

Now, this begs the question: what aspect of the world's system am I tolerating and inviting into the church that compromises its purity? Am I guilty of "baptizing worldly concepts" or "sprinkling some Jesus on it"?...How would we know? As disciples of Christ, we already know how. In our humility, we must be willing to be open, to be taught, be rebuked, receive correction, and be trained in Righteousness. On the flip side, we must not be silent, either. Looking back to the letter, someone was prompted by the Spirit to report to Paul, who in turn pointed out the sin. And praise God for doing so despite how anxious and uncomfortable it must have been! Later we learn of the repentance this brought on in Paul's second letter to the Church in Corinth.

Now another question comes to mind: "what will you do when your pride is pointed out and sin is revealed? "