In verse 6 Paul goes on to say, “Your boasting is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump?” The Corinthian believers, in spite of the confusions and such a gross sin as incest among them, were boasting and glorying. The apostle’s Epistle should humble them by pointing out the sinful things among them, thus making them realize that their boasting is not good.
In speaking of a little leaven, Paul’s thought here may be that there is no need to have such a gross sin as that which existed among them; just a little leaven, a little sin, leavens and corrupts the whole lump, the whole church.
In verse 7 Paul continues, “Purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, even as you are unleavened. For indeed our Passover, Christ, has been sacrificed.” The word new in this verse literally means young, new in time. A new lump refers to the church, composed of the believers in their new nature.
To say that Christ is our Passover indicates that the apostle considers the believers God’s chosen people, who have had their Passover, as typified by the one in Exodus 12. In this Passover Christ is not only the Lamb, but also the entire Passover. To be our Passover, He was sacrificed on the cross for our redemption and reconciliation to God. Thus, we may enjoy Him as a feast before God. In this feast no leaven is allowed to be present. Sin and the redeeming Christ cannot go together.
In verse 7 Paul says that the believers at Corinth are unleavened. Is this not difficult to believe? How could the Corinthian believers have been unleavened? In the first four chapters of this Epistle they were rebuked by Paul for their divisions. Is divisiveness not leaven? Are not jealousy, strife, and pride sinful things? How, then, could Paul say that the believers there were unleavened? This seems to be a contradiction. Actually, there is no contradiction here at all. The Bible always gives us a complete view of a matter, especially of our history as believers. This means that the Bible reveals both sides of a matter. On the one hand, we have the side of Christ; on the other hand, we have the side of what we are in our fallen nature. According to one side, the side of Christ, we are holy. We are saints in Christ. In 1:2 Paul pointed out that we are “sanctified in Christ Jesus, called saints.” Thus, in Christ we are unleavened. But according to the other side, the side of our natural being, we are full of leaven. The crucial question is whether we eat unleavened bread or leavened bread. In other words, do we live Christ or do we live ourselves? If we live Christ, then we eat unleavened bread. But if we live ourselves, then we eat leavened bread.
In verse 7 Paul charges us to purge out the old leaven that we may be a new lump, even as we are unleavened. We need to be a new lump according to Christ’s side. We are unleavened in Christ, and should live according to Him, not according to ourselves.
In verse 8 Paul says, “Let us therefore keep the feast, not with old leaven, nor with leaven of malice and evil, but with unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.” The feast here refers to the feast of unleavened bread as the continuation of the Passover (Exo. 12:15-20). It lasted for seven days, a period of completion, signifying the entire period of our Christian life, from the day of our conversion to the day of rapture. This is a long feast, which we must keep, not with the sin of our old nature, the old leaven, but with unleavened bread, which is the Christ of our new nature as our nourishment and enjoyment. Only He is the life supply of sincerity and truth, absolutely pure, without mixture, and full of reality. The feast is a time for the enjoyment of a banquet. The entire Christian life should be such a feast, such an enjoyment of Christ as our banquet, the rich supply of life.
From verses 7 and 8 we realize that here we have two feasts. When we were saved, we enjoyed the feast of the Passover. But now throughout our entire Christian life we should enjoy the feast of unleavened bread. In typology, the seven days of the feast of unleavened bread signify our whole Christian life. Without 1 Corinthians 5, we would not think of the Christian life as such a feast. But according to verse 8, we see that the Christian life is a feast of unleavened bread, a feast of the enjoyment of Christ as our life supply without any leaven.
In the book of 1 Corinthians Paul compares the believers at Corinth, and himself as well, to the children of Israel. He takes the history of the children of Israel as a background for this Epistle. This gives us the ground to say that the history of the children of Israel is a full type of our Christian life in the church. In verse 7 Paul speaks of “our Passover, Christ.” If Christ was Paul’s Passover, then He must be the Passover for every believer. The children of Israel did not live individualistically; on the contrary, they lived, camped, traveled, and fought battles together. Their corporate life typifies our life in the church. Therefore, when we read the history of the children of Israel, we should realize that we are reading our own history. What happened to them is a type of our experience today. They ate manna in the wilderness; we also eat manna. They drank of the living water; we also drink the living water. They had a rock which went with them; we also have a rock. They experienced the Passover; we also have a Passover, a Passover that is Christ Himself. Furthermore, after the Passover, they kept the feast of unleavened bread. This indicates that we also should keep this feast. The church life is a feast of unleavened bread. For this reason, any leaven must be purged out of the church.
Unleavened bread indicates a living which is without sin, without leaven. In ourselves we cannot possibly have this kind of living. However, in Christ it is possible to live a sinless life. We have been put into Christ, and now we must learn to live in Christ and by Christ. Then He will become our unleavened life supply. He will become the source, the fountain, of a sinless life and living. Because we have such a source and supply, it is possible for us to live a sinless life.
If we would live a life without sin, we must daily eat Christ as unleavened bread. Dietitians tell us that we are what we eat. If we eat unleavened bread, we shall eventually become constituted of unleavened bread. Then we shall live an unleavened life. Although in ourselves it is impossible ever to be sinless, in Christ we can become sinless by eating Him as the source and supply of a sinless life. Since Christ, our source, is unleavened, if we feast on Him daily, we can have an unleavened church life.
In writing this Epistle, Paul was endeavoring to bring the distracted Corinthians back to the central vision of God’s economy. He knew that once they were brought back, they would be all right. But if they remained away from this vision, they would still be sinful in their living. This principle applies both to the church corporately and to the believers individually.
We need to learn to bring others back to the central vision, not just to deal with their failures and sins. In the first two chapters of this book Paul lays a solid foundation for all the matters he later covers. Everything Paul deals with in this Epistle has the first two chapters as its basis. This indicates that all our dealings with the church and the saints must be based on the need to come back to Christ and to the central vision. We must help others see that the reason they have been distracted is that they have turned from the central vision to something else. If they come back to Christ, they will come back to the feast of unleavened bread.
In verses 9 through 13 we see that the evil one must be excommunicated from the church. In verse 13 Paul says, “Remove the evil man from among yourselves.” This is to excommunicate him from the fellowship of the church, as typified by the separation of a leper from the people of God (Lev. 13:45-46). This is an extremely serious matter. Paul had already judged such an evil one, and he expected the believers at Corinth to do the same and to remove that one from their midst.
Verse 11 says, “But now I have written to you not to associate with anyone who is called a brother, if he is a fornicator or an avaricious man or an idolater or a reviler or a drunkard or a rapacious man; with such a one not even to eat.” Here Paul mentions not just one kind of evil person, but several different kinds. Furthermore, Paul does not simply deal with a certain sin; he deals with the person who lives in that kind of sin. There is an important distinction here. For example, to commit fornication is different from being a fornicator, one who lives in that sin and remains in it. A fornicator is not merely one who commits fornication as David did in the Old Testament; he is a person who lives in that sin. That sin becomes his living. Thus, such a person becomes a fornicator. In this chapter Paul is dealing with the person, not merely with the sin. This means that he is not simply removing sin from the church; he is judging and removing a sinful person. Suppose, due to weakness, a brother commits a particular sin. We should help him to repent, to forsake that sin, and to return to the Lord. If he is willing to do this and if he brings forth the fruit of repentance, the church will certainly forgive him. However, if he remains in that particular sin and becomes a kind of person who lives in it, he must be removed from the fellowship of the church. Otherwise, the entire church will be leavened.
In this chapter we have a number of important points. First, the church must be pure, unleavened, and it must not tolerate a sinful person. Second, we must learn to exercise our spirit and to use our spirit in every situation. Third, we need to see that, as those who have experienced the Passover, we should now enjoy continually the feast of unleavened bread. Finally, if a person truly becomes an evil one and refuses to repent, he must be removed from the church life. However, if such a person eventually repents and brings forth the fruit of repentance, the church should forgive him and receive him back into the fellowship. If we consider all these matters, we shall have a clear understanding of how to deal with an evil person in the church life.