Flee Sexual Immorality: Your Body Glorifies God

Redeemed bodies indwelt by the Spirit must glorify God.

Through the cross of Jesus Christ believers have been redeemed and brought into a new relationship with God. The Holy Spirit now dwells within them, making their lives sacred spaces of God's presence and calling them to live in ways that reflect Christ's saving work.

Jesus taught that the heart and body must be devoted to God and warned against lustful intentions that corrupt God’s design for holiness.

Paul commands believers to flee sexual immorality by grounding their conduct in the truth that their bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit and belong to God through redemption.

Paul has been correcting a misuse of Christian freedom among the Corinthians. After explaining that the body belongs to the Lord and is united to Christ, he now delivers the pastoral command to flee sexual immorality. This instruction builds upon his earlier argument that believers’ bodies are members of Christ and destined for resurrection. Paul further deepens the theological foundation by reminding them that the Holy Spirit dwells within them. The passage concludes with the redemptive logic of the gospel: believers have been bought with a price. This culminates in the exhortation that the body must therefore be used to glorify God.

Corinthian society tolerated and normalized various forms of sexual immorality. Many in the surrounding culture viewed sexual behavior as separate from spiritual devotion. Paul confronts this assumption by grounding sexual ethics in redemption, union with Christ, and the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit.