Leaven Free

 

DEVOTION

THE 1^ST LETTER TO THE CORINTHIANS

LEAVEN FREE

1 Cor 5:6-8

6 Your boasting is not good. Don't you know that a little yeast works through the whole batch of dough? 7 Get rid of the old yeast that you may be a new batch without yeast — as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. 8 Therefore let us keep the Festival, not with the old yeast, the yeast of malice and wickedness, but with bread without yeast, the bread of sincerity and truth.

NIV

Is the pride of their sin, that which Paul just mentioned about a man having illegal relations with this father’s wife, the same as this boasting which is not good? Is this the yeast that works through the whole batch of dough, or is Paul talking about spiritual pride, spiritual boasting, or perhaps the boasting is about having this freedom in Christ that what this man did was not actually considered a sin but freedom in Christ? It is most likely this is not about this man. But it is about the whole of the church boasting in their wisdom, in their superior knowledge and being about setting up and supporting their respective teachers, as Paul mentioned before about some follow Paul, some Apollos, some Christ. This is not the way of the Lord, we should all be united in the faith, having but one Lord, one Good Shepherd. We should be united around the word of God. This idea that Paul is presenting here is that Jesus is our Passover Lamb. In the Jewish tradition of Passover, they are to purge their homes of any evidence of leaven. There is not to be one single morsel of leaven anywhere in the house. Here Paul uses that analogy of the old yeast, purging the church of malice and wickedness and having bread without yeast, which is the bread of sincerity and truth. We can learn this lesson both as a church as a whole and in a personal sense. Of course, if we learn it in a personal sense, that would bring it right into the church as a whole. But that would require every one of us to learn it personally. If there is one who refuses to purge all malice and wickedness personally, then the church is in danger of that yeast spreading throughout. These Greek words translated as malice and wickedness carry various meanings. degrees of ill feelings, non-forgiveness, improper attitudes such as pride, arrogance, feeling superior, thinking more of ourselves than we should, as well as behaviors that should not be. Sincerity and truth on, the other hand, is being like Christ. He said that he is the way, the life and, the truth. Jesus never, nor has God ever lied about anything whatsoever. Jesus has never been insincere about anything. He is our Passover Lamb, and so as we indulge ourselves in Jesus, such as the Jews were to do with their Passover Lamb, eating every bit of it, ingesting all of Jesus, so to speak, then we would be so full of Christ, we would have no room for any leaven at all. We may not be able to have much effect on how others deal with this, but we as individuals need to make sure our bread, our life, is leaven free.