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This is day three together of our look through 1 Corinthians chapter 5 verses 6
to 8 today. I know walking through this chapter is not an easy walk. This is not
one of the happiest chapters of all the scripture.

But the truth is great joy can result from this chapter. I don't want to let too
much of the cat out of the bag. But if you happen one day to read the book of 2
Corinthians, you'll find that what Paul is talking about here actually ends up
with good news, ends up with change in the church, ends up with refreshing,
refreshing change and only God can work.

So tough words here, yes. But the Corinthians act on this. And because of that,
God changes a man's life and he changes the direction of a church.

That's the good news in this. So in light of that, let me read for you as we
continue to talk about what to do. What do you do when Christians sin?

Let's read together verses 6 to 8. Your boasting is not good. Don't you know
that a little yeast works through the whole batch of dough?

Get rid of the old yeast so that you may be a new batch without yeast as you
really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. 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.

As Paul talks in these verses, your boasting isn't good, a little yeast works
through the whole batch of dough. He's revealing to us another reason why he's
so strict on this, so strong on this. Yesterday, he told us your acceptance of
somebody else's sin can keep them, actually keep them from God's grace.

Here today, he tells us that your acceptance of that sin can also influence you
to join them in the same sin. That's why boasting is not good. Paul says a
little yeast works through the whole batch of dough.

Yeast is what makes the dough rise, just a little bit changes the whole dough.
If you don't think that the influence of others changes your life, you're just
being dishonest with yourself. The way other people around you, your best
friends, those you're associated with, in relationship with, react and talk and
think, and the things that are important to them, those are the things that
become important to you.

The phrases they use become the phrases you pick up. We are influenced by the
lives of others around us. And to say that I'm not is just plain pride.

That's why Paul says your boasting is not good. We're made to relate to each
other and to influence each other. Paul says your boasting is not good, and he
gives them three pictures of why this boasting is not good.

Why other people influence us so strongly. Now these three pictures that he uses
are not so clear to us, but they were very clear to them because they all come
out of the Jewish Passover celebration. They all come out of the Jewish culture
of that day.

He talks about leaven and bread, that's the first picture. He talks about a
Passover lamb and Jesus, that's the second picture, and then he talks about a
festival, that's the third picture. Let's look at what those pictures mean, and
when you see the meaning of those pictures, you'll see the power of what Paul is
saying to us here about how we influence each other.

First of all, he talks about leaven. He says get rid of the old yeast. The
picture behind that is what a Jewish family would do on the eve of the Passover
celebration.

Remember, the Passover was celebrating the fact that God had set the Israelites
free out of Egypt. And when they celebrated this on a yearly basis, one of the
things they would do at the beginning of this celebration is they would clean
out their cupboards. Everything in their house would be cleaned out, and one of
the purposes was to make sure that all the old yeast was cleaned out.

There would be no old yeast within the house. One of the reasons for that was
the bread that was cooked in a Passover was unleavened bread. It was bread
without yeast.

It's sort of like a cracker, it's real crunchy. Bread with yeast obviously is
doughy, it's the kind you might rather eat. But in the original Passover, when
God had brought the ten plagues upon Egypt and then had set the people free,
Pharaoh had finally said let them go.

God said I want you to bake unleavened bread because it won't have time to rise.
So that's the bread that you'll eat as you escape from Egypt. So every Passover
celebration they would eat this unleavened bread, and as a part of that they
would clean out the leaven from their house.

And Paul says that's a picture. A little leaven, leaven's the whole lump. You
got a little old leaven in your house.

It might get into that Passover bread, that unleavened bread. Let's get it out.
Get rid of the old yeast so that you may be a new batch without yeast.

In the picture oftentimes something being unleavened is a picture of purity. And
when Paul says a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough, he's talking
about the influence of immorality in our lives. When immorality is allowed in
the close relationships of your life, it will inevitably affect your life.

You can say it won't, you can say it doesn't, but you're lying to yourself. It's
not me saying that. It's God saying that.

It's not me saying that to you. It's God saying that to us, to me and you
together sitting here listening to him. That tells you that the greatest danger
to your purity as a Christian isn't what's on TV or in magazines.

And that is a great danger, by the way. I'm not saying that's not a great
danger, but the greatest danger to your morality as a believer is not what's in
TV or in magazines or in the movies. It's to be found in your relationships with
believers.

If you choose the wrong relationships with the wrong believers, people who say
they're believers but who feel that, "Oh, it doesn't matter if I do that, it
doesn't matter if I'm involved in that," it'll take you right down. Little
leaven leavens the whole lump. Paul is comparing us to the Passover bread here.

The fellowship of the church and the individual purity in our lives is to be
like that Passover bread unleavened by sin, pure and holy before the Lord. Now
none of us, none of us have become perfect. All of us struggle with sin.

But the question is, are the people that you are around struggling or are they
just accepting it in their lives? That's the difference. Are they struggling
with sin?

Are they struggling to grow? Are they struggling to reject the things in this
world that tear our hearts and lives and families apart? Or are they just
accepting it?

Leaven. It's one of the pictures of why dealing with sin in our lives and the
lives of other believers around us is so important. A second picture that Paul
gives here is the Passover lamb.

He says, "For Christ our Passover lamb has been sacrificed. " And you probably
remember the story from the book of Exodus, how when the people of Israel were
set free, the tenth, the final plague that God finally brought upon Egypt that
caused Pharaoh to let the people go was the killing of all the firstborn and all
the households. And God told the Israelites to kill a lamb and to take the blood
of that lamb and put it on the doorpost of their house.

And when the death angel came into Egypt, the death angel would pass over,
that's where you get the word "pass over," he would pass over that house. He
would save those children, and that's exactly what God did. But that wasn't the
whole story.

When God did that in Egypt, he was looking forward to the day that his son was
going to die on the cross. When he said, "Slay a lamb and put the blood on the
doorpost of the house and it will be assigned to me that you'll be protected,"
he knew that one day he would give his own life on the cross. And in dying for
us, his blood would become the blood on the doorpost of our hearts that protects
us.

The only reason, the only reason I'm going to be with Jesus for eternity
forgiven is because of the blood of Jesus on the cross. And if I begin to think
that something I've done has made me a little better than another Christian, if
I begin to think that some way that I've acted or how long I've been a Christian
or the ministries I've been involved in or the ways that God has chosen to use
me have made me just a little more forgiven, then I'm going to be a terror in my
relationship with other believers, and it's going to take me down. So we all
stand before Jesus equal.

His blood is the only reason we're forgiven. Remember the leaven, Paul says,
remember the Passover lamb. And he says also remember the festival.

In verse 8, "Therefore let us keep this festival," keep the festival not with
the old yeast, the yeast of malice and wickedness, but with bread without yeast,
with the bread of sincerity and truth. There's an awesome picture here. Paul
said, "Christ our Passover lamb has been sacrificed, so let's keep the festival.

" Is he telling us here that you and I as believers are supposed to keep a
Passover festival? No, he's not. He's not at all.

This is an awesome truth. In actuality, as believers right now, we are in the
midst of the Passover festival. You see in a Passover festival, the lamb would
be sacrificed, and then you'd have the party.

And Paul is saying the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, he's
been sacrificed on the cross. So now we have the party. We are living in the
midst of this celebration.

That's the picture in the New Testament. We don't celebrate legalistically. We
celebrate eternally.

The Sabbath days in the New Testament aren't legalistically kept because we live
in a Sabbath rest that's going to continue for all of eternity. Just read the
book of Hebrews. And Passover celebrations in the New Testament are not a
once-a-year thing for us as believers, although I think it's okay to do, to
remember what the Jews did.

But they're not required of us for our faith. They're not the focus of our faith
because we live in a constant Passover festival in recognition of the
resurrected Jesus. That's where we live.

If you want to live the kind of life that we want to live together as believers,
we're not living a funeral together. Jesus didn't die on the cross without a
resurrection. We're living a festival.

We're living a party. We're living a Passover celebration together. That's what
the world needs to see is a group of believers who, because Jesus has saved us,
we are now the bread without yeast, the bread of sincerity, the bread of truth,
the bread of changed life.

Those are the pictures that are behind how you and I relate to each other now as
believers. Now in your relationships this week, the question is, how can you
practice that? Who is it that you can encourage?

How can you strengthen the faith, the life of another believer? First just by
showing up and being with them, but then how can you be an encouragement? Let's
pray together.

Jesus help us to encourage each other, to encourage each other by your word, to
encourage each other by the faith that you put into our hearts, to encourage
each other by your love. Thank you that we stand together equally before you in
need, but also as we've turned to you equally forgiven because of the blood that
you gave for us, shed for us on the cross. So Jesus, help us to celebrate the
Passover this week, to celebrate the fact that you've given your life for us and
that we're looking forward to celebrating with you and for you in all of
eternity.

We ask this in your name. Amen. Tomorrow we're going to look together at some
strong words from the Apostle Paul.

He gets very specific about this issue of relationships with other believers.