For the commandments, "You must not commit adultery; you must not murder; you must not steal; you must not have an evil desire," and any other commandment if there is any, are summed up in this command, "You must love your neighbor as you do yourself."

The night has almost passed; the day is at hand. So let us put aside the deeds of darkness, and put on the weapons of light.

Let us live becomingly for people who are in the light of day, not in carousing and drunkenness, nor in sexual immorality and licentiousness, nor in quarreling and jealousy.

Make it your practice to receive into full Christian fellowship people who are overscrupulous, but not to criticize their views.

The man who eats anything must not look down on the man who does not do so, nor must the man who does not do so condemn the man who does, for God has fully accepted him.

For if your brother is hurt because of the food you eat, you are not living by the standard of love. Stop ruining, by what you eat, the man for whom Christ died.

For the kingdom of God does not consist in what we eat and drink, but in doing right, in peace and joy through the Holy Spirit;

The right thing to do is not to eat meat, or drink wine, or do anything else, that makes your brother stumble.

On your part, you must exercise your faith by the standard of yourself in the sight of God. Happy is the man who need not condemn himself for doing the thing that he approves.

But the man who has misgivings about eating, if he then eats, has already condemned himself by so doing, because he did not follow his faith, and any action that does not follow one's faith is a sin.

It is the duty of us who are strong to bear with the weaknesses of those who are not strong, and not merely to please ourselves.

Christ certainly did not please Himself; instead, as the Scripture says, "The reproaches of those who reproach you have fallen upon me."

In this matter it has ever been my ambition to tell the good news where Christ's name had never been mentioned, so as not to build upon foundations laid by other men,

but, as the Scripture says: "They will see who were never told of Him, and they will understand who have not heard."

who once risked their very necks for my life. I am so thankful to them; not only I but also all the churches among the heathen thank them.

For such men are really not serving our Lord Christ but their own base appetites, and by their fair and flattering talk they are deceiving the hearts of unsuspecting people.

To Him who can make you strong in accordance with the good news I bring and in accordance with the message preached about Jesus Christ, in accordance with the uncovering of the secret which for ages past had not been told,

Now I beg you all, brothers, for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ, to be harmonious in what you say and not to have factions among you, but to be perfectly harmonious in your minds and judgments.

Christ has been parceled out by you! It was not Paul who was crucified for you, was it? You were not baptized in Paul's name, were you?

Yes, I did baptize the family of Stephanas, too; I do not now recall that I baptized anyone else.

For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the good news -- but not by means of wisdom and rhetoric, so that the cross of Christ may not be emptied of its power.

So where is your philosopher? Where is your man of letters? Where is your logician of this age? Has not God shown up the nonsense of the world's wisdom?

For consider, brothers, the way God called you; that not many of you, in accordance with human standards, were wise, not many influential, not many of high birth.

what the world calls of low degree, yea, what it counts as nothing and what it thinks does not exist, God chose to put a stop to what it thinks exists,

Now when I came to you, brothers, I did not come and tell you God's uncovered secret in rhetorical language or human philosophy,

and my language and the message I preached were not adorned with pleasing words of worldly wisdom, but they were attended with proof and power given by the Spirit,

so that your faith might not be in men's wisdom, but in God's power.

Yet, when among mature believers we do set forth a wisdom, but a wisdom that does not belong to this world or to the leaders of this world who are passing away;

Not one of this world's leaders understands it, for if they had, they would never have crucified our glorious Lord.

Now we have not received the spirit that belongs to the world but the Spirit that comes from God, that we may get an insight into the blessings God has graciously given us.

These truths we are setting forth, not in words that man's wisdom teaches but in words that the Spirit teaches, in this way fitting spiritual words to spiritual truths.

An unspiritual man does not accept the things that the Spirit of God teaches, for they are nonsense to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are appreciated by spiritual insight.

But the spiritual man appreciates everything, and yet he himself is not really appreciated by anybody.

So I myself, brothers, could not deal with you as spiritual persons, but as creatures of human clay, as merely baby Christians.

I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you could not take it. Why, you cannot take it even now,

for you are still unspiritual. For when there are still jealousy and wrangling among you, are you not still unspiritual and living by a human standard?

For when one says, "I belong to Paul's party," and another, "I belong to Apollos' party," are you not acting as mere human creatures?

Are you not conscious that you are God's temple, and that the Spirit of God has His permanent home in you?

As for me, myself, it is of very little concern to me to be examined by you or any human court; in fact, I do not even examine myself.

For although my conscience does not accuse me, yet I am not entirely vindicated by that. It is the Lord Himself who must examine me.

For who makes you superior? And what do you have that you did not get from someone? But if you got it from someone, why do you boast as though you had not?

I do not write this to make you blush with shame but to give you counsel as my dear children.

For though you have ten thousand teachers in the Christian life, you certainly could not have many fathers. For it was I myself who became your father through your union with Christ Jesus, which resulted from my telling you the good news.

But some of you have become conceited over the thought that I am not coming to see you.

But I am coming, and coming soon, if the Lord is willing, and then I will find out, not only what those conceited fellows say but what they can do,

for the kingdom of God does not consist in talking but in doing.

Your ground for boasting about such a case is not good. Are you not aware that a little yeast will change the whole lump of dough?

So let us keep our feast, not with old yeast nor with the yeast of vice and wickedness, but with the bread of purity and truth without the yeast.

not that you are to stop all dealings with sexually immoral people of this world, any more than with its greedy graspers, or its idolaters, for then you would have to get clear out of the world.

For what right have I to judge outsiders? Is it not for you to judge those who are inside the church,

Do you not know that God's people are to judge the world? And if the world is to be judged before you, are you unfit to try such petty cases?

Do you not know that we Christians are to sit in judgment on angels, to say nothing of the ordinary cases of life?

I ask this to make you blush with shame. Has it come to this, that there is not a single wise man among you who could settle a grievance of one brother against another,

To say no more, it is a mark of moral failure among you to have lawsuits at all with one another. Why not rather suffer being wronged? Why not suffer being robbed?

Do you not know that wrongdoers will not have a share in the kingdom of God? Stop being misled; people who are sexually immoral or idolaters or adulterers or sensual or guilty of unnatural sexual vice

or thieves or greedy graspers for more or drunkards or slanderers or swindlers will not have a share in the kingdom of God.

Everything is permissible for me, but not everything is good for me. Everything is permissible for me, but I will not become a slave to anything.

Foods are intended for the stomach, and the stomach for foods, but God will finally put a stop to both of them. The body is not intended for sexual immorality but for the service of the Lord, and the Lord is for the body to serve.

Do you not know that your bodies are parts of Christ Himself? Then may I take away parts of Christ and make them parts of a prostitute? Never! Never!

Or, are you not aware that a man who has to do with a prostitute makes his body one with hers? For God says, "The two shall be physically one."

Or, are you not conscious that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit that is in you, whom you have as a gift from God? Furthermore, you are not your own,

The wife does not have the right to do as she pleases with her own body; the husband has his right to it. In the same way the husband does not have the right to do as he pleases with his own body; the wife has her right to it.

But I say this by way of concession, not by way of command.

But if they do not practice self-control, let them marry. For it is better to marry than to be burning in the fire of passion.

To the people already married I give this instruction -- no, not I but the Lord -- that a wife is not to leave her husband.

But if she does leave him, she must remain single, or better, be reconciled to her husband. I instruct the husband too not to divorce his wife.

To the rest of the people I myself would say -- though the Lord Himself has said nothing about it -- if a Christian has a wife that is not a believer and she consents to live with him, he must not divorce her;

and a woman who has a husband that is not a believer, but he consents to live with her, must not divorce her husband.

But if the unbelieving consort actually leaves, let the separation stand. In such cases the Christian husband or wife is not morally bound; God has called us to live in peace.

Has a man been called after he was circumcised? He must not try to change it. Has a man been called without being circumcised? He must not be circumcised.

Being circumcised or not being circumcised has no value, but keeping God's commands is important.

But if you do get married, you have not sinned in doing so. And if a girl gets married, she has not sinned in doing so. But those who do will have trouble in their earthly life, and I am trying to spare you this.

and those that mourn as though they did not mourn, and those who are glad as though they were not glad, and those who buy as though they did not own a thing,

and those who are enjoying the world as though they were not entirely absorbed in it. For the outward order of this world is passing away.

It is for your welfare that I am saying this, not to put restraint on you, but to foster good order and to help you to an undivided devotion to the Lord.

Now if a father thinks that he is not doing the proper thing regarding his single daughter, if she is past the bloom of her youth, and she ought to do so, let him do what she desires; he commits no sin. Let the daughter and her suitor marry.

And so the man who gives his daughter in marriage does what is right, and yet the man who does not do so does even better.

If a man supposes that he has already gotten some true knowledge, as yet he has not learned it as he ought to know it.

But it is not in all of you that such knowledge is found. Some, because of their past habits with idols, even down to the present moment, still eat such food as was really sacrificed to an idol, and so their consciences, because they are overscrupulous, are contaminated.

Food will never bring us near to God. We are no worse if we do not eat it; we are no better if we do.

But you must see to it that this right of yours does not become a stumbling block to overscrupulous people.

For if somebody sees you, who have an intelligent view of this matter, partaking of a meal in an idol's temple, will he not be emboldened, with his overscrupulous conscience, to eat the food which has been sacrificed to an idol?

Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are you not the product of my work for the Lord?

If I am not an apostle to other people, I certainly am one to you, for you yourselves, by virtue of your union with the Lord, are the proof of my apostleship.

What soldier ever goes to war at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard and does not eat any of its grapes? Who shepherds a flock and does not drink any of the milk the flock produces?

I am not saying this only by way of human illustrations, am I? Does not the law say so too?

For in the law of Moses it is written, "You must not muzzle an ox that is treading out your grain." Is it that God is concerned about oxen only?

Is He not really speaking on our behalf? Yes, indeed, this law was written on our behalf, because the plowman ought to plow and the thresher ought to thresh, in the hope of sharing in the crop.

If others share this right with you, have we not a stronger claim? Yet, we have never used this right; no, we keep on bearing everything, to keep from hindering the progress of the good news of Christ.

Do you not know that those who do the work about the temple get their living from the temple, and those who constantly attend on the altar share its offerings?

But I myself have never used any of these rights. And I am not writing this just to make it so in my case, for I had rather die than do that. No one shall rob me of this ground of boasting.

For if I do preach the good news, I have no ground for boasting of it, for I cannot help doing it. Yes, indeed, I am accursed if I do not preach the good news.

To the Jews I have become like a Jew for the winning of Jews; to men under the law, like one under the law, though I am not under the law myself, to win the men under the law;

to men who have no written law, like one without any law, though I am not without God's law but specially under Christ's law, to win the men who have no written law.

Do you not know that in a race the runners all run, but only one can get the prize? You must run in such a way that you can get the prize.

So that is the way I run, with no uncertainty as to winning. That is the way I box, not like one that punches the air.

But I keep on beating and bruising my body and making it my slave, so that I, after I have summoned others to the race, may not myself become unfit to run.

For I would not have you, brothers, to be ignorant of the fact that though our forefathers were all made safe by the cloud, and all went securely through the sea, and in the cloud and the sea

still with the most of them God was not at all satisfied, for He allowed them to be laid low in the desert.

So the man who thinks he stands securely must be on the lookout not to fall.