Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of 1 Corinthians 6:20
For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God’s.
20. ye are (lit. were) bought with a price ] the “one sufficient Sacrifice, Oblation and Satisfaction made for the sins of the whole world” by the Death and Passion of our Saviour Christ. Cf. Act 20:28; 1Pe 1:19; 2Pe 2:1; Rev 5:9, &c.
and in your spirit, which are God’s ] These words are not found in many of the best MSS. and versions, and they somewhat weaken the force of the argument, which is intended to assert the dignity of the body. They were perhaps inserted by some who, missing the point of the Apostle’s argument, thought that the worship of the spirit was unduly passed over.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
For ye are bought – Ye Christians are purchaseD; and by right of purchase should therefore be employed as he directs. This doctrine is often taught in the New Testament, and the argument is often urged that, therefore, Christians should be devoted to God; see 1Co 7:23; 1Pe 1:18-19; 1Pe 2:9; 2Pe 2:1; Rev 5:9; see the note at Act 20:28.
With a price – time. A price is that which is paid for an article, and which, in the view of the seller, is a fair compensation, or a valuable consideration why he should part with it; that is the price paid is as valuable to him as the thing itself would be. It may not be the same thing either in quality or quantity, but it is that which to him is a sufficient consideration why he should part with his property. When an article is bought for a valuable consideration, it becomes wholly the property of the purchaser. He may keep it, direct it, dispose of it. Nothing else is to be allowed to control it without his consent – The language here is figurative. It does not mean that there was strictly a commercial transaction in the redemption of the church, a literal quid pro quo, for the thing spoken of pertains to moral government, and not to commerce. It means:
(1) That Christians have been redeemed, or recovered to God;
(2) That this has been done by a valuable consideration, or that which, in his view, was a full equivalent for the sufferings that they would have endured if they had suffered the penalty of the law;
(3) That this valuable consideration was the blood of Jesus, as an atoning sacrifice, an offering, a ransom, which would accomplish the same great ends in maintaining the truth and honor of God, and the majesty of his law, as the eternal condemnation of the sinner would have done; and which, therefore, may be called, figuratively, the price which was paid. For if the same ends of justice could be accomplished by his atonement which would have been by the death of the sinner himself, then it was consistent for God to pardon him.
(4) Nothing else could or would have done this. There was no price which the sinner could pay, no atonement which he could make; and consequently, if Christ had not died, the sinner would have been the slave of sin, and the servant of the devil forever.
(5) As the Christian is thus purchased, ransomed, redeemed, he is bound to devote himself to God only, and to keep his commands, and to flee from a licentious life.
Glorify God – Honor God; live to him; see the Mat 5:16 note; Joh 12:28; Joh 17:1 notes.
In your body … – Let your entire person be subservient to the glory of God. Live to him; let your life tend to his honor. No stronger arguments could be adduced for purity of life, and they are such as all Christians must feel.
Remarks On 1 Corinthians 6
1. We see from this chapter 1CO 6:1-8. The evils of lawsuits, and of contentions among Christians. Every lawsuit between Christians is the means of greater or less dishonor to the cause of religion. The contention and strife; the time lost and the money wasted; the hard feelings engendered, and bitter speeches caused; the ruffled temper, and the lasting animosities that are produced, always injure the cause of religion, and often injure it for years. Probably no lawsuit was ever engaged in by a Christian that did not do some injury to the cause of Christ. Perhaps no lawsuit; was ever conducted between Christians that ever did any good to the cause of Christ.
2. A contentious spirit, a fondness for the agitation, the excitement, and the strife of courts, is inconsistent with the spirit of the gospel. Religion is supposed to be retiring, peaceful, and calm. It seeks the peace of all, and it never rejoices in contentions.
3. Christians should do nothing that will tend to injure the cause of religion in the eye of the world, 1Co 6:7-8. How much better is it that I should lose a few pounds, than that my Saviour should lose his honor! How much better that my purse should be empty of glittering dust, even by the injustice of others, than that a single gem should be taken from his diadem! And how much better even that I should lose all, than that my hand should be reached out to pluck away one jewel, by my misconduct, from his crown! Can silver, can gold, can diamonds be compared in value to the honor of Christ and of his cause?
4. Christians should seldom go to law, even with others; never, if they can avoid it. Every other means should be tried first, and the law should be resorted to only when all else fails. How few lawsuits there would be if man had no bad passions! How seldom is the law applied to from the simple love of justice; how seldom from pure benevolence; how seldom foe the glory of God! In nearly all cases that occur between men, a friendly reference to others would settle all the difficulty; always if there were a right spirit between the parties. Comparatively few suits at law will be approved of, when people come to die; and the man who has had the least to do with the law, will have the least, usually, to regret when he enters the eternal world.
5. Christians should be honest – strictly honest – always honest, 1Co 6:8. They should do justice to all; they should defraud none. Few things occur that do more to disgrace religion than the suspicions of fraud, and overreaching, and deception, that often rest on professors of religion. How can a man be a Christian, and not be an honest man? Every man who is not strictly honest and honorable in his dealings, should be regarded, whatever may be his pretensions, as an enemy of Christ and his cause.
6. The unholy cannot be saved, 1Co 6:9-10. So God has determined; and this purpose cannot be evaded or escaped. It is fixed; and men may think of it as they please, still it is true that there are large classes of people who, if they continue such, cannot inherit the kingdom of God. The fornicator, the idolater, the drunkard, and the covetous, cannot enter heaven. So the Judge of all has said, and who can unsay it? So he has decreed, and who can change his fixed decree? And so it should be. What a place would heaven be if the drunkard, and the adulterer, and the idolater were there! How impure and unholy would it be! How would it destroy all our hopes, dim all our prospects, mar all our joys, if we were told that they should sit down with the just in heaven! Is it not one of our fondest hopes that heaven will be pure, and that all its inhabitants shall be holy? And can God admit to his eternal embrace, and treat as his eternal friend, the man who is unholy; whose life is stained with abomination; who loves to corrupt others; and whose happiness is found in the sorrows, and the wretchedness, and vices of others? No, true religion is pure, and heaven is pure; and whatever people may think. Of one thing they may be assured, that the fornicator, and the drunkard, and the reviler shall not inherit the kingdom of God.
7. If none of these can be saved as they are, what a host are traveling down to hell! How large a part of every community is made up of such persons! How vast is the number of drunkards that are known! How vast the host of extortioners, and of covetous people, and revilers of all that is good! How many curse their God and their fellow man! How difficult to turn the corner of a street without hearing an oath! How necessary to guard against the frauds and deceptions of others! How many men and women are known to be impure in their lives! In all communities how much does this sin abound! and how many shall be revealed at the great Day as impure, who are now unsuspected! how many disclosed to the universe as all covered with pollution, who now boast even of purity, and who are received into the society of the virtuous and the lovely! Verily, the broad road to hell is thronged! And verily, the earth is pouring into hell a most dense and wretched population, and rolling down a tide of sin and misery that shall fill it with groans and gnashing of teeth forever.
8. It is well for Christians to reflect on their former course of life, as contrasted with their present mercies, 1Co 6:11. Such were they, and such they would still have been but for the mercy of God. Such as is the victim of uncleanness and pollution, such as is the profane man and the reviler, such we should have been but for the mercy of God. That alone has saved us, and that only can keep us. How should we praise God for his mercy, and how are we bound to love and serve him for his amazing compassion in raising us from our deep pollution, and saving us from hell?
9. Christians should be pure; 1Co 6:11-19. They should be above suspicion. They should avoid the appearance of evil. No Christian can be too pure; none can feel too much the obligation to he holy. By every sacred and tender consideration God urges it on us; and by a reference to our own happiness as well as to his own glory, he calls on us to be holy in our lives.
10. May we remember that we are not our own; 1Co 6:20. We belong to God. We have been ransomed by sacred blood. By a reference to the value of that blood; by all its preciousness and worth; by all the sighs, and tears, and groans that bought us; by the agonies of the cross, and the bitter pains of the death of Gods own Son, we are bound to live to God, and to him alone. When we are tempted to sin, let us think of the cross. When Satan spreads out his allurements, let us recall the remembrance of the sufferings of Calvary, and remember that all these sorrows were endured so that we might be pure. O how would sin appear were we beneath the cross, and did we feel the warm blood from the Saviours open veins trickle upon us? Who would dare indulge in sin there? Who could do otherwise than devote himself, body, and soul, and spirit, unto God?
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 20. Ye are bought with a price] As the slave who is purchased by his master for a sum of money is the sole property of that master, so ye, being bought with the price of the blood of Christ, are not your own, you are his property. As the slave is bound to use all his skill and diligence for the emolument of his master, so you should employ body, soul, and spirit in the service of your Lord; promoting, by every means in your power, the honour and glory of your God, whom you must also consider as your Lord and Master.
There are strange discordances in MSS., versions, and fathers, on the conclusion of this verse; and the clauses , , and in your spirit, which is God’s, is wanting in ABC*D*EFG, some others, Coptic, AEthiopic, Vulgate, and Itala, and in several of the primitive fathers. Almost every critic of note considers them to be spurious. Whether retained or expunged the sense is the same. Instead of price simply, the Vulgate and some of the Latin fathers, read, pretio magno, with a great price; and instead of glorify, simply, they read glorificate et portate, glorify and carry God in your bodies. These readings appear to be glosses intended to explain the text. Litigious Christians, who will have recourse to law for every little difference, as well as the impure, may read this chapter either to their conviction or confusion.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
For ye are bought with a price; what price this is that is here mentioned Peter tells us, both negatively and positively, 1Pe 1:18,19; Forasmuh as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. So he argueth with them against this sin from their redemption, it being suitable to reason, that those who are redeemed out of any slavery or captivity, should be the servants of him who redeemed them, not of those tyrants from whom they are redeemed; such are our lusts and corruptions, from which we are redeemed, as well as from that curse and wrath, which is the consequent of them.
Therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are Gods; therefore, (saith the apostle), you who are redeemed with a price, and with such a price, are bound to glorify God, as by speaking well of his name, so by obeying his will, Mat 5:16. And this you are bound to do, not with your bodies or your spirits only, but in or with your bodies and spirits also, that is, with your whole man; for both of them are Gods, by a manifold right, not that of creation and providence only, but that of redemption also: with which exhortation the apostle finisheth this discourse, and cometh to give them an answer to some questions about which they had wrote unto him.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
20. bought with a priceThereforeChrist’s blood is strictly a ransom paid to God’s justice by the loveof God in Christ for our redemption (Mat 20:28;Act 20:28; Gal 3:13;Heb 9:12; 1Pe 1:18;1Pe 1:19; 2Pe 2:1;Rev 5:9). While He thus took offour obligation to punishment, He laid upon us a new obligation toobedience (1Co 7:22; 1Co 7:23).If we accept Him as our Prophet to reveal God to us, and our Priestto atone for us, we must also accept Him as our King to rule over usas wholly His, presenting every token of our fealty (Isa26:13).
in your bodyas “in”a temple (compare Joh 13:32;Rom 12:1; Phi 1:20).
and in your spirit, which areGod’snot in the oldest manuscripts and versions, and notneeded for the sense, as the context refers mainly to the”body” (1Co 6:16;1Co 6:18; 1Co 6:19).The “spirit” is incidentally mentioned in 1Co6:17, which perhaps gave rise to the interpolation, at firstwritten in the Margin, afterwards inserted in the text.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
For ye are bought with a price,…. Not with gold and silver, but with the precious blood of Christ, as the whole church, and all the elect of God are. This proves them to be the Lord’s, not only his redeemed ones, being ransomed by a price from the bondage of the law, sin, Satan, and the world; but his espoused ones, and which is chiefly designed here; for one way of obtaining and espousing a wife among the Jews was by a price p;
“a woman (they say) is obtained or espoused three ways;
, “by silver”, by a writing, and by lying with; by silver, the house of Shammai say, by a penny, and the value of a penny; the house of Hillel say, by a “pruta”, and the value of a “pruta”: how much is a “pruta?” the eighth part of an Italian farthing.”
That is, be it ever so small a price, yet if given and taken on the account of espousals, it made them valid; and it was an ancient rite in marriage used among other nations q for husband and wife to buy each other: Christ, indeed, did not purchase his church to be his spouse, but because she was so; but then his purchasing of her with his blood more clearly demonstrated and confirmed his right unto her, as his spouse; he betrothed her to himself in eternity, in the everlasting covenant of grace; but she, with the rest of the individuals of human nature, fell into sin, and so, under the sentence of the law, into the hands of Satan, and the captivity of the world; to redeem her from whence, and by so doing to own and declare her his spouse, and his great love to her, he gave himself a ransom price for her; which lays her under the greatest obligation to preserve an inviolable chastity to him, and to love and honour him.
Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s; by “God” is here meant more especially the Lord Jesus Christ, by the price of whose blood the bodies and souls of his people are bought, which lays the obligation on them to glorify him in and with both; and contains a very considerable proof of the deity of Christ; who is “glorified”, when all the perfections of the divine nature are ascribed to him; when the whole of salvation is attributed to him, and he is looked unto, received, trusted in and depended on as a Saviour, and praise and thanks are given unto him on that account; and when his Gospel is embraced and professed, and walked worthy of, and his ordinances submitted to, and his commandments kept in love to him: and he is to be glorified both in body and spirit; “in body”, by an outward attendance on his worship, and a becoming external conversation; by confessing and speaking well of him; by acting for him, laying out and using time, strength, and substance, for his honour and interest; and by patient suffering for his name’s sake: “in spirit”, which is done when the heart or spirit is given up to him, and is engaged in his service, and when his glory lies near unto it; the reason enforcing all this, is because both are his; not only by creation, but by his Father’s gift of both unto him; by his espousal of their whole persons to himself; and by his redemption of both soul and body from destruction: the Vulgate version reads, “bear” or “carry God in your body”, and leaves out the next words, “and in your spirit”, which are God’s; and which also are left out in the Ethiopic and in the Alexandrian copy, and some others.
p Misn. Kiddushin, c. 1. sect. 1. q Servius, in Virgil. Georg. l. 1. lin. 31.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
For ye were bought with a price ( ). First aorist passive indicative of , old verb to buy in the marketplace (). With genitive of price. Paul does not here state the price as Peter does in 1Pe 1:19 (the blood of Christ) and as Jesus does in Mt 20:28 (his life a ransom). The Corinthians understood his meaning.
Glorify God therefore in your body ( ). Passionate conclusion to his powerful argument against sexual uncleanness. is a shortened form of and is an urgent inferential particle. See on Lu 2:15. Paul holds to his high ideal of the destiny of the body and urges glorifying God in it. Some of the later Christians felt that Paul’s words could be lightened a bit by adding “and in your spirits which are his,” but these words are found only in late MSS. and are clearly not genuine. Paul’s argument stands four-square for the dignity of the body as the sanctuary of the Holy Spirit united to the Lord Jesus.
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
1) For ye are bought with a price. (agprasthete) lye were bought, redeemed from the slavemarket, (Gar) for or based on this recognition (times) of or with a price (high bid). 1Pe 1:18-21; Gal 4:5; Eph 1:7.
Redeemed how I love to proclaim it, Redeemed by the blood of the Lamb, Redeemed by His infinite mercy, His child and forever I am.
2) Therefore glorify God. (dokasate de) Then glorify yell (ton theon) the God. Only He is worthy of praise and adoration,
a) in your body. (en to somai humon) In the body of you. This means in the way one lives, walks, talks, and Ac in daily conduct.
b) And in your Spirit. This and the latter phrase are omitted by some authorities. Yet the idea that man belongs to God in his entirety is affirmed by the body of the Scriptures as a whole.
3) Which are Gods See 1Co 3:21; Eze 18:4-5; Joh 17:10.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
20. Glorify God From this conclusion, it appears that the Corinthians took a liberty to themselves in outward things, that it was necessary to restrain and bridle. The reproof therefore is this he allows that the body is subject to God no less than the soul, and that accordingly it is reasonable that both be devoted to his glory. “As it is befitting that the mind of a believer should be pure, so there must be a corresponding outward profession also before men, inasmuch as the power of both is in the hands of God, who has redeemed both.” With the same view he declared a little ago, that not only our souls but our bodies also are temples of the Holy Spirit, that we may not think that we discharge our duty to him aright, if we do not devote ourselves wholly and entirely to his service, that he may by his word regulate even the outward actions of our life.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
20. With a price Directing their thoughts to the blood of the atonement.
Therefore glorify God Honour, and spread the honour, of the holy God by the spirit of purity in your body. So that holiness is not confined to the soul. It must reign in the body and act forth in its actions.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
1Co 6:20 . For (proof of the .) ye were bought , i.e. redeemed from the curse of the law, Gal 3:13 ; from the wrath of God, Eph 2:3 ; from the bond of the guilt of sin, Rom 3:19-21 ; and acquired as God’s property (Eph 2:19 ; Eph 1:14 ), for a price , which was paid to God for your reconciliation with Him, namely, the blood of Christ, Mat 26:28 ; Rom 3:24 f.; 2Co 5:18 ff.; Eph 1:7 ; 1Pe 1:18 f.; Rev 5:9 . We have the same conception in Act 20:28 , although there, as also in 1Co 7:23 , and Tit 2:14 , the church is represented as the property of Christ ; but see Joh 17:9 .
] strengthens the . as the opposite of acquiring without an equivalent. Comp 1Co 7:23 . The common exposition (following the Vulgate): magno pretio , inserts without warrant what is not in the text (so, too, Pott, Flatt, Rckert, Osiander, Olshausen, Ewald). [1008] Comp Herod. vii. 119, and the passages in Wetstein; and see already Valla.
. . [1010] ] Do but glorify , etc. This is the moral obligation arising out of the two things grasped by faith as certainties, 1Co 6:19 . Regarding the of urgency with imperatives, see on Act 13:2
. .] not instrumental, nor as in Phi 1:20 (comp Rom 12:1 ), but so expressed, because the exhortation proceeds upon the footing of the whole tenor of 1Co 6:19 , in which the body is described as a temple; in your body , namely, practically by chastity, the opposite of which would be an (Rom 2:23 ) in His own sanctuary!
[1008] How high a price it was (1Pe 1:19 ) would suggest itself readily to the readers, but is not implied in the word itself.
[1010] . . . .
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
REFLECTIONS
READER! let you and I learn, from this interesting Chapter, how utterly unsuitable, and unbecoming it is, in a child of God, called out of the Adam-fall of nature, and redeemed from the law of works, to be entangled in courts of earthly judicature, when we are professedly looking for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. Oh! what a reproach it is, as the Apostle saith, to see brother going to law with brother, and that before the unbelievers!
Let us pause again, and again, over that precious Scripture, of sinners washed, sanctified, and justified, when brought out of nature’s darkness, and the shadow of death. And, oh! what delightful view are we called to contemplate, in being told, and with such an assurance of undoubted testimony, that our bodies are the temples of the Holy Ghost. Solomon was struck with astonishment, in contemplating the infinite condescension of Jehovah to regard the house; which he had made. Behold, (said he,) the heaven, and the heaven of heavens cannot contain thee! But here we are called upon to behold God, the Holy Ghost making the bodies of his people his temple. Lord! give me grace to honor those members of Christ’s mystical body, which are made the indwelling residence of the Holy Ghost; and never by any act of sin and infirmity; desecrate what the Lord calls his temple. Precious Lord Jesus! let me never lose sight of this blessed truth: that I am thine, and bought with a price. Oh! that every thought, and word, and action, could give glory to thy Holy Name!
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
20 For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God’s.
Ver. 20. Ye are bought ] Shall I drink the blood of these men? saith David. So, shall I abuse my body, the price of Christ’s blood, abandon it to venery? &c.
Glorify God in your body ] The very Manichees that denied God to be the author of the body, fasted on sabbath days, and in fasting exercised a humiliation of the body. Pone in pectore dextram. (Pers.) Let God have heart and hand, mind and mouth, faith and feet, spirit, soul, and body, 1Th 5:23 , all which are his by a manifold right.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
20 .] Proof, that ye are not your own . The possession of your body as His temple, by the Holy Ghost, is a presumptive proof that ye are not; but there is also a proof in matter of fact : For ye were bought (not, as E. V. are bought , which destroys the historic reference) with a price (viz. the blood of Christ , see 1Pe 1:18-19 ; Mat 20:28 ; Gal 3:13 , not as Vulg. prelio magno : merely recalls the fact here , that a price was paid and so the purchase completed). This buying is here mentioned mainly with reference to the right of possession , which Christ has thereby acquired in us. In other places it is alleged as a freeing from other services: e.g. that of sin ( Rom 6:17-18 ), of the law and its curse (Gal 3 .), of Satan ( Col 1:13 ).
. . ] Glorify then ( , not exactly an inference from the foregoing, but = ‘eja,’ ‘agedum,’ tending to enforce and intensify the command: “as a cheering or hortatory expression,” Stanley. So Od. 1Co 6:17 , , ; see Hartung, Partikellehre, i. 284 f.) God (i.e. not praise God, but glorify Him by your acts) in your body (not, by means of your body, but in your body , as the temple of God; see Joh 13:32 ).
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
are = were.
bought. Greek. agorazo. Occurs thirty-one times, always translated “buy”, save Rev 5:9; Rev 14:3, Rev 14:4.
glorify. Greek. doxazo. See p. 1511.
and in your spirit, &c. All the texts omit.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
20.] Proof, that ye are not your own. The possession of your body as His temple, by the Holy Ghost, is a presumptive proof that ye are not; but there is also a proof in matter of fact: For ye were bought (not, as E. V. are bought, which destroys the historic reference) with a price (viz. the blood of Christ, see 1Pe 1:18-19; Mat 20:28; Gal 3:13,-not as Vulg. prelio magno: merely recalls the fact here, that a price was paid and so the purchase completed). This buying is here mentioned mainly with reference to the right of possession, which Christ has thereby acquired in us. In other places it is alleged as a freeing from other services: e.g. that of sin (Rom 6:17-18), of the law and its curse (Galatians 3.), of Satan (Col 1:13).
. .] Glorify then (, not exactly an inference from the foregoing, but = eja, agedum, tending to enforce and intensify the command: as a cheering or hortatory expression, Stanley. So Od. 1Co 6:17, , ; see Hartung, Partikellehre, i. 284 f.) God (i.e. not praise God, but glorify Him by your acts) in your body (not, by means of your body, but in your body, as the temple of God; see Joh 13:32).
Fuente: The Greek Testament
1Co 6:20. , ye are bought) You are entirely in the power of another. To sell is used for to alienate; to buy for to claim for ones self, and here too with propriety; for the mention of a price is added.-, with a price) This word has thus much greater force, than if an epithet were added. So also 1Co 7:23.-, glorify) An Epiphonema [an exclamation subjoined to a weighty argument.-Appen.] They are in error, who think that God should be only internally, or only externally worshipped.- ,[55] in your body) Rom 12:1; Php 1:20.
[55] The words which follow to the end of this clause, are declared by the margin of both Ed. as a reading not genuine; wherefore, also, in the German Vers., they are only within a parenthesis. Not. Crit. on this passage agrees to it: , ) a sure reading; the question here is about the use and abuse of the body.-E. B.
Rec. Text adds . Both Syr. Vers. alone of the oldest authorities support this reading. But ABC corrected later, D corr. lat., G Vulg. fg Iren. Cypr. Lucif. Memph. omit the words.-ED.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
1Co 6:20
1Co 6:20
for ye were bought with a price:-Man had sinned and was under the sentence of death. Jesus interposed and gave his life to secure a respite from the sentence and to open the way by which he might return to the favor of God and enjoy eternal life. The only way man can come to appropriate the cleansing efficacy of the blood of the Son of God is to come by faith and take the laws given by Jesus Christ into the heart and let them control and govern his life. Those who accept this offer of mercy are bought, redeemed, purchased.
glorify God therefore in your body.-Inasmuch as they had been redeemed by Jesus Christ, he exhorts them that they should with their bodies glorify him. Live so as to honor him, and not through fornication defile the temple of God by making it one with a harlot. [We should so use the body as to please and do the service of God. To glorify God is to exalt and honor him as worthy of the highest praise and most faithful service. Our only and supreme desire should be to know the will of God that we may do it. For we show forth his praise by obedience to his law. The heavens declare the glory of God in obedience to the law of creation, and much more do men glorify him by willing obedience to the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus. This being so, what a profanation it is when we take this body, which is built to be his temple, and put it to uses which it were blasphemous to associate with God! Let us rather find our joy in realizing the ideal set before us, in keeping ourselves pure as a temple of God and in glorifying him in our body.]
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
and in your
Some authorities end verse with “body.”
Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes
ye: 1Co 7:23, Act 20:28, Gal 3:13, Heb 9:12, 1Pe 1:18, 2Pe 2:1, Rev 5:9
God: 1Co 10:31, Mat 5:16, Rom 6:19, Rom 12:1, Phi 1:20, 1Pe 2:9
Reciprocal: Exo 21:2 – an Hebrew Lev 8:23 – Moses took Lev 14:14 – General Lev 26:13 – General Deu 7:6 – an holy Deu 26:17 – avouched Deu 32:6 – hath bought Psa 22:23 – glorify Psa 63:3 – lips Psa 86:12 – glorify Psa 95:6 – kneel Psa 100:3 – not we ourselves Psa 116:12 – General Son 4:12 – garden Son 7:10 – my Son 8:12 – thou Isa 43:21 – General Isa 44:22 – return Isa 61:3 – that he Mal 3:17 – they shall Mar 12:17 – and to Joh 15:8 – is Act 27:23 – whose Rom 6:11 – but Rom 6:13 – but yield Rom 8:12 – we are Rom 14:7 – General 1Co 1:13 – Paul 1Co 3:23 – ye 1Co 7:34 – both 2Co 5:15 – that they 2Co 7:1 – filthiness 2Co 8:5 – first Phi 2:1 – if any fellowship 1Pe 4:11 – that Rev 14:4 – redeemed
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
ON GLORIFYING GOD
Ye are bought with a price; therefore glorify God.
1Co 6:20
Notice some of the ways in which the Christian is called upon to promote the glory of His God.
I. The primary meaning of the word glory is opinion: the estimate formed of a person by others. The verb to glorify will then signify, to exalt a person in the opinion and estimation of others, to enhance his favourable report with others. It will be seen at once that it is only in this modified sense that it is possible for mortals to glorify the great God. When we speak of glorifying God, we mean that we can in some humble fashion reflect some portion of His light, that others, seeing that reflected light, may glorify our Father Which is in heaven.
II. This is a high calling indeed: a higher we could not have.Let us by the grace of the enabling Spirit rise to its responsibilities. The good namewe say it with deep reverenceof Him Whose name is above every name has been placed in the Christians keeping. On him, on his walk and conversation, on his daily practice, it depends whether it shall gain or lose by the committal. What the world thinks of Christ and His cause will depend largely upon the testimony accorded to Him by those who profess and call themselves Christians. It is very well to say that men ought to estimate Christs cause apart from the practice of its adherents; but men will judge of it according to what they observe that practice to be. From without, so long as she is true to herself, the Church of the living God has nothing to fear. From false friends, from the errors, the inconsistencies, the hollownesses of the unworthy amongst her children are her chief dangers to be looked for. It is her own familiar friends, in whom she trusted, which did eat of the bread of her communion, who, when they lift up their heel against her, wound her worst.
III. Now that you belong by your own act of self-surrender to your Lord; now that you are personally identified with His controversy in the earth, every time you thus trip you do Him hurt; each time you soil your hands in the business transaction with compromise of strict integrity you are driving home the nails into your recrucified Redeemers hands; each time your feet turn aside from the straight path of the saints you are repiercing His feet; each time your traitor thoughts are yielded to impurity or malice you are replaiting the wreath of thorn for His torn temples; each time your heart hides the sin on which daylight may not look you are thrusting the spear into His side. Beware how you walk, for the keen-eyed world is looking on.
IV. It needs no grand and imposing career to reflect the Divine glory.Every falling raindrop contains a perfect picture of the landscape surrounding the line of its fall. There is no need for us to seek for exceptional opportunities, to be ambitious of pretentious achievements. In the economy of grace life has no commonplaces. If by the providence of our Father our feet have been set in the quiet byways of the world, in those ways we shall probably best glorify Him; nor add to our appliances by forsaking them for the broad highways of publicity and display. There is some danger even in the very use of such phrases as Church-work, Christian-work, in the implied fallacy that such work is confined to the more ostentatious efforts for others good. To the Christian all work ought to be Christian work; and the least solid and lasting ought not to be that which secures recognition in no parish statistics, and which is so unobtrusively done that the doers left hand knows not what the right is about, whom it is guiding, whom it is helping, whom it is blessing. The Saviour chose a lowly walk in life that He might understand life at its lowliest. And if his public walk occupied three years, His private spread itself over thirty. See to it, then, that you be not misled into thinking that you can best do Gods work in the Church by neglecting to do it at home. Whatsoever your hands find to do, do it with your might. Take Christ with you into every employment and into every company. Confess Him before men with firmness, but with humility. Be loyal to your Lord, and consider that everything laid against your good name is a reflection upon His.
Bishop A. Pearson.
Illustration
There are phases of Christianity out of which the principle of pure loyalty has been dropped. Religion itself is a systematised selfishnessa compact by which the interests of my own soul are to be ensured, and these being ensured, its work is done. I am to serve God in order primarily to get to heaven. I attend church in order primarily to get good to my soul. Lo, we have left all, and followed Thee: what shall we have therefore? This mercenary spirit still lurks in the churches: a spirit which the best of us would scorn to recognise in such lower sphere as, say, patriotism. What true soldier would permit himself to think of decorations and promotion while engaged in thrusting an enemy from the shores of his country? The honour of his King and his flag is at stake: that is enough for him. Recognition comes, but it comes unsought and unthought of.
Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary
1Co 6:20. If a person wishes to own something he will pay a price for it, and the value of the price will depend on the estimation he has of the thing to be bought. God rated the persons (both fleshly and spiritual) of the disciples so highly, that He paid the price of the blood of Christ for them (Act 20:28; 1Pe 1:18-19). It is hence the duty of Christians to use their bodies and spirits (minds) in such a way as to glorify God.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
1Co 6:20. For ye were bought with a price[1]with precious blood, even Christs, says Peter (1Pe 1:19). Is it so? then, as the purchased property of another, ye are at no liberty to dispose of yourselves for uses of your own.
glorify God therefore in your body. The words of the received text that follow were beyond doubt wanting in the original text, and have crept in to fill up the supposed sense.[2] But since the subject in hand was the abuse of the body, the seeming abruptness of this way of closing the subject will be seen to give it a telling effect.
[1] The Vulgate renders this with a great price (magne pretio): Luther, Ye were dear-bought(theuer erkauft); De Wette, much as the Vulgate (um theuren Preis erkauft). But, as Bengel well says, the emphasis is best conveyed by being left to speak for itself, as in chap. 1Co 7:23.
[2] They are wanting in all the Uncial MSS. save three (two of these of less value); they are found only in one good Cursive; they are wanting in both the old Latin and the Vulgate, as also in other versions; and they are wanting in the oldest and best patristic authorities.
Note.It is impossible not to be struck with the contrast between the views of even the most cultivated portions of the heathen world on the subject of morality and religion and those of Christianity. It is to Christianity alone that we owe that purity of feeling which has expelled almost the knowledge of those unnatural lusts which were current in heathen lands, which has banished to the darkest caverns of secrecy such of them as still live, and has made the mention of even the less abhorrent impuritieswhich were unblushingly practised and freely spoken aboutto be offensive to Christian ears, and felt to be tainting to Christian lips. But another thing, the counterpart of this, should not escape noticethat although Christianity furnishes motives to holiness peculiar to itself, motives inappreciable save to its genuine disciples, it is so far from disdaining considerations favourable to virtue which are derived from natural ethics, that it readily avails itself of them all, and both kinds of motives are found so readily to fit into each other as to shew that they come from one Divine source. In the present case, for example, while Christians are asked with astonishment if they are not aware that their bodies are members of Christ and temples of the Holy Ghosta sphere with which only Christians can intermeddlethey are at the same time reminded that unnatural sexual connections are of such an intrinsic character as to be a species of corporeal suicide. Thus are the lower ethical principles taken up into the higher and thereby consolidated and sublimed.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
for ye were bought with a price [sold to sin (1Ki 21:20; Rom 7:14), we have been redeemed by the blood of Christ– Act 20:28; Rom 6:16-22; Heb 9:12; 1Pe 1:18-19; Rev 5:9]: glorify God therefore in your body. [Since our bodies belong to God, they should be used to glorify him. The whole passage confutes the slander of those materialists who contend that Christianity depreciates the body.]
Fuente: McGarvey and Pendleton Commentaries (New Testament)
20. For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body; E.V. adds, and in your spirit which is the Lords, this clause not appearing in the original; doubtless some transcriber interpolated it, thinking to augment the beauty of the text. Paul is not speaking of the human spirit, but simply of the body.
Fuente: William Godbey’s Commentary on the New Testament
Furthermore, God has purchased (Gr. agorazo) every Christian with a great price, the blood of Jesus Christ (Rom 3:24-25; Eph 1:7; et al.). So we belong to Him for a second reason. In view of this we should glorify God in our bodies rather than degrading Him through fornication (cf. Rom 12:1-2). Usually the New Testament emphasis is on redemption leading to freedom from sin (e.g., Gal 3:13; Gal 4:5; Rev 5:9; Rev 14:3), but here it is on redemption leading to faithfulness to God. Even our physical bodies are to be faithful to the Lord with whom we are joined.
"The reason to glorify God in the body and not engage in sexual immorality is rooted in a new way of understanding the self." [Note: Cousar, "The Theological . . .," p. 99.]
"What Paul seems to be doing is taking over their own theological starting point, namely, that they are ’spiritual’ because they have the Spirit, and redirecting it to include the sanctity of the body. The reality of the indwelling Spirit is now turned against them. They thought the presence of the Spirit meant a negation of the body; Paul argues the exact opposite: The presence of the Spirit in their present bodily existence is God’s affirmation of the body." [Note: Fee, The First . . ., p. 264.]
Paul’s solution to the problem of the lack of discipline (chs. 5-6) was the same as his solution to the problem of divisions in the church (1Co 1:10 to 1Co 4:21). He led his readers back to the Cross (1Co 6:20; cf. 1Co 1:23-25).
Incest was one manifestation of carnality in the church (ch. 5), suing fellow believers in the public courts was another (1Co 5:1-11), and going to prostitutes was a third (1Co 5:12). Nevertheless the underlying problem was a loose view of sin, a view the unbelievers among whom the Corinthian Christians lived took. In this attitude, as in their attitude toward wisdom (1Co 1:10 to 1Co 4:21), their viewpoint was different from that of the Apostle Paul and God. God inspired these sections of the epistle to transform their outlook and ours on these subjects.