1 Corinthians 10
13 No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.
This a frequently misused section of scripture. Well meaning people looking to comfort Christians struggling with besetting sin will use this as the verse that will get them out of trouble. If anything, it adds to guilt that follows succumbing to temptation. The struggling believer surmises, “Am I so bad a person that God withheld my ‘way out’ of this sin?” Used by judgmental Christians it becomes a tool of discernment to question that status of someone’s salvation. “He wouldn’t give in to such temptation if he were a true believer.” This passage is a summary of chapter 10 in its entirety.
Paul gave the church in Corinth a comparative history lesson of the exodus generation. It was time that required extreme faith on the part of the Israelites as they left Egypt after living for generations as slaves to the Pharaoh. Even in the face of miraculous events, the Israelites faltered and engaged in idolatry, sexual immorality and grumbling. For example, shortly after crossing the Red Sea and seeing the miraculous power of God first hand, they faltered in their faith and constructed a golden calf and worshipped it. A day later they held a feast that turned into an orgy. And, they grumbled about a lack of food and grumbled more at the lack of diversity of food when God fed them from His own with manna from heaven.
Paul warns the church in Corinth that they also lived in perilous times. He not only showed the disobedience of the Israelites in the wake of God’s miraculous deliverance, Paul also showed them the consequences for this disobedience. The Lord allowed the Levites to slay 23,000 Israelites that day and later struck them with a plague.
Paul’s warning to the church in Corinth is applicable to the church today. We live in perilous times. Each day brings us closer to the return of Christ and closes the time for repentance, salvation and restoration. The text does not provide an antidote for resisting temptation per se. It reminds people of God’s faithfulness. God is gracious and just but this chapter is about His faithfulness. A reminder of His faithfulness with an expectation of our future glory based on the work of Christ should be enough of a reminder that steers us away from temptation and towards our Savior. Quoting Joseph, “How then could I do such a wicked thing and sin against God?” (Gen 39:9)
