¹⁴ I don't write these things to shame you, but to admonish you as my beloved children.

¹⁵ For though you have ten thousand tutors in Christ, yet not many fathers. For in Christ Jesus, I became your father through the Good News.

¹⁶ I beg you therefore, be imitators of me.

¹⁷ Because of this I have sent Timothy to you, who is my beloved and faithful child in the Lord, who will remind you of my ways which are in Christ, even as I teach everywhere in every assembly.

¹⁸ Now some are puffed up, as though I were not coming to you.

¹⁹ But I will come to you shortly, if the Lord is willing. And I will know, not the word of those who are puffed up, but the power.

²⁰ For the Kingdom of God is not in word, but in power.

²¹ What do you want? Shall I come to you with a rod, or in love and a spirit of gentleness?

¹ It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and such sexual immorality as is not even named among the Gentiles, that one has his father's wife.

² You are puffed up, and didn't rather mourn, that he who had done this deed might be removed from among you.

³ For I most certainly, as being absent in body but present in spirit, have already, as though I were present, judged him who has done this thing.

⁴ In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, you being gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ,

⁵ are to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.

⁶ Your boasting is not good. Don't you know that a little yeast leavens the whole lump?

⁷ Purge out the old yeast, that you may be a new lump, even as you are unleavened. For indeed Christ, our Passover, has been sacrificed in our place.

⁸ Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old yeast, neither with the yeast of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

⁹ I wrote to you in my letter to have no company with sexual sinners;

¹⁰ yet not at all meaning with the sexual sinners of this world, or with the covetous and extortioners, or with idolaters; for then you would have to leave the world.

¹¹ But as it is, I wrote to you not to associate with anyone who is called a brother who is a sexual sinner, or covetous, or an idolater, or a slanderer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner. Don't even eat with such a person.

¹² For what have I to do with also judging those who are outside? Don't you judge those who are within?

¹³ But those who are outside, God judges. "Put away the wicked man from among yourselves."

¹ Dare any of you, having a matter against his neighbor, go to law before the unrighteous, and not before the saints?

² Don't you know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world is judged by you, are you unworthy to judge the smallest matters?

³ Don't you know that we will judge angels? How much more, things that pertain to this life?

⁴ If then, you have to judge things pertaining to this life, do you set them to judge who are of no account in the assembly?

⁵ I say this to move you to shame. Isn't there even one wise man among you who would be able to decide between his brothers?

⁶ But brother goes to law with brother, and that before unbelievers!

⁷ Therefore it is already altogether a defect in you, that you have lawsuits one with another. Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be defrauded?

⁸ No, but you yourselves do wrong, and defraud, and that against your brothers.

⁹ Or don't you know that the unrighteous will not inherit the Kingdom of God? Don't be deceived. Neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor male prostitutes, nor homosexuals,

¹⁰ nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor slanderers, nor extortioners, will inherit the Kingdom of God.

¹¹ Such were some of you, but you were washed. But you were sanctified. But you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and in the Spirit of our God.

¹² "All things are lawful for me," but not All things are expedient. "All things are lawful for me," but I will not be brought under the power of anything.

¹³ "Foods for the belly, and the belly for foods," but God will bring to nothing both it and them. But the body is not for sexual immorality, but for the Lord; and the Lord for the body.

¹⁴ Now God raised up the Lord, and will also raise us up by his power.

¹⁵ Don't you know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them members of a prostitute? May it never be!

¹⁶ Or don't you know that he who is joined to a prostitute is one body? For, "The two," says he, "will become one flesh."

¹⁷ But he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit.

¹⁸ Flee sexual immorality! "Every sin that a man does is outside the body," but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body.

¹⁹ Or don't you know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit which is in you, which you have from God? You are not your own,

²⁰ for you were bought with a price. Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's.

¹ Now concerning the things about which you wrote to me: it is good for a man not to touch a woman.

² But, because of sexual immoralities, let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband.

³ Let the husband render to his wife the affection owed her, and likewise also the wife to her husband.

⁴ The wife doesn't have authority over her own body, but the husband. Likewise also the husband doesn't have authority over his own body, but the wife.

⁵ Don't deprive one another, unless it is by consent for a season, that you may give yourselves to fasting and prayer, and may be together again, that Satan doesn't tempt you because of your lack of self-control.

⁶ But this I say by way of concession, not of commandment.

⁷ Yet I wish that all men were like me. However each man has his own gift from God, one of this kind, and another of that kind.

⁸ But I say to the unmarried and to widows, it is good for them if they remain even as I am.

⁹ But if they don't have self-control, let them marry. For it's better to marry than to burn.

¹⁰ But to the married I command--not I, but the Lord--that the wife not leave her husband

¹¹ (but if she departs, let her remain unmarried, or else be reconciled to her husband), and that the husband not leave his wife.

¹² But to the rest I--not the Lord--say, if any brother has an unbelieving wife, and she is content to live with him, let him not leave her.

¹³ The woman who has an unbelieving husband, and he is content to live with her, let her not leave her husband.

¹⁴ For the unbelieving husband is sanctified in the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified in the husband. Otherwise your children would be unclean, but now they are holy.

¹⁵ Yet if the unbeliever departs, let there be separation. The brother or the sister is not under bondage in such cases, but God has called us in peace.

¹⁶ For how do you know, wife, whether you will save your husband? Or how do you know, husband, whether you will save your wife?

¹⁷ Only, as the Lord has distributed to each man, as God has called each, so let him walk. So I command in all the assemblies.

¹⁸ Was anyone called having been circumcised? Let him not become uncircumcised. Has anyone been called in uncircumcision? Let him not be circumcised.

¹⁹ Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but the keeping of the commandments of God.

²⁰ Let each man stay in that calling in which he was called.

²¹ Were you called being a bondservant? Don't let that bother you, but if you get an opportunity to become free, use it.

²² For he who was called in the Lord being a bondservant is the Lord's free man. Likewise he who was called being free is Christ's bondservant.

²³ You were bought with a price. Don't become bondservants of men.

²⁴ Brothers, let each man, in whatever condition he was called, stay in that condition with God.

²⁵ Now concerning virgins, I have no commandment from the Lord, but I give my judgment as one who has obtained mercy from the Lord to be trustworthy.

²⁶ I think that it is good therefore, because of the distress that is on us, that it is good for a man to be as he is.

²⁷ Are you bound to a wife? Don't seek to be freed. Are you free from a wife? Don't seek a wife.

²⁸ But if you marry, you have not sinned. If a virgin marries, she has not sinned. Yet such will have oppression in the flesh, and I want to spare you.

²⁹ But I say this, brothers: the time is short, that from now on, both those who have wives may be as though they had none;

³⁰ and those who weep, as though they didn't weep; and those who rejoice, as though they didn't rejoice; and those who buy, as though they didn't possess;

³¹ and those who use the world, as not using it to the fullest. For the mode of this world passes away.

³² But I desire to have you to be free from cares. He who is unmarried is concerned for the things of the Lord, how he may please the Lord;

³³ but he who is married is concerned about the things of the world, how he may please his wife.

³⁴ There is also a difference between a wife and a virgin. The unmarried woman cares about the things of the Lord, that she may be holy both in body and in spirit. But she who is married cares about the things of the world--how she may please her husband.

³⁵ This I say for your own profit; not that I may ensnare you, but for that which is appropriate, and that you may attend to the Lord without distraction.

³⁶ But if any man thinks that he is behaving inappropriately toward his virgin, if she is past the flower of her age, and if need so requires, let him do what he desires. He doesn't sin. Let them marry.

³⁷ But he who stands steadfast in his heart, having no necessity, but has power over his own heart, to keep his own virgin, does well.

³⁸ So then both he who gives his own virgin in marriage does well, and he who doesn't give her in marriage does better.

³⁹ A wife is bound by law for as long as her husband lives; but if the husband is dead, she is free to be married to whoever she desires, only in the Lord.

⁴⁰ But she is happier if she stays as she is, in my judgment, and I think that I also have God's Spirit.