There was received at one time

INSPIRATION, ILLUMINATION, SEPARATION AND SERVICE

The Epic of Obedience

From Century to Century

In what follows, assistance has been provided
to help any to save time and meet various needs.

To help the reader in this crucial field of modern misalliance, purple summaries of major aspects will be given and material which one short of time might wish to leave till later will be italicised, in paragraphs.

Where there is only a very short set of italics this will remain in the normal usage.

The clear necessity to separate on biblical grounds is presented first,
other topics as they were raised, to meet conscientiously each point.

Purple minor headings help the reader to find a given topic in the reply quickly and to select what is desired at any given time.

There was received for consideration, at one time during the more than 40 years of my ministry in four countries, some material of significant interest, which gave one indications of a certain mutation relative to the word of God, the Bible, on the topic of separation. While this undoubtedly is by no means assumed to have been the intention of the writer of that material, it does appear to fit the method of procedure on occasion. This letter was not written to me, but concerned the Church.

Thousands of people seem to be confused, misled or mistaught on this crucial topic, and therefore the pith of the material is made available.

The answer in terms of these queries and presentations, follows this present section, below. It has of course been slightly changed, not in what it presents on the topics, but in anything relevant at the personal level which is not germane to general readers. An end-note has been added as also the last one. .

First however, consider the case in question, and indeed the genre, which concerns separating from what is not founded on the Rock, but on rock-'n-roll music, or new christs, or experience with Lord-and-more-for-me as some sort of false guide to life or standards of purity not to be found in the Bible. Do you stay with a doctor who is a doctor death ? do you imagine that the name 'doctor' is guarantee ? Do you stay with a body once a Church, when its ways, biblically defined, are those of death ?

It is not only time to consider, but HIGH TIME! Moreover, in truth there is comfort, in mercy there is cleanness, in pardon the way to purity lies open and in the God of all comfort, the way out of calamity into counsel is but one step into Jesus Christ, as living Lord and complete Saviour. Then the highway of holiness stretches over its valleys and summits. It is not ANY 'Lord' or 'Jesus' or 'Christ' but the 'Lord's Christ' who acts (Luke 2:26). Paul has warned of others using the same name as that of Jesus, but for another Christ, from the opposite course, that of death (II Corinthians 11).

Thus an open door being present, and open need being astoundingly obvious and pressing, this answer, then, is not just to issues raised by one person, but to the whole gamut of such issues arising from what is presented.

Many are embroiled in such issues as more and more former churches change their allegiance to the Christ of history in alienation or indifference, and substitute idols of their own. In so doing, they often prefer to continue using His name, changing the word of God just as the soldiers sought to change Jesus, with their fists, mockery and sneer-laden crown. It is important not to be alert to history, but dead to the present, alive to tradition, but inert to truth.

If these issues are not faced NOW, then the lag as in the case of any other sphere of divine command, can bring those asleep into an awakening they might rather not have.

Interesting indeed is your approach to the question of context. As you make this a sort of preliminary, in all courtesy, I shall do the same. One of us, to whom you have written, thinks you seem to have misunderstood him. We are here of course committed to the Bible, all of the Bible and the Bible as its own interpreter, with indeed the grace of the Spirit of God as promised. Culture and all that sort of this-world's contribution to the understanding of the word of God, which tells us that friendship with the world, enmity with God (James 4:4), is naturally to some extent relevant; but never as a criterion, merely as circumstantial.

Now when it comes to the more important point of scripture's own context, there are two extremes, both of which have only a little to commend them. One says this: Text without context is pretext. The other says this: Context allegedly at war with text is a suspect analysis.

If we were to move from aphorisms to actualities, it would therefore help. It is possible that by irony or some subtlety, a text or isolable statement in a given document, may appear at some degree of variance, not to say contradiction, with the context. "Your words are clearly absurd. What a genius you are!"

In either statement, each making the context for the other, there is formally apparent contradiction. This is not an abstruse matter, but clearly understood. Good communication is not a kaleidoscopic bundle of erratic words. If to the recipient, the speaker wishes to convey something, there are ways. If the recipient is blind, nothing much helps of course, and that is precisely what Christ sometimes stated concerning various people, in this, that the context in their hearts, if you will, their presuppositional background, with its barriers and assumptions, was making light impassable (cf. Matthew 13:15ff.). That is one part of it. For now, it is enough.

In the special case of God speaking, we are told that His words are clear to him who understands, that there is nothing writhed or contorted in them (Proverbs 8). We are not, note, here speaking of depth and challenge, but of unclear expression per se. Repeatedly as in Isaiah 42,49, the Lord asserts that it is so far from a lack of clarity in His speech, but rather a lack of ears or eyes that function to the point, which is the problem.

Here is the very criterion of (relevant) blindness, the one who thinks he is so very religious, and yet is based on presuppositions, cultural inhibitions or commissions, traditions and the like so that words are traduced in meaning, context is manipulated blindly, as by a child, and results are worse than desultory. Blind leaders of the blind are thus able to function in their thoughtless and useless, indeed worse than useless manner (cf. Jeremiah 23, Ezekiel 14),

We now come to the separation of depth of meaning, showing need of grace and light, in order to understand matters of 'meat', from something quite different. The pathological procedure often met applies quite well to superficial or deep matters alike. It involves the elevation of context by devious and distorting devices, to the place of potential disaster area for clear and rational analysis. Context is good, but just as some lawyers for example, are noted for being able to use the mass of law to incite confusion, so do many act with the Bible.

Again, you see in Matthew 22:23-31, Christ exposing the sightless efforts to bring reason without inspiration into frank conflict with the Bible, while trying to remove the clear force of biblical statements. They have blinkers to their understanding, to aid their blindness; and it makes it, if possible, worse. Understanding was denied their vapid chatter in this instance: as Christ put it, they understood neither the power of God nor the scripture.

Thus cultural desire or habits become unnoticed glasses through which the word of God is viewed, in the most calamitous fashion, so that Christ Himself exposed such abuse of His word. In Matthew 15 there appears the deployment of a dedicated gift to the temple as an excuse to distance a clear mandate, indeed the command to honour father and mother, so avoiding the help clearly intended for the parents. So did the Lord rebuke the manhandling of Moses' words by cultural desire, in order to escape clear duty (Matthew 15:3,7-9). Thus religiosity cancels commandment, with the appearance of an escape clause! Cultural desire or custom annuls the impact of the word of God, and intrudes in mind, into the context when it is read (cf. Mark 7:7ff.).

This involves contextual manipulation or blindness to part of it, and such needs examination to avoid the same sort of illicit result which Christ lampooned and derided (Matthew 23:17ff.).

Further, II Peter 3 makes it clear that some topics are MOST demanding, and that some people are so facile and superficial that they will tread unwarily in some of these, to their own damnation. Thus it is not that all understanding is EASY, but that it is not the fault or failure to the least degree of the Speaker, of His words, that is in view. It is failure in heart that is the basic distortion, obfuscation (Matthew 15:8-9, Proverbs 8:8-9).

Now it seems that you are actually thinking of a domain not precisely context, in terms of such an example as you cite, about selling all that you have (which, if general, could lead to an amazing reciprocity of changing your fortune to his and his back again and so on, if one does not take the depth and cosmos of thought in view aptly, on the one hand, and the individual nature of the case, on the other). One must be careful to avoid viewing the incident rather woodenly, to be sure, seeing in it not a contextual issue of possible contradictions but one of understanding what the speech is about. It is necessary to find from the immediate and general context and contexts, and the words, and the incident, and the principles the Lord exhibits and states both here and elsewhere, both in one statement and another, what is actually 'light' on the topic, as distinct from opacity.

Of course you could CALL it contextual, and anything could be made to seem similar to something else by means of words that define themselves this way and that; but the issue here is to grasp the sort of speech that Christ is using. It is a matter of spiritual discernment. Analysis however provides verbal barriers to misconstruction or from His use of words, receives stimulus to control.

What has just been shown is able to make the situation in principle very clear to anyone facing the impactive imperiousness of Christ's exhortation, in line with such words as let not your right hand know what the left is doing and so forth. Proverbs often give statements of KIND, that is as is the nature of proverbs, things that give a sense of type, direction and due outcome.

These are preliminary cautions concerning context in its correct use. This case of the rich young ruler, however, does not have that dimension. It is a case of a particular, distinctively characterised person.

The Luke 18 case involves a particular pathology in a colourful young man,
his intense desire, wealth and negative response, all dramatic,
in no way universalisable to all humanity, either logically or psychologically.
It cannot be therefore be used to illustrate grounds for disobedience to a clear command.
Context is the point! not its omission.

In the Luke 18:18 case, it is a word to individual in a particular pathological condition of spirit. Neither in form nor setting is it universal AS A COMMAND. This therefore cannot be used as an illustration of the painful necessity of getting a clear command and not doing it. What that man had to do, no one else is instructed to do, any more than someone without diabetes has to do what the sufferer has to do. The cutting off of the right hand is dependent on its becoming a stumbling block: en masse cuttings are neither necessary nor sound in any way; nor is there any difficulty about the meaning of 'cut off' and 'hand' in this case, as it is apparent it is an illustration, the eye and so on being metonymy, things associated with something being used to pin-point the idea.

The personal pathology of the young man in question in Mark 10 is demonstrated in that, whatever Christ did or did not mean in telling him to sell all that he had, he could not do it, and went mourning at his inability to get the eternal life he came running to grasp (taking more detail from the parallel in Mark 10:17). It is allied in Gospel context with the fact that he had great possessions. Is it really so hard to understand that at times one must cut off the right hand rather than have the whole being go to hell!

Is it so hard to realise that this is not an invitation to butchery, but to be understood by discernment as meaning something other than generic maiming, never authorised in scripture which wants more abundant life; and that it is rather exhibiting the quite ordinary figure of speech, metonymy. After all, contortions and constraints in a diseased soul may be great to avoid a need, and a personal command may very aptly be used to a particular case; though to be sure, the concept of lust for soulless liberty is a generality to be avoided when one considers any particular case and its cost.

The right hand is associated with power and personal efficiency, and if one's talent/power, premises get in the way, then it may be necessary to abandon the engulfing psychic or other inflammation which is endangering the whole life. Such figures are common, such contexts are simple, they strain nothing. It is interpretation of the meaning, the thrust of the speaker which is in view, the spiritual import. Context ? well, IN the context there are all sorts of things, but THROUGH the whole passage, there is a meaning, thrust, depth and dimension. You have to be adroitly contentious or blind to miss it, or something not too dissimilar.

However, this is mere illustration. We get back in particular to the case you cite, Luke 18:22 and thereabouts.

You raise the question regarding selling all that you have and giving to the poor, whether this is required of all who want eternal life ? Where does it SAY so in this cited textual episode ? What possible interpretation of text or context, or thrust or genre could possibly imply that the rich young ruler, with great possessions, constitutes a generic for widows with cents, or others whose temptations are different ? Is John with arthritis, given notice of what he must quit, to be used as a model for Bill, muscle-bound, with what he must do ? There is no way in which directions to a specific, specialised, analysed, differentially focussed person becomes by some sort of rigid presumption, directions for all.

NO interpretation can do that to this text. ALL are not so directed; ONE is. That is all. You can bring in your presuppositions and canons of thought as you will, and make results; but not from this text or its context or its thrust.

Now you ask questions which one expects, are posed with all goodwill, and certainly not in intention amiss, but which seem to act as red herrings if the point is what a command actually directs one to do.

Is the text about the rich young man challenging to rich Westerners ? you ask. You think so. I think so too. But that is not the point at issue when the matter before us is understanding what the Bible is commanding. It is not commanding all to do this. To be sure, the command to a pathological person can awaken

The point is one: what does it mean as command ? What is commanded ? Certainly, no command to all people is in ANY way visible there. Assumptions about what might be useful or beneficial are useful; but not for the meaning. These assumptions depend on many personal, cultural and indeed pathological or health aspects; and the Spirit of God might convict some, and indeed some might resist this: all this is so. But the words do not so command to all. There is no difficulty whatsoever in this case about the meaning. There is simply room for individuals to ruminate: good, but rumination is not command.

You indicate that you have a penchant or desire or sense of obligation to find, first, the message for the original. That is certainly part of any conscientious approach to the word of God, to find what it was meant to convey to the recipient, if any specific one is in view. Secondly, you feel one ought to find the message for us. This is absolutely standard to what many have taught long and hard. It is normal Bible booklet technology, as in Daily Light and so on. We are not bound to personalise everything, but the Spirit of God may apply it how He will; we must not fail to be willing to have ANY application, and some are amazing. However the personal application that God sees fit to give, and the structural application which may in some cases be apparent for certain audiences, these are one thing, and useful for exhortation: but the MEANING of a command is another.

"Love your mother" one may say; and you think you must wash up the dishes for her; but this is not the command. That is a possible application of ethical dimensions, which may or may not be good or wise or sound; and it may be shockingly obvious. This is not the meaning. It is a possible personal application.

Context, you say, must always be given its due weight. It is difficult to see how it could be other. We do not seem to be making much progress away from norms. We just need to realise the difference between pastoral and personal application and what is commanded, WHEN the ISSUE is what a command is! If it is, then it must be obeyed; if it qualifies itself, then it is qualified; if it has a personal impact on us, real or potential, then this is part of its use: but the COMMAND is not its application. It is what it is. We can become so personalised that we fail to be objective.

We are really dealing in the area of biblical hermeneutics, and must not confuse this with biblical application. If you say to a dog, SIT! that is not unclear. If the dog thinks, Ah! that is an interesting command - it really makes one wonder if one is working too hard! and so on, this is not the command, but the canine reflections, quite a separate matter, with its own criteria and uses.

AVOIDING A COMMAND BY CONTEXT IS NOT TO BE CONFUSED
WITH AVOIDING CONTEXT. The point deserves clarification.

There is no difficulty when all the Bible is given its status as the word of God and faithfully followed with all its prompts and precision. The issue raised on the point of context then, does not affect the matter in hand, obedience to commands of God. Punctilious care is needed before the normal thrust of words is seen as irony or any such thing; but a good writer leaves no one in doubt who seeks, and God is a good writer. So far we are left with the commands themselves in full biblical context, and without avoiding it or them in any way.

Now we are dealing with issues, not with what this or that person (other than God) has said. But it seems that what one has said previously is this: that an unqualified command is not to be given qualification, through the use of any contextual manipulation to avoid it. Your own paraphrase uses the term "to avoid its application to ourselves."

Since this issue seems to be DOING what you are TOLD by God, and not that of thinking your own thoughts about the topic in general, or its relevance to your life in this way or that, then what appears to be in mind a single, simple element. If God says DO THIS, then do not squirm and turn about, seeking some AVOIDANCE technique from the context.

This is quite common and has long been so. Christ used the case in terms of honouring yhour father and mother, the command.

Indeed, Jesus Christ refers with great derogation to such errors, as in the following from Matthew 15.

This is the domain to be noted, realised, repudiated.

In modern terms, the sort of way the same thing might now be done, we could imagine a case something like this. HONOUR your father and mother ? "But well, if they are not honourable, let them have it with the tongue and show them up to others, for it will do them good in the long run, and it is the thought that counts!"

Our point as individuals and as a church is, and always has been for decades, that what is written is first of all, not subject to human manipulation. What it says, being of God, is not to be understood in terms of one's personal philosophy (if any), or metaphysics (if any), known or unknown, conscious or other; and God who is master of His people, is to be sought in such a way that one forsakes all that one has (this IS generic incidentally), including personal pre-conceptions about culture this way or that, or anything else, which dares to intrude its philosophic attitudes - and in many, these are often anti-God - into interpretation. It is then not avoidance of the context, not recommended by anyone of ours, but of the issue which is here the point. So let us return to the issue and avoid what is not the point.

Conscious or unconscious, when such things happen, the result is in form the same.

One classic case of 'knowing better' than what is actually said, and employing cultural or personal 'interpretation' which is in fact repudiation, of course is found in Mark 8:32-33.

Peter's error was in what he savoured, thinking in human terms outside the parameters and godliness of God. Peter's pre-conceptions misled him, and he actually argued with Christ about what He OUGHT to mean. This process is not always open in someone's heart, and the desire becomes father of the 'interpretation'. That is why text and context, near and far in the word of God, MUST be weighed with great care.

The context when not used to AVOID, is of course as much part of the word of God as anything else in the Bible, ALL of which is from such a basis as ours, and in particular in the Westminster Confession on this topic, to be revered. In the latter case of course, it can only be by reflection, the commanding diction of the word of God itself dynamically ALWAYS in control in any issue.

Thus all you have to say, as far as one has so far seen on the topic of context, does not relate to anything so far known, about the issue. It is pastorally normal on the whole, interesting, and fine for exhortation so to forsake pre-conditions of thought or life, in dependence on God and on His written word; but when the issue is this: IF IT COMMANDS, DO IT, then do not take this or that measure to AVOID that, qualify it and so on: thus the point is back where it started.

This raises the interesting point however, in terms this time of the actual need, hermeneutics, of what people are to do about the GENERIC, when it is in view, such as this: forsake ALL that you have, or be INCAPABLE of being His disciple (Luke 14).

In the context, the cross being taken up (and words relate, this way and that, and as in the body, are to be seen BOTH in isolation and in reticulation), it is clear that the meaning is spiritual in essence. We are not engrossed in carpentry here. It is not about riches, but about a degree of devoted integrity which lets nothing get in the way of service for, and devotion wholeheartedly and single-mindedly to Christ.

Forsaking all that you have, in terms of taking up a cross, is relinquishing all that could get in the way either of what the cross implies, or of the Christ for whom you take it up, if so be. If there is anything which makes a person's absolute departure from cultural norms (where these challenge or negate Christ or His teaching in any way), or psychological forms (where habit makes eyes slow or blind, one reinforced by social mores and so forth), necessary in order to secure absolute obedience to whatever Christ commands you: then that person must forsake, depart from the matter in question.

If anyone has things which are already in total submission to Him, then forsaking them would mean being less devoted! The generic must be understood in context, in thrust, in meat, in point, in its mode of diction, and so on. It is not too hard for a willing mind in the generalities of practical things (cf. John 7:17,24).

What then of this in Luke 14 ? The issue is forsaking competition with Christ, and the outcome is taking up the cross, paying for what is required though it seems to harrow the soul and imprint life with disciplines extraordinary. It is all very simple. One is not to be minimising the requirements of the call of Christ.

IF there is one dollar, or pride, or pretension, or self-love, or anything else material or moral or spiritual, intellectual or social which is NOT given up to Christ, as Abraham willingly yielded his great hope, Isaac, then you MUST give it up. That is the point.

What if someone does not know of such a fault, flaw or failure in his or her life ? Then in faithfulness, you ask God to search you and try you and see if there is any wicked way in you (Psalm139); and you study the word of God and see if it has negative or reinforcing impact on what you find, and respond accordingly. It does not mean perfection (I John 1), nor does it mean being dilatory (I John 3:9). It means being vigorous and faithful in pursuit of truth in life.

Difficulty in understanding the command at this phase in focus ? Impossible to find.

Difficulty in doing it ? Worse, it is impossible to do this, if a person's heart is still in sin's control; it is challenging if it is no longer stone. But what you are to do, would take some ingenuity, even to make some issue. It is all simple: DO IT.

Christ is not different in His stated expectations, making no allowance for putative difficulties, but dealing with the things as clear in command and the issue as obedience. Thus He asks a question which is in the spiritual context, immensely relevant, for this undoubtedly IS generic. It is this:

The issue is KEEPING His sayings, and the contrast is the house on the rock, and that on the sand as foundation.

Attaching to the answer to these questions there would not seem, even to the priests of Baal, any difficulty. They might want to rip apart the speaker, or the words, but the meaning is transparently apparent, to the point of reductio ad absurdum.

It is a tour de force on the part of Paul, inspired by the Spirit of God (as in I Corinthians 2:9-13). We might then ask what is the topic on which this is the climacteric division ? WHAT is it which is so clear ? Obvious even in these verses themselves is this: that Paul's words involve a prohibition about believers and unbelievers having any sort of spiritual relationship in a concerted fashion.

They are not to be mixed up in any way with such opposing forces. The canons of co-operation in any personal way are strong and multi-faceted. Agree ? what agreement, is there anything to agree about when I John 2:23 asks, "Who is a liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ ?" Indeed, it is THIS SAME Jesus and not another (II Corinthians 11), who has Christ has commission as biblically defined (Luke 2:26), the Lord's Christ, and a Gospel as immutable (Galatians 1). It fits together as Romans 16:17 shows it does and must^*A.

Hard indeed would it be to find that in some esoteric sense, all this meant something, to paraphrase, like this:

No, that would not be a paraphrase. It would have all the relevance of the words of Peter to the words of Christ, so that just as Peter began to rebuke Christ, so Christ at once rebuked Peter.

Perhaps we could try again, then, in some kind of paraphrase to illustrate meaning:

The word of God has already spoken here. It is the same in Romans 16,
except even more direct, requiring AVOIDANCE when apostolic doctrine is not followed. False doctrine is only giving another mouth to Christ, to the apostle whom He sent.
The Lord, however, and His apostle through whom He speaks, are what and who they are, and are not available for voidance duplication! Yet we pursue the points you make, for completeness, not necessity.

It goes on to indicate that if you actually obey (increasingly an uncommon response - cf. II Peter 2, II Timothy 3), then God will have you as sons and daughters. Your old 'home' will not leave you alone, but your home, as with Abraham, for whom GOD HIMSELF was His shield and exceedingly great reward, is with the Lord. That is the other house. It is He.

Is there an area to be excluded in this command ? No, it is quite clear. WHO are unbelievers ? They may worship another Christ (II Corinthians 11 - Paul speaks here of Satan masquerading as an angel of light - good actor) or themselves, using religion as a flying buttress; but they do not worship Christ.

Trusting in Him is for them not the way: they trust in their devious, or additive, or personally contrived little ideas; but the word of God is harassed by their imagination, if indeed it is regarded at all.

Special cases and symptoms arise regarding this separation, above in general terms, below in particular instances.

In I Corinthians 6:9 we are expressly told that amongst others, idolaters and sodomites, homosexuals and adulterers are not among those who inherit the kingdom of heaven. Hence at once, they CANNOT be MEMBERS of a Church, which is for believers, or prelates or anything of that kind, since to have chosen as supervisors in terms of Titus and Timothy, precisely the opposite to the requirement of the Bible, is rebellion already.

Sound in faith is one of the QUALIFICATIONS for Church supervisors, by apostolic command. Where such supervisors are permitted, or such members, then the Church of which Paul is a master-builder is not the one in view. It is a cultural substitute. You do not build a car by using ping-pong balls.

You change it so that you live where you are instructed to live, or leave it. You do not spend your life in disobedience, but come out to be separate as specifically and so very clearly instructed to do by Paul, and hence by God (I Corinthians 14:37). Alternatively, you can construct another apostle, Bible or christ; but that is an option with which we are not concerned. Our issue: OBEYING the biblical command. HENCE such steps as here evaluated are not relevant. We commend they be not taken in the Lord's name. Romans 16:17 puts it on the line. You obey the apostle in this or you rebel; and what refuses him is to be avoided.

That is the immediate and necessary first step. If you 'cannot' do this in the Church, in one way, then you get faith and do it through the power of God; but if the Lord does not enable you so to gain faith to do it this way, within whatever mores you may choose to make mandatory, system of preferences or whatever, then you do it in another way. One way or another, if you follow Paul, and his commands, you separate.

You may get rid of such prelates or leave them. In either way you are separate. It is not a matter of trying, but doing. Commands - these are not to be interpreted in the "Lord, Lord" manner of Luke 6:46, Christ declares, but in DOING THEM.

What then happens when obedience occurs ? Then those in forbidden and designated categories of this kind cannot be members, they cannot even vote. If they reject words of Christ, then we look at John 7:17. People who want to do His will will know from whom the words come. A pastor may teach and prepare such parties, but believing in Christ is not divorceable from His words. His mouth is not to be cut off. He insists that what He says is to be received, that rejection is not merely error, it is a consequence of spiritual mist, failure to desire Him. We always distinguish between rebellion and weakness of course; but we are discussing BIBLICAL COMMANDS, what they mean.

If you want to play cricket, you cannot be a member in the football club, which whatever it thinks of cricket, is not here doing that thing. Let us clarify a little further.

Does this mean (as an aside) that those sins, as say in I Corinthians 5 and 6, exclude all who have ever practised them ? Of course not, as in Ezekiel 18. It does not say that. Someone with a former fault is not thereby designable as having this contemporary characterisability. Excursion from the fault and pardon may intervene. One remembers what once David did in the matter of Bathsheba. Moreover, when one is born again, there is a new creation! There is a thing called forgiveness (Psalm 103, I John 1). This has first to be applied from explicit biblical principles.

No, if someone errs and repents, this is not the issue. This is a saint who sinned, and not a rebel who defies the word of God: rather he uses it to return to the Lord in peace.

This in no way changes the point that if someone IS in this sphere, practising in this field, in any of the exclusion categories mentioned, then the exclusion applies. Thus it does mean that where the title is just, so is the result sure. An adulterer is one who practises this, it is a style of being which has a style of appelation. Exclusion then applies, and where it is not done, then one's own removal is the other option.

Jointness is forbidden. It is really very simple. It does not take a lot of time. The Bible insistently and constantly says AVOID, GO, SEPARATE.

Thus those who are in any of these domains, such as making their own minds the determinants of what doctrine, either as a sort of private Biblical supplement or otherwise, which they accept, idolaters generally, or perverts: these are not in the kingdom (cf. News 99 on relevant Anglican church developments, as also Tender Times for Timely Truth Ch. 7). Indeed, Paul spends no little time casting down such intellectual devices, such imaginations (II Corinthians 10:5), which are as intolerable as the circumcision issue was to him (both in immediacy and in action - Galatians 2).

Let us elaborate a little on the topic of supervisors and church members in what may be called the Church of Jesus Christ, in this, that it follows Him.

The grounds for selection of overseers, to revert to this aspect, as in Titus, are of a total contrary and actually contradictory type to those in such categories as are stated by Paul for exclusion, from which one must come out (II Cor. 6, I Cor. 5, 6).

To violate here is something that cannot be done, except in rebellion. As to church membership, they cannot be accepted. It was usual before morals fell so far in so many modern churches, for contracting adulterers, after due warning, for them to be excluded pro tem at least, from church membership. What is definitively not in the kingdom of heaven is not ready for church membership of those who by faith are.

Quite simply, anything called church which refuses such premises, is refusing the Bible. Hence no such church is justly called a biblical Christian church.

Avoid does have a meaning. It is not obscure or recherché. It does not require magnificent Greek to ferret it out.

Avoid^*1 does not mean: join with them in their church, or in some church of some organisational totality, where their ways are deemed acceptable, for example.

The opinion of God of such persons, who depart from the commandments of the apostles and their teaching is shown in what follows Romans 16:17. The fear of God, a clean fear and not a craven cowardice, is just and good and commended in both Testaments (Psalm 19:9, I Peter 2:17). His view of alternate mouths using His name is low, as you see in Romans 16:18ff.! The required DISSOCIATION with such is very understandable! 'Belly' there is metonymy for 'flesh', with derogatory emphasis.

It is after all a reverse form of plagiarism: you make up what He says and then pin it on His word.

The same 'avoid' applies, when an Anglican Australian Primate declared that Jesus is not the only way to God ( Tender Times for Timely Truth Ch. 7). Either the Church removes him and his doctrine (except he repent) or it allows him to stay. If the latter, he is not avoided, and his influence in the body of Christ is contrary to the intense statements of scripture, in being allowed. Such a body as is willing to continue with him over time is contrary to the apostolic teaching to the maximal degree, and avoiding such a church is not talking about some part of the whole which has this primate, but about the church of which he is primate, which is in fact hierarchical in structure, and in any case, one total organisation. You cannot stay where such things are not repudiated by the body guilty of them; and this is far from recognising a primate or prelate in his place, as part of a broad consensus, over-riding any particular. Attacks on the central elements of the faith go or you do; they do not linger, and if they do, you do not.

In fact, to avoid the avoid, one simply ignores the commandment. This is the message one of us doubtless had in mind when he presented his point to you, and it is the same one that the Church has in mind, since it is repeatedly presented in the most unequivocal possible language in the Bible.

But let us come to the arenas of some of your other thoughts, to those topics and see, in all due 'humility' (that is, watchful that we do not assert anything beyond or less than the scriptural input on any topic as defined, giving due respect to authority, illimitably when it is the Lord's, veracity , and He is it, and the mind of divinity - cf. Isaiah 66:2), to what we are required to do, there also; although of course any ONE commandment defining itself to a point, is sufficient.

You mention I Corinthians 5. The concentration on this is now our, because your, topic. We look at it simply because you do: it is your field and one follows you to it.

You seem to feel that the Greek word in question has a sense of intimacy, continuity, contiguity. Let us however first look at the context, before this interesting exercise. In the context, where this verb is used the first time, we are told that Paul had written to them concerning a certain option, that they were not to DO THIS, take such a course. Certain associations were excluded by the apostle. He then wrote again to the effect that he had not intended them to understand that prohibition was for all in those categories, or that it was universally applicable to those in question.

He had implicitly in mind, he indicated, the Christian context. He was intending to deal with the double designation: professing Christian and those in the forbidden categories, simultaneously. A professing Christian adulterer, pervert and so on: this was the thing he had in mind in making his exclusion commandment. ONLY BELIEVERS were in mind when he made these exclusions about being mixed up with others.

Now the important thing at first is what the apostle meant, and this is our first port of call. IF he HAD meant (using this verb) that they should not so associate, and was pointing out that had he meant this in unrestricted style, then they ought to go out of this world, a natural question arises ... Why ? why would it be an obligation to leave this world if you did not get yourself mixed up with such people as those to whom the finger pointed ? How would that work ?

It would not do. It would be unworkable, that is why. It would be an unpractical thing, and you could not do business, buy real estate and so on. People of all sorts are of all sorts of opinions and religions; but if that whole series of categories of people in view could not have the sort of relationship with one, to which the Greek term points, then getting out of this world is the necessary thing to do.

What then must it mean ? Is it necessary to avoid intimate relationships, as distinct from some kind of superficial sort of relationship, with people, or to go out of the world ? Not at all. These are no horns of a dilemma. That is not the meaning.

Then that cannot be what the apostle meant, or he would have been talking to the air, and stirring himself up to no point. If they HAD followed the command (which he was rather afraid they might apply outside Christian connections as well as inside them), then by no means would they have had to go out of this world. Hence we are not justified, if we believe Paul to be writing under the power of the Holy Spirit in the accuracy signified by him (I Cor. 2:9-13), in so assuming. Let us now look at the Greek. Is this in fact what the word and the context jointly say ?

It is simply a combination of a root meaning mix, or mingle, with syn (or sun) together and ana, up or among or together in this setting. It means - mix up together, mingle, associate.

There is a series of possible applications and the Greek dictionaries spell out the options of such a base term.

Paul, who spoke Greek, is not ignorant of the possibilities. Hence he tells them that he did not mean that they should IN ALL THINGS, apply this term, exclude the sorts of people he mentioned. In other words, it could be applicable in this sphere, dominion, sense or setting, or in that, but ONLY for professing Christians who so defiled themselves. If it had been applied in its broadest possible sense of not mixing up together at all, then of course they WOULD have to go out of this world. All this is coherent, consecutive and logically mutually self-reinforcing.

NOW however, he wishes to limit the applicability of the Greek verb. He wants to make it clear that the thing he had in mind, and has, is not impractical, that you would not have to go out of the world to obey this command. Rather, he wants the command to be used in a more restricted fashion, both obeyed and obeyed IN THIS WORLD, so that you do not have to leave it to do it!

It is because this applies ONLY when a person involved is called a brother, that is, makes Christian profession or is received on that basis, and so given appelation as brother, that the impasse is removed.

There is not the slightest difficulty in this. Language and logic are direct, mutual, exact. They neither admit alteration nor logically would require it. What they demand is one thing, carefully stated, clearly expressed, indefeasible in content. Nor is this all.

In this sense and setting, then, the apostle having LIMITED but not rebutted his former word, by way of clarification, he goes on to say that this Christian setting is the applicable case for the former instruction, and that indeed with such a person as that, one should not even eat. The term for 'eat' is clear. There is an exclusion on any such way of life, attitude. So far from having any sort of SPIRITUAL relationship with such heretics, one must extend this to the very social domain and not even share a meal with them. That is simple, clear and consecutive.

Paul does not qualify this, and so, in keeping with keeping humbly to one's own place, and reading and not breeding scripture, we regard it. Paul's insistence on clarifying what MIGHT have been misinterpreted is a good and scholarly example of the care of choosing words of which he speaks in terms of the Spirit's control in I Cor. 2.

Now, having found the Greek and the setting and the cohesive sense, we do not 'have to' try to be making something of I Corinthians 5:10, as you seemed to suggest. God does not need any help from floating imagination, intrusion of unuttered thoughts, when His terms and logic are decisive, incisive and direct. He never of course needs help, but to offer here such additives would be an exceptional case of intrusion, or eisegeis.

The command is quite clear. Since you wish to look at this, assuming the Greek term to be what you say, and not to have the broad scope which its structure and usage indicates, for restrictive reasons of your own, not verifiable, we will share with you so far (for a moment, but not for one hour, just for a logical exercise).

However, it is necessary to note that even if the meaning were of this intimate character to which you wish for whatever reason to limit it, it would have small impact on the situation. We are COMMANDED not to eat with such persons, and that is the end of the line: we are NOT EVEN to eat with them. The categories are clear; the action is defined: it is not to occur.

The full force of the initial command is extended to the last point, within the restricted area of so-called Christians. There, there is a point, a position far from there being a relatively minor limit in voluntary fellowship.

In other words, write a new Greek dictionary and you still cannot eat with them. Even if your cultural background on the topic, and not the dictionary^*1A, is to be the criterion (the former something needing forsaking in the contest context), there still is no room for manoeuvre.

Let us go further into the interstices of the mix together verb in view, in the Greek, summoning its various senses or usages. Taking the dictionary illustrated and defined use of the term for being mixed up, associating with these people, we get the following.

You are going one way, assisting each other; but they are not to be envisaged as on the same side, not to be AIDED in this generic sense.

These are the exclusions in terms of the scope of the verb^*1A. Such are indeed dictionary illustrations in type of its usage.

That is an interesting sort of church situation, if such were allowed to continue in it. People then in the Church would be fighting on different sides, not allowed even to eat together, or to help one another as a mode of life, at all.

What sort of an integumental body, each joint and sinew working with the other, is this! (Ephesians 4:15-16). If the prohibition in the Greek term is not followed, then what DOES follow is comic within the tragic area, grave humour indeed.

What of such a body as ignores the command ? It becomes a counter-Church, a calamity, a fraud, an alien from the definition of Church. It is not under the Head, Jesus Christ, but its power has gone to its own head or heads, and it rules as it will. WHY do you call Me, Lord, Lord and NOT DO the things that I say becomes painfully applicable.

To remain in it is to avoid the church concept, and substitute a new one. If a Church meeting is superficial in its highest discussions or decisions, this is a new phenomenon, quite alien to Acts and to Paul (cf. Acts 4:23-31, Ephesians 4).

Discipline is needed, sure and careful, not allowing a breach in the building through intrusion and wrong materials, designs or schema: this is in view. Then the situation of confused disobedience does not arise. Control the traffic and avoid the collisions. It is so simple.

TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE, THE ISSUES BEING CLEAR AND EXTREME:
THE APOSTLE PAUL SHOWED IN HIS OWN EXAMPLE THE FORCE OF IT!

Thus Paul did not leave the circumcisionist heresy in situ, opposing it with such force, that he indicates it was not left simply to continue "for one hour"; and he hied off to Jerusalem. It was intolerable, destructive, awry in its base and to be excluded (Galatians 2:5). He did not make muted noises. He acted to expose, to challenge, to take regional action, to have the evil condemned as unfit for the Church. It came, he went to the council: It was fast. It was consciously and conscientiously fast, and the correlation is here noted with rigour by the apostle.

As apostle (I Corinthians 11:1), he gave an example in principle, in thought, in feeling, in attitude, in timing, in detestation, in concern .

Indeed, he is activated just as he was seen to be in II Corinthians 11:1ff., when he declaimed:

It is the same spirit and testimony as he showed to the elders in Acts 20:19-31, and as in shown in Jude. Don't dally with wolves, don't dally with other 'husbands', come out from such things! The message thunders as on a summery afternoon with dark clouds constantly issuing sound.

But, as to the word you focus on - sunanamignumi: in the end, on all sides, the root meaning is sure: associate, keep company, be mixed up in. It is made up of those parts or particles. What then of those subject to such a division, such an exclusion, in vocabulary terms: Christians and those in the exclusion categories are poles apart and must not act together with it in intent, in portent, in company, in joint objective, in anything mixing you together, and in the case in view with Paul, not even in eating. You seek the lost: you do not add them to the Church. It is when they are won that they come. It is a Church for believers, not deceived and deceivers. It is far from perfect, but rebellion is an extinguishable category, like witchcraft, as Samuel declares.

You can feel what you like about this Greek term, then of course; but this is the root and these are examples of its range of meanings in terms of the dictionary usage. Applying what the word means to professing Christians has all of this exclusion. To prohibit its application in thought or deed, is to prohibit the apostle's declaration. It is common to be sure; but unfit for copying.

Let us go further down the line in the exclusion field. It does not say in what setting this eating is not to occur, but since Paul is emphatic about the change when there is a Christian profession, and the topic is limitation of the original command which he had made about separation, not as incorrect statement, but one interpretable too broadly in SCOPE of persons involved: then not being allowed EVEN to eat with them excludes all things that are more.

This is the periphery of the exclusion zone, not its content. Its content has not been changed. It is not to be understood in terms of something else. NOT EVEN EATING with them is the order, and the terms are not variable. The form of association in view extends in exclusion, so far as eating. That is his fresh input in I Cor. 5:11.

The kind of eating is not in question; it is the very act of eating. This is taken as the extremity of the application, one to the uttermost of rational thought, and practical application.

It is not with respect to some private concept of intimacy which Paul refers, in eating, but to what eating is. Moreover, the EVEN signifies that this is a TYPE of the sort of thing included in his prohibition, and it is "almost any form of association" for those in these categories - except that this may be almost too little. It is however a good summary.

Now in the Greek, to which you and therefore I refer, you mention for verse 10, a translation of a term by the word 'not complete'. Since this is an effort to translate, as it seems, one must note that it is not clear in its relationship to the original. It could be used, perhaps, but not as an exhibit for discussion; for something more elemental and categorical is available from the Greek. The term you seem to be targeting here, is pantws, which simply is the adverb for all things. Altogether is a reasonable translation. Not complete is here rather an imported concept, useful but not basic enough for use as a basis for thought. Not in all ways, is found in the actual literal Greek. The Authorised version does well to translate "yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world..."
It is not in all respects so, in all ways so, altogether the case.

It is neither necessary nor permissible to use terms in English which then need interpretation in English, in the place of the clearest term in Greek. This applies at all times, when issues arise.

The use of the negation of the totality term - let us keep to the word of God, not this and that implication or imagined implication, and adhere to the Greek as definable in dictionary format - is necessary.

Here it is simple: Paul had not meant his command earlier to be IN ALL THINGS applicable to the categories of persons, that follow. There were SOME THINGS excluded from the exclusion. The command did not have universal applicability.

Rather than paraphrase on the basis of needlessly additive or obscure English and so mixing the text, let us follow what the words say. I wrote to you not to be mixed up together with fornicators; and not in all ways with fornicators of this world, or with the covetous, or rapacious or idolaters, since you then ought to go out of the world.

That is what is said. We must not mix up some exotic or statistical series of English renderings and give them marks, but see what is written, if the word of God is to be given straight and clear force. What does it say, not what could we make of it in our minds, this is the point. When that point is taken, it is eminently clear.

It says this. Is there some oddity then ? Test. We must then see if it is ambiguous (God is a clear writer and I have never found anything that comes out as ambiguous in His word) or directive. If it were to seem ambiguous, the strong possibility would be, and the scriptural certainty, that we are overextending what is written, and in that sense, are left without ground.

Here however, it is not possible if the text be followed even to do that. The word is clear, forceful, in context smooth.

NOT IN ALL THINGS is his initial command to be applied to the following aggregates and categories. The categories are active for the commandment only where they are first chosen within the field of professing Christians. We do not have to wonder if he meant this or that at this point in consideration and review, since here that is merely intellectual exercise. There is no puzzle. Some may seek to argue and torment the passage, if trying to justify this or that rendering, but if we keep to what is written, then the rest can look after itself. In analogy: You isolate a tumour, and regard it; but this is a separate question from how it arose, why it arose, and what to do about it. It is there.

We isolate the word of God from our potentially inventive thoughts. It is clear, Let it speak for itself. Unlike Baal, it can do that. What some construe it to indicate is not at this level, to the point at all.

This Christian people were not to do what the Greek term meant, be mixed up together with certain categories of person. This was meant to be limited to professing Christians, as in those categories. It must not, however, be misapplied to all people. If it were, then one should go out of this world. The words are simple, needing neither doubt nor contortion nor distortion nor abortion. Importing puzzling thoughts to a context strikingly defined by the terms of logic is a contortion of the word of God, and by all means to be avoided. Let it speak. If someone misses something, then let it be corrected. If nothing is missed, nothing is the need.

Consider the case. Your effort to make "go out of this world" mean something other than "go out of this world", and in fact to mean have a monastic style separation is mere addition. It is for this reason not an option. Import to the territory of the word of God is indefensible.

He does not say that. If he had wanted to exhibit such a concept, means were readily at hand, to import so unnoted a dimension. The 'cosmos' is not something little, except by contextual compulsion. Being inventive without such constraint, is mere addition, having literally NOTHING to do with the command. It simply does not say this, or anything which relates to such restrictive particularity, which in any case is only a very partial separation.

Even if the Greek dictionaries were wrong, and you were right about some rigid requirement for the Greek word concerning being mixed up together, as if it should have some very select and supposedly necessary meaning which then is to command understanding, something lesser than the word's components and norms, something not based on any usage or definition, even so: Paul is STILL saying that if they had taken his former word as totally applicable, they would have had to go out of this world. You can change the protasis, or the apodosis, but you need to do both; and even then it is not enough!

Thus you can change the Greek, in terms of some cultural preference, and then change it again, in terms of a special meaning imposed on the word 'world', and invent all sorts of variables, but the Greek simply does not permit it, say it or allow it. You are adding restrictions on two terms, without warrant. It does not matter what else, you change and then interpret. Paul's conclusion again; and thirdly, still needs excision for the application to be vitiated, that of not even eating. That remains unqualified to categories specified.

It is quite some effort, revisionism at its height or depth. It is by all means to be avoided if one is to be faithful simply to what is written, leaving God as sole author of the thought and content. He means what He says, and says what He means, sufficient in context, logic, etymological. He knows what He is doing.

Thus, leaving this necessary defect, which would change the meaning of the one word, from what it is, to some invented concept, and considering its total and categorical association with II Corinthians 6 et al., as written, we come back to the point that even if only an intimate association were in mind, as excluded, it certainly would not require one to do what Paul specifies in the command, without further tuition in the misuse of terms, or special pleading for what is neither written nor constrained. Leaving the cosmos is a simple expression, unambiguous. Needing to do so is a simple, clear and logically coherent expression in all his words here. Something either would or would not require one to do this. Paul's former words would have required this. He says so.

Let us review it. Taking his words with that humility which you mention as desirable, a point shared, therefore one which does not add or re-write or unblushingly import cultural assumptions, with no contextual or other ground, we find that had Paul not restricted his former words^*1B: he would have had this result, out of the cosmos. It is a reductio ad absurdum. But there is not this result, as has been pointed out, on the tutored basis for the text, when the Greek verb is given a new meaning.

The monastic concept you mention for going out of the world, is not in view, stated or contextually required or implied by the Greek words chosen. It is not mentioned, not relevant, and above all, not written. The text is of exemplary nature, needs neither impositions nor reconstructions nor additions. Even if however it were twisted twice by additions not present, it still would not alter the result. You cannot EVEN EAT with such. Any endeavour to make going out of this world to mean something other, so that it is not a reductio ab adsurdum, but some other sort of context entirely, not here analysed by Paul is eisegesis.

As to that ? It is an interesting form of play; but unwise. It has in any case NOTHING to do with the word of God. Association is to be such that not even eating is in view. It does not say what form of association, except that if it were applicable in all categories of the terms, out of the cosmos one should go. Eating is an expression of the extent to which forms of association are to be restricted: EVEN TO THAT it must not go. Paul makes it very clear that whatever we or they or anyone may think, the affair in view excludes the activity of eating with people in the excluded categories concerned. That is definitive, correlative in essence, an extremity in form; but it is so written concerning category of person and activity in view.

Categories and consequence are what is relevant at this point, and that is the consequence. It is like an overall: it dictates not only the almost total exclusion in view, it renders it so extreme as to be amazing; yet it also brings in as an illustration, the extent of the separation.

First Paul in his reference to his former command, has this: Let us limit the initial rule to professing Christians. Now this, he also adds: Let us indeed limit it concerning those categories in this way: but having done that, let us do more - DO NOT EAT with them, do not even do that!

Any person can do it or not; follow the word of God or not. What anyone cannot do, logically and linguistically^*2, is obey, and YET NOT do these things as written and commanded, in coherent, progressive, fully self-explanatory context. It is indeed uniquely fully self-explanatory context as it stands.

Nothing else thrust onto God's words can match this, its consistent coherence, direct declaration and the clear definition of Greek terms. The passage is neither difficult not abstruse in any way. There is no question when you keep to what is written. Imagination can vault; fidelity is constrained. The words that are there are indefeasible; the logic is uniquely progressive; the result follows the verbal input precisely. Change the reductio, bring carpentry onto the word, add concepts, and then ignore results and then you can take off: but only into the air.

Each part in the parcel is wrapped carefully. There is nothing to be rapt about. It speaks. As shown in *2 below, it is in precise parallel with the death sentence in the Old Testament theocracy.

Any person can do it or not; follow the word of God or not. What anyone cannot do, logically and linguistically^*2, is obey and not do these things as written and commanded, in coherent, progressive, fully self-explanatory context. It is indeed uniquely fully self-explanatory context. There is no question when you keep to what is written. Imagination can vault; fidelity is constrained. The words that are there are indefeasible; the logic is uniquely progressive; the result follows the verbal input precisely. Change the reductio, bring carpentry onto the word, add concepts, and then ignore results and then you can take off: but only into the air.

When the writing as it stands is avoided, and thus the command voided as far as it may be, then the ground of the word of God by then has been carefully left. For that there is and can be no justification, and one can only exhort to avoid the peril of trying out the word of God for its power. It is alas all too possible to engage in a process without fully realising what one is doing, and doubtless this is one reason for the scriptural exhortation to Christians to exhort one another! (Hebrews 3:13). This too is a command to be obeyed.

Love finds it hard to sit by and watch calamity, and the word of God directs to what is! If one is to be so solicitous, then there is a reason; and if the case is demanding because of perilous thoughts, then the response need be strong. But let us proceed.

On either count, additive or limited in licence to what is there: the result is nevertheless somewhat similar to our present purpose; but this is only of the slightest interest, since it is but one thing that is written. However a person may interpret, against the lexicons or in accord with them, with restrictive input the word does not require, or not, contrary to its simple root meaning or in some choice of possibilities which restricts the word of God beyond what it is: it is still in the end, the same. If Paul says not to eat, and the categories are stated, and the negation is applicable to them as within stated categories, it is in any case an exclusion in the terms of reference. You cannot EVEN EAT WITH PEOPLE IN THESE CATEGORIES.

As written, it is almost inordinate in impact. It carries on from his earlier words, with this later specificity. If your reading of something else conflicts with this, so much the worse for that reading, but not for those words of His. They are consistently defined, extensively, with exemplification and analysis combined, on the right hand and on the left.

It is THIS that it says, as in cosmos and company, as in eating; and nothing can change it, but selective additions and restrictions. It is easy when you do that; but in the case of the presentation, which you have in mind, even that has such arcane aspects as to beggar imagination, additions in non-included concepts to words which have no such capacity, unless granted it by creativity. It is God, however, who is the creator of His own speech; He needs no help, and tolerates none. What would you expect!

So far from the context requiring something else, it does not in the Greek even tolerate it as an imposition, and attempts to FIND some way to get around verse 10 only lead to adding.

We may focus further the point that the word sunanamignumi is in root precisely like our English, not to be mixed up with something or someone. That is its direct translation.

You can attend to minutiae, with applications of the Greek in ordinary usage, and to the root with the same result. This is what it says, and whatever particular possibilities exist, where the word is to be found, we cannot vex the word to force it into equivalence with another and more specialised term^*2A.

It has a range of applications which are illustrative of the root, signifying compliance, comradeship, admixture, involvement, whether in joint battle or venture. Its generic is simply being mixed up with something. Relevantly, its negation means NOT having compliance, comradeship, admixture, involvement, whether in joint battle or venture or even aid!

In mathematics, to solve an equation by altering it, in the end, is not even interesting or relevant in any way at all. To pass time ? perhaps. To settle the issue ? let us be very serious about these grave things, and not change language to find desire or for any other reason. Additives alter.

You seem to want to specialise in this particular text, though the matter is consistently clear in this, as in many contexts; but let it be allowed for the moment, as one moves in almost every endeavour available. You can see a systematic treatment of it at Separation 1997. It is good to go over matters, if need be, from each angle, aspect, bringing each point to the conspectus and focus of Scripture, however often this is needed, in however many phases.

You are interested in the necessary implication of what the text above has actually stated. The interpretation, however, is not of one's own thoughts, but of what is there in the Bible, and unwillingness to face those words is tantamount to rebellion. It is not that one accuses anyone here of that, but this the final logical result of any such trend, if indulged and taken.

So the wicked person in one of the forbidden categories listed (I Corinthians 5:10,13), he is not to be there for informal social relationships (eat is quite a simple term), or for that matter formal ones (it is not specified). The party in question is excluded from participation in any form of eating at the voluntary level. Leaving the command without aid, to speak for itself, it says this. You can deal with it negatively or positively; but it states this.

I do not think so, in the normal setting; but if it did, it is not for me to comment negatively. Romans 16:17 for example makes it categorically clear that it is in terms of apostolic doctrine that the Church is to commune within itself, be built, be and live: that is an actual Church, one which believes in the Lord, and does not just say, Lord, Lord and not DO what He says (as in the case condemned by Christ, found in Luke 6:46).

If a body does not adhere to this, if it failing to be what it is meant to be systematically by such inclusiveness of contrary persons, then what is that body to do, biblically ? (cf. Titus 3:10, Romans 16:17). It first purges out those who refuse to adhere to apostolic doctrine. These go, so that the church is now obedient, and exhibits that AVOIDANCE which Paul commands expressly. It is then that the Church no longer adheres to the error. If these do not go, then the believers, if a minority, have very likely to find a new building.

This is what they have to do, have often done, and in America for example, are currently doing. It is nothing so strange, sacrifice for Christ, taking up one's cross, doing it the way He commands. The other way is to put up cultural inhibitions and indulge in breach of apostolic prohibitions. There are two responses: yes and no.

This need for a people to re-locate their meeting place frequently happens; but it is not severe as having to find a new body, the task for Christ after the crucifixion! Obedience may well lead to revival, stimulating consciences and preparing hearts; and example cannot be undervalued as to its force on others. If someone in politics does not seem to MEAN BUSINESS, he tends to be discounted. At least, in obedience, as with Noah, the world stands condemned, and this can impact piercingly on conscience and then on action! Omitting it is omitting this aid to revival, endorsing sloppy sleepiness, the snores of indifference or the groans of defeat.

Thus if the ecclesiastical body in question refuses to obey when the case comes up, it is in rebellion from the word of God (I Corinthians 14:37). It cannot have everything. It can at a cost, obey; and it can, at a far greater cost, disobey. To change the meaning of those two words, however, while often sought by many in effect, is neither profitable nor edifying. If it were possible, it would confuse the issue. However, let us use words with meanings intact, and bear the consequences of our actions. God is merciful; but He does not fool with disobedience as a principle or position

In fact, Paul is designating some very potent items in such contexts as these. In Acts 20, those involved are wolves and sheep. Similarly, in Jude, waves foaming our their own shame are depicted in the negative case, put to those who must fight for the faith once for all delivered to the saints. Even the blind can hear the waves.

Accordingly, in Jude, believers exhorted not only to listen to sound doctrine of salvation, but to contend for the faith, while the waves rage, foam and set forth their great swelling song of vanity. Naturally, the contention includes carrying out that warfare in the essential ways both illustrated in Jude in the succeeding verses, and so often repeated in the Bible. 'Contend' is not the same as deliver speeches, though this is one format.

If you are told in an Army to contend, and there are standing orders from millenia back, in type, then there ought to be no confusion. If earthly armies often DO show such confusion, there is neither need nor permission for that voluntary army of the Lord to share in such negligence.

As for those seeking to mingle with the saints, yet manifestly not interested in keeping to the faith once for all committed to the saints, the designations and illustrations given for edification on this point, are of one kind. As to Jude, examples of the extinction or shame or eternal chains due for those who fail to keep to this faith, are loaded and as vigorous as well might be. Indeed, the tenor and tone, in essence, is just like that of Paul in II Corinthians 6.

Thus in Jude, we are told to snatch from the fire SOME of them, despising even the fleshly garments. That is hardly a fitting approach to anyone in your church, or even club for that matter. Jude and Paul are in precise concourse in their various messages: there is an ABHORRENCE so that it is almost impossible to deal at all with such persons, flaming and unclean, but if there is hope of salvation, then with extreme distaste, act speedily and clinically (Jude 22-23), as you would be well advised to do, if someone were on fire! That is part of the message of Jude.

Involvement spiritually ? It is excluded from the first, distempered to the last, the only possible contact being one of a saving nature, and that not in the concourse of the normal, but in the emergency speed of a crisis. Even then, it is to be despatched with distaste, felt with abhorrence, yet executed with deft deliverance if it may be wrought. SNATCH the flaming and near lost soul out of the flames.

It is like a Hospital, but a dirty hospital has no relief. It is mere words. Filthy garments, flames ?

You do not eat with that. It needs attention FIRST. Church being (Acts 4, Ephesians 4) the very living body of Christ with all its sinews and elements in intimate concourse as the apostle describes it, with Christ Himself the Head, and therefore being a body of the uttermost spiritual and social intimacy (cf. Acts 4), at a spiritual level, then the cleavage once more is apparent. Of course some body purportng to be a Church, which does not so act can scarcely claim to be one, in biblical terms, at all. Even where laxity and verbal squalor was the kind of failure, Paul was ready to engaged in open conflict and engagement in the power of God (II Corinthians 12-13), as he did in the Galatians 2 (Acts 15) case.

God is patient, as you see in Revelation 2:20-23, 2:15, but time limits are set. Reasonable response and repentance is required and the situation cannot breed (Revelation 3:3, 2:5). This last verse specialises on the emergent urgency of time! ACT and do not delay, for the case like a critical infection in hospital, MUST receive timely attention. It is not static, but an emergency is in view.

So no, Paul is not advocating cleavage of what are definable as Churches, heaven forbid; He is advocating removal of certain inhabitants of what otherwise quickly are liable for a title of a different kind, like the 'not my people' in Hosea. He wants table tennis players not to be seen on the cricket pitch, and cricket to be the discussion in concert.

You seem to think of 'impossible to achieve' as something relating to what is required in terms of the commandments; but this is not scriptural either. His commandments are not burdensome, and He does not ask us to perform what is not for abundant life, for which He came, but what is; and He does not ask us to think, but to DO. NOTHING shall be called impossible with God (Luke 1:37, Matthew 17:20). If HIS mind desires it, and so it is with God, then the impossible is unintrusive.

When Paul declares this, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me" (Philippians 4:13 cf. Ephesians 3:16), his is not posing as superman but exhibits an example (I Corinthians 11:1). He is telling us of what he has learned (Philippians 4:11-12). It is not as a gnostic oddity, but a Christian path that it is given. To God, never say CAN'T to a COMMANDMENT. Ask instead help and grace (Hebrews 4:16).

If a 'Church' structure seems to make it impossible to do what you are commanded within it, then you either stay because of presuppositions and cultural preference and the like, or you obey. You are not REQUIRED to stay, and so make your own impossibilities, outside of the Lord's required path. If you try to change a tyre with a screw-driver you may meet something like an impossibility. The means however are provided. The commands are clear. The power of God is present. On the required path we can tread with confidence, an adventure in faith, a joy in service to the Lord. Never have I found His power insufficient, though often my own!

He is reliable to the uttermost, and as to power, Acts 5:32 tells us that He gives His Holy Spirit to those who obey Him. It is part of the inheritance of the Christian, and nothing can stop that capacity so conferred from being adequate to faith.

Arguments to the effect that I CANNOT do not remove rebellion. when Paul declares this, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me," he is neither removing the cost or encountering failure.

Sacrifice, then ? Oh yes. When I COULD not remove Principal Geering in his anti-resurrection heresy from the Church in New Zealand, where I was an ordained Minister of that Church, I went to the Assembly, backed by the Session of the Church where I was pastor, and told them that whatever princes or philosophers might think, the resurrection of the body was necessary, central, apostolic, and affirmed unconditionally in terms of NOT ROTTING, the simplest of terms. A failure to act, to denounce the heresy that did not affirm the resurrection of the body, which allowed this view in the Church teaching, would bring on them condemnation.

They did not so act, but rather made the bodily resurrection merely optional. Therefore I had no option: the condemnation on biblical grounds was brought on. In a little, I had to cast off the dust of my feet upon them. I could have no involvement in that, nor be mixed up in it in any way, be it this or that element of the outreach of that term.

Did I lose ? only some social savour, money, prestige, continuation in a delightful setting, place as pastor, losing the joys of that land, friends there made and so forth. What of it ? When it comes to the Lord, I count all things but loss that I might gain Him (Philippians 3:7-8); and having Him, I have no heart to deviate from Deity. We all have fights to meet, battles to confront (cf. I Peter 4:12ff., Ephesians 6); but surrender is no action in view. There are then results.

In the New Zealand case mentioned, if the wicked person, talking of the dust of Christ's body being in Palestine, were not removed from teaching, his doctrine condemned, if this were found to be the will of the Assembly (and it was!), then what ? If that Church body would not put him away, then I had another option within obedience to Christ. Rather than be a participant in contempt of Christ, I put him away in the way one always can. It had become my duty to condemn in Assembly the doctrine, presenting exhortation and challenge in the Church and in the Prebsytery, using newspapers in company with a medical specialist, one of the elders and visiting and warning the people.

All this had been done. But more was required if the command to separate were to be kept. AVOID does not mean be vocally negative about errors, not discreetly subdued in cases savouring of involvement directly. It requires turning one's path from that of those concerned; and joint membership in a Church, where rebellion is TAUGHT, is not such. It is to be voluntarily enmembered in something claiming to be the body of Christ, but which is disastrously dissident from its Head, which is left some way apart from the body concerned, as if by guillotine. I should rather be apart from such a body as that, than from the Head. I should rather bring things to a head and stay with my Head, than join a severed body, already attacking the Head it pretends to worship. I should not care to be enjoined in such as Christ characterised in Matthew 23.

The Seminary Principal concerned would not be removed from teaching ? Then I must go. At last, with changing numbers in our ruling body, I left after strong denunciation, presentation of grounds (in that case, around 17000 words, an official document supporting my call in Assembly to have my dissent recorded). Staggeringly, it appears that I alone out of hundreds actual had my dissent recorded. To what was it recorded ? Why it was to that dreadful assault on the bodily resurrection of Christ as simple fact and required doctrine, which came from the disgraced Assembly of 1966..

Whatever it takes, is done. If it cannot be done, and you find this, then either you lack faith or you are to be out. If you have faith, it will be done. But to disobey and to stay in a body which freely has Primate letting people come to God without Jesus, as but one example, is so unthinkable as to be more than comic. It is tragic.

In Jude, which you mention, the appropriate and specific response in the area of his definitively chosen specialty of concern, is clear. Since you present on this topic, we must answer. As with many of these points which you raise, they are not necessary for knowing what to do, since so many scriptures are simplicity itself on the point. However, since they concern your mind, they must receive attention in reply.

What then is Jude saying ? His purpose in this epistle is not what it had been, namely to build each other in any direct sense. Always relevant, that is not the pith of the crisis he now addresses.

NOT HERE, in this epistle of Jude, is the focus the common salvation but instead CONTENDING in the presence of wolves, shams, shameless intruders takes the stage. This then negates the other and more general one, as to primary intent (Jude 3).

Though building up in the faith is always a good thing to do, and certainly never excluded (as when a doctor gives you general health notes but also and crucially a specific antibiotic which is his current interest if you have a specific disease), since this improves your overall performance in any dimension: yet the point at issue here is by Jude defined. (Jude's approach is treated in detail in News 43.)

Whereas his approach had been "our common salvation", now it is something else which he has found necessary to declare, and he proceeds to note what it is and then to do it.

Let us then be clear. What is this something else, this constraining topic, this special field into which Jude is prompted to move, instead of extending earlier words ? It is this. Creeping men have as in times gone by, come to deliver dangerous pollution and it is thus requisite to contend earnestly for the changeless faith.

In this epistle, Jude elaborates on similar cases in the past, he illustrates in practice and in principle.

Examples are given of former infections within the people of God, and the devastations wrought on the perpetrators, the horrendous nature of such crimes, the inflammatory character of their ways and destiny, the everlasting chains for the expression of their fate, the results for the fearlessly dissident, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, the woe which is the impending impact for such rebellions against the Lord, their compilation with wandering Cain, their perishing as with Korah.In that case, it was a very specific matter of separating, being somewhere not occupied by the rebels at all. Thus when those who would not obey the word of God met in their own separate place, it was so that they could perish quite literally.

The people had actually been required to separate BEFORE the destruction of those daring to challenge the work, authority and provisions of God by divine revelation. The matter proceeded in high and exemplary drama, of the most edifying kind. The result came in short order, and to this Jude refers in application of his command.

It was physical, social, personal; there were contrary groupings by orientation, executed by command, provided with warning and commands both deliberate and awesome. It was the Mosaic parallel to II Corinthians 6. Abomination from the Lord competed with abhorrence of the evil, and irresistible power conquered the diversification of authority. There is one God, one source of command and competition with Him, in addition, subtraction, confrontation, effrontery, however plausible, is divinely exposed and here removed. We have volition and can freely act, not in physical removal of persons, but if they do not go, of ourselves. The case is simplicity itself.

In indicating the swift destruction to come, or which did come, on the illustrative cases, Jude is not saying that God allows continuance, but issues His own discontinuance. Where there is history, He acts. Where there is destiny, He acts. In either case, it is complete and final, except for repentance. There is no mixing anywhere in any way, except at the end, and even then, when some on whom you have compassion, there is to be a quick act of deliverance, wrought with great care, as they whisked out of their burning state. And to what are they taken ? it is of course to the safety where you stand, not burning.

Will a fireman whisk the victim into a flaming truck, out of the flaming forest! So the Church must be clean, and rescue with diligence as case may permit (Jude 21-23).

A church burning is not a place from which to draw to safety an individual burning. This fits with the fact that Jude was GOING to write on general topics such as you envisage, but statedly changed his mind. INSTEAD he decided on a change of message entirely. Now it was not on general terms, but on a special peril that he spoke. As to the creepers who get in, WOE to them! There is no more thought of inclusion that of cancer.

Does the pastor then properly admonish them ? Woe to many of you here, false wolves! Or is the pastor one of them ? In a disobedient Church, that becomes a real question!

The Greek verb used for 'contend' here is used quite widely in sense, as when an army was to contend against Hannibal. Whatever it takes, in biblical conspectus, whatever are the spiritual weapons, for our warfare is with principalities and powers (Ephesians 6), we USE it. It involves discipline, exposure, exposé (II Cor.10:5), discipline (II Timothy 4:2), removal (I Cor. 5-6, II Cor. 6), cleaning (II Cor. 6:14, II Timothy 2:19ff., Isaiah 52:11).

The Bible specifies in its many illustrations of the CHANGED topic to which Jude comes to address himself, how many and what devastating destructions and undesirable destiny are apt for those unrepentant: it covers time present and to come in its cited dimensions. These people are ungodly, unspiritual, destined (if they do not repent) to the vigour of hell. Clean up your church then, snatch out what you may, be warned of impending destruction, do not dally, act with every power you have in spiritual zeal. This is the thrust.

At this point, you are not predominantly clarifying the Gospel which they wilfully distort. Specifically you are DEALING with devilish and devious devices seeking to overthrow, make of the church of God a means of rebellion, an effrontery to God and a myth for man.

Let us revert to the example of Korah - and ALL scripture is given for our instruction: as in Numbers 16:21ff., the illustration shows what was done, indicating priorities. Moses, under the direct orders of the Lord, tells the congregation to SEPARATE themselves from such wickedness. (In that case, it was a matter of varying from the commands of the Lord with private opinions, creating wanton schism when the task was hard enough and the fractious example was perilous to all. This brings us to another point which you raise.

Let us consider the present case of Korah in Numbers 16, then. When the separation of those rebelling and those not doing so was complete, at the appointed time, a fire from the Lord then consumed them. This is the answer for you, to the strange question, indeed, about the Lord not saying something you have in mind at a particular part of scripture. Emphasis and repetition is for God to decide on. Let us consider some of the normal teaching principles in this connection.

It is as if anyone should have some idea of how much repetition God should engage in, and by whom He should say this and that, when already the Bible bulges with just such things.

Each biblical writer under direct divine discretion and power, has his own task, precision, and each with all is made into a symphony, none out of place (cf. Luke 24:25-27). That query in this context is in fact a non-point, therefore. I am sorry to have to say that it is not even relevant to that humility you seem so to desire, not to intrude opinions. If God says a thing, once, twice, thrice, is He to become a parrot in planning ? I think not. One learns FROM Him, rather than instructs Him.

What is the principle of instruction to the point here ? As a teacher, a person may repeat, vary tone and tenor, aspect and element, include here, exclude there, weigh impact, work diligently and perceptively (if one can, but with God there is no limit), to secure the optimal result with the student.

However as above, concerning the examples which may or may not be listed: we CAN read and so can they. A thing is given as discretion and wisdom elect.

In no single instance do the cases mentioned in Jude involve continuation in company with unrepentant heretics; and in this enormous conflagration of history, the prophet makes his explicit point so clear that we can almost see by the fire to this day. That, as in Numbers 16, a dire example, was physical destruction as well as separation; it is the latter on which we here dwell. (On Jude, see News 43, Message ... 3).

Indeed, the latter was required, separation, that the former might proceed, judgment. As with Lot, it was a case of divine retribution, and being distinct in field was a prelude for those who thus separated, to their not being destroyed, for they were by then absent from the site of the rebels. It would be foolish, unwise, clumsy, awkward, imprecise, lacking in the fear of God if they had not separated, just as Moses in addition COMMANDED them to do so. The nature, destiny and appearance of doom versus haven in heaven, for the two groups in prospect, was infinitely different.

Just as repetition can nauseate, and sometimes needs to do so to the recalcitrant, so on occasion omission can leave room for one's thoughts; and the perfect teacher uses discretion in discerning which course to take. There are multiple possibilities. As to GOD, He is the perfect teacher.

Let us then move on with the case of Jude, in which you showed some interest, and link this with II John.

Your idea that none of the readers of Jude "were in a position" to expel, has no effective ground, when you see just how the apostles can act. Sometimes people loiter in the field of duty; but there is no necessity or much reward for it.

You see this in Paul's intended "sharpness" if necessary in II Corinthians 12-13 (that is, if they did not clean up their act and repent, there would be action to correct even in the very power of God Himself).

What he has in mind is shown earlier in his words,
which are mordant and definitive in I Corinthians 5:4-8

It was later, then, that he emphasised his assurance that those remorselessly out of order should find that though he for his own personal part was weak, yet in the power of the risen Christ, they would have confrontation and results if remedy did not arrive. Such actions and the correlative words do not give support to any imagination of soft hands on hard issues, where not understanding but obedience was the test. The apostolic church was not timid, did not dither: on the contrary, it tended to mean precisely what was said by the Lord, and this often with delighted enthusiasm as in Acts 4.

Thus Paul warns them very strongly ( II Cor. 13:4-6), about thinking him too weak to discipline, or too dilatory to close the questions raised:

Nor does any scripture make it right to do wrong; but far to the contrary is the requirement. Indeed, II John tells us that if any do not bring the doctrine of Christ, we are not to receive them even into our houses (and there were of course house churches, then as now - I Cor. 16:19). Indeed, you are not even to 'greet' such persons. It is all fraud, pretence, as it were spies in the midst of a home country (cf. Galatians 2:4). It becomes sacrilegious to be mixed up with them at all. The word of designation and the deeds correlative are consistent, insistent, implacable, unrelenting. Disobey at your peril. Be warned.

God is indeed able to keep His people from falling, but let us be clear: to disobey and then abuse grace in this way is not unknown in scripture.

Balaam is another on the negative side, a rebel, listed in the words of Jude.

One whose tedious and tiresome deviousness is grievous and treated to great condemnation in Jude and II Peter, is Balaam. He is a prime example of the negative path in terms of separation of services to God, with God, without involvement with the enemy, or participation: he exemplifies the horror of it all, to the uttermost point!

While speaking as if the word of God were sacrosanct, worshipful, inflexible, he himself was less so!

Refusing to be separate and trying to have God re-interpret the clearest commission: this was his appalling fault.

At the outset, when it came to men seeking him come and curse Israel, to help Moab, God declared clearly: DO NOT GO. He did not. But they returned with more offers, and pleasant courtesies, attractive to the devious mind.

Balaam no more simply dismissed them, avoided them, refused to be mixed up with them.

Instead, considering the gain, what did he say on this second approach from Moab ?

I will ask God tonight, said Balaam, as if he had not already been told, on an earlier night. Did he want God to be turned, like some seller of goods, into a bargainer. ; the circumstances did not alter the fact that this was a clear cut country with a clear cut mission and a clear desire to have Balaam perform a defined work. It was NOT, DON'T GO! Balaam obeyed to a point; but on the second visit, he was given permission to go, a fearsome warning to dilettante dabbling. This permission was in order that he should become an example!

The case in fact was just as it had been at the beginning of the renegade's episode. Result: as in II Peter 2:14ff.. It is like having a culture of golden staph in the Hospital, perhaps kept permanently on the clothes of one of the doctors ... It is not wise, permissible or clean. Separate now, and not sometime is the point, when the word applies.

Yes such duplicitous dealings are known and cited in the Bible. But how is it treated ? Such a thing is however known only for condemnation. If your doctor said, Take these pills and exercise, and this can keep you from sickness; and you then do not do what you are told, but remember the bit about keeping you from sickness, you are most unwise. You then have disrupted the context, disturbed the provision, carelessly misused the obvious intent, and dared to try some kind of defence. That is an illustration of using parts of a text without discretion or discrimination. Precisely as it is, so let it be.

That appears to be one of the most inordinately objectionable features of such dealings (cf. II Corinthians 11, Jeremiah 2:35, 7:4-11). People simply invent what they want and invest the word of God with their notions, and then act as if they were all right to do so.

Consider this in the arena of the II Corinthians 12-13 episode mentioned. Even in that particular case, such a person would be arrogantly presumptuous in this thing, if unrepentant. Paul showed this well enough by his reference to committal to Satan!

Disobedience is never humble, and God characterises rebellion with witchcraft, obedience on the other hand as better than one's sacrifice. Rebellion has no name for humility (I Samuel 15:22); but it has much for a discipline that can become horrendous even to consider.

"Has," asks Samuel, "the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord." It is perfectly apparent that He does not; and moreover that He expects obedience. Indeed the whole life story of Saul with Samuel is an illustration of the extent of this re-interpretation idea. Saul acted in a matter of regal import, in a way contrary to divine orders, and to divine order as well. He precipitately deemed sacrifice to be 'needed' in view of circumstances, without waiting for the prophet to come as planned and ordered.

In that case, it was so simple in appearance, so dangerous in the spiritual context. Samuel told Saul to wait for his coming before action. Saul thought Samuel rather a long time, and sacrificed, though king not priest, to get things moving. This disfigured the word of God, and His work.

No more to be king, Saul paid in precious coin for his adjustment of the word of God, even to the loss of his kingdom. He ended up dabbling in spiritism, trying to contact Samuel even after he had died. It is to God, not man, that one looks for mercy, and for Him, not man, that one seeks to find obedience.

Alas for Saul, his initiative and sense of need transcended his trust, so that he became marked with special divine odium, despite Samuel's later lingering sadness. Samuel's rebuke to Saul for this presumption is a classic both in historical setting and in spiritual resonance through the ages.
When it comes to presumption on one's own wits, or performance on God's word, there is nothing to choose. It is creditable or derelict; it is a voyage, or a reef.

Reverting to more of Jude, pursuing John, considering Supervisors,
Teachers of Tattle not Truth

You can love your enemies, but must not follow their ungodly ways (Jude 15 in fact, three times in one verse uses the word 'ungodly' regarding such, mockers). Nor must you be mixed up with them, allow their godless spiritual deadness and disease to contaminate your life, whether then it be your prayer meetings, pulpits, eldership, superintendent structure. You do not thus act. You do not proceed in Church as if flaming fires (Jude 23) in its spiritual corridors were the setting for spiritual strength, as if damnation were suitable for church membership, as if two can certainly walk together, though they be disagreed (contrary to Amos 3:3). THIS disagreement is spiritual, concerns the clear provisions of the word of God.

How much of the word of God is to be re-written for such indulgence to those whom the Christian is exhorted not even to greet: that being a specific order for this specific disease (II John), and one of considerable significance (II John 10-11)! None if one obeys.

But AVOID THEM, this is the word of God written; and if this sort of enemy does not even warrant greeting, or reception, what is to be said for the place accorded deception for those who allow them on the board of the Church, and more unthinkably on the supervisory committee or in the role of teacher or ruling elder or the like!

Such are isolated in shame. Rescue one here or there, but do not dabble in forbidden authority (cf. Titus1:5-9, I Timothy 3, Jude 22).

Such persons, supervisors, these must not only have a very different character but be "apt to teach" (Titus 1:9, I Timothy 3:2), "holding fast the faithful word", and able "by sound doctrine, both to exhort and convict those who contradict."

Imagine selecting a bishop, if it were possible for one so to do, and actually installing one who was so inept at teaching, that he positively taught error as a specialty, so little held fast to the faithful word that he became a byword for innovation, so unable to convict those who contradict that he is one of them! How hilarious! What sacking seems due for those who so selec, and give authority to such persons. If you were to translate this sort of gross failure in applying selection criteria, into ordinary labour action, what a travesty it would be!

Would it be merely a matter of incompetent so to instal the exact opposite of what is given in the job description ? Far more than this, it would be a mockery, an insult to the management, and nothing less. It could even become a case of criminal negligence, so audacious and witless.

Error is not much good at refuting itself! Those under its domain do not serve well in enlightening others concerning it, and showing them how to avoid that in which they dabble, or by which they themselves are illicitly and horrendously controlled. Such bathetic misuse of church authority reminds one of the lambasting Christ gave to well-known exhibits of the disease in Matthew 23. One cannot think of any literature with a higher power to denunciation than that one, exposing high claims and shameless departure from biblical precepts with words that crusade into the history of derision.

The thing that does NOT happen within the peaceable performance of the command, is this: that you do not turn away, but have ostensible fellowship (a Church MUST since it IS in part a fellowship - Acts 2:42, I Corinthians 1:9, Philippians 1:5, I John 1:7, Ephesians 2:21); or continue where it is formal teaching by heretics and wolves, authorised to be among the lambs.

Indeed, where such is the character of permission in a body, that body has no permission to continue to be, and those who are believers lack permission to be in it. In fact, if Christians turn away, then only ecclesiastical nonentity is left behind.

What then ? It is an exercise in ruin, duplicity and peril, not for the sheep, not for their lambs, not for their acknowledgement, not for them to turn to, to acknowledge in joint meetings.

Not thus is the tenor or temper of Paul's instructions to the elders, the supervisors (Acts 20:27ff.). Imagine a responsible body actually suffering wolves to be set in the flock, authorised personnel, with lambs!

The apostle did not warn them that the engulfment of the lambs by the natural action of the teeth and mouths of the wolves might be officially authorised! He did not suggest at all that this would be a good way of dealing with wolves, to induct them to office, a good site for families, to bring near the lambs, a good work to support in word, deed, organisation or structure, in name or interest, so that insidious Satan might continue his blandishments, as if he somehow belonged.

People can disobey God in many ways in this field. Thus if a church allows this sort of thing, it is in rebellion, endorsing at its hierarchical or other top human level, what is condemned. If you want to be apostolic, you avoid it. If you do not, then you are personally and individually involved in the common bond of the stated body concerned, in this rebellion. You may deplore it, but you add to it by not AVOIDING what you are IN.

All commands cut. All loss can be grievous, whether of the odd million dollars or friend or social prestige; and though some loss is not essential to the point of severing Christian discipleship, and can be disregarded in its impact and import: yet it occurs. ALL things but dross that I may win ... says Paul in Philippians 3:8, on his way to Philippians 3:19ff., a little later, where he deals with the reality of the assured resurrection, "Who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body ... ".

What refuses to ACT in SUCH a way that the REQUIRED result is obtained is merely a subsidiary in a category. It can be done because you want to, because you find the cost too high, because your sense of solidarity is of such and such a mind, because of your historical feelings or a hundred other considerations. All must face the same fiery trial (I Peter 4). The important thing is not to fail to obey.

Moreover, what does Ephesians 5:11 tell us but that we should have NO "fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them". What are examples of these in this Epistle to the Ephesians ? Why the "fornicator, unclean person," and again the "idolater" who worships what is definably different from the God of the Bible. In fact, Paul goes further (Ephesians 5:7): "Do not be partakers with them," he asseverates! The term rendered 'partakers' in the negative, means not to be joint partakers with them, not to cast your lot with them, not to share with them.

Once more there is this prohibition, put in so many ways and in so many forms, in the norm of exclusion once more. What fellowship after all does light have with darkness ? Greys may have their days, but light so defined is no concomitant with darkness, the spiritual with the carnal, the conforming with the malconformist! That is no way to treat the name of the Lord.

Obedience is never impossible; it can be most grievous, as when I have had to suffer expropriation of my good name by wolves, by slanderers, loss of income, position, and the like, removal from this or that by some authority, required to make appeal, to exhibit and expose what many do not want to know. What of it ? It is all dross compared with the deliverance of serving Christ. If one fails, it is not to be in principle. If one slips, it is not to become a habit.

Neither Paul nor Peter just hated wolves: they dealt with them summarily, as in Acts 8:17ff., where Peter declares to Simon, a newly professing Christian, erupting into error, wanting to purchase something of the performance power of the Spirit of God:

In Acts 13:10, Paul dealt with the opposition in spiritual manner, this time an outsider to be sure, but to one impending and acting in the very path of endeavour to bring salvation to another, saying,

and not satisfied with that, he brought a blindness on wrong-doer for a time. This too is relevant in its categorical nature in insisting on purity with no compromise in all things and at all times, all co-operations; for if the evil person had been allowed to continue influencing the convert, he might have made a new form of synthetic heresy.

In fact, Paul, in I Corinthians 5, gives express, simple and direct command (v. 13):

In context, that is one in any of the categories of exclusion, limiting who is included in the Church. This is not difficult to understand. IF obedience comes, then the command is applied. In that case, at the very outset, the spiritual criminal element is deleted, as in Deuteronomy 13:9ff., those making efforts so like the modern ones, dabbling with other gods and their imaginary ways. This of course deals with the recalcitrant, the unrepentant, and in the spiritual order of the Church of the New Testament, not linked with theocracy, it means outside the camp, excluded from the fellowship. It does not, however, mean that when you are not partakers with such, exclude them, "do not share with them,” “have no fellowship with them,” turn away from them - those who in the case cited by Paul were actually stoned to death: that you merge into a church with them.

Just as you do not, of course, put someone away from Church members by having him or her continue to be a member, far less do you have formally received speakers of this kind: that would be not only disobedience or rebellion, but provocative arrogance against the Lord, and intensive neglect towards the young. If there is a number of such persons, then each in his category and place and time, each is to be put away. There is no respect of persons with God, who is just. Hygiene in a hospital is not legalism, nor is cleanness in a Church derangement, except of the dirt which infects. If we love the sinner, let him repent and be snatched from the fire; but let us not hate the children of God by allowing sin to banish righteousness where we have voluntarily lodged our church membership.

If a large group of such wicked misleaders is involved in a 'church' , then each is divorced from it, who has divorced from the will, doctrine and truth of God. This is not the pastoral aspect, which has longing and care, but the administrative side, when the pastoral fails.

If more than half the church is involved, then since you cannot then put them away, and the 'church' is now not under the control of Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour, and hence not a Church, for the Church is His body, and however imperfect, is not crassly to be confused with what repudiates Him and His word: so once more the commandment has its result.

In that case, the minority which remains in the 'church' has to separate from what is a fraud, and instead continue in sincerity. One reads of such cases. The Reformation was not easy, for in the 1660s some 2000 Anglicans of blessed memory left their manses, incomes and security, for really harsh results, rather than obey what was to be forced on Churches, but not biblical.

Nor was it easy for Bunyan, though it appears unquestionable that he gained a far wider ministry through the 12 years or so of labour in the prison through his spiritual writings, than was ever likely to have been wrought in the pulpit, had he succumbed to the temptation to share the Church for which Christ died, with the world.

The likelihood, however, of a majority being in rebellion, if in the church the command had been obeyed from the first, is not great; but if it did happen, then that is the result.

If they cannot be put away from the Church, then the Church in leaving them, has corporately put them away, being in new residence under the same presidency, but not that of the recalcitrant, anomalous body which sought and in this case, secured take-over. Militarily, it would be like storm-troopers taking over a position. Those surrendering to become virtual prisoners of war need to examine what sort of war it is, and who is in this setting, exercising dominance ... Better than that, evacuate and fight on, with honour undimmed, and hope constant.

What, however, if a Church has been ludicrously and even almost comically slack, failing to put away the evil person and the ilk, for decades or even centuries ? Then it was no place to join; but if one is joined to it, its rebellion from Romans 16:17, for example makes it a rebellious body (I Corinthians 14:27, 2:9ff., II Peter 3:16), not to be confused with New Testament Churches. Procedure may take a little; but it does not and cannot take a life, which otherwise would be a life of disobedience.

In that case, there needs to be repentance. If such persons as do repent, and have no thought except to remain with Christ and His word, do not have the numbers or set-up, what then ? Then, after prayer and seeking to remove the evil ones, they need to go where they are removed by their own abstraction. They have to do what they are told and separate. Doing this, the result is the same, and it is this result of separation which is the requirement.

You can remove your car from the kerb by removing the kerb or the car. If removal is the criterion, either does it. If in the spiritual case, it must be stressed, due action had occurred in its time, then the more difficult but still obligatory case would almost certainly not occur. Sometimes, cars being more mobile than kerbs, they have to be started up by the will, with the pedal on the accelerator of obedience put down, and move. They are, such things as cars and people, relatively mobile. The case is calamitous if the car tries to move the kerb. The massive fixture of a carnal majority in a church is already disaster.

Historically, this happened in the Presbyterian Church in the US in the early 1900s. The Auburn Affirmation^*3showed a desire for laxity towards men in the Ministry who did not adhere to certain orthodox statements and beliefs. The Assembly granted this liberty; for those asking for it, were not ostensibly asking for it for themselves, but in the interests of 'liberty' for others. Soon the Assembly year came when those who were heretical were in the majority, and they had no toleration of those who were biblical. Princeton Theological Seminary sacked a missionary-minded Professor of New Testament, who insisted on sending out missionaries who actually believed the Gospel, and more even than that, the Board of Professors was merged with another Board, and the Bible then and there ceased to be the only authoritative book for doctrine.

Naturally, thousands left the body, and continued in another Church. That is the situation. The loss occurred because some did not act in time.

That is one reason why Jude is writing. It IS URGENT. Action is necessary^*4. You have to contend for the faith, not amend the standards. You have to separate from Korah or separate him from you, but you CANNOT in any spiritual vein at all, go with him.

The cultural concept that a commandment is not to be obeyed because of its results, is mere human wisdom disprizing the privilege of divine revelation. WHY, asks Christ, do you call Me Lord and NOT do what I say! That is the whole point, that one must not avoid the commandments but do them, applying what is relevant, not what is unrelated.

You cannot continue to work with them, in their midst, with them in your midst, in their organisation, one captured if they are allowed to remain: unless, in the end, proceeding to the position of a traitor. Therefore, if you cannot remove them, you go elsewhere, and fight from there. That fulfils the command. You are not confined to any one building, and can in fact meet in a home. The Church is where God's people are, and this is not that.

You try to save some ? it is good so to seek: but that is not the point here in view. Let us recall that Jude was GOING to write on this general topic of salvation but instead dealt in terms of immediate separation and showed attestation from the scriptures, exhibited in many examples, so that the generalities are excluded as the topic and point of his address. The specialties speak for themselves. In an extraordinary feat, you might be able to snatch some not consumed ember and draw it to the peaceful grown of spiritual security. It is a clinical exercise, as when a dentist puts on gloves. You must hate, if you have to come so near as all that, even the garment, even the cultural conditions, the very savour of hell present in such a burning relic.

The Church is not the world, not a place where a blight rules; it is a saved and saving platform through the Gospel, and needs to be clean as it is written (Isaiah 52:11), and certainly not on fire, with no fire engines at work.

"Depart, depart," it says, "you who bear the vessels: be clean!" Paul cites this in II Corinthians 6:17-18, crying

As in Isaiah 52, that was good preparation, exhortation and orientation for the coming of the Lord as shown in 49-55 and this from Paul, is good preparation for His return.

It is a pity he is so extravagantly not obeyed. The Gentile is no better than the Jew; each has been lifted up in vast prodigies of divine grace, in many ways; and each has prodigiously failed nationally or ecclesiastically or both.

Those who continue to resist the commands of God need warning, and we do not hesitate to give it. It is good that some are willing to listen. Man shall live by EVERY word which proceeds out of the mouth of God. These are some of them. Man shall live by every word which proceeds out of that divine mouth, and so proceed with them in heart, abiding in faith, hungering for righteousness (Psalm 119:20,24), knowing where it is found, blessed in the divine life (John 15:7), in Christ so freely given (Romans 3:23ff.).

Here then is a key: if His words abide in you and you abide in Him, you shall ask what you will, and it will be done for you (John 15:7). IF that is the case, then so embraced is your heart with His principles, so imbued your mind with His commands, so actively operative is your faith, so near is your Lord, that it is so. Consider the path of Christ Himself, as in Luke 22:39ff. : the way opened into agony but was wrought with strength and ended in felicity. To abide in Him and therefore in His words, this is the highway of holiness, whether even fools do not err! (Isaiah 35).

Then, whether it be

for the God of all comfort, as counsellor and friend, not convenience and manipulee,

so that He is the LORD who is God
and not the idol which is a mere imagination of a mutable mind:

there is the relish of reality.

There and then is found the comfort of His Creator's smile, His strength as Redeemer, His inspiration as teacher and His companionship as working in us, both to will and to do (as in Philippians 2).

There is such a sweep and staccato rush in the scriptural prohibitions on fellowship where wolves, the recklessly wayward, the seduced into spiritual rebellion and the wilfully and contrarily disobedient to the word of God are concerned, that you find resonances like the one to follow.

Thus, just as Paul says in Romans 16:17 that IF there is a division from the apostolic formulations, doctrines, then those causing it have to be AVOIDED, there readily arise overtones of the principle, a natural outworking of a great truth.

Who are these to be avoided then, who cause divisions as noted ? Those firstly are the ones who teach otherwise (reinforced in I Timothy 6, where one comparatively mild - social - example of divergence from what Christ authorises in doctrine, qualifies for exclusion and separation. Secondly these include those who being willing to be misled, go with them, thus DIVIDING the church of God, since HIS disciples are FORBIDDEN such a step.

Now in II Thessalonians 2:15-16 and 3:6 we have another resonance, in addition to that in Timothy. Here we are told first, as a lead to the prayer of Paul for the everlasting consolation of the people of God, the admonition, the exhortation, to STAND FAST. In what way are they so to stand ? It is in this way: "STAND FAST AND HOLD the traditions which you have been taught, whether by word or our epistle" (capitals added). In II Thess. 3:6 we are then acquainted with a further point.

Here there is a COMMAND TO WITHDRAW from "every brother who walks disorderly and not according to the tradition which he received from us." Paul reminds them that they KNOW how they ought to walk, since the apostle himself has been with them personally. In particular he worked and so avoided being a burden to them.

Here we find that EVEN IN the slight (relatively) anomaly or divergence of not working, perhaps just waiting for the Lord to return, there is a PROHIBITION on fellowship, so clear that it involves WITHDRAWAL. Hence when the earlier command in Ch. 2, to STAND FAST to what was taught, is applied, even a minor example is sufficient to show the result. You are with them or against them; it is not the case as with Jesus and those doing miracles in His name. Here it is those departing from the teaching, which has been authorised and given by His word and Spirit (I Cor. 14:37). So strict is this, summed up in Romans 16:17 that even so relatively small an infraction leads to a commanded withdrawal.

The Greek term signifies to avoid, turn away from, deflect, keep away from someone's society, to shun. It is found in the sense of turning away from righteousness or from evil. Such is the dictionary's contribution. This is the word rendered 'avoid' in Romans 16:17.

. It is used in I Peter 3:11 in turn away from evil; in Romans 3:12, in the sentence, "They have all turned aside, they have together become unprofitable."

There is a certain simple decisiveness about the meaning, and you see it in these well. We do not imagine that those who turn aside to become altogether unprofitable are only mild cases, that the phenomenon is in some way a wandering about. Nor does Peter incline thoughts of a certain degree of distancing: rather from evil there is an inveterate, constant and consistent dealing: LEAVE IT ALONE, avoid it.

The definition, the construction of the word (starting with 'out of'), the usages all are of one kind.

Incidentally, in a review of 26 translations of the New Testament, but no, even more than that, meanings for your Greek term re mixing are separated as: "not to keep company", "not to be mixing yourselves", "stop associating with", and some others are "not to associate with". Vine's Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words has "company", literally "mix up with", and "signifies to have or keep company with." Liddel and Scott, a classic work, may also be noted, in their vast dictionary. Their translation includes "succour" while Gingrich and Arndt have "keep company or assist", and Moulton and Milligan in their papyri work indicate "strive together with", shown in the sense of being on the same side. It would be a great church where their members were forbidden to assist one another in significant segments, a comedy of errors, with tragic tarnish.

False ecumenicity, with confused fellowship, may take many forms. However, the form that AVOID takes is not crucial; it is its avoidance which is important, radical when it is a matter of those using the name of Jesus Christ.

The body of Christ must not be joined to a (spiritual) harlot any more than the physical man should be so (I Corinthians 6:15-20, Ephesians 5:11, Revelation 2:20ff., Romans 16:17, with Ezekiel 16,23) - where the correlation between spiritual and physical defilement is made clear in the parabolic parallels.

Similarly in Revelation, there is not only the physical aspect, but the permission of the heretical woman to TEACH, which is condemned, with a time limit for exclusion and repentance. ALL uncleanness (including covetousness, a stated idolatry) is to be avoided, we learn in Ephesians 5, and from all such dealings one must be separate, not partaking with them (Ephesians 5:7), just as in I Timothy 6, where one example of unsound doctrine is given, not according to the soundness in Christ, and with this as criterion, one is told to withdraw (I Timothy 6:3).

Withdrawal (I Timothy 6:5) does not mean to continue; not to partake (Ephesians 5:7) does not mean to inhere in the same spiritual establishment. These actions contradict those words.
It is just as in II Thessalonians 2:15, where they are told to stand fast in the traditions which they had been taught (cf. Galatians 1:6-9), while in II Thessalonians 3:6ff., they have this applied to a particular case. As to that case, it is a MOST mild one by comparison with more advanced rebellion; but even here, they are not to have fellowship, so that the party might be ashamed. That is the apostolic instruction.

There could be no question of BEING in an assembly together, for that is the very heart of fellowship with each other, as parts of the body of Christ, which is not cancerous, but wholesome in Him who is Head and directs it. Indeed, in Ephesians 4, we learn of it that this, the body of Christ has apostles and prophets, pastors, teachers, and is very visible accordingly. We must, he continues, grow in all things into Christ "from whom the whole body, joined and knit together" acts in such a way that "every part does its share." Belonging to such a body is not to avoid its members, name or function, unless Paul be called a liar, and Peter a key failure (II Peter 3:16).

What then of the Thessalonians passage ? The having no fellowship is for the purpose, even in this mild case, of MAKING ashamed, and so there is a turning aside, an obvious withholding. They are NOT to be together OSTENSIBLY in Christ. This is to be registrable, so that the message is given, the impact is made. It is not that it makes no DIFFERENCE; it must make on the contrary, a categorical difference. Don’t, says the apostle, be mixed up with such. If this is the mild case, what of that more serious!

Will people suck at the bosom of wolves for the pure milk of doctrine (cf. Acts 20:29), act in concert to deliver them ? or will one expose children in a fellowship in Christ's name to such molestation of mind and spirit!

Is that how you AVOID them, and cease to be partakers or have fellowship with them ? There are many ways to HAVE fellowship and hence many in which to AVOID (Romans 16:17) it, and those of whom the apostle speaks in this direct vein: that is, those who cause divisions from the apostolic doctrine. This may be wrought by teaching contrary to it, or insisting on pursuing a contrary line in the very face of its application. Ignorance or habit may count, but seeking to defend such a position is to amend the apostolic command, which Paul assures us (I Corinthians 14:37) is the command of Christ, and would require a new religion.

What then of those who are outside the kingdom, being clear-cut rebels against His doctrine/practice, but who yet name Christ, in the light of Timothy, Corinthians, Ephesians and Romans ?

One way is to have communion with them in the same room, another is to have communion with them in the same denomination - where the body is defined by the body as its total self - another is to share spiritual life with them, another is to recognise them as Christians in any way, such as being in a denomination which accredits them, so that you as part of it see fit to conjoin with it, as they with heresy, so implicating not only your name, but your spirit, and defiling the name of Jesus Christ by your own volition.

You can bear with them ? you can acknowledge them as part of a church so sound that you can be part of it ? yours is joint membership with them in the official body in which you choose to have your earthly spiritual habitation ? This is spiritual integrity ? Here is your testimony of participation: for if you do not participate in that of which you are a member, how are you enmembered! This is the voice which you would hear and have spoken by CHOICE, when on earth, in Christ's name ? What then are you, if such a person, trying to do to His name, that you have it violated and conjoin with the wolves, as part of the stated, spiritual pack in which they raven, which you FORMALLY acknowledge as His!

So the squirming of misled spirits seek to be conjoined with a body which is in formal and official spiritual harlotry, as if so joining the body of Christ were a brothel in which to inhere. Small wonder the Lord so castigates Israel in Ezekiel for its wanton alliances, partnerships, movement and action together with what is astray in unbelief, just as it excludes what is ostensibly in faith, but alien in action.

Such was the famous case of Balaam, who corrupted Israel gravely and grossly by his impositions and posturings (cf. Numbers 22-24, II Peter 2:15, Jude 11, Revelation 2:14), words and ways apart, disobedience to the word of God so great that an ass had to speak to him, to his shame! Ezekiel 23:14-19 makes such false alliances, though spiritual and political in kind, matters of lust, having the characteristics of playing with paramours and harlotry. Just as ALL impurity is what is in mind in Ephesians 5:3, so all classes of it are subject, in divine prohibition, to merger.

In short, when you are told to AVOID, it is not for you to qualify this as if co-author of the Bible. Paul in I Corinthians 5:9-13 shows just what zeal should be shown, in executing this spiritual separation.

Consider it anew. Thus he HAD written to them not to keep company with the sexually immoral; but he makes it clear that he did not mean in so saying that they were to avoid ALL such, the covetous, extortioners, idolaters with them in a bundle. Why then, he continues, if they had taken it that way ? Why then they would have had to go out of the world! In so saying, he is expressing the impossibility of obeying such a commandment, if it were taken to be applicable to all persons in this world. He is indicating that had they taken it that way, it could not possibly have been done, so that in fact it was to be taken in another way: namely with reference to their own fellowship ONLY. This he now elucidates and states directly in I Cor. 5.

He was not legislating for the world, but for the Church, not the standards of the world, but those in the Church: that, he indicates, is the position. If you applied such standards of purity to all relationship with this world, then you certainly could not be in it! Such is Paul's explicit and apostolic direction. DO what I said, as if it applied to the whole world, and you would have to leave it. That is Paul's decisive and incisive, direct and directed message.

If you leave part of this world, going to a monastery or other segment, where this world would still decidedly be, with who knows what aberrations: then still, it is not heaven. You are still in it. Such action is far from being something out of this world. In fact, has a goodly stake in it! It would indeed have been both possible and ineffective, in seeking to fulfil Paul’s requirement, to take such a course. That is a mere shunt WITHIN this world. His meaning cannot abide in such misconceptions.

Thus he makes it clear that it is not possible to have obeyed what he was taken to mean; he did not mean that: and if he had, it could not have been done. As to this sort of religious apartness, by contrast, you COULD have done that. Clearly, this does not do what he says, is an evasion of his intent. It neither follows the force of his argument that what he had said was not possible if rightly interpreted, nor even its own romancing additive to his word. It is not out of this world, then, nor would it serve logically if it were.

The point is very simple: OBEY his command if taken most generally, and you would go out of the place where you have to be, in order to live here - the world. You can't; and that is of course not what he meant, the apostle indicates as he instructs them. What follows then ?

He makes it explicit. It is the Church world of which he speaks. But in so speaking, it is clear that in this case, the separation is strict and stringent, not oozy and fuzzy, as if still petting a fornicary partner, while not actually engaging in copulation. It is directly comparable with going out of this world, except that now it is limited to going out of THAT world as totally as would be the case if you had to physically go in orbit, or elsewhere, had it still applied to all!

If he had meant out of normal circulation, let him say it. If he means the world, he has said it. Invention of what circumvents argument such as the apostle makes, and ignores the words which he speaks, is a double whammy; and when what does not even meet the case, but imagines what is not given, even in the thing imagined and inserted, it is a third one.

Going out of this world as a reductio ad absurdum point to clarify a meaning, this does not mean going into a little world. It means what it says. Telling God what He means is always unwise, and adding qualifications or inhibitions or modifications to Him is merely to co-author His word (v. Proverbs 30:6).

Thus Paul states that he CERTAINLY did not mean that his prohibition was to cover all in such categories without restriction, not only in statement, but in logical force. IF you had taken me to mean that, he says, it would certainly not be correct, “SINCE THEN” you would have to go out of this world. Those are his words. He is so far from qualifying them that he is magnifying the point.

It is OBVIOUS, he is stating, that if you did this (what you took me to mean), you would have to do that; but you CANNOT do that. He gives as his GROUND for your not taking it that way that it could not be done, and this makes the reduction of the possibility to nothing, the reason why it should be clear that this was not its intention.

Any place where you could go which is possible is to ignore his argument and defile his reasoning, miss his point and depart from his speech.

What then of those who acting as believers in apostolic Christianity, do not so act, do not so disengage from EVEN THIS REDUCED CATEGORY OF PROFESSING CHRISTIANS WHO ARE RESOLUTELY IMMORAL! What if such people adhere round about those apostolically excluded, in this way or that… It is thus, for any doing so, to act in the very face of the apostolic authority, with those who despise it, joined in this, that it is defaced.

Such derelictive disobedience, pursued and sought, thus becomes this: to write your own rules with the prodigious error of using His name still, while you do it. It becomes like using your father’s cheque book in order to finance a robbery. What does this do to his name, while you forge his signature!

Disobedience thus to Romans 16:17, AVOID, involving avoidance, is not a small matter; nor is any rebellion; for it is 'as witchcraft' and unworthy of the saints (I Samuel 15:22-23). In fact, says Samuel, in this context, stubbornness is iniquity and idolatry. Rejecting the word of the Lord, the criterion he announces to Saul, is courting spiritual confusion and worse.

What then ? As Paul goes on to show, you must not even EAT with those of this disposition which he is excluding when they name Christ, nor must you keep company with them.

How extensive is this prohibition is shown not only by the stated necessity to leave the world if you tried to apply it to all people, but by these additional illustrations NOT EVEN to eat, far less to participate in anything more meaningful that the sharing of physical food! It is in the one sentence: not to be mixed up with such people AND NOT EVEN to eat with them! It is presented as an enforcement and application with singularity.

Consider then: if you tried to stay in this world and keep what he has in mind, YOU COULD NOT DO SO. If you stay in the same denomination with spiritual criteria ostensibly shared in common, and acknowledgement that you are a member of this joint facade, then you CAN easily do so. You can do anything if you can do that. Be your own auditor, write your own bible. But then, for such a person, who is God ? Failure to act is one thing, moreover, teaching contrary to his word, or seeking to excuse conformity to this world or not to the Bible, it is ... another.

When you come, to be more complete, to the category of those who frankly reject Christ as the only way to His Father, the sole avenue, as God to God, to this more advanced, simple and categorical case, why then you might as well, says Paul, expect to link the body of Christ the devil as do that! (II Corinthians 6:14ff.); for that is to conjoin light with darkness, the temple with idols. In that way, you make a twilight world, you parallel the neither hot nor cold ‘church’ and instead of proclaiming in disciplined obedience, Christ the light of the world, you combine His lustre with darkness, His integrity with the father of liars.

In fact, the constraints are: logical, aetiological, etymological, semantic, procedural, consequential and cumulative.

The logical flow has already been noted, as has the etymological base and the semantic impact. In terms of procedure, Paul moves from prohibition to limited prohibition as to scope, but not intent, to prohibition of eating to exclusion of the bad fellow involved. Limit upon limit comes, leading to the two components of the finale: do not EVEN eat and 'put away from yourselves the evil person'. This term for 'put away' in the Greek from which the translation is derived, means to shun, avoid. Not to be mixed up becomes not to eat and to shun progressively.

Aetiologically the sense of cause and effect is strong: there is something wholly repugnant, cordially detested, utterly corrupt, so don't be mixed up. It follows, this result.

The thing in view, the categories denoted, they cause evil, have no good, are an interruptive anomaly, a hypocritical extrusion from this world and intrusion into the Church. All right, this is not about civics, but about church realism and self-identification, Paul indicates. Therefore keep even from the same table, let no guard be let down, do not indulge in pseudo-fellowship, far less anything actual, and... SHUN such people. It is precisely like spies. They do not belong, mean only evil, do evil, are wilfully corrupted, extemporise in religion, know nothing of the power of God, and are corruptive and corrosive: so avoid all admixture, even to the table, and as to the entirety ? As in I Cor. 5:9, so in 5:13, AVOID, SHUN it, and be far from there.

The final part of this Chapter 5 is in the NKJ version, about shunning the evil person, put in inverted commas. Why ? If we turn to Deuteronomy 18:20, and remember the immense place of the prophets and the law in the knowledge and revering of much in Israel, it is rather like consulting a dictionary for a word; but here we consult the Law for the concept and the words.

In Deuteronomy 18, Moses is speaking of the great prophet ('that prophet') who was to come. He is to be heeded, divine words in His mouth, indeed His speech will present exhaustively what God has commanded to this special prophet (in fact, Himself God incarnate - Zechariah 12:10).

However, Moses is moved a little earlier, in Deuteronomy 13, to pursue implications and applications in the area of prophecy. Suppose, there is the supreme audacity for someone else to presume to speak in the name of the Lord, in such a way as to diversify deity, move to other gods. This is not the consummation following Moses, the authorised finale, the Messiah, but something very different. What of this then ? What is to be done in such a case as this ?

Here is not the completion but the obliteration (cf. Mark 7:7ff.), or the pollution of the word of God on unsound premises. What then ? What if someone of Israel, and in it, yet moves some in it to go away from the definitive revelation of the living God, to extend, amend, substitute in part or in whole, what then ? First of course, it is forbidden (as in Deuteronomy 4 and 12, to add, to subtract.)

Deuteronomy 13:4--8 speaks of this pollution in the Exodus product, Israel. Such a person is not to be spared (using a term parallel to Paul's in II Corinthians 13:2 - "I will not spare" in just such a context, though with Paul it is planted now in the New Testament setting).

Moses indicates that such a person is not to be concealed either, no, neither concealed nor spared. You must neither consent nor listen to him, Deuteronomy declares. This indeed in Moses follows the order, to "put away the evil from your midst", just as the death penalty follows it (Deuteronomy 13:9). Action is required, not specious toleration, insulting to God, defaming to His covenant and demeaning of His reality.

Public infamy is to be publicly defamed. More, that evil person in that theocracy, is to be killed.

Re context of Paul, however, the interesting exhibit is found in Deuteronomy 13:5, where they are told amidst the utter abhorrence and death penalty deliverances from the Lord, this:
"So shall you put away the evil from your midst."

In fact, in Paul's reference to this, the term in the Greek being in the accusative (meaning - evil), it matches both neuter and masculine, for gender, so 'evil person' and 'evil' are alike possible translations in I Corinthians 5:13. Thus this becomes a precise quotation, just as "I will not spare" is the same concept and semantic sighting as in Deuteronomy. The entirety is so close that it is thus put in inverted commas in the NKJV, at I Cor. 5:13.

In view of Deuteronomy and the verbal and conceptual match, it is apparent that whether we render 'evil person' as is usual, or 'evil' which matches Deuteronomy precisely in context and word, the person and the evil are here, because of pathology, both to be put away. There is to be neither admixture nor involvement. So intense is the Mosaic context, which led to death and used the wording 'evil from your midst', that the two are inextricable, mutually aligned, though diversely applied for theocratic or ecclesiastical purposes.

Death is not now in view, in the New Testament, minus theocracy; but the putting away, the shunning, which had been OF an evil THROUGH an evil person, is intensely personal as well as acutely principial in both cases. In I Cor. it is of course progressive, in quite a variety of steps: moving from not mixed up, to not eating, to the exclusion of judging of people outside the church, with the exhortation to judge those who are INSIDE. It is this semantic sequence which ends with the charge to put away the evil, the evil person from their midst!

It is perhaps because it would be inconceivable that this emphasis on the person - right to the end of the preceding context, and on judging persons, followed by THEREFORE in Corinthians, and the injunction to 'put away' - could exclude the personal, exclude that application of the gathering thrust of the passage, that no known translation consulted, including coverage of a large number, puts 'evil' instead of 'evil person' (5:13).

Paul is thus applying principles of one and a half millenia in standing, properly in the new political regime, excising civic execution; and in his own context, he does so in consecutive personal ways.

There is no thought of turning a death sentence (in the Old Testament case adduced) into fellowship. A final parting into some measure of co-operation. "I shall not spare" in context both of Paul and what he cites in Deuteronomy, "You shall not spare", does not at all imply subsisting in the same Church. 'Shun' does not mean co-exist in the body of Christ, nor does 'put away' here imply, be rather distant.

It is the same in I Timothy 1:10 and Romans 16:17 as indeed in II Corinthians 6:14. Since death is no longer appropriate and outside theocracy, severance is.

The Berkeley translation has: "Therefore expel that wicked person from you own company." It cannot be less.

It is this sequence involving several more steps then, including broader context, which brings on the ever increasing sense of the cumulative, as above. As to the consequential, Paul having made his prohibition, moves to various modes of application, with their consequences, tying the matter up in a cause and effect fashion, with the results prohibitive, glowing with the intensity of his first command with the severely impassable outcome: OUT with them.

Such a combination of considerations of one type only, each decisive, all indefeasible, merely concurs with Old and New Testament requirements about unbelievers, from II Corinthians 6 to Titus 3:10, from Isaiah 8 to Revelation 22, from Moses to Romans. Violation of such exclusion is enticement to pollution; and authorisation of such evil persons is combination in corruption.

What does the identical build-up of terms in English mean ? If a father says to a son, or a pastor to a member, or a mother to a daughter, or an uncle to a nephew concerning business relationships: I do not want you to be mixed up with those people, what would it mean ?

It would mean that there was a desire for them to avoid any sharing of goals, operations that are joint, mutuality of action, involvements of any kind that would implicate, associate, help them in their purposes and ways of life. It would exclude war on their side, and in fact, it would have just the same coverage as consultation with dictionaries and word book, classical and biblical Greek, instances and applications have shown to be the usage for the Greek term itself. The parallels are interesting intense and detailed.

This is hardly surprising as an empirical research, since the Greek and English expressions here in view are manufactured by just the same meanings in the parts and particles.

As to its meaning that you could share a church membership situation with them, this would represent the highest possible regard, perhaps outside marriage (marriage to Christ is transcendent), the greatest eminence that could readily be discovered for negating the apostolic command, with all its force (I Cor. 14:37). It would have even negative panache! It would appear super-charged rebellion.

In all these things, such is the vulnerability of mankind, the INTENT and what is being done are by no means always the same. Not only do people sometimes say, How could I have done that! but also this: I had no idea that this was really what I was doing!

But what ? It would breach the command in essence, in spirit, in application, in involvement, in mutuality of incorporation, biblical required fellowship (on the second admonition, says Paul to Titus, in 3:10, reject). Rejecting "on the second admonition" is of course not the same as living in the same spiritual fellowship for years.

Going out of this world if you had to apply this to everyone would literally be necessary. It is so in this way. Your organisation could then not deal in any concurrent way with any sort of involvement, so that you could not buy shares, being then very much involved, get insurance, buy a house, as we have found a very intimate matter of integrity, honesty, knowledge and so forth, being excluded from being mixed up together.

Dishonesty and dishonour are always undesirable; but in the case of the 'saints' or those professing to be Christians, these ruins to remedy, these barbs to blessing, these shameless foaming waves emitting shame like spray, they are excluded to the point not only of avoidance, but of greeting (II John where the doctrine of Christ is not present in a professing believer), of eating. Such are the terms of reference, and such are the referents of the terms.

That is the direction of flow from the discourse, as the matter develops, watching each word and each progression.

In business, in love, whatever the context, this would be the result, the specialisation belonging to what is in the mind of the speaker. We do not have to guess this. Paul addresses a highly specific ISSUE. It is this.

Consider the category of not being mixed up with something. Consider the second series of categories, what you are not to be mixed up with. Consider the result if it had been with ANYONE in ANY of those categories you were not to be mixed up. See that you should go out of this world if that were so.

What is it then ? It is only to professing Christians that the command applies, re not being mixed up. As to that, it is so important and potent that I do not want you even to eat with people, says Paul, in these double categories: a) professing Christians and b) idolaters, perverts and the like. This is the scope very precise and most direct of the terms, the parties. It is not a matter of simply business, or simply food, or simply society which is the constraining and limiting context; on the contrary, contextually, it is ALL who are professing Christians and ALL who are in any of the opprobrious categories mentioned, and it is in GENERAL coverage. This is the scope of terms to which the prohibition applies, and the result is of that breadth. This is the equivalence of terminology, contextually defined.

If Paul then is telling them not to be mixed up with idolaters (most of the world seems to be in this category), and so forth, then of course the context is Christian people and categories of other people relative to various moral, spiritual, doctrinal issues without limit. The subordination of the latter to the sub-group, professing Christian is then explicitly wheeled in. The wheels then go further: do not even EAT with them, such is the vigour, not at all diminished by this specification of professing Christians as the relevant body, but rather increased if it were possible, with a rigorous eye and determined thrust. Paul's 'nursing' eye is troubled and will not rest (I Thessalonians 2:7).

What then ? It is Christian and non-Christian which is the topic, and their species of meeting, WHEN the latter is ALSO called by the name Christian, as to commitment. Originally, it would simply have meant it in every regard, quite inoperably and manifestly so. Now it is NOT ONLY applied without qualification to the case where the violators are called Christians, but a refinement is added for emphasis. Mixed up ? Yes do not even go through the phenomenon called eating, with them. It is clear as in II Corinthians 6, Isaiah 8:20 relative to doctrine, that the cleavage is indeed darkness and light, the word of God purified seven times and the word of men, infinitely below the Creator's thoughts, and that the mixture of the two is subject in this to an absolute prohibition:

His word is inviolate in itself, violable in life by profanity of what is sacred, by lie about truth, or by lounging instead of diligence, sacrilege instead of sanctity (cf. SMR Appendix C and D).

As Psalm 94 put it in entire accord, Testament by Testament, on this separation:

The answer is apparent. They are deadly, death-dealing and devious, and their ways are evil.

No, the devilish dealings of those departing the faith, these come from a specialised pollution, comparable to that insidious devastation wrought, we might apply the point, by radioactivity.

Nor will He, the Head of the body, have in that body, fellowship with them. If the body may not be joined to a harlot, an adulteress, how much less may it be joined to a spiritual fornicator! (I Corinthians 6:15-20). Many harlots collected to grace, will enter heaven before some of the spiritual fornicators, we find (Matthew 21:30-32)..

We do not have to damn them, for it is God who gives what is so given; we do not have to kill them, for force is not the way of faith, there being here no theocracy; we do however have to realise that to the point of instruction, we DO have to avoid them.

If you keep in inoperable cancer when you are instructed to have it dealt with, then not only are you not wise, you are playing with death, and defying due medical authority. If you expect a miracle, fine, but when God is the One rebelled against, that is a forlorn hope and even a presumptuous one. Do you ask for a labourer to bring your sandwich to your mouth ? When it is in the power of a body to act, and it is told what to do, it is ever so simple: DO IT. IF you have weakness, seek the means of grace for strength, if you have friends hard to relinquish if need be, remember Luke 14:26.

Love dictates obedience, though it is no dictator. Its strength is even greater than that, and indeed, is stronger than death.

A more recent development has now arrived, paralleling the earlier Anglican feature of a Primate in Australia, indicating that in his own, personal view there is more than one way to God, Jesus Christ having no monopoly, which of course is antichrist in spirit as I John 2 makes so very clear. I John 1 defines Jesus Christ as the eternal life of God, who became flesh, such that "He who has the Son has life; he who does not (I John 5:12) have the Son of God does not have life".

Believing that Jesus is the Christ, is the Son of God, is the eternal life of God, so that not having Him MEANS not having the very life of God (I John 1:1-4) is parallel indeed to John 14:6, where Christ declares there is no other way to God but He! I John adds that the spirit which does not recognise this Christ is that of antichrist. A pronouncement from a church 'prince' that this is not so is, no less than is the Uniting Church case now in the Press, not merely a denial of the faith but in terms of I John, which is the word of God, a manifestation of the spirit of antichrist.

Christians should realise that playing with fire and ire are not always different; and when it is spiritual fire, it is well to consider the case of the sons of Korah, and their revisionism, aloof from the pronouncements to Moses from God (Numbers 16), moving into the field of what is now ecumenical inclusivism. In its earlier stages at that phase, it is what one might call radical proto-ecumenism.

Obviously joining as such is meaningless for progress or regress: it depends on what you join and how it relates to truth. If you join the devil as Christ did not, preferring to RESIST and REJECT BY THE WORD OF GOD (Matthew 4), then you are indeed inclusive, reconciling yourself with the devil himself, but neither with God nor His Church. In this case, a third coverage in this arena has been written, and it is added also for reference.

This development is covered below in No Place for Pilgrims. For this and more, see Holocaust of Morality and the Coming of Christ the King, Chs. 4 and 5.

Gordon H. Clark, a Presbyterian Minister, formerly Head or Chairman of the Philosophy Department at Butler University in Indianapolis, gave an important address on this Auburn Affirmation. A small section of it is cited below.

In the case of Numbers 16, Moses DEMANDED categorically that the people separate from what was seeking to make of itself a counter-moral authority, and he ASKED that the matter receive divine signature. Their being swallowed by the ground indicated the sort of situation which would attend those who declined to obey, whether this was through sympathy with the rebels or through involvement with them or social desire not to seem to be other, or indeed for whatever reason whatsoever. Whatever the reason for failure to separate, the result of being swallowed up was just the same. Such was the classic Numbers 16 case.

There is an urgency about obedience, as about avoiding equivocation. It does not help, and confuses no one who considers well. Let us take for example in review and with Psalm 94 in view, the ludicrous concept of making a 'monastery' not only an example of going out of this world, but a fulfilment of avoiding the moral exclusion in Paul's words! IS it out of this cosmos ? DOES it exclude the evils, errors and shenanigans Paul notes! It is necessary to be most clear, since the results of disobedience are extreme, and tempting the Lord is never wise, indeed it was cited to the devil by Christ, as a thing categorically to be avoided (Matthew 4:7).

Let us then apply these things in review to the I Corinthians 5 passage considered above.

Thus, firstly, going out of this world was an indication of the impossible stringency which WOULD have resulted IF Paul's intention had been for them to eschew, avoid being mixed up with any people in the forbidden categories. He pursues the point that this was NOT his meaning, as shown by the fact that of course he was not advising such a course but instead a Christian CONTINUANCE IN THIS WORLD! Not only did he not, and of course, want them to act in this extreme manner, but what he had in mind was such that this would in no way be necessary!

If it HAD been, they would have had to do something which could not be done without becoming Elijahs or suicides or the like! Thus it not only was not his meaning, but could not have been so. That is the point he is making. He does not wish it to be thought that he is CHANGING what he has in mind, but clarifying it. In so doing, he is showing WHY he might have imposed a tacit understanding that he dealt only with what was his commission, and that ? it is the church and not the world as far as giving commandments is concerned! He is not a ruler (cf. Luke 12:14).

In fact, his reasoning continues, he had something far more limited in mind. It was only in the domain of the CHURCH that he was speaking. What, he protests, have I to do with those who are outside! (I Corinthians 5:12). He is not attempting to govern the world but instruct the CHURCH! Thus, he proceeds, if anyone is called a BROTHER, that is makes claim to or is regarded as a Christian, a member of the household of faith, a delimited and ostensibly spiritual category at the outset, THEN and then only is his warrant of not being mixed up with them, to apply.

IF he HAD meant the unrestricted version (which as above, he makes clear is outside his mandate and hence implicitly was never in view in his exclusion notice), then going to a monastery is not only not mentioned, but going OUT of this world is. To add to the word of God is not only forbidden (as in Proverbs 30:6, Deuteronomy 4, 12, Revelation 22), to the things it says (cf. The Holocaust of Morality ... Ch. 6), but it is a means of altering its meaning, impact or measure: co-authorship is not only excluded, it is a matter intruding into the sphere of blasphemy.

Further, going to a monastery is very decidedly IN this world, and not only so, it can include just as readily as anything else, as history so abundantly shows, the very sort of conduct which Paul has condemned. In some cases, it could even specialise in evils. Such a site in this context is an intrusion from outer space into the apostle's words, is irrelevant to his discourse, contrary to his requirements in type, does not meet the conditions, does not cover the thrust or the words use, either of them; but what his actual word DOES do, having been thus focussed, needs attention.

What is written is this, that if anyone is called a brother but is covetous, an extortioner, an idolater, a fornicator, then entanglement, admixture, company with, involvement with such a person is excluded. How much is the exclusion ? It is SO much that if the command applied to ALL mankind and not just to the spiritual sector in the Christian camp, that is to those reputedly or by claim Christians, then the disjunction, the dissociation which the apostle commanded would be utterly unworkable. You could not in that case retain normal or even necessary human life. There would be rupture and dissociation on so broad a front that it would be entirely unworkable.

It is however NOT AT ALL unworkable to attend the same church as such people, to be in the same denomination as such rebels, or to have communion with a crowd of persons in which such exclusions do not occur - far less in one where such things are only NOT removed, but approved or applauded in principle! Whether it be in one local body or in a denomination incorporating these by consent, this makes nil difference. To be in a group of churches where the ONE BODY of the ONE LORD is acclaimed as applicable to the entire group, so that the spiritual communion is of that order, one could scarcely be more mixed up, unless words have no meaning, one body is an intended myth or the thing is a mere form.

Thus in Psalm 94, we read in the strongest terms this: "Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship with Thee!" the one which "frames mischief by a law", precisely as the Anglican body and for that matter, the Uniting Church one, has done with respect to morality.

Fellowship with GOD! Heaven forbid such a thing! that is the clear indication of the text. Of course the Utterly Pure God will have no fellowship with what demands the demise or deity as He has revealed Himself and His will, or contests His authority! In Israel at that time, the nation was theocratically governed, so that application was to the entire people, under divine law by initial consent (as in Joshua 24). Now, the relevant body which bears His name is the Church.

If then the HEAD of the body is not going to have such fellowship with such people and such carryings on, how on earth is His 'body' going to do so ? Practically, there is only one way: it is this. In that case, the Head would have to be severed from the body, so that it could have the fellowship, as here, and He not. This could be done in either of two ways: the body could sever the Head, as in the crucifixion, or the Head could sever the body, that is the sub-section claiming to be His body, as in Revelation 2:5, and be confronted in the process as in Revelation 2:16 with Him who would fight against them. There is in such cases a fight on and the result is severance of the false communion which insists on error.

"Candle-sticks" can indeed be removed from apostate churches. But there is another possibility. To obey...

The other option is for the individual in the false communion to leave it, as in II Corinthians 6:17, Romans 16:17, Ephesians 4-5, I Timothy 6 and Numbers 16, for example. This has the result that the person concerned is no more mingled together with those who so invoke divine disjunction, so that he or she can remain with the Head of the body, rather than consenting to its severance or inducing it, as the case may be. Separation FROM the rebellion TO the clusters of obedience avoids the severance, either of the Head or of the body by the Head in this way. It is all a matter of a four letter word: OBEY.

Christ was obedient in three stages, first in leaving equality with God to take the form of a servant IN FLESH; secondly in being obedient to the requirements of His missionary situation and thirdly in proceeding to the impact and moribundity of the anguish of the Cross (Philippians 2). He sanctified Himself (John 17) to such an end. No less, not of course in the program of redemption since HE ONLY did this (Hebrews 9-10), but in the obedience IN PRINCIPLE, is needed of His body. HIS body is the one which is to remain attached to the head, rather obviously. Separation to HIM and from what is CONTRARY is REQUIRED. It is part of being faithful.

	It would seem inept not to help others by the answers given. The matters in view - put at times tentatively, which is a mercy - included the questions of
	context and text,
	translation and application,
	command and capacity to obey,
	ecclesiastical sacro-sanctity and the word of God,
	together with some emphasis on special aspects of the epistles of Jude and of Paul to the Corinthians.

	a) many who have the same pathology
	b) many who are tending that way
	c) many who are actively tempted in that direction
	d) many who do not apply this type of thing at all to their congregations and so on.

	Neither YOKAGE in the other body, that of unbelievers,
	nor COMMUNION
	nor ACCORD
	nor AGREEMENT
	nor even PART.

	IF UNBELIEF, IF LAWLESSNESS,
	IF DARKNESS BIBLICALLY DEFINED IS IN VIEW,
	THEN DO NOT SHARE YOUR SPIRITUAL LIVES IN ANY WAY,
	HOWEVER REMOTE, WITH IT.

	separation from false churches, or
	installation of true testimony, or
	information on the Lord's call for your life's work, or
	the task of telling others, or
	meeting demands nearly deadly but in the Lord's strength refreshingly challenging: yes, whether it be
	work in this form of helping or that type of production

	Paul then is multiply exclusive in this matter.
	Further, here is an abhorrence, and not merely a separation.

	If a Church refuses to obey,
	then you become an accomplice if you stay.

	is not to act as on the same side as these people,
	cannot therefore have any ecclesiastical relationship, since this is PRECISELY being on the same side, if this is excluded.

	"... we also are weak in Him, but we shall live with Him by the power of God toward you."
	"If I come again, I will not spare" (13:2).

	Amos 3:3-9,
	Jeremiah 23:28-29,
	Isaiah 34:16, 41:19-24, 43:10-14, 44:44--24-28, 45:21, 46:9-10, 48:6-18, 59:21,
	Acts 4:25,
	I Peter 1:10-12, II Peter 1:19-21,
	II Corinthians 2:9-13,
	Matthew 4:4, 5:17-20, 24:35,
	Deuteronomy 4, 12,
	Psalm 12, 119, 111,
	Revelation 22:18-20,

	no sharing,
	no collegiate status.