18 Oct
2026

Honor God With Your Bodies

Passage: 1 Corinthians 6:9-20

REFLECTION QUOTE

“You didn’t think, did you, that just by pointing your finger at others you would distract God from seeing all your misdoings and from coming down on you hard? Or did you think that because he’s such a nice God, he’d let you off the hook? Better think this one through from the beginning. God is kind, but he’s not soft. In kindness he takes us firmly by the hand and leads us into a radical life-change.”  —Romans 2:3-4, The Message

“To pray ‘your kingdom come’, is to pray ‘my kingdom go.’” – Fleming Rutledge

OUTLINE

  1. Who is your king?
  2. What is his kingdom like?
  3. How has the king loved you?

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS: 

The Heidelberg Catechism from 1568 begins with asking and answering the question: “What is your only comfort in life and in death?”Answer: “That I am not my own, but belong—body and soul, in life and in death—to my faithful Savior Jesus Christ.” Before learning how to live, we need to know who we belong to. How does our sense of belonging impact our behavior? What does it mean to you to belong – body and soul, in life and death- to our faithful Savior Jesus Christ?

Read 1 Corinthians 6:9-20. What does this passage show you about God’s character and about being his follower? What challenges, encourages, or sparks questions for you in this passage?

Consider the various sins included in this passage. What are our cultural blind spots – the sins we’re more easily deceived into being “comfortable” with? Where do we tend to point the finger and accuse more easily? How might our answers to those questions reveal values of our culture?

We often speak of faith in Christ in terms of spiritual life. How does Paul emphasize in 6:12-20 that the Christian’s relationship with Jesus is not simply spiritual but physical as well?
Paul says, “Run away from immorality” (6:18) and “honor God with your bodies” (6:20). What form should this “running away” look like for Christians today? What does honoring God with our bodies look like in our present context?
In 6:11, we read: “And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.” This is our received identity in Christ. We are not free from temptation, but we are equipped to battle against sin because of who we are in Christ. How does our identity in Christ shape the way want to deal with sin in ourselves and alongside those we love?
What from this passage and this discussion is something you want to put into practice or be more aware of this week or praise God for?

 

PRAYER

Share with your group how they can be praying for you: what is weighing on you from this past week? What are you praising God for from this past week?

“By his power God raised the Lord from the dead, and he will raise us also.” 1 Corinthians 6:14

RESOURCES:

Preston Sprinkle, Does the Bible Support Same-Sex Marriage?: 21 Conversations from a Historically Christian View

Rebecca McLaughlin, Does the Bible Affirm Same-Sex Relationships? Examining 10 Claims about Scripture and Sexuality

Wesley Hill, Washed and Waiting: Reflections on Christian Faithfulness and Homosexuality