1 Corinthians 6: Your Body, More Than a Burdensome Shell

Introduction

“I hope you came with your body today. Or maybe only your body came and your mind is somewhere else.” That is how Andy Owen opens this message at Zollhaus, in Lucerne, in a series going through the first letter to the Corinthians. The advantage of such a series, he says, is that you run into subjects you might not have chosen: you take what is there. That morning, the text speaks about the body and sexuality.

We have an ambiguous relationship with our body, because it does not always match what we would like and does not always cooperate. Humanity has always wondered what place to give it: am I first of all this body, or first of all my heart, my mind? Andy Owen warns: “There are a few hot topics.” Yet he suggests looking at what God, our Creator, wants to tell us in 1 Corinthians 6, in three ideas: what you do with your body matters, your body is not private, and your body does not belong to you, it was bought.

Message Outline

1. An Aging Body, a God Who Took a Body

Our age swings between two extremes. On one side, the idea that what I do with my body does not matter, only my thoughts do. On the other, the cult of the body: Andy Owen mentions “looksmaxxing,” a trend mostly among young men who go as far as having surgery to look as good as possible.
He tells of a “frightening” discovery: his daughter, who likes to style his hair as a game, took a photo of the back of his head. Looking at it, he saw that his hair was thinning. “I did not even know.” Our bodies age, and we have to live with it, in a society obsessed with youth and beauty.
We are also sexual beings, and our sexuality is lived out in our body. The questions are many, and it is good to receive direction from the one who created us.
This Creator is also the God who became man. Incarnation comes from “carne,” flesh, as in “chili con carne”: God came in the flesh, in a body. Jesus rose in a resurrected body, and we have the promise of a resurrected body too.

2. Start with Identity, Not Condemnation

Corinth was a “wild” city, a bit like Las Vegas: pure hedonism, where everyone does as they please. The Corinthians had their slogans about the body, and Paul takes them up.
An essential point: Paul is speaking to Christians. “If you are not a Christian, you can live as you like.” These lines are healthy guideposts for those who belong to God. The Church does not impose them on everyone; it is a path to walk in freedom.
The passage starts strong (verse 9): those who do wrong will not inherit the kingdom of God. Believing in Jesus and living differently do not go together. Paul lists them (abuse, greed, theft, sexual immorality) and says: this is how we all lived.
Then comes what Andy Owen calls “a sermon in itself” (verse 11): the filth of your faults has been washed away, you now belong to God’s holy people, you are declared righteous in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. Not because we did something good, but by grace.
“Identity is not that we struggle, it is not that we used to be sinners. Identity is that we are now washed.”
The subject is sensitive in society, but also because the Church has often approached it from the legalistic side: “you must do this, or you are condemned.” The preacher asks his listeners to hear him from identity, from the call of a Creator who loves you, who gave himself for you and who shows you a path of freedom.

3. What You Do with Your Body Matters

Verse 18: “Flee sexual immorality.” The Greek word (porneia, which we find in “pornography”) refers to every sexual act outside the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman. Paul spends time on it, not because these sins would be the worst, but because their consequences directly affect the body, and the body is “very important and very holy” in God’s eyes.
The Corinthians said: food is for the stomach and the stomach for food. In other words, sex would be a basic need like eating, and only the heart would count, not what I do with my body. Paul answers: “Fine, but that does not mean we can do whatever we want with our body.” Andy Owen compares this slogan to a well-known phrase today: “My body, my choice.”
In a certain way, it is true: God gave everyone free will. But here, Paul is speaking to Christians: “The body is not meant for immorality, but for the Lord. And the Lord is for the body, and he has the right to dispose of it” (verse 13). This clashes with our individualism: “I want to decide, I know what is good for me.”
The preacher, a father of teenagers, remembers his own teenage years: “No need for a rain jacket, I won’t get sick.” And he got sick.
Verse 14: as God raised the Lord, he will also raise us by his power. What you do with your body matters, because it will live forever. From now on, I can live in holiness, as it will be at the resurrection. “It is a beautiful promise, for my thinning hair too,” a promise for our weak bodies, as we age and become more fragile.
The present body will pass away. Elsewhere Paul uses the image of the seed put in the ground: what comes out is the same and yet different. Our resurrected body will be the same and yet other, and we can rejoice in it.
Verse 15: your bodies are members of Christ. “Your hands become his hands. Your mouth becomes his mouth.” You cannot unite yourself sexually with someone else when you are united with Christ. Andy Owen mentions a great temple in Corinth, which he calls the temple of Artemis, with more than a thousand sacred prostitutes, specifying that the date is not historically certain.
If this is your past, shame and judgment do not have to rule your life: go back to verse 11, God has washed and forgiven. And if this is your struggle today: “We are human, we have struggles, we have temptations.” It is an invitation to undo these ties, to confess, to receive forgiveness and to bind yourself to Christ again.

4. Your Body Is Not Private, It Is Indwelt

Verse 19: “Have you forgotten that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit? The Spirit God gave you lives in you.”
We often think: “What I do for myself, in my room, is nobody’s business.” Paul answers that the living God dwells in your body. “You are never alone. You are never in private.” Everything you do, including with your body, is never simply a private matter. The Spirit of God is a gift.
Under the old covenant, you had to make a long journey to Jerusalem three times a year to approach the sanctuary, and only the high priest entered once a year. Paul says your body is the most holy place.
“How good it is to know that you are never alone. But on the other hand, it is also frightening: you are never alone.” Nothing is private, not even our gaze.
To the argument “I am not harming anyone,” the text answers: you harm yourself, and you harm the Holy Spirit.

5. Your Body Does Not Belong to You, It Was Bought

Another Corinthian slogan (verse 12): “Everything is permitted.” Perhaps they had heard it from Paul himself. Andy Owen also recalls the saying attributed to Augustine: “Love God and do what you want.”
Paul answers: yes, everything is permitted, but not everything is good. “With your freedom, you can do things that deprive you of your freedom.” I can do anything, but if I rob a bank, there are consequences.
Our society’s sexual ethics took some good things from Christianity: not harming others, consent. That was not the case among the ancient Greeks and Romans. But it did not take the rest: we no longer belong to ourselves, and what is permitted is not necessarily good for me and for others.
“I will not be enslaved by anything”: do not use your freedom to become a slave again, dependent, addicted. The preacher lets each person apply this to their own life.
Paul changes the question. He does not ask “am I harming anyone?” but “who do I belong to?” “Freedom is not belonging to no one. Freedom is belonging to the right person. That is true freedom.”
Andy Owen ends with the first question of the Heidelberg Catechism: “What is your only comfort in life and in death?” Answer: that, body and soul, in life and in death, I belong not to myself but to my faithful Savior Jesus Christ. “We do not have to invent ourselves, or define ourselves by our performance.” You can belong to him with your body, even a weak one, and with your inner struggles.

6. Three Steps to Take Home

Attach yourself: decide for Jesus, bind yourself to him, to him alone and to nothing else.
Open the space to him: the Holy Spirit lives in you, give him his place.
Give him back the property rights: over your body, over your thoughts. Honor God with everything you have, including your body.
In his closing prayer, the preacher thanks Jesus for paying this very high price: he gave his life, his body was broken, his blood flowed, “so that we and our bodies could live and rise.” He asks God to bring his comfort through the shame, to lead hearts to repentance and to enable his Church to honor him with its bodies.

Key Takeaways

The starting point is not condemnation but identity: in Christ, you are washed, sanctified and declared righteous.
Your body is not indifferent to God: it is for the Lord, it is a member of Christ and it will rise.
Your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit: you are never alone, and nothing is purely private.
The real question is not “am I harming anyone?” but “who do I belong to?”
Freedom is not belonging to no one, it is belonging to Jesus Christ, body and soul.

Personal Application

How do you look at your body today: as a burdensome shell, as an object to perfect, or as a body God created and will raise?
Is there an area of your past where shame still rules? What does the word “you have been washed” change for you?
What ties do you need to undo in order to bind yourself to Christ again, with your soul but also with your body?
In what area are you using your freedom in a way that makes you dependent?
Concretely, how can you give God back the rights over your body and your thoughts this week?

Verses Cited

Frequently Asked Questions

Why does Paul talk so much about sexuality in 1 Corinthians 6?

For Andy Owen, it is not because sexual sins would be the worst of all. Paul spends time on them for a practical reason: their consequences directly affect the body, and the body is, in God's eyes, something very important and holy (1 Corinthians 6:18).

What does “your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit” mean?

The living God dwells in you. Under the old covenant, you had to make the journey to Jerusalem to approach the sanctuary, and only the high priest entered the most holy place once a year. Paul says your body is that most holy place. So you are never alone, and nothing you do is purely private.

“Everything is permitted”: is a Christian free to do whatever they want with their body?

Paul answers that not everything is beneficial and that he will not be enslaved by anything. Andy Owen sums it up: you can use your freedom to lose your freedom. Paul does not ask “am I harming anyone?” but “who do I belong to?”. Freedom is not belonging to no one, it is belonging to the right person.