1 Corinthians 10:9 Commentary - Dr Peter Masters

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1 Corinthians 10:9

Comments

‘Neither let us tempt Christ’ – stretch his patience. The exodus generation were always stretching the patience of God. They provoked him by doing the very things that he had commanded them not to do, almost as if they would see what his response would be. The Greek word actually means ‘test Christ’, and it is usually used in a bad sense – testing somebody out. You may have done this mischievously when you were children at school. There is a teacher who seems a little bit gentle, and so what do some of the children do? They push the teacher as far as they can. ‘How much can I get away with? How much can I do what I want to do? How much can I talk and chatter? How much can I play around? There is a bit of give in this teacher; I will test and push as far as I can.’ That is the sense in which this word is used: tempting Christ – seeing how far you can go, how much you can do; how much worldliness you can get away with; how much self-advertisement and living for your pride and the old ways. Don’t tempt Christ; don’t press Christ, and try and disobey him and go away from him. ‘Neither let us tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed of serpents’ (Numbers 21:5-6). They tempted him in exactly the same way as we read, ‘the people lusted’. For a second time they went after meat and earthly things.They murmured and complained (Numbers 14:2), when they should have been thankful for their deliverance from Egypt and all the blessings that awaited them in the promised land. Do we grumble at our lot, grumble and groan instead of solving our problems by prayer and Christian rejoicing?

Application

Do you temp Christ? It is your second day without personal devotions, your third day without personal devotions, your fourth day with only a hasty prayer for rescue and help! Are you not stretching the patience of God, to reprove you in some way, to jolt you, to bring you back? Oh but you have done it before, many times, and nothing has happened. It maybe you have to receive a very big jolt. This is stretching the patience of God.

Since the lockdown and the pandemic, some have got used to the armchair – it is much softer than the pew – and the computer screen. ‘It is a long way for me to come, so I will stay at home, and I won’t fellowship, and I will watch on the internet. Well, the internet has been a wonderful help to us, but for some it goes on, and on. Maybe then even that tails off: ‘Oh, I missed it; Oh I missed it, or I didn't make it in time.’ It is too easy to skip Bible Studies, to let prayer gatherings slip. That is stretching the patience of God. It is not the pastor you are going to upset; it is the Lord: that is what counts. We read the exodus generation and we see these words here: ‘Neither let us tempt Christ’, stretch his glorious kindly patience, the Christ who has done everything for us. So they were destroyed of serpents unless they cried out and looked to him.

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1 Corinthians 10:9 Commentary and Bible Study