Now, we might think, yes, but there is a problem. If we were in that church at Corinth, will not the gospel still suffer? It is all very well his being repentant, but this is what he did, and the people in the city, the people in the town, they will always point, if we let him back in, and say, ‘Ah that is the church that tolerates an incestuous man.’ Will he not always be a blot and a hindrance and a stain in the church? Well, there certainly is that possibility, but there is another factor and that is the church also stands for forgiveness and the love of God and the grace of God. So it is time for that to be expressed too. Yes, he did a terrible thing, but yes, he has mourned and repented, and yes, God is a forgiving God and a restoring God, and that is what at Corinth stood for. So although it is a danger, there is another great principle that the church must now uphold and project to the world.
Then there would be people who would say, oh but is such a sinful tendency ever cured? You hear that today. Somebody did such-and-such thing, can you ever recover from that? Yes you can, says the Scripture. We must not think like that. The sinner, if he is truly repentant, can be entirely changed. Following the formidable list in 1 Corinthians 6:9 Paul says, ‘and such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.’ The incestuous sinner can be forgiven.