Bad Company

The Bible tells us to pick our companions wisely.

The Apostle Paul says, "Do not be deceived:evil company corrupts good habits."

The Apostle Paul warns us not to be deceived...telling us that there are some who think that "who" their companions are makes no difference on "who" they will become.

Many times people have used this passage to make for themselves a nice comfy Christian "getto".

We cut ourselves off from any "unbelieving" relationships because it will corrupt us.

I do believe that as we build relationships with unbelievers we need to constantly remind ourselves that the reason for that relationship is to bring that person into the kingdom of Christ...and not drag you from it.

But when we go back a few chapters we see Paul here also warning the Corinthian church about 'wrong' fellowship.

"Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump?" [1 Cor 5: 6b]

"I wrote to you in my epistle not to keep company with sexually immoral people. Yet I certainly did not mean with the sexually immoral people of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world. But now I have written to you not to keep company with anyone named a brother, who is sexually immoral, or covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or an extortioner---not even to eat with such a person." [1 Cor 5:9-11, emphasis mine]

Even though God doesn't give individual Christians the authority to decide whether someone is really a Christian or not [this authority belongs to the church], He does here seem to be giving the individual the authority of whom they will fellowship with inside the church.

In Matt 18 Jesus shows us that when the church makes its finally judgment against an unrepentant "brother", then after the judgment that man is no longer a brother...he is to be viewed as heathen...an unbeliever.

But not every sin can be proven by two or three witnesses...things in the church are not just black and white all the time.

Some people can be very slippery when it comes to their sinful lifestyles, and seem to do a good job at keeping away from the churches judgments.

If a man is living in unrepentant sin, as a Christian, then we need to go to him about his sin. If he refuses to listen then we need to try to take it further to try to bring him to repentance...if this man is of the "slippery" type and it can't be brought to the two or three witnesses or to the church then you are not obligated to be 'best friends'...you are actually told not to be.

If a man has been disciplined by the church [barred from the Lord's Table] and yet he continues to name himself "a brother" you should not fellowship with him under his definition.

If you ate with him in order to bring him to repentance and back to the Lord that is one thing...but if you agree with him in his self definition then you are only encouraging him in his self destruction.

I have heard of cases where someone is disciplined by the church [concerning the deity of Christ] and this person rejects the discipline and leaves the assembly of the saints. Some of the members within the church continued to fellowship with the person who was disciplined...not to win them back but fellowshiped with them still "as a brother". Guess what happened, someone was won over...those who refused to listen to the churches judgment were won over to the rebels way of thinking.

We need to choose our friends wisely...birds of a feather do flock together.