Devotional 12 January 2026

January 12, 2026 • Steve Torres

1 Corinthians 9:7.jpg

“Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry. I speak as to sensible people; judge for yourselves what I say. The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread. Consider the people of Israel: are not those who eat the sacrifices participants in the altar? What do I imply then? That food offered to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything? No, I imply that what pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God. I do not want you to be participants with demons. You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons. Shall we provoke the Lord to jealousy? Are we stronger than he?” (1 Corinthians 10:14–22, ESV)

Paul’s warning in this passage rests on a deeply unsettling truth: what we do is never neutral, because we are not neutral. While the objects we interact with may be morally indifferent, our participation in them never is. The reason is simple and weighty: we are the body of Christ.

Earlier in the letter, Paul made this same argument regarding sexual immorality. To join oneself to a prostitute is not merely a private moral failure, it is a public theological contradiction. “Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ?” (1 Corinthians 6:15). To unite Christ’s members with what is unholy is to implicate Christ Himself. That same logic now governs Paul’s teaching on idolatry.

When Paul speaks of the Lord’s Supper, he describes it as a real participation (koinōnia) in Christ (1 Corinthians 10:16). Participation is covenantal. It binds. Just as Israel’s sacrifices involved fellowship with the God they worshiped (v. 18), pagan sacrifices involve fellowship with demons (v. 20). Idols may be “nothing” in themselves, but what they represent, and who is joined through them, is not nothing at all.

This is why Paul’s warning becomes so sharp. To participate in idolatry is to attempt to bring Christ to another table. And the Lord will not share His glory. “Shall we provoke the Lord to jealousy?” Paul asks, echoing Israel’s wilderness failures, where God’s covenant jealousy was aroused not by ignorance, but by divided loyalty (Exodus 32; Deuteronomy 32:16–17).

Here the pastoral weight presses in. Being the body of Christ sounds glorious until we realize what it requires. Christ is not neutral. He is holy. And as His representatives, we carry His name into everything we do. In that sense, the question is not far from the familiar phrase, What Would Jesus Do?—but sharper. Would this action, if attributed to Christ Himself, serve as an argument against His holiness and deity?

If the answer is yes, Paul’s counsel is clear: flee from it (1 Corinthians 10:14). Examine not only what you know to be permissible, but what your participation implies. Because wherever you go, Christ goes with you—and He will not allow Himself to be mocked.