Study Desk

And this is what some of you used to be. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.

"All things are lawful for me," but not all things are beneficial. "All things are lawful for me," but I will not be dominated by anything.

"Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food," and God will destroy both one and the other. The body is meant not for fornication but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body.

But anyone united to the Lord becomes one spirit with him.

Shun fornication! Every sin that a person commits is outside the body; but the fornicator sins against the body itself.

But because of cases of sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband.

For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does; likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does.

I wish that all were as I myself am. But each has a particular gift from God, one having one kind and another a different kind.

But if they are not practicing self-control, they should marry. For it is better to marry than to be aflame with passion.

To the married I give this command—not I but the Lord—that the wife should not separate from her husband

(but if she does separate, let her remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband), and that the husband should not divorce his wife.

For the unbelieving husband is made holy through his wife, and the unbelieving wife is made holy through her husband. Otherwise, your children would be unclean, but as it is, they are holy.

But if the unbelieving partner separates, let it be so; in such a case the brother or sister is not bound. It is to peace that God has called you.

Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing; but obeying the commandments of God is everything.

Now concerning virgins, I have no command of the Lord, but I give my opinion as one who by the Lord's mercy is trustworthy.

But if you marry, you do not sin, and if a virgin marries, she does not sin. Yet those who marry will experience distress in this life, and I would spare you that.

but the married man is anxious about the affairs of the world, how to please his wife,

and his interests are divided. And the unmarried woman and the virgin are anxious about the affairs of the Lord, so that they may be holy in body and spirit; but the married woman is anxious about the affairs of the world, how to please her husband.

I say this for your own benefit, not to put any restraint upon you, but to promote good order and unhindered devotion to the Lord.

But if someone stands firm in his resolve, being under no necessity but having his own desire under control, and has determined in his own mind to keep her as his fiancée, he will do well.