2 Corinthians 6:14-16 states:

¹⁴ Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness? ¹⁵ What harmony is there between Christ and Belial? What does a believer have in common with an unbeliever? ¹⁶ What agreement is there between the temple of God and idols? For we are the temple of the living God. 

Some things in Christianity might be difficult to understand, others may be difficult to live. These particular passages are neither--they are clear, direct, and tell us exactly how we should live our lives. There's no gray area, no scratching of our heads and asking "Huh?"--it's right there.

And really, what is there to add to it? Who among us doesn't feel that twinge from our conscience when we know we're doing something wrong, who among us hasn't at some point deluded ourselves by saying "Well, God will understand, and besides, I'm forgiven anyway, so...." Yes, we are forgiven, but that doesn't give us carte blanche to intentionally and with full knowledge commit sin.

That's the core of these verses. We know wickedness when we see it, we can recognize a false god when we see one, and we certainly know better than to listen to an unbeliever and say to ourselves "Hmm, maybe he's onto something." Paul's audience knew that their former ways of worshiping the pantheon of Greek gods was wrong and needed to be stopped, and Paul was reminding them that idol worship wasn't just a matter of custom, but of eternal import. The words to those early Christians were to ignore the clearly wrong things that were in their midst and to stop mingling with unbelievers. They were a new people, a forgiven people, and needed to begin living that way.

In the modern age, these reminders are just as timely. For those of us raised as Christians, we know the difference between Godly and ungodly, and one of our primary duties is demonstrating what those differences are to non-Christians as we come across them, and do it in love and kindness. We need to train our children to follow in our footsteps, and always pray for guidance and diligence from the Holy Spirit to keep us on the right path. Just because we know the way doesn't mean that we stay on it. As we begin this final month of our year-long journey through the Bible, we should always be reminding ourselves that while some things are complicated, most aren't. We didn't read the Bible to merely increase our knowledge, but to change our ways. The verses highlighted today are pretty good first steps to tell how well we've been internalizing the words.

Scott