1 Corinthians SeriesCorinthian Idol Introduction: No timeWe need to hurry today. We are already running out of time. There’s no time for an intro today. No funny story or inspiring quote. This sermon is too important. There’s no time to wasteToday we are going to continue our journey through the book of 1 Corinthians by  covering chapters 8-10. These were the chapters that have been pressing on my heart the most over the past four months as I prepared for the summer. Here the broken church of Corinth faced the issue of idolatry. Section 1:The Corinthians had yet another problem. On top of factions, sexual immorality and lawsuits the church was divided on yet another topic. I’ve never seen a church with so many issues! There were some in the church would were eating meat that had been sacrificed to idols. You see, in those times the temples of Poseidon, Aphrodite’s and Demeter would have sacrifices of goats, lambs and other animals. Some of the meat was burned for the gods, some was given to the priests and the rest was divided up. Some temples would have ritual feasts where everyone would eat together to celebrate the Gods. Often these were more social affairs then religious ones. The rest of the meat was sold in the market. With the number of temples and different God’s in Corinth it meant that a lot of the meat sold in the market had been “sacrificed” to one God or another. One one side people thought this was no big deal. After all, they have the author of creation on their side. The LORD of lords. Why should they fear other Gods? To these believers they thought the meat was no big deal. On the other side, people were FREAKING OUT. They were horrified that believers were eating meat sacrifice to idols. They were being idolaters. Idolatry by the way, is a big deal in the Bible. Simply put, idolatry means putting another God before the LORD YAHWEH. For example: “You shall have no other gods before me. 4 “You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. 5 You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God..”"Let there be no strange god among you; Nor shall you worship any foreign god.”He who sacrifices to any god, other than to the LORD alone, shall be utterly destroyed.Simply put, worshipping idols instead of YAHWEH, the God of Israel is kind of a big deal. Section 2: The ritual of MarriageAnd because it’s such a big deal Paul works hard to set the Corinthians straight.He acknowledges that the first group of believers is correct. The idols have no power. They are just wood, or stone or paper. They have no ability to interfere with the life of believers. Yes, there are demonic spiritual powers but eating meat sacrificed to idols was not going to corrupt believers. They were secure in the power of God. However, not all believers understood this & that was a big problem. Paul describes two types of Christians in this matter. Those who are “strong” and those who are “weak”. Often when we look at this passage in english. We think that strong and weak refer simply to there consciences, what they feel bad about. That there are some who have weak consciences and we need to almost tip toe around them. That’s not what paul is getting at. Deep study into the words “strong” and “weak” show that they had to do with class. The strong were “ those with “social power, influence, political status and wealth” [and a] “a traditional Roman value””Meanwhile the weak were “not only “of low social standing” but… [craved] for identity, recognition and acceptance by “the strong”So what paul is worried about is these “weak” members of the church who crave to be like the strong ones. They had come out of idol worship and were still new to faith. They hadn’t come to fully realize the power of God and were still new to a C