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I. "FOR THIS CAUSE MANY ARE WEAK AND SICKLY AMONG YOU, AND MANY SLEEP."

1. Just then there was a more than average prevalence of disease and mortality, and Paul had authority to trace it to its source. Our Lord has solemnly warned us against drawing such inferences arbitrarily (Luke 13:1-5). We are prone to this sort of presumption. But here St. Paul was speaking in the Spirit, and was authorised to knit together a particular sin and punishment. And I cannot read in this record the "thus far and no farther." I catch here the faint echo of the thought that God our Father has us all in His school, and is carrying on our education for a life beyond death by a direct providential dealing with us in the way of mental and bodily chastisement. "For this cause" — because of such and such a sin, with which the man would not deal for himself — "many are weak," etc.

2. To some minds the idea of punishment may be repulsive and demoting. To me it is a thought of hope: it speaks of a living and personal God, not willing that I should perish. The chastening hand, St. Paul tells us, stops not short sometimes of taking the very life itself. There are even deaths which condemn not but only chastise the sinner.

3. Read it in its simplicity, and what comfort is here for some comfortless mourners! Let the Christian mother hush her agony over the grave of some soldier or sailor son taken away in the very dawn of manhood, with immature piety, and believe that still, for all that, the young life was taken, not in wrath, but in chastisement; taken, perhaps, that it might expand in a purer and a higher companionship.

II. Yet St. Paul goes on to teach us that even these judgments might be turned aside. "IF WE WOULD JUDGE OURSELVES, WE SHOULD NOT BE JUDGED."

1. So unwillingly does God afflict, that, if the same end, which is our good, could be otherwise reached, it would be. It is our refusal to judge ourselves which, as it were, compels God to judge. Do it upon yourselves, and the rod drops from His hand.

2. St. Paul carefully guards against the idea of any self-infliction of suffering, by varying the word when he speaks of our judging. To "judge" becomes then not to punish, but simply to discern. To "judge" ourselves is to look ourselves through and through, so as to distinguish between the precious and the vile.

3. Do not look upon this duty with repugnance. God and you are on one side in the matter. He bids you to do what is necessary for yourself in the way of judging, and so to answer the one purpose, which is that of your not being left in self-deceit.

4. Many shrink from this self-intuition from the dread of long and difficult processes. Will they just bethink themselves of that fountain opened for sin and uncleanness?

III. The final cause of that judging which is chastening — "THAT WE SHOULD NOT BE CONDEMNED WITH THE WORLD." Weakness and sickness — even the last sleep itself — all have this merciful character within the Church of Jesus Christ. They are to prevent the everlasting "damnation." Nothing short of apostasy, the wilful and obstinate "standing away from the living God," can throw a man back out of the Church of the Divine chastisement into the Cosmos of the Divine condemnation.

(Dean Vaughan.)

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KJV: For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep.

WEB: For this cause many among you are weak and sickly, and not a few sleep.