Truth Be Told: A Blog by Pastor Bill Alderson

  1 It is actually reported that there is immorality among you, and immorality of such a kind as does not exist even among the Gentiles, that someone has his father's wife. 2 You have become arrogant and have not mourned instead, so that the one who had done this deed would be removed from your midst. 3 For I, on my part, though absent in body but present in spirit, have already judged him who has so committed this, as though I were present. 4 In the name of our Lord Jesus, when you are assembled, and I with you in spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus, 5 I have decided to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of his flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. 6 Your boasting is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough?      1 Corinthians 5:1-6 In his first address to the church at Corinth, Paul thought it of great importance to address the principle of sin (leaven) and its effect on the spiritual health

It is interesting to observe that in Scripture there are a number of times when there is a period of forty days attached to major events. The two most prominent of these might be the time Moses spent on Mount Sinai receiving the Law and the time Jesus spent in the wilderness while being tempted by the devil. In fact, we find nine different times when forty days are assigned to a Biblical event. This is significant when you consider that 9 x 40 = 360 days; Jewish calendars in the past are represented by a 360-day year. We can conclude that these forty-day periods represent seasons of testing in the believer’s life.   The First Season The first of these “seasons” is found in Genesis 7:4-5 in reference to the predicted flood:   " For after seven more days, I will send rain on the earth forty days and forty nights ; and I will blot out from the face of the land every living thing that I have made ." Noah did according to all that the Lord had commanded him . God is instructi