Avoid Immorality

(Leviticus 20:10-21; 1 Corinthians 5:1-8)

1{2}That thou mayst keep thoughts, and thy lips may preserve instruction. Mind not the deceit of a woman.

2{3}For the lips of a harlot are like a honeycomb dropping, and her throat is smoother than oil.

3{4}But her end is bitter as wormwood, and sharp as a two-edged sword.

4{5}Her feet go down into death, and her steps go in as far as hell.

5{6}They walk not by the path of life, her steps are wandering, and unaccountable.

6{7}Now, therefore, my son, hear me, and depart not from the words of my mouth.

7{8}Remove thy way far from her, and come not nigh the doors of her house.

8{9}Give not thy honour to strangers, and thy years to the cruel.

9{10}Lest strangers be filled with thy strength, and thy labours be in another man's house,

10{11}And thou mourn at the last, when thou shalt have spent thy flesh and thy body, and say;

11{12}Why have I hated instruction, and my heart consented not to reproof,

12{13}And have not heard the voice of them that taught me, and have not inclined my ear to masters?

13{14}I have almost been in all evil, in the midst of the church and of the congregation.

14{15}Drink water out of thy own cistern, and the streams of thy own well:

15{16}Let thy fountains be conveyed abroad, and in the streets divide thy waters.

16{17}Keep them to thyself alone, neither let strangers be partakers with thee.

17{18}Let thy vein be blessed, and rejoice with the wife of thy youth:

18{19}Let her be thy dearest hind, and most agreeable fawn: let her breasts inebriate thee at all times: be thou delighted continually with her love.

19{20}Why art thou seduced, my son, by a strange woman, and art cherished in the bosom of another?

20{21}The Lord beholdeth the ways of man, and considereth all his steps.

21{22}His own iniquities catch the wicked, and he is fast bound with the ropes of his own sins.

22{23}He shall die, because he hath not received instruction, and in the multitude of his folly he shall be deceived.

23{6:1}My son, if thou be surety for thy friend, thou hast engaged fast thy hand to a stranger,