Charles Spurgeon Commentary 1 Corinthians 11:30

"For this cause many among you are weak and sickly, and not a few sleep." — 1 Corinthians 11:30 (ASV)

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

Many even die; – not that they are lost, – not that this sickness is sent as a curse, but as fatherly chastisement; and the death of many of its members is often a chastisement to the church which is thus weakened by losing its best helpers.

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

Persons coming to the Lord's table in an improper spirit are very apt to come under God's discipline; some will be taken ill, and some will die. This discipline is being carried on in every true church of God. God's providence will work in this way if many treat the table of the Lord as the Corinthians did, acting as if it were a common place for eating and drinking. Many of them were weak and sickly, and many died.

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

There is no doubt that God visited chastisement upon the Corinthians for their lack of reverence at His table; many were weak and sickly among them, and many died. They were not lost if they were believers in Christ, but the church at Corinth sustained a great loss through their departure; and I have no doubt that God still exercises a unique discipline over His own people. Those who are outside are, to a large extent, left to sin as they please; their punishment will fall upon them hereafter; but the child of God cannot be allowed to do so, and he will be chastened for his sin.

The Lord still says to His spiritual Israel, You only have I known of all the families of the earth: therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities. A father may let another man's child alone, but his own son will not transgress without suffering for it. Such conduct as is described here does not bring damnation, for there is no damnation to those who are in Christ Jesus; but it does bring the chastening with which God visits His children when they walk contrary to Him.

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

It appears that God visited this church at Corinth with sickness, and caused many of the members to die, because they had profaned the Lord's table and had walked in a disorderly manner before Him. Paul did not mean to say that these persons were lost; but he intended to remind their fellow-members, and all who might read his Epistle, that God visits churches in this manner with discipline and chastening because of the unseemly conduct which is always so offensive to Him.