1 Corinthians 10:21, commentary and pictures

What the Gentiles sacrifice they sacrifice to evil spirits and not to God, so to share in those sacrifices in any manner is to have fellowship with devils and is forbidden. The devils meant are evil angels, the messengers of Satan, not the spirits of the dead, so ancient idolatry, including both worship of the dead and pretended communion with them, was in reality demon-worship. The Corinthians violated this by perverting the true meaning of the Lord's supper after the pattern of idolatrous feasts. They assembled to celebrate Christ's sufferings and death but turned the occasion into feasting and selfish enjoyment, joining a social meal to communion where families ate their own food without waiting for others. The wealthy thus made the holy institution a gluttonous feast while the poor were shamed when their meager fare contrasted with costly viands.

To make the house of God a place of feasting and revelry is to act like a company of idolaters in imitation of the public religious feasts of the Greeks. This compromise was introduced by false teachers who first assured Christians it was not wrong to attend idolatrous feasts and then brought the same practices into the church. Sharing in the worship or offerings of idols is incompatible with sharing in the Lord's worship, so Christians cannot partake of the Lord's table and the table of devils. Even buying food offered to idols could appear to sanction idolatry.

The warning is for all time and is specially adapted to the present day, for by idolatry it means not only the worship of idols but also selfishness, love of ease, and the gratification of appetite and passion. A mere profession of faith in Christ and a boastful knowledge of the truth does not make a Christian. A religion that seeks only to gratify the eye, the ear, and the taste, or that permits any hurtful self-indulgence, is not the religion of Christ but is in harmony with the spirit of the world and opposed to the Scriptures. Festivals and scenes of amusement in which professed Christians imitate the customs of the world and enjoy its pleasures are a virtual union with the enemies of God.

Intoxicating wine should never be placed on the Lord's table because it is not a proper symbol of Christ's blood. The wine Christ made from water was pure grape juice, not fermented or intoxicating wine, since making intoxicating wine would have contradicted his teachings and example. Taking part in the Lord's table does not prove a person is a true Christian, for people influenced by Satan may be present even at the most solemn occasions, including the Lord's table. Taking part in the Lord's table is not a basis for requiring participation in the foot-washing ordinance first; a person may be welcomed to communion without joining in foot washing.

There is no middle ground, even in business relations with the unconverted: Christians are either under Christ's rule, heeding His instruction and doing the work God gives them to do, or they are under the control of the enemy. Those who profess to be Christians but are not under God's control contribute nothing to the efficiency of the gospel, bear no fruit to God's glory, and the Lord cannot co-operate with them. They stand written in heaven's record books as consumers, not producers, as stones that take up room in the building but emit no light because as living stones they receive no light from the chief Cornerstone. They cannot trust their souls to such uncertainty, for they are either doing positive good or incalculable harm, and their influence is either a savor of life unto life or of death unto death.

Even a people privileged to behold the glory and power of Jehovah needs this warning, because men do not know their own hearts, for the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, while God understands the tendencies of depraved human nature. Satan watches for opportunity to lead God's people into conditions favorable to rebellion and transgression, ever alert to open channels for the unrestrained flow of evil in their nature that they have not overcome, because he desires their ruin and condemnation before God. Holding communion with evil spirits produces the results seen in the abominations of the Canaanites — loss of natural affection, idolatry, adultery, murder, and every corrupt thought and revolting practice — and makes people abhorrent to God. Those who fall into the same errors will die under similar judgments as Sodom and Canaan.