The Body of Christ (Sermon 1.27.2013)

Since we did not have church this morning, I found myself in a conundrum... I was so tempted to not post this sermon and just use it next week because I thought it was such a good sermon that I did not want it to go to waste.  But after getting some of your feedback through conversations via facebook, email and face-to-face I have found out that there are several people who like reading these sermons, therefore, it is not a waste.  I will prepare next week's sermon like I have every other and it was in the will of God for this one to be read on this blog.  Going back to last week's sermon, I almost let my pride get the best of me by thinking that this sermon was "too good to waste" but the Holy Spirit encouraged me to share it regardless.  Today's sermon focuses a lot on community.  This is an issue that is very near and dear to my heart because I feel that God calls all of His people to function as part of a community, even if we are seperated by thousands of miles.  There are different levels of community with the most basic starting with your circle of family and friends, then it branches to your congregation and church, then to the town or city you live in, all the way up to the community of the universal Church.  As you read today you will notice an emphasis with a capital 'C' when referencing Church because I wanted us to understand the scope of Paul's message which encompasses the entire Christian community, not just the one where you are most involved.  I know that a lot of churches canceled their services today so I hope today's message finds more people than normal since a lot of you did not have the opportunity to attend your normal church service.  I encourage you to make time for some sort of worship today and just let God know that you are still striving to stay close to His will.  Today's scripture comes from Paul's first letter to the Corinthians chapter 12 verses 12-31:

¹² For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. ¹³ For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit.

¹⁴ For the body does not consist of one member but of many. ¹⁵ If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. ¹⁶ And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. ¹⁷ If the whole body were an eye, where would be the sense of hearing? If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of smell? ¹⁸ But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. ¹⁹ If all were a single member, where would the body be? ²⁰ As it is, there are many parts, yet one body.

²¹ The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” ²² On the contrary, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable,²³ and on those parts of the body that we think less honorable we bestow the greater honor, and our unpresentable parts are treated with greater modesty, ²⁴ which our more presentable parts do not require. But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, ²⁵ that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another.²⁶ If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together.

²⁷ Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. ²⁸ And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healing, helping,administrating, and various kinds of tongues. ²⁹ Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? ³⁰ Do all possess gifts of healing? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?³¹ But earnestly desire the higher gifts.

And I will show you a still more excellent way.

As I mentioned earlier, I spent last night at Wells Fargo Arena with our youth and the youth of the Church of Christ.  And as she so often does, Cheyanne had been telling me all week to write my sermon because it would be late when we got home and my response was that I wanted to wait until after the concert to write it for I felt that I would have more material to base the sermon on.  And to prove to Cheyanne that I was right, I felt “compelled” (and by compelled I mean the simple fact that I could save face with my wife) to talk about the concert and the experience with the other youth group in today’s sermon.  Without the experience of last night I think I could have made the mistake of not making this sermon broad enough.  All week I had been planning on talking about how we have so many different “parts” that make up our church body, while that is true and I do not doubt that I could have wrote a great sermon on that, I feel like God is calling us to look much broader than just our church in particular.

First, I want to talk about the range in music that was played last night.  There were bands and musicians of about every genre that you can think of.  There were musicians that I liked, ones that I did not particularly care for, there were bands that some of you would have liked, some that my grandparents may have liked and others they would not enjoyed at all.  There were musicians that could dance... almost as good as I can.  There were bands that explosions and fire shooting into the air.  There was one musician that played with just her guitar and no one else.  There was a hip-hop artist along with your typical contemporary worship bands that you may see at any given contemporary service.  All of these people were greatly skilled at their craft and they were all very entertaining and had great stories to share even if I did not particularly like their kind of music.  The point is that God gave these musicians a lot of talent and this allows anyone who went the opportunity to hear the kind of music they like.  The faith lesson that comes from this is that God spreads out these talents so we can worship to any style of music that we like best.  The way the each of us views our relationship with God is unique so our way of worshiping can also be very unique.  We need to maintain an open mind to the way others may worship and just because it isn’t our cup of tea, does not mean that it is wrong.  As I was writing this sermon, my eardrums are still trying to tell my how wrong some of that music sounded but it works for others.  

Second, I want to talk about our experience with the youth of the Church of Christ.  They have a very strong youth program and most of the credit for that goes to their youth pastor Jimmy Tyree.  He commands the kids’ attention but yet they respect and listen to him.  He is a great asset to that church and this community and I have enjoyed getting to know him through this experience and hope to do a lot more with the youth of both programs.  The Church (capital ‘C’ which means the universal Church) may have a lot of ‘parts’ as discussed in today’s scripture but we are still part of the same body.  Even though we come from different denominations or parts, our goals are still similar.  The way the worship, or function as their part of the body, may be different than ours but yet they still worship the same God and believe that Jesus died and rose again for the forgiveness of our sins.  The word ‘denomination’ is a word that creates division and what we are trying to do is create a community that takes care of one another and spreads the good news of Christ.  Denominations have a tendency to divide us instead of unifying us and today’s scripture was wrote in the hopes of unifying the many different parts of the same body of faith.  Some churches are so scared of the word ‘denomination’ that they call themselves non-denominational as to avoid such divisions.  I do not think this is always necessary but there way of thinking is in the right place.  They are trying to create an environment where people from many different walks of life can worship in one place.  Pleasantville and the surrounding areas should also be working towards a similar goal.  We should not be divided among denominational lines; instead, we need to be unified as a community that demonstrates character, care for one another, love and hope for a better future.  For far too long, there have been lines drawn for reasons that we no longer understand or that are no longer relevant.  If you are real with yourself and your faith, there is absolutely no reason for such divisions to have a foothold in this community.  It seems that when people move here who have not grown up here there is somewhat of a competition to get them to join our side because we feel our side is better than the other options.  The point is that the should be no sides.  There should be no sense of competition.  We should only be worried about making them feel welcome into this community.  I am guilty as charged because I am comfortable with my group, in the past I have not gone out of my way to make others feel welcome because it is not comfortable for me to do so.  But God calls me to get past that.  As part of God’s people, I am called to welcome everyone and to make them comfortable in our community.  

Third, I want to look at the picture of unity that Paul draws for us when it comes to the body of the Church.  It is neat how God has aligned the lectionary with the class that I am taking as part of the Commissioned Ministries Program.  In class, we are talking about the letters that Paul wrote since they seem to be written closest to the death of Christ compared to the other NT books.  Since Paul was a Greek Jewish-Christian, he was very familiar with the writings of many of the Greek philosophers.  Plato is extremely important to today’s scripture because he was one of the first to talk about the unity and connectivity of the body and this is why Paul chose to use this analogy.  Plato pointed out that we do say, “My finger has a pain,” instead, we say, “I have a pain.”  When we use the pronoun I, we give it a personality, which helps us unify all the parts of the body.  Christ does the same for the Church.  Christ is what gives the Church its personality, He is what unifies the body.  It is through Christ, and Him alone, that all the diverse parts of the body, the Church, find their unity.  In verse 27 the pronoun shifts from I to you.  Understanding this switch is crucial for us to understand this analogy.  Christ is no longer physically on this earth so this means that God calls us to take over aspects of the body.  For example, if God wants a child to be taught, He has to find a teacher to teach him; if God wants a sick person healed, then He has to find a doctor to do His work; if He wants His story told, He has to find a person to tell it.  This scripture is literally telling us that we have to be the body of Christ.  We must be his hands to build a home of for the homeless, we must be His feet to run his errands, we must be His voice so others can hear His message.  It is by following this command where we find God’s glory on earth, we are called to be the body of Christ on earth.  

Verses 21-25 offer us some great insight into how the Church, the body of Christ, should function and connect with each other.  First, Paul tells us that we must realize that we need each other.  If I did not have fingers, I could not type this sermon.  If you did not have hands, someone would have to hold the communion trays for you and serve the sacraments to you.  This means that there cannot be isolation in the Church because this leads to neglecting or criticising other aspects of the body.  When I was in high school, I wanted to do curls all the time, you know, curls for the girls... I wanted big biceps because that is what got the girls’ attention, plus it made me feel and look and strong.  But that led me to neglect my triceps, which are a lot more important to the position I played in football.  It led me to neglect lifting my legs which are also a lot more important than the biceps.  If I wanted to be a good athlete and have a healthy body, I needed all the parts of my body to be strong.  The same goes for the community of Christ, we must understand that someone’s gifts may be different than our own and we need those gifts to maintain a healthy body.  Second, Paul shows us that we must respect each other.  For the body to function properly, we can place more importance on certain parts of the body than we do others.  When I twist an ankle, it causes my whole body to function differently.  I favor the ankle that is injured and shift my weight to the other leg which causes it to carry more of the load.  As a pastor, if I were to favor the worship aspect of our service, then my ability to preach would suffer.  Whenever we favor one aspect of the Church, community, or body it causes others aspects to suffer.  Therefore we must show mutual respect to all parts.  Third, Paul teaches us that we must sympathize with each other.  If any one part of the body is affected, all the other parts suffer in sympathy because they cannot help it.  We must see the Church as a whole because it so easy to get caught up in the importance of our function that we lose sight of the other aspects.  When one part of the body fails, the others must be there to help it cope.  If we fail to see beyond this congregation, this church, or even this community, we fail to grasp the unifying power of the Church, of God, and of the saving grace of Christ.  

In closing, Paul leaves chapter 12 with a cliffhanger, or what those in tv call a tease.  You know when you are watching a show or a newscast, they give you just enough information to keep you tuned into that channel.  They do not give you enough to draw your own conclusions but just enough to keep you interested.  That is what Paul does here, he says that I will show you the most excellent way.  It is almost to say, “stay tuned folks, I am about to tell you the key to all of this, stay tuned, keep reading and you will find the key to unifying the body of Christ.”  If you have been to any number of weddings, it will soon come to you just what Paul is talking about.  1st Corinthians 13 is often referred to as the hymn of love.  It tells us about the greatness of love and the many characteristics it entails.  But this definition of love is the key ingredient to what Paul shares with us in chapter 12.  Paul understand that it is love, and only love, that has the power to bind the Church into perfect unity.  It is like the music of Winter Jam, even though the sounds, rhythms and words are different to each of the musicians, it is their love of Christ that unifies them.  It is that same love that reaches across denominational lines and blurs those boundaries so that we can realize that we are worshipping the same God and spreading similar messages about the saving grace of Christ.  It is the same love that lifts up a community and tears down the walls of jealousy, pain and misguided hearts.  If you would like to become apart of the body of Christ, not just part of this congregation, but a part of something much bigger than we can imagine you may do so today.  It is a simple prayer that is between you and God.  All you have to tell Him is that you accept that Christ died for your sin.  Your grace is already there, patiently waiting for you to take it.  The price has already been paid for you, all you have to do is accept it.  Maybe you would like to become a part of this congregation, but with the understanding that in doing so you are becoming part of the entire body of Christ, you may do that by transferring your membership.  We will gladly accept all that you as part of this body of Christ.  Amen.

God Bless and have a great week!

Clinton Wallace (link to my Facebook page)

Fairview Christian Church (this is a link to Fairview's Facebook page where you can 'like' us and follow us)