I Belong, Part 3
Notes
Transcript
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. 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.
For the body does not consist of one member but of many. 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. 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. 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? But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. If all were a single member, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, yet one body.
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.” On the contrary, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, 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, which our more presentable parts do not require. But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together.
Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. 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. Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? Do all possess gifts of healing? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret? But earnestly desire the higher gifts.
And I will show you a still more excellent way.
Scripture: 1 Corinthians 12:12-31
Sermon Title: Building Blocks of Faith—I Belong Part 3
“I belong to Jesus, and thus to his body, the church.” This is the building block of faith that we’ve been considering here the past two Sundays. What does our faith need to develop? We need to know and experience this kind of belonging. This morning is our final part of this building block as we turn again to what it means to belong to the church. Last week my message was intended to connect us to the church universal. We were reminded by Scripture and our standards that we are not alone in our Christian faith, we join with all people who are called to love the Lord.
Our Scripture for today from 1 Corinthians heads us in a similar direction. This is one of those passages that speaks of a physical body and how the church relates to and functions like the body. But we will focus on what it means to be a local church, and what being members of our local congregations involves. It is fitting on a day in which we are celebrating a baptism and the symbolism of welcoming into the family of God and a local body that we are looking at this topic.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, what does the local church do? What is its business? I don’t use that word in terms of how are we making money, but what do we busy ourselves with? What is our work, our practice?
During my time in college when I was planning for seminary and even as I got to Western, I wrestled with that idea and sincerely felt that it was a wrong and flawed question. In my mind, what the church needs to be thinking about is not what it does, rather the church is who it is, who we are called to be. Individual members do work, but for the church, aren’t we simply called to exist, to be followers of Christ? If you want to know what to do, well, read your Bible, you’ll figure out what you’re supposed to do.
To an extent, I still believe that to hold some merit. I don’t want to toss that out completely. God has given to each of his children different passions and interests and skills. We can choose to pursue careers and activities which glorify him by using those gifts. When it comes to our lifestyles, what do each of us need to know about behaviors we should exercise? Certainly, it is by God’s infallible word and the Holy Spirit ministering to our spirits. If we can read or listen, then each of us can and should figure out what a godly, redeemed life looks like by picking up our Bibles. There’s some truth to the mentality that Christians simply are, and the church is.
And yet the church and specifically for us on this topic of local churches or congregations today, the church also should be doing. When you think about the body as Paul speaks of to the church in Corinth, he is talking about it not only in terms of its parts, but also the functions of the parts. The foot is not a hand, but both are in the body. The ear is not the eye, but both are in the body. Our feet enable us to stand and walk and run and kick—all of those are actions. The hand can hold a loved one, it can take the milk out of the fridge, it can handle a fork or spoon to feed ourselves, it can also crank a fishing reel and bait a hook—actions. Our eyes see. They take in light and images, and process them so that we can be aware of our surroundings. Our ears hear. They take in vibrations and sounds, processing them so we can be in conversation or listen to a sermon or a command from our parents. So, too, our noses smell—sometimes fresh flowers, sometimes a bad odor. If we were blindfolded and put in a car without any sense of direction, our noses enable us to tell if we’re still in the country or if we’ve gone to somewhere like Sioux Falls.
Verse 18 says, “God has arranged the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be.” The body is one, but it is able to accomplish so many things because the parts are different. The parts do not just look different. If that were the case, Paul could be describing a statue of a human being. But what really matters in Paul’s description is recognizing that not only are the parts different, but the differences in what these parts do.
The body as we looked at last time is the whole church, the universal church, from the earliest believers back at creation all the way through today until Christ comes again. The church is made up of believers who claim redemption not in themselves but in the sacrifice and love of the one true God. We, as a congregation here, are only a part of that body. Maybe we quickly try to figure out what part we are. Are we an arm that reaches out to help, or a foot that kicks things out (there’s churches that fit that role), or are we part of the mind—are we thinkers? Yet the body is only a picture for the church to use. Knowing which limb or organ a church could be considered is not most important, but what is our role, what is our function?
We heard Paul list off a variety of gifts, of ministries—and the answer to the hypothetical questions of verses 29 to 30 is no. We’re not all apostles or speakers in tongues or workers of miracles. Within a local church, we have different gifts and callings. We can actually represent a variety of the parts of the body. That lends credence to what I was talking about before, that we as individuals do on our own—we live out our faith according to the gifts God has given to us. We can do that without the name of a local church. Sometimes we might even feel like formally connecting our gifts might disrupt the good we are already doing and accomplishing. All of this to recognize though the church is to be active. Individually and together, part of our identity as Christians and of churches is that we are active doers. The church is the body that is and that does.
But before we go any further, it’s important to clarify, what is a local church? Throughout his letters, Paul spoke to the churches he knew in the early church era. These letters are named in our Bibles according to the places they went. Romans to the church in Rome, Galatians to the church in Galatia, and each to the churches in Ephesus, Philippi, Colossae, Thessalonica, and yes, Corinth. He wrote them specifically about what was going on in their church, in their cities—different believers struggled with different things. When we talk about the local church, we must recognize that our context, our place does matter. A church in Corsica will look different in certain aspects from a church in Chicago or in Hong Kong or Amsterdam or Kenya. But we can learn and join together, too, to serve Christ’s kingdom.
In this letter that is before, Paul speaks to the Corinthians about a number of topics pertaining to worship in their church or churches. These words were going to house churches, to collectives, to corporate bodies made up of members who were invested and living in accord with one another for the kingdom. That is what a local congregation is. We are members of Christ’s church universal because we belong by faith to Jesus, but we also see value and see the direction in the Bible for us to be getting together. Our being members in a congregation involves holding each other accountable, helping one another in our struggles, discerning what is truth when the devil tries to tell us lies. We are committed to one another under the lordship of Jesus Christ.
We have turned to our creeds and confessions the last couple of weeks, and I want to point again to the Belgic Confession. In Article 29, Guido de Bres lays out “Marks of the True Church,” and this is just a few selections: “The true church can be recognized if it has the following marks: The church engages in the pure preaching of the gospel; it makes use of the pure administration of the sacraments as Christ instituted them; it practices church discipline for correcting faults. In short, it governs itself according to the pure Word of God, rejecting all things contrary to it and holding Jesus Christ as the only Head…As for those who can belong to the church, we can recognize them by the distinguishing marks of Christians: namely by faith, and by fleeing from sin and pursuing righteousness, once they have received the one and only Savior, Jesus Christ.”
Understanding who the church is and the practices of the church, we use this language of belonging and membership. What we mean by that is that as members, we recognize that there’s value to not going on our own with our faith; we need help, we need correction; we can nurture and be nurtured. Christians who are in congregations are tying into the church that seeks the truth of God’s word and action for salvation. We exercise discipline in various ways. We partake in the sacraments that draw us to the real actions of Jesus’ sacrifice. We are living together in such a way that promotes seeing the work of Jesus’ redemption and grace in our lives and this world. We recognize that God’s work is not just general throughout the world, but it is particular in each community. That is what a local church and being members of a church should be about—we truly are better and better off together for the kingdom.
For our final point this morning, I want us to consider a local question, and that question is what do we do? What is our function, our business, our ability, our gift? Whether you consider yourself a member of Grace Reformed Church or a member of Corsica Christian Reformed Church, or a member of Grace-slash-The CRC, or are abstaining from membership or have membership in a different church—what do you understand your church to do?
Quite often churches can be quick to answer that question by naming programs and events. We do Sunday School. We do Coffee Break and other Bible studies. We do worship services, youth group. A church could say we do Cadets, GEMS, AWANA; some churches have support groups, day cares, conferences. We run through a list involving names and times and places. Some churches work in various ways to serve the less fortunate in their communities, or in lobbying for political policies. That is what they do and consider kingdom work. And those are not wrong answers. There is vital ministry, transformative ministry that can happen through these avenues of the local church.
But that leads us to ask another question—if the local church is primarily about program ministries and you are part of this church or another—are you committed and involved in what your church does? I mentioned before that we have individual ministries and callings, and we don’t necessarily need to put those under the name of our local church, but how are we contributing to work of God’s kingdom and can we with the church do more together for the kingdom?
To answer these kinds of questions requires us to know what is our purpose and what is our mission? Why do we exist? Why has God put this church here in Corsica? Is it to solely train up those who are born into believing families? That’s a necessary thing, we believe that the church is called to do that—look again at the baptismal vows. But is our purpose also linked to what Jesus has said—“Go, make disciples, baptizing people you’ve reached out to, and teaching them to live in the way of Jesus because his way is different from the way of the world”? What is our God-given purpose, and are we living accordingly?
Then what is our mission? What has God called us to be involved in? Who, where, what has God called us to do? Does your church have a direction for these kinds of questions? Are you committed to being involved in purpose and mission, or do we just want to consume what tastes good and is convenient to attend?
Brothers and sisters, “you, all of you, are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it.” So, what are we doing for and with the body? What gifts has God given us to use and how can we encourage one another to use those gifts? How are we contributing for God’s church and kingdom together? Amen.