I Corinthians 12:12-31

For the sake of further discussion, here is the passage that we went through last week.

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. (From the English Standard Version)

One thing I wanted to bring up in Sunday School, but didn’t have the time to, was the assumption that it seems Paul makes in this passage. In reading it, there seems to be a clear message that every believer is supposed have a spiritual gift or role in the Church. However, I have known believers (and have been guilty of this myself) who had no desire to be a “body part” or have any kind of service. What do we do when we encounter this in others, or see it in ourselves? Now I am not talking about giving all of our available time to the church or it’s activities, but more in the sense of seeking what spiritual gift(s) the Holy Spirit has for us (12:31, 14:1) that can be used when we come together. It often seems like in many of today’s congregations there are a lot of people who just want to be an unseen member. Does anyone have any opinions about this?

Holiness

Sorry we missed class Sunday, we were helping out in Sarah’s class. I’ve been thinking about this for a couple of weeks now, since I took us down the rabbit hole. What I was TRYING to do a few Sunday’s ago was NOT derail the class on a non-essential tangent, but discuss maintaining holy lives in the midst of participating with “the world.” (natives as Clint would say). I was thinking how could I express what I mean by holy living? Why would I need to do that? Why, because we tend to assume a plain moral-centered idea of holiness, and that’s not strictly what I mean by holy-living. When we don’t interact (I mean go to movies with, eat with, talk with) with non-Christians our idea of holiness has that obey the law feeling to it. So as long as I do these things and don’t do these other things I’m living a holy life. The problem is we tend to need a clear rule rather than a guide and embed our cultural preferences within the message of holiness. Is this not the issue Jesus took with the Pharisees.

Joel Scandrett has a great article in the current Christianity Today (May/07). He makes the point that the word for holiness has more to do with belonging to God, not to neglect our moral responsibility, but to keep us from an unhealthy moral-ism (see John’s thoughts).

“To be holy, to be set apart to God, is never an end in itself but is always for the sake of the world.”

Everything, for me, comes back to church (I need to identify what I mean by that…another post). Our closest brothers and sisters help keep us in check, not in a moralistic way, but in a relational way, so that they just know “somethings not right.” A friend of mine put it this way: Would you every say, I’m going to relate to my wife today? No, you just do. If you relationship is hurting, you know it. You may not want to face up to it, but you know. It’s that way with church, we have people that help remind us who we belong to, And that anchors us. If you agree with me you might like listening to this and enjoy reading this. If you think I’m way off, it would still be worth your time to listen/read/think/pray.