The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ. For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body - whether Jews or Greeks, slave or free - and we were all given the one Spirit to drink. Now the body is not made up of one part but of many. If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason cease to be part of the body. And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason cease to be part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact God has arranged the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you!” And the head cannot say to the feet, “I don’t need you!” On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and the parts that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor. And the parts that are unpresentable are treated with special modesty, while our presentable parts need no special treatment. But God has combined the members of the body and has given greater honor to the parts that lacked it, so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it. Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it. (1 Corinthians 12:12-27)
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(Congregation sings:)
We are God’s people, the chosen of the Lord, Born of His Spirit, established by His word.
Our cornerstone is Christ alone, And strong in Him we stand.
O let us live transparently, and walk heart to heart and hand in hand.
We are God’s loved ones, the Bride of Christ our Lord, For we have known it, the love of God outpoured;
Now let us learn how to return the gift of love once given:
O let us share each joy and care, and live with a zeal that pleases heaven.
This passage of Scripture is a celebration - and maybe it’s best to leave it as that. To this point in 1 Corinthians, Paul has been lamenting the lack of unity that he sees within the Christian community at Corinth. He’s bewildered by what’s happened there; he’s troubled by it; he’s angered by it. The gospel should be giving the Corinthians a sense of shared identity and purpose and mission and instead it’s torn them apart - or, at least, they way they’ve used and abused the gospel message has torn them apart. But enough of lament for Paul - now is the time to start celebrating, and to give the reasons for celebration, because you can’t convince people to be a real community simply by chastising them - you have to tell them what’s so great about being a real community. If you’re in a situation of conflict, where the conflict is endemic and starts to permeate everything and everyone and is everywhere you look, then conflict can become the default position. People can forget that there’s any other way. Churches in conflict are sometimes in conflict because they think it’s a normal way of being church. That’s sad, but true. So, Paul now turns (in the rest of the letter) to what should be “normal” for Christians - and that’s an attitude of joy and celebration, because of what God has done in and through Christ.
To celebrate this community God has called into being means recognizing the bond that we have with one another, and understanding what that bond means. The church is Christ's body on earth, and what that means is that more than anything else is that, simply put, the church needs a passionate commitment to Jesus and not a passionate commitment to political ideas or doctrines or even to social justice. The church as a whole needs to be committed to Jesus more than to hanging on to influence within society, and followers of Christ as members of the body need to be passionately committed to Jesus rather than to the desire to have things the way we want them. Too often, perhaps, the church loses that passion. We become committed to doing “things” without the focus on Jesus. I hear it said often that the best way to attract people to the church is to give them meaningful “things” to do, but that’s not really true. In the contemporary world, people are more interested in “being” than in “doing.” That’s not to say that they won’t “do” the “things” that Christ calls them to do, but they need to know that it’s Christ calling them to action, and not that they’re being asked to “do things” simply for the church, or to “do” simply for the sake of “doing” as an end in itself. To be truly one, the church has to rediscover the beauty and the majesty and and the power and the spirituality of a strong commitment to Jesus Christ that places him at the centre of everything that happens. When that happens, we won’t get bent out of shape about things that are truly unimportant. The only thing we’ll be concerned about in everything we do is "Did we meet Jesus?" and “Did we introduce others to Jesus?” If the answer to either question is “yes” we’ll celebrate; and if the answer to either question is “no” we’ll try to figure out where we went wrong, make amends and seek to go deeper next time, but what we won’t be concerned about is “Did I get my way today?” or “Did everything happen the way I thought it should happen?” To be reminded that we are the body of Christ is really to celebrate the fact that we are called to be not so much “Christians” - which sounds so institutional - but rather “followers of Jesus” - because that talks about relationship with Jesus, and relationship with others who follow Jesus. Rediscovering Jesus means revitalizing worship; it means sharpening our mission; it means nurturing one another. That’s what the one body of Christ does when it focusses only and exclusively on Jesus.
(Congregation sings:)
We are the body of which the Lord is head, called to obey him, now risen from the dead;
He wills us be a family, diverse yet truly one:
O let us give our gifts to God, and so shall his work on earth be done.
We are a temple, the Spirit’s dwelling place, formed in great weakness, a cup to hold God’s grace,
We die alone for on its own each ember loses fire:
Yet joined as one the flame burns on to give warmth and light and to inspire!
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