One Body, Many Parts

Paul, in 1 Corinthians 12, begins with two words that tell us why he wrote 1 Corinthians. It says, now concerning.

He's going to answer, he's referring to some questions that have come to him from the believers in Corinth. Somehow they'd been sent to him, and he will actually use that little phrase there six times here in 1 Corinthians, because he's answering so many questions. But when you get to verse 12, the focus here is going to shift over to us, all of us,

Believers, believers in Jesus Christ. He's going to tell us two things. One is he's going to tell us that each one of us, when we come to faith in Christ, we get a spiritual gift. Now, let me explain what that means. A spiritual gift is not a natural ability that God sort of takes and hones. It's not your natural way of doing things. It's not your natural way of doing things. natural way of doing things. It's not something you can go to a book and improve yourself or take a class at some organization and improve yourself. A spiritual gift is something that is not something you had before, but for whatever reason, God gave it to you now.

I'll give you a perfect example. I came to Christ at 14. When I was in junior high, I got pulled out of class every single day because I stuttered so badly I couldn't finish a sentence. And then I heard the gospel. And it came to Jesus. And I actually get up and speak in front of people.

That's not something you just go and learn. It's not something I can look back at, you know, one particular teacher and say, well, thank you for teaching me this method or anything like that. God just does a work. And he does that in your life as well. It's not just me. Every single one of us. I don't know what your gift is exactly, but I'm telling you right now that if you've made that decision to follow Christ and you prayed, you asked Christ into your life, he did something inside of you that all you have to be willing to do is say, yes, God, whatever it is you want.

And he'll use you. Now, the second thing that Paul's gonna tell us here too is that we're supposed to be using those gifts to build and encourage the body of Christ. The body of Christ here is simply a metaphor for us, the church. We are the body of Christ.

You know, the best metaphors are the ones that are easily understood. And this one is really easy to understand. Because we all have bodies. You know, we get it that when the body is functioning the way it's supposed to, that the heart is pumping blood to every corner of the body and the lungs are pulling in oxygen to put in those. The kidneys are filtering out all the junk. The fingers, even that we have, the toes, the fingers have this ability to sort of reach out and touch different things and feel like, is it hot, cold? All this time sending the messages to our brain so that the central nervous system can make a decision on what it's gonna do.

And, you know, is it too sharp? Can I grab it? What do I need to do? I mean, the body is an amazing thing. The muscles are just there waiting until you give it an order and then they move.

It's a great metaphor, a great metaphor for understanding how the church works. We've seen bodies work well. But we've also seen bodies that didn't work so well. I mean, we've all seen people that have, for whatever reason, have gone in some accident or something like that. They've been injured in a certain way. They had to have surgery. You know, something happens and it's not working to peak performance right now. We get that. We understand that.

Sometimes the body doesn't work to peak performance, not though because of an injury or an illness. Sometimes it's simply just a lack of motivation.

You know, you can look and you can walk into a church and you can say, well, they don't need me. I mean, this is a big church and a lot of people and they don't need me. don't need me. There's people running around, you know, doing something. I mean, I think we need on a Sunday, like 250 volunteers like every Sunday, you know, and they're running around all over the place doing different things. And you say, ah, they don't need me. No, you're missing the point.

We do need you because God gifted you to do something and we can't help you become who God wants you to be if you're not willing to go, yep, use me. Let me serve God.

When there's a lack of motivation, or an injury, the church suffers. It's like the body suffers. You know, it's so interesting because, like, it's like a little thing. Like, you can take and you, you know, slam your finger in the door or something like that. Have you ever noticed that when that happens, I mean, like even your little finger like this, you slam it in the door and it's like impossible to shake somebody's hand. You can't pick up anything. You can pick it up with this side, you know, and stuff like that, but it just sort of causes this pain that sort of reverberates to every part of your body and it just, you know, it's like, it just doesn't work like it's supposed to.

About a month and a half ago, I had my shoes off and I hooked my little toe on something. Anybody ever do that? Broke it? Nobody cares. It's your little toe. Come on, you know. Why are you whining about that? Because I'm walking like this. You don't run. You don't go, hey, let me just slip up that ladder real fast or let me jump off of that and I'll come and help you. No, you're like this. Everywhere, it's a little toe. It's no big deal. It has nothing to do with my shoulder, right? Except I can't function at the top level.

Can't function like I'm supposed to function. This past week, I was, you know, cutting some stuff on our trees and, you know, doing a couple of different things and I'm up there and, you know, of course, you know, we're not the brightest. I'm not the brightest. You know, I'm up there, I'm on this, I'm cutting something like this and just part of the cut, comes down and goes right into my eye.

Now, I got another eye. What's the big deal? I mean, it's a little tiny little cut off of a piece of wood. It mounts to nothing. If I go, it's gone, you know. But instead, it got inside of my eye and I'm like, you know, I've got this cutter and I'm trying to figure out a way to put this down without cutting my leg off and I'm trying to go down the ladder like this. I mean, it's a little thing and yet, it disables us.

Can't get it done. Got to go and wash. Wash my eye out and then it's better and I finally put my glasses on like I should. You know, in a situation like that,

It's so easy to lose confidence. So easy to lose the ability to do what I'm really trying to do. When one part of the body doesn't function correctly, the whole body struggles. That is exactly what Paul is getting at here in 1 Corinthians chapter 12. Clearly, what had been written to them in the church there is, hey, there's a lot of people here with an incredible amount of gifts. Corinth was an incredibly blessed place. They had incredible teachers but what about the average person?

What are we supposed to do? You talk about spiritual gifts, what do we do? Paul wants to address that. Now, look what he says here because the first thing he's going to tell them here in verses 12 through 14 here is that we all come to Jesus the same way. Listen to what he says. says. For just as the body is one and has many members and all the members of the body through 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.

What he's saying here is the body of Christ has lots of different parts but all of them are a part of the same body and in fact, in in verse 13, he refers back to the fact he says Jew, Greek, slave, free, that particular list was meant to encompass everybody because in Corinth, that's exactly who would have been there.

Everybody. He calls them believers. They're all believers no matter what the background is in this case, all were baptized by one spirit, that would be the Holy Spirit, into one body that is the body of Christ. I mean, again, if somebody comes along and asks you, hey, do you have the Holy Spirit? The simple answer, the biblical answer is according to Romans chapter 8 verse 9, if you don't, you're not a believer.

Ephesians chapter 4 verse 5 says there's one faith, one Lord, one baptism. What he's saying here is that the same Holy Spirit that brought those Greek people to Jesus is the one that brought those Jewish people to Jesus. The same Holy Spirit that brought you to Jesus is the one that brought me to Jesus.

That's an amazing thought, isn't it? You know where you can really see how amazing that truth is? Have you ever been on a missions trip outside of the country?

I mean, it's one of the most incredibly amazing things. I mean, I can remember going into Haiti. I don't speak any Creole. I thought Creole was, you know, something in a little thing and I put it on my food. I mean, really, I didn't know what it, I didn't even know what it was. I mean, and so we went there and yet I didn't know any much about their country. I didn't know much how it worked. I didn't know how the people were going to respond to certain things. Our cultures were completely different. The language, obviously, was completely different and yet they began to sing this song and it realized that's the same songs that we sing

And then we began to sing together and it was just amazing how God had this ability to show us, hey, you're all one. It was just incredible.

You know, years ago, Tyler McGrath and I took a couple of hundred high school students to Washington, D .C. on a street -level gospel choir tour and we went to a bunch of different places. We had all our kids were prepared. They, you know, we had gone through all this evangelism training and all these other different things and they all had little parts they were doing and we would do these different kinds of songs, a lot of secular stuff and then end with Christian stuff and everything and just kind of making this really kind of a fun, incredible vibe and so, you know, we performed in front of like the Smithsonian. We performed, you know, on Freedom Plaza.

We performed right in the last one we were there. We were at the Reflection Pond right at the bottom of the Lincoln Memorial and big crowds of people come to the Lincoln and so these people would stop and they would watch and they would listen. While we were there doing our last show, a really large crowd of tourists that had come in from South Korea. And they were, you know, seeing D .C. and they stopped and they watched the performance

And we finished the last song was kind of a worship, a Christian song, you know, and then after we were done, this large group of tourists, they started singing in Korean. Same song. And then our kids all kind of turned and noticed and they started singing along with them in English.

It was amazing. People that were, sitting, you know, on the steps and people that were up at the Lincoln and people that were around the Reflection started coming over and gathering, trying to see what was going on. I'll tell you exactly what was going on. God was giving a picture of what it looks like when the church all comes together, one faith, one Lord, one baptism, all comes together, cultural differences, but one faith, Jesus.

It was appealing even to the lost. There's just something amazing all about that. And that's what happens. Go someplace else. Go someplace in the world and run into a believer in Uganda and see how, you know, they treat you like brothers and sisters. They sing the same songs in Japan, in Poland, in Mexico, in all these different places because Christ has something about pulling us all together into one body. Our faith unites us. The cultures might be different.

The diversity just enriches us. Look at verse 14 again. Paul says, for the body does not consist of one member, but of many all over the place. That's a church. Different culture, same faith. When we cooperate, all of us using our gifts, the body can display the work of a supernatural God. Now, the second thing that he's going to tell us here is that every believer matters in the body. Look at what he says in 15 and 16. Where if the foot should say, because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body. Or what 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. So Paul here actually stops and imagine one single part of the body like going, oh, I don't think I'm, you know, as talented or as gifted or I don't fit in with this person over here.

It's going to tell us that that's absolutely wrong. Look at verse 17. He says, 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? In other words, it clearly makes a difference that we're different. It matters. It's necessary. If the whole body were just one, you know, where would be the hearing? Where would be the taste? Where would be the touch? We would miss out on, we would miss out on life.

Look at verse 18. But as it is, God has 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 and yet one body. So what he says here is we don't all have the same gifts. In fact, it's so interesting because it tells us here that God has arranged the members in the body and gifted you according to his choice.

I don't know if you catch that or not, not your choice. I don't think I would have ever chosen to have this one. But whatever it is, if you're trusting in the Lord, if you've trusted in the Lord, he has called you to something. He has given you a gift that needs to be used to build up the body and you don't have the choice of what it is. You can improve yourself in lots of different areas. You can become a public speaker. You can do all those things like that. But there's a spiritual gift that's been given you directly from him and it's done on purpose. It's not an accident. He picked you to play a position in the church.

Let me give you an example of what I mean by this. Anybody here ever play baseball?

Softball? Any softballers? Okay. First of all, let me say this. Every little kid, boy or girl, usually when they start playing and they've played just a little while, wants to play catcher for a little bit. They want to play catcher because the catcher gets to touch the ball every single play and the catcher gets to turn and look and see the whole field and everything happens around them and right in front of them. It's sort of a position of action and people really like that and then they take a foul ball off the face mask and they don't want to play. They're good with right field. Okay. Well, part of the thing about it that's so alluring again about playing catcher is the catcher does get to touch the ball every single play

And they have this weird thing where they get to squat down and kind of sit back like this a little bit and sometimes you'll see them do this, you know, and whatever the case may be and it's kind of fun. You're by all the action. The batter's right there. The hump's right there. They're throwing the ball to you. I mean, it's the fun place. So what if the shortstop,

Gets jealous? Well, I want to touch the ball every time. Why does he get to sit down? Why don't I get to sit down? I'm sitting down. Could you imagine the shortstop sitting down like this? How many games would you win?

None. You wouldn't win anything. The catcher and the shortstop don't have the same roles.

They have the same goal. They play on the same team. But they don't play the same position. That is exactly what spiritual gifts are in the church. God has not called everybody to be a catcher. God has different roles for every single one of us. I just simply need to go, I'll play my role.

The one that he's called me to play, that's the one I'm going to play. That's what Paul is telling us here in verses 18 through 20, that each of us, our gifts matter, our service matters, encouraging each other, building each other up, they all matter.

I've had people that would tell me, yeah, but you know what? I'm not on stage, and I don't teach, and I'm really not the kind of singer that wants to sing in front of everybody else, so I don't know if I really do matter. And the answer is, yeah, absolutely you do matter.

Your gift matters. Your service matters. Your presence matters. Listen, when somebody's really hurting, the gift that I have, the gift of God, the the gift of gab, sort of, can go in one ear and out the other, just like that. You know what works? It's the ability to see someone that's hurting a little bit and to stop and maybe go over and sit down next to them. How you doing?

Doing okay? Can I pray with you? How can I help you? Someone that just simply would listen. Someone who would care, who would walk with somebody that's hurting, that's using a spiritual gift. Maybe you have the gift of encouragement. Maybe you have the gift of help where you see somebody that's doing something that's a hard task and you don't think, well, that's their job. No, go help them.

Jump in. Maybe you're struggling right now because you're in a dark place. You don't need somebody that has the gift of administration.

You need somebody who has the gift of encouragement who would just be there to walk you and talk you through it. Remember what verse 18 says here? God has arranged the members of the body, each one of them, as he chose.

So the one who designed you, who created you, who sent his son to die for you, who has adopted us into his family, who's implanted the Holy Spirit inside of you along with a spiritual gift, he has a job for you, an assignment for you to build and encourage the rest of the body, the church.

All he's asking is, say yes. It may not be the one you even think. Watch the video here for a minute, will you? When we first started serving or we decided to serve in missions, I kind of selfishly thought, oh, this would be good for our kids to see. But then throughout the years that we've been doing it and our kids being involved and I kind of saw the impact that our kids had on other people in the church. I remember our oldest, our oldest telling us a story about one of his friends saying, I don't want to ever be poor because I won't be happy. And his response was, I've seen the poorest people in the world and they're some of the happiest people I've ever seen.

My favorite thing about serving with Highlands is we took a trip to San Luis, Mexico and I met this guy and he was trying to get across the border and he was at the migrant center. He then came and got his eyes checked and wound up getting glasses and on Sunday, he was like, was like, he was one of the three or four people that came up and gave his life to Christ. That was a huge impact for me and my kids that were on that trip and it was just cool to kind of see all the way through of like, hey, we are making a difference. This is building more people for the kingdom and it was super exciting.

I think one huge misconception about serving is that you need to be proficient at something in order to start. I also think another misconception is that you need to figure out exactly what your gifts are and then go do something in line with that and choose that. And I think it's really important to engage God in that process and go, Lord, where do you want me to serve? I've seen people over the course of the years that we've done these international missions, I've seen people grow up. I've seen a young boy that came at probably eight years old and now he's going to college next year. And I've seen that kid go from a kid that didn't want to help or serve anybody to a kid that could run the, the the entire mission trip himself.

I've also seen people that have come on a trip and said they need curtains in this room. And then the next time we went, that person made curtains and brought them down. And now they have curtains in their migrant center because that one person went down on a trip and said, how can I help and what can I bring back? And then we have another example where we had a family and down in the church down there had a roof with a hole in it. And I called somebody that I knew, they'd never been down there and they said, sure, we'll put a brand new roof on that church for them. So I've seen that impact of people get moved in the church by doing these mission trips and doing these things.

They think to themselves and they go, how can I help and how can I be involved? And all we've done is just given them that platform to go out and do those things. And then naturally with the Lord and the Holy Spirit through them, they have come up and done these great things. I would say if you're thinking of a particular place that you want to serve, that you think, gosh, I would really like to do that. I just don't feel very gifted in that area or I don't feel that seems really scary for whatever reason. I would say tell somebody because most likely they're going to encourage you in the gifting that they see in you.

God is looking for just you to be there and do it and he will use your gifts in that capacity and serving. So I was that person that was sitting in the seat saying, no, I don't want to do that. I would say that if you're not sure where you want to serve, spend some time just you and the Lord. Ask him because he's going to reveal to you where he wants you to be and he'll put that passion in your heart for where he wants you to be.

Maybe it's time for you to jump into one of the trips like that. I got to tell you, that is an amazing thing. I mean, years ago, we got out of debt as a church and we were able to purchase all our eye care stuff so that we can do all the eye tests and we can actually make glasses too. And so we can go down and set that up and test all these people that maybe haven't seen well in years and years and make glasses for them and then they show up on Friday and the pastor there, the jefe, he gets to get up and give the gospel and people respond in an amazing way and it's just an awesome thing and you'd really be missing out if you don't take a chance and going using your gifts on something like that.

The third thing here, we're almost done, is that, is that is that none of us are superior to anyone else. Look at verse 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. In other words, that doesn't happen in the body. No one looks and says, well, I'm the only person that's necessary here. Verse 22, 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 are more, which are more unpresentable parts do not require.

But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to that part that lacked it. So no gift, no role, no person is so great that they can dismiss others. What Paul is saying here is that you may think that your gift is a weaker gift. We're telling you right now it is indispensable.

We have to have the behind the scenes gift. We have to have the saints. We have to have the quiet servants, the prayer warriors. They're vital to the faith. The parts we can see, to be honest, we can, we could lose those if we're not saying that we would ever want to do it, but we could lose those and be okay. But you can't do with the parts that Paul would call like the heart, the lungs, the kidneys, the central nervous system. We couldn't function as a church without a prayer team. Without a welcoming team that meets you even outside to make sure you feel good about being that we're thankful that you're here or meets you at this inner door so that we can remind you one more time we're really glad you chose to be with us today.

That group of people matters to us. There's a group of people that come early, real early and put all these like, you know, food things out, finger food stuff out and cut donuts and all these other things like that. Not because they get like a tax break. But because they want to make this experience good for you so that you'll have a chance to come in, feel welcome, sit down and hear the truth.

We need more people to do that. Maybe you just need to stop and say thank you to some people like that. We need people that run our sound. We need people that run our videos. On any Sunday we might have, you know, seven, eight hundred even to a thousand people that might watch on, you know, it's a great thing. We wish they could be here with us but if they're stuck in a position where they have to watch,

We have volunteers that come and learn how to do all of this stuff to put it out there so that they can have a taste of God's word.

That's what it means to be gifted and to serve in the body of Christ. Did you come here with children and drop them off in a children's area? Somebody's there to take care and to talk about Jesus and help them understand the truths that we're going through. God has designed the body that there will be no divisions. That when one part suffers all feel the suffering. When one part is honored all would rejoice. No one would ever feel inferior or superior. It's not just a good idea.

This is how God has set up the church to work. This is what the body of Christ is meant to be. A family. A body. That we would build and encourage and serve together. Now the final thing here is that Paul's going to give us some takeaways. As members of the body. Verse 27 he says now now is another simply way of saying based on everything I've told you in the past let me tell you what you need to do.

Now you are members of the body of Christ and individually members of it. And then in verses 28 through 30 he begins to walk through this diverse group of spiritual gifts and people that are in the body and they really are different roles. In verse 28 he mentions the apostles the prophets the teachers the miracle workers the healers the helpers the administrators the speakers of tongues. The passage is clear though not everyone does the same thing.

It's a diverse list. In fact one of the things you can see here is he actually asks this question in a rhetorical way. Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Do all work miracles? The answer is no. Nobody in the body of Christ other than God God other than Jesus has everything. You know why? So that no one would ever get to the place where I don't need anybody.

We need to function together. We're part of a body. God intended it for it to be like that.

He distributed his gifts intentionally as he wishes. Each role is important. Each role matters. Each role is intended to build up the church.

Verse 32. He ends with a challenge here. He says, but earnestly desire the higher gifts and I will show you a still more excellent way. Now if you understand where we're at in 1 Corinthians you know that the very next thing he starts off into the love chapter and the very first thing he'll say is look if I have the ability to speak in the tongues of men and angels but I don't have love I'm nothing.

Pretty important words. The more excellent way here is love. So here's five takeaways. I'll give them to you fast. Number one. You matter.

Whatever your gift is however you serve you're needed. We need you here. Do not let comparison or insecurity steal your purpose. You matter. Just the way you are. We need you to use your gifts. Number two. The people around you matter. No one is above anyone else in the kingdom. So encourage them. Come alongside of them. Help serve them as they serve you. Say thanks. If somebody's going through all the work of cleaning up tables and putting out something it's a good thing to stop and just go thank you. Appreciate that so much.

Number three. Do not be envious of another's gifts. Envy leads to comparison. Comparison leads to a poor self image or jealousy. I mean remember why we're not supposed to feel jealous or envious? Because back in verse 18 it says that God chose your gift. This is not about how hard you've worked at something. Well I've worked really hard at this to be you know no no no. That gift you have God gave it to you.

It's a supernatural thing. So the question that gift is the question that God who gifted you

Use your gifts. Be faithful with your gifts. Don't worry about anybody else's gifts. The issue here is will you be faithful with yours or not?

The fourth thing here the fourth takeaway is don't be arrogant because of your gift. Remember what he said back in 28 to 30 there. He says no one can do it all. Three times he says are all this? Nope. Four times he says do all do this? Nope. Paul's point is no one can do it all.

The fifth thing is this. We belong to each other. The body needs all of us. We don't just need those that are up front and we don't just need those that are behind us. Behind the scenes we need all of it to function as God calls the body to function.

Look let me be really clear about this. The God that we're talking about here is a God that loves us so much that he sent his only son to come and make a way for you to get into heaven. You see the standard of God's heaven is perfection and I don't care what you do in this life you can never be perfect. You could give away every single dollar you have. Maybe you could give a million dollars away. You know what that would make you? That would make you the best person in the room but it would not fundamentally make you what God needs you to be in heaven and that is perfect. The only way you can get into heaven is if a perfect God makes a way for you.

That is exactly what he did. I simply need to quit trusting in me and trust in his son Jesus. When I do that everything changes. Now the one who created me who designed me now he's not only forgiven me and adopted me into his family but now he puts this gift inside of me and says hey I want you to be in my work. I want you to serve.

That's the God we're talking about. If you don't know that God let me can I encourage you that you could begin a relationship with him right now. You don't need anybody to help you. You could pray right where you're at and ask God to forgive you to come into your life and if you trust in him he'll come into your life. He'll come into your life. He'll save you.

Pray with me. Father thank you so much for gifting us in a way that we can honor you.

Pray that our hearts would be open to doing that. To recognizing what you've done for us. Your love for us. How you've made a way for us. How you've implanted your spirit inside of us. How you've gifted us. Help us to step forward to use that. To be a part of your work. To build up the body. Thank you Father. In Jesus name. Amen. Listen we're gonna have people that are gonna be down here they would love to pray with you and for you. They'd love to be able to encourage you. If you wanna make that decision to follow Christ they'll help you with that. We have a whole lot of people that are in the lobby out there that have all sorts of opportunities for you to serve the Lord.

Can I just say one thing? Please use your gift to do God's work. Please. Don't waste it. People need it. There are people that just need to be loved and encouraged, built up. You know feel like they matter in the kingdom. Come alongside of them. Do all those things that are necessary but use that gift. You will find great fulfillment in it. God bless you. Love you all. Have a great day.