Dan Herold | 1 Corinthians 12:12-21, 26, 27 | January 10, 2015
(Sermon begins at 23:18)
How many times have you ever felt under appreciated? Maybe you’ve felt like your hard work goes un-noticed and someone else gets all the attention and all the credit while you get forgotten. If you’ve ever felt that way you’ve probably also wished, at one time or another, that you could be the one that gets the praise and recognition for a change. This happens to all sorts of people. It happens at your job and it happens at home. If you are the one that typically does the laundry or the cooking or the cleaning at home sometimes it might feel like no one else appreciates all the hard work you do. It might even seem like it’s not worth doing that work anymore if no one else is going to appreciate what you do and then you find yourself wishing you were somewhere or someone else. You find yourself wishing that you could be rich and famous so that you could hire someone to do the cleaning and the cooking and the laundry for you.
When I was younger, I played football for a long time. I started in 5th grade and played through college. If you are familiar with football at all you can probably guess just from looking at me now that I was never one of the guys on the football team that got to score touchdowns or even touch the ball very often. In 8 years of high school and college football I touched a football twice during games. For most of my playing days I played on the offensive line—the big guys trying to push the other big guys around so the littler guys can score touchdowns. Playing on the offensive line on a football team is a notoriously thank-less job. It’s always your fault when something goes wrong and it’s never your fault if something went right. Any offensive lineman would be lying if he told you that he never wished he was a running back or a quarterback and got to score touchdowns and be in the spotlight.
The offensive line is one of the most important parts of a the football team, though. Without an offensive line there’s no barrier between the running backs and quarterbacks and the defense. Without the offensive line doing their thank-less job the rest of the offense would never have a chance to score a touchdown. In fact, the offensive line isn’t the only necessary part of the team, every position has a job that needs to be done in order for the team to function as it is supposed to. A football team needs lineman, and quarterbacks, and running backs, and receivers, and defenders, and it even needs kickers. Every position has a job that is necessary for the team.
There’s something deeply ingrained in our nature, though, that makes us hate not getting attention when we think we should. If we do a good job we want to be recognized for it. When that doesn’t happen we start to resent having to do a job for which we don’t get recognized. What would happen, though, if we all did the same job? What would happen if we all gave up doing the things that we feel we don’t get recognized for and we all did the same jobs?
It would be a pretty boring football game if there were only lineman, or only quarterbacks, or only kickers. If we all wanted to be the same either we’d have to work overtime to accomplish everything that needs to get done or there would be important jobs that just never did get done. We’ve been talking so far about jobs (both in and outside our homes) and football teams, but this same principle applies to the church—it applies to the church as a whole (as in all believers) and it applies to our own congregation right here at Shepherd of the Hills. In 1 Corinthians 12 the Apostle Paul talks about building up a strong body.
Paul recognized that even among Christians there is sometimes strife. Even though we have been redeemed by the blood of our Savior, Jesus, we all still are sinners and at times we are going to rebel against things like the jobs we have been given to do. Paul gives some directions for how we can work together to build up our own congregation and the whole body made up of all believers. There’s three parts to Paul’s instructions—first of all, we need to recognize our unity.
One of our temptations when we feel unappreciated is to act out and sometimes even to neglect our jobs. But, when we do that the ones that we end up hurting (even though they might be the ones we are unhappy with at the moment) are the ones who are on our side—the other parts of our body of believers. So, first of all Paul reminds us that we are on the same team and that our goal is to help each other out. Paul says,
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“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.”
The first part of building a strong body is recognizing that we are in this together—we all have been made part of the body of Christ, we all have received the same Spirit, and we all have the same goal of spreading the gospel.
The second step in building a strong body is embracing our differences. Paul carries on the comparison to how a body functions in the following verses from 1 Corinthians chapter 12;
“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?”…” 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…”
All the parts of the body are necessary. Sometimes an eye might not like being an eye and wish it was an ear, but if the eye wasn’t there the body would suffer. There are going to be times when we wish we were someone else or had the gifts that someone else had, but God designed us in such a way that we each have something valuable to contribute to the group. In order to build a strong church body it is necessary for us to embrace our own differences and recognize the differences of our fellow members—and that those differences aren’t bad, but exist for a purpose. Our sinful nature is what makes us think that our gifts aren’t any good, that they aren’t useful, but God gave them to us for a purpose and that purpose is to use them!
And that is the third part of Paul’s instructions for building a strong body…use your unique gifts working toward our common goal. Paul says in verses 18-20,
“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.”
God intends his church to be one united body made up of numerous and varied members that each have a unique purpose and unique gifts. God knew what he was doing when he made each of us who we are and equipped us with the gifts that each of us have. He gave us exactly what we need in order to be exactly who he wants us to be.
Telling you that you aren’t good enough, talented enough, or special enough is one of Satan’s greatest lies and favorite tricks. When the body of Christ, the united group of believers, works together it is the most powerful and efficient thing ever designed—because it was designed by God. Satan knows that if the the body of Christ would function at peak levels he’d never stand a chance. So, Satan does everything he can to disrupt the body. He makes us jealous, he makes us anxious, he encourages us to not be content with what we have and who we are. Satan would love it if we were all ears because then we’d never see him coming. Satan would love it if we were all hands because we could never walk away from him. Thankfully, God is smarter than Satan and didn’t make us all ears or hands. God made each of us different and gave us different jobs so that if the ear doesn’t hear Satan coming the eyes can warn them…if the hands are stuck in Satan’s mess of lies and sin the feet can walk and carry them away.
God has blessed us with awesome gifts of our own and he has blessed us with fellow believers who all have awesome gifts of their own as well. Great things happen when the body of Christ is built up to be strong. The gospel is proclaimed, hearts are changed, and forgiveness is delivered to troubled hearts all by the work of the body of Christ being God’s light in a world of darkness. That’s pretty awesome! Satan wants to tear us down, but let’s not let him. Paul gives us some practical directions for how to be strong and do God’s will rather than Satan’s.
Remember that, as believers, we are all on the same side. Instead of arguing or getting jealous over our differences, embrace them! And finally, use your unique gifts in the service of God’s kingdom and for our united purpose of spreading the message of salvation through Christ, our Savior. We can’t do it on our own, but thankfully God has blessed us with a family of believers to work with to accomplish that goal..