I.N.I.

a sermon to be preached at Zion Lutheran Church, Clark, NJ on the 3rd Sunday after the (22 January 1995), and based on the Epistle for the day: 1st Corinthians 12:12-21, 26-27

Grace, mercy, and peace be yours in Christ Jesus our Lord!

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

A few days ago I was skimming through a history of the American Civil War and came across an interview with the historian Shelby Foote. The question was asked “What was it that made men take part in those death-defying charges across open fields?” Foote’s answer began, “Mostly it was the man next to him starting to charge.” He was saying, in effect, that the whole group had a power to motivate and accomplish things that the individual soldiers didn’t have. That’s true in the military and it’s true in other areas as well.

Our text this morning makes clear the thought that each individual member of the church is important to the working of the whole. One of the problems in the church can be that individuals begin to think of themselves as much less or much more important than the others. We all need to recognize–through God’s grace–that there’s a unity in the church which should overcome all undue pressure toward sinful individualism.

There is unity in Christ’s body. It a rises in Baptism. It is our identification. And it prescribes our direction.

St. Paul begins this passage countering any opinion that the unity of the Christian church is something that is achieved through hard work, negotiations, study teams, or committees. He says in verse 13 that “in one Spirit all of us … were baptized to form one body.” Our unity is the results of God’s work.

Some of us here this morning were baptized in this church building. Some in other churches. Perhaps some of us were baptized in a hospital, or in a foreign country. Most of us were probably baptized by Lutheran pastors, but some were not. Some may even have been baptized in emergency situations. The fact remains, though, that all of us have passed through the same cleansing flood. All of us have had our sins washed away and all of us remain cleansed because of our baptism in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. It unifies us all.

Do you know why these differing circumstances don’t make any difference? It is because the Spirit is doing the baptizing. The same Spirit whose anointing of Jesus in fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy was announced in the Nazareth synagogue in today’s Gospel has brought each of us to faith. Christ died for us all, and his Spirit unifies us through our Baptism.

Now we are the body of Christ. We are his hands and feet, his eyes and ears in this world. “Christ is no longer in the world in the body; therefore if he wants a task done within the world he has to find [someone] to do it. If he wants a child taught, he has to find a teacher to teach him; if he wants a sick person cured, he has to find a physician or surgeon to do his work; if he wants his story told, he has to find a man to tell it. Literally, we have to be the body of Christ, hands to do his work, feet to run his errands, a voice to speak for him.” [William Barclay, Letters to the Corinthians Daily Study Bible, rev ed. Philadelphia : Westminster, 1975; pp. 113-114.]

So being in the body of Christ describes who we are. It gives us an identification. It gives us a role. When the credits roll at the end of a movie or television show, you realize that there are a lot of people involved in these kind of productions who aren’t in front of the cameras. Usually there are a lot more people behind the cameras. In our military forces today there are also a lot more people in support positions than in the front lines. Each of these behind-the-scenes people has an important role to play.

The church, the body of Christ, is similar in some respects. We are a united organism, with a single purpose: to share the good news that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners. Some of us do it in public ways, preaching and teaching. Most of us, however, exercise our important parts in accomplishing that purpose from a behind-the-scenes position.

We don’t have to feel bad about not being someone else. God has called each of us to be his own dear sons or daughters, and that is important enough for anyone.

Being the body of Christ also describes what we do. You could also say that it prescribes what we do. It tells us what we have to do. Just as an apple tree has to bear apples; just as a dolphin has to swim and leap in the ocean; just as an iceberg has to follow the ocean currents either to melt in warm water or to rejoin the ice pack; just as these things in our world do what they do by their very nature, so also do Christians do certain things by our very natures. We do the work of Christ in this world, because we are Christians. It is our very nature.

Now, of course, we have much more freedom than the apple tree, the dolphin, and the iceberg.

There is an infinite variety of ways in which we can serve the Lord and do his will in our world .

At the same time, each of us has a job to do. Paul’s body analogy in our text makes it clear that there are different jobs for different people, each one important. If you have the gift of being a hand in the body of Christ, it is incumbent upon you to be doing the things a hand does: picking up, carrying, pointing out, writing, patting, and so on. If you are a foot in Christ’s body, you must by your gifts be doing the things a foot does: walking, running, kicking balls, helping balance while standing, and so on.

If you determine to do other than what God has given you the gifts for, and say ‘I am not a nose, so I am not part of the body,’ you are telling God he doesn’t know what parts a body needs. The unity of the body of Christ demands that everyone take up his or her part and carries it out.

At the same time, we are clearly not charged with doing everything. There is sometimes an attitude in the church that sees that somebody isn’t taking part in the programs and activities of the church, so some other people, interested in seeing the work of Christ progress, try to carry the entire load. This is the eye saying to the hand ‘I don’t need you,’ or the head saying to the feet ‘I don it need you.’ (v. 21 ) We do need each other. We need the people who aren’t taking part because God has blessed them with the talents and abilities to do certain things. We need to help them to discover and exercise their gifts so that Christ’s body in the world will grow stronger. If we refuse to let fellow Christians help out, we are stunting our own growth.

Now when we extend this body analogy to a wider context, we can see some other interesting things. There are times when a congregation as a whole looks enviously at other congregations. We think we would like to have their nice building, or a pipe organ like theirs, or the numbers of people they attract on a Sunday morning. Perhaps we wish our pastor could preach like some other pastor, or that we had a thriving school like some other congregation. When we do this in this way, we are trying to take some other congregation’s place in the body of Christ.

Not only would we be shouldering aside that other congregation from doing what it is supposed to be doing, but we would be shortchanging our own congregation’s ministry in the body of Christ. Think of our personal relations the same way. When we try to take over somebody else’s duties in the body of Christ out of jealousy or spite, we are keeping them from doing what God has called them to do and we are losing our own focus on the tasks God has given us.

We have so many blessed opportunities in the Church to celebrate the unity that is ours in Christ. When we acknowledge world mission efforts that bring people to Jesus who are so very different from us, we celebrate our unity. When we joyfully acknowledge the baptism of another new child of God, we celebrate our unity. When we look from side to side on a Sunday morning and recognize family and friends with us before the cross of Christ, we celebrate our unity.

Christ Jesus came into the world in fulfillment of God’s promises made years before. His revelation to the world followed shortly thereafter. When Jesus died on the cross to save us from the punishment we earn for our sins, he died on behalf of each and every person in the history of the world. We have this in common: our sins and our salvation.

Jesus died for each of us. The Spirit brings us into further unity through our baptisms. Our continuing unity as the body of Christ in the world is our identity now. And our continuing unity describes what we do and how we act.

It’s good to know, in our darkest times, that someone else shares our burden. It’s good to know, in our times of joy, that others celebrate with us. It’s good to know in all times that our unity as members of the body of Christ brings us this support and celebration. AMEN

The peace of God that passes all human understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord. AMEN

S.D.G.