Members of the Body (1 Corinthians 12:12-27)

All right, open up your Bibles to 1st Corinthians chapter 12,

First Corinthians chapter 12. If you're using one of our black

1 Corinthians 12 · chapter mention

hardcover Bibles, it's page 959. We're working through a series

called Church Anatomy One O 1 today.

Specifically, my teaching is entitled Members of the Body and

we're going to be talking about membership in the church.

I know membership is not necessarily the most interesting

topic, but it is of the utmost importance for your for your

spiritual life. And so it's that's why we're

taking a chunk of time to really dive into this idea of church

membership. When you think about membership,

you typically think about membership with an organization

like maybe like Sam's Club, right?

Or Costco by show of Hands, who is Sam's fan?

How about Costco? OK.

It's usually pretty, pretty divided.

I don't think there's any difference.

I've been to both. It's the same stuff.

Yeah, I knew. I knew that was going to get

some comments. You know, we thinking about

membership like that, you maybe think about your gym membership,

right? I'm a member at Crunch.

I'm a member at Gainesville Health and Fitness.

Or or maybe some of your Country Club members and you get to golf

because you're a Country Club member.

But the, the way that it works is I pay a fee and then I get

benefits, right? That's how that's how it works.

I pay a fee and I get benefits. And that is the nature of our

relationship with that organization.

I don't really care about the other members of Sam's Club,

right? I'm not there to be friends with

them. I'm there to get my bulk coffee

and my pretzel and my drink. I don't care about the company

necessarily. It's about what we can get out

of the situation. It's about me and my experience.

And then if I stop getting the benefits that I want, I'm going

to drop my membership, right? So if Sam's Club stops giving

out free samples, I'm going somewhere else, right?

That is like my lunch on Saturdays.

You just wander around and then you put on a disguise and then

you go do all the circuit again and you get double S of

everything. But it's about, I don't actually

do that. I've thought about it before,

right? But it's about me.

It's about what I can get out of the out of the deal.

That is very different than the Bible's idea of church

membership. I want to read a quote for you

out of a book written by a man named Mark Dever.

The book is called 9 Marks of the Healthy Church, And this is

actually a quote that I read. Every time we welcome new

members into our church body, we stand them at our Team Vita

meeting. We stand them up in the front.

And I read this to remind us what we are committing to as

members of God's church. He says church membership is our

opportunity to grasp hold of each other in responsibility and

love. By identifying ourselves with a

particular church, we let the pastors and other members of

that local church know that we intend to be committed in

attendance giving prayer and service.

We allow fellow believers to have Great Expectations of us in

these areas, and we make it known that we are the

responsibility of this local church.

We assure the Church of our commitment to Christ in serving

with them, and we call for their commitment to serve and

encourage as well. I think it's a good summary of

what church membership really is and what it means.

Church membership is a formal, not casual, it's official.

It's a formal reciprocal relationship between a Christian

and a local church. OK, So it's not just casual.

There's some formality to it and it's reciprocal.

It's two sided. It's not just one giving all,

but it's it's give and take on both sides.

Your decision to join or not join a church as a member, I

believe will have a bigger spiritual impact on you, on your

life and on your health than almost any other decision that

you make as a Christian. Maybe with the exception of of

who you marry, right, If you're married, if you get married, it

is a huge deal for our spiritual lives.

And so we're going to spend the next 4 weeks really digging into

what the Bible says about it. And so today, if I can just kind

of summarize the main point of where we're headed with First

Corinthians 12, really what Paul gets at here is that the church,

God's church, is composed of different members who belong and

are needed in the body for the church to be effective.

And you and I are all called to be members of a local church

body. So membership is not some kind

of optional add on for the really committed, but it is just

for anybody who is a follower of Jesus.

Give you a little bit of background before we dive into

chapter 12. If you were here last week, you

heard Gordon Gordon talk about the community in Acts chapter 2.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

Beautiful picture of of the the original church community. 3000

people get saved after Peter preaches on Pentecost and they

start organizing into these smaller groups of disciples and

they're extremely devoted to one another.

And there is an incredible sense of unity and togetherness among

God's people. 25 years later, the apostle Paul is writing this

letter to the church in Corinth. OK.

So it does not take long For what was so beautiful and

unified at first, the edges start to fray, and we start to

see some disunity, some divisions among God's people.

And so Paul is spending really, really the whole letter of First

Corinthians as he's addressing all of these different issues in

the church that are causing division among God's people.

He talks about there there's factions that have formed.

Some people say I follow Apollo, so other people say I follow

Paul. Christians are suing each other.

Christians are divorcing each other.

They're disagreeing with each other over issues of food that

was sacrificed to idols and if it's OK to eat that food or if

it's not, there's disunity as they're taking the Lord's Supper

with one another. So there's just all this trouble

now and this division that has come into God's church in

chapters 12 through 14. The context is spiritual gifts.

So in the Corinthian church, people are ranking one another

based on their gifting. Oh, you're such a powerful

prophet, you're more important. And that's causing division in

the church. And so Paul is correcting them

and he uses in these verses an illustration of a physical body,

a human physical body to talk about unity in Jesus church.

So as we do every week, let me give you a moment of silence

before we before I read the text for us today, just to prepare

your heart, to quiet your heart to clear your head, maybe take a

brief moment and pray and ask God to speak to you and

encourage you through his scriptures.

I'll give us a moment of silence and I'll read the text, pray for

us, and preach. 1st Corinthians 12 Starting in

verse 12, the apostle Paul writes For just as the body is 1

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, slave or free, and all were made to drink of 1 spirit.

For the body does not consist of 1 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 the sense of 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 I 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 are

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. Father, help us to see clearly

today. There are so many things in this

world that seek to divide people, and not just people out

there, but people in here, people in your church.

And we pray God that you would help us and strengthen us to be

unified as your body, as you call us to be.

Thank you, Jesus, that you died for us, that we might be adopted

into your family. You identify with us so closely

that you call us your very body. And so help us to see these

things, to understand these things, and to live out a right

kind of unity in your church. Strengthen us with a strong,

unified membership here at Vita Springs.

Bless this time as we look to your words, Jesus, and fill me

with the Holy Spirit. Help me to teach your church

well. We pray all these things in

Jesus name, Amen. OK, so we start here in verses

12 and 13 and Paul is using this illustration of the physical

body. It is one unit that is composed

of many different members and he's saying that is a kind of a

picture or an image or an illustration of Jesus Christ's

body. The church verse 12, he says for

just as the body and he's talking about the physical body

first is 1 and has many members and all the members of the body,

though many are one body. So it is with Christ.

So again, very simple illustration, the human body,

you have one body, but in that one body that God gave you,

there's a whole lot of different pieces and parts, right?

I shared some stats the first week of this series.

You have 30 to 40 trillion cells that make up your body.

That's a lot. It's a big number.

You have 600 to 800 muscles, you have 206 bones, 78 organs, and

all of those pieces and parts work together to form 1 cohesive

body, one cohesive unit. And so Paul is saying it's the

same way with Christ, right? So it is with Christ.

He goes on in verse 13 he says for in one spirit we were all

baptized into one body and now he's talking about the church

body. Jews are Greeks, slaves are free

and all were made to drink of 1 spirit.

So you look around the room and you see all of these different

pieces and all of these different parts, many different

individuals, different ages, different races, different

cultures, different social categories, different life

stages, different spiritual gifts and abilities and

experiences all come together and form 1 cohesive unit 1

church body. The sin that separated us from

one another has been paid for by Jesus on the cross so that we

can now come together, be joined together by one common faith,

through one common Savior into one common church.

We, as he says in the verse, he says, we share this.

We're all baptized into one body.

We've all, if you're a Christian, you should have been

through that symbol of baptism showing that you have died with

Christ. You're resurrected with him

again and now you are a part of his people.

We share that common symbol. We have the same Holy Spirit

that has been poured out onto each of us, that fills each of

us, that dwells in each of us. We've been made into one.

So now there's two different ways or levels to think about

the church, OK, the body of Christ.

And I just want to clarify these so you have this clear in your

mind. There is the universal church,

OK, some people call it the Big C or the capital C church.

You can define the universal church as all Christians from

all time, OK Anybody who has trusted in Jesus as Lord and

Savior in the Old Testament, those who look forward to the

coming Messiah are included in that church.

New Testament church age. Those who look back on the cross

and with trusted Jesus to be our Lord and Savior.

We are in that church, right? We're a part of the Big C Church

and we share that same family with like Abraham and Ezekiel

and Moses and the Apostle Paul and Peter and Billy Graham and

Charles Spurgeon and you name your favorite Christian pastor,

celebrity, family member, whatever, right?

We are all part of the universal Big Sea Church.

But there's another expression of Jesus Church, smaller

expression, the local church, or sometimes we call this the

Little Sea Church, Vita Springs, right, Creekside, Christ

Community, Grace at Fort Clark, different local churches.

When you are saved and you come into the Big C church, now you

have the privilege and the responsibility to be a part of a

Little C local church, a local body.

Big C church membership is automatic.

When you get saved, OK, you are in it.

Local church membership is not necessarily automatic.

You must make a willful decision to join a local church body.

Some people say, and I've heard this through the years, some

people say, I don't need to be a part of a local church because I

am part of God's church, the Big C church.

What's the big deal, You know, And so because I'm a part of the

universal church, I, I just want to love the whole church and be

a part of the whole church. So this week I'm going to go to

this church and then the next week I'm going to go to that

church. And then the next week I'm going

to go to that one. And then the next one, I don't

think I want to go. I'm just going to watch online

because there's this guy in Orlando that I really love

listening to. And then the next week I'll hop

around from here to there to here to there.

Or maybe I won't even do that. Maybe I'll just read my Bible,

right, because you don't have to physically be in the building to

be a part of God's church. So I'll just read my Bible on my

own. I've heard that a lot through

the years, and I think that is misguided and unhealthy

thinking. That's like saying, you know,

I'm a human. I'm a part of the human race.

And so I don't need a family. I don't need a mom.

I don't need a dad. I don't need grandparents.

I don't need brothers or sisters.

You know why? Because I'm a human.

I'm part of the human race, right?

It just doesn't make sense. You would say.

No. You are part yes.

You are part of the human race. Congratulations.

So am I. And you need a family, right?

You need a family. God gave you a family.

You don't hop from family to family to family to family,

right? And and I'm going to eat dinner

with the Gatlings tonight and the Jerkowitz is the next night

and the Browns the next night. Because you know, if they're all

just part of my, we're all part of the human race.

No, you find a family. You don't have an online family.

You have a flesh and blood family.

You are a part of the human race and you need a human family.

You are part of the Universal church and you need a local

church, an Incarnate body of believers that walk with you and

live with you and help you and that you pour into as well.

It's not good. It's not healthy for a Christian

to be disembodied. They think of that word

disembodied. You have been separated from the

body. If there was a disembodied foot

on the stage, Gross. Exactly.

You'd say that's not good, that poor foot and that poor person,

right? That is not healthy.

That's not the way that it's supposed to be.

A foot is supposed to be bodied, not disembodied.

It's the same for the Christian, right?

It's the same. We need a body, we need a

family. So, and this is where Paul is

going with this illustration. And so as he continues, he

illustrates 2 really big points in this section.

He wants us to see that number one, you belong to a family.

OK, you belong to a family and then #2 you are needed in a

family that's stronger than just you belong.

You are needed in the church body.

So let's go look at verse 14. He says for the body does not

consist of 1 member, but of many, right?

Just not like your physical body has many different parts, not

just one, right? That it's same thing for the

body is not because of 1 member, but of many.

So verse 15, if the foot should say because I'm not a hand, I

don't 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, right?

So just because they're different from one another and

they play different roles from one another in the body, that

doesn't mean that they don't belong to the same body.

You know, it's like the foot saying to the hand, oh hand, you

are so elegant and so skilled. And I here I am.

I'm just stuck in a shoe all day and I've got calluses and I get

walked on all day long and I'm constantly under pressure.

I must not belong to this body. You got it.

You're different. You're better than me.

I must not belong. You say.

That's absurd. No, you need your hand and you

need your foot or the ear, says to the eye.

Oh, I you are so sophisticated and you are so beautiful.

And I am just this weird flap of skin and cartilage hanging like

a flag on a windless day to the side of this guy's head.

You must belong and I must not belong.

And you would say, well, no, of course not.

That's absurd, right? Your eye has a role.

Your eye is made a certain way and it belongs to your body.

Thank God for your for your eyes and your ears have a different

kind of role, a different kind of shape, a different kind of

function. It's like somebody on the coffee

team saying to a small group leader, oh, well, you have so

much influence in people's lives.

And, you know, you get to lead discussions on Wednesday night.

And all I do is I just come in and I grind beans and I pour

water through beans and I, you know how to clean up drips,

right? It's like, no, well, hold on.

You have a different role in the body, right?

Or somebody who has a strong gift of mercy.

Thank God for people who have gifts of mercy coming to Pete,

you have a gift of mercy coming to someone who has a gift of

leadership and saying, oh, all I have is this lowly gift of

mercy. I just care about people.

And, you know, and and you get to, you know, rally the troops

and really drive forward the vision like I must not belong.

We'd say, no, we need both and you both belong.

He goes on. So do you see what he's saying

here? You, you belong.

You're different. We're wonderfully different, but

we all belong to this body, he says in verse 17.

He says if the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of

where would be the sense of hearing?

If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of

smell? The body would be so limited.

If all of the parts were exactly the same, it would be #1 if we

were all an eye, it would be gross, it would be monstrous,

and we would be severely limited.

We would lose something very, very important if we didn't have

diversity, all belonging together.

Verse 18 he says. But as it is, God arranged the

members in the body, each one of them, as He chose.

That's very, very important. Remember that regardless of what

gift you have, your experiences, your inclinations, your

passions, God arranged the members of the body, each one of

them as He chose, and then he goes on.

If all were a single member, where would the body be?

As it is, there are many parts, yet one body.

So God has ordained all these different parts in one unified

body. If we were all the same, we'd be

in trouble. And so thank God we are not.

Just because you're different than other people in the church,

that does not mean that you don't belong.

That does not mean that you don't belong.

God knew what he was doing when he assembled your physical body,

and God knows what He's doing as he assembles his spiritual body,

the church. We are Better Together in our

differences than we are apart from one another.

You belong to the body. This is true in marriage.

You know, we see this in marriage.

God, in his wonderful sense of humor, brings people who are

very different. Usually this is how it works,

people who are very different and he puts you together and if

you're married, you agree with me, right?

It's like I married my opposite, that God does that.

He knows what he's doing. It's for your good.

By the way, it can cause conflict, but it does not mean

that you don't belong together. He was intentional and that I

think about this regularly. I'm very analytical.

I'm very practical. My wife is more emotional.

She's more of the dreamer. She wants to buy fixer uppers.

And I'm like, Oh my gosh, the last thing I want to do with my

time, energy and money is buy some junky old house and spend

all my spare time ripping out drywall and, you know, putting

floors in like that. Just you want to torture me,

make me remodel my house. She was like, let's get a bed.

Let's do make a bed and breakfast.

I don't like bed and breakfast. I have to have breakfast with

people I don't know. It's very awkward.

I would rather go to a hotel and just then go to a restaurant

afterwards. I'm in control of my

surroundings. Like we why are we?

And that has caused some conflict between us because

she'll have a dream and I'll instantly squash her dream.

And we went to a counselor together once and he was like,

you need to let your wife dream. You need to encourage her in her

dreams. I'm like, OK, that's very hard

for me. I'm going to try.

I think I'm doing better, right? Honey?

I'm doing better. Just because we are different

from one another in that, and that causes conflict among us,

that does not mean that we married wrong.

In fact, I would say I think we married right because I'm

stretching her and she's stretching me.

We're shaping one another in our differences.

And God does that in the church, right?

You look around this room and we see people from different

ethnicities, different countries.

We have old and young, we have married and single, we have some

widowed. We have introverts and

extroverts. We have different people with

different gifts, different passions, different experiences,

different level of education. And that is a good thing.

Thank God that we have that diversity.

Just because you're different than the person sitting next to

you, that does not mean that you don't belong in this local body.

Don't let Satan trick you into thinking that because you're not

like everyone else, you don't belong.

And I think he plays that one on repeat for a lot of people,

right? He gets in our heads.

See, this is this you're, this is not right.

This is not for you. You're in the wrong crowd.

He wants to cause division. Listen, here's the beautiful

thing about Jesus church. Do you know why you belong?

And I belong because Jesus died for you, and Jesus died for me,

and I was a Sinner, and you're a Sinner.

And Jesus poured his blood out on one cross that He would

create a people who could come together and forgive one

another, as we have been forgiven of our sin and love one

another as we have been loved by Him.

That we could belong in one family.

Isaiah chapter 53, verses 3 through 5.

Isaiah 53:3–5

He was despised and rejected by men.

A man of sorrows acquainted with grief, and as one from whom men

hid their faces. He was despised, and we esteemed

Him not. Surely He has borne our griefs

and carried our sorrows, Yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten

by God, and afflicted. But He was pierced for our

transgressions. He was crushed for our

iniquities. Upon him was the chastisement

that brought us peace. Peace with God and peace with

one another. By his wounds we are healed.

Jesus was despised and rejected and cut off and chastised so

that you could belong, so that you could be welcomed and so

that you could be included. He died to create a people.

God is wise. He made you intentionally.

You have a place among God's people.

You belong. You belong, he goes on and now

he shifts his focus a little bit and he talks about how all the

parts of the body, although they're different, are also

needed were needed for this body to function correctly and

properly and well, look at verse 21.

He says the I cannot say to the hand I have no need of you nor

again the head to the feet. I have no need of you.

It is arrogant and downright foolish for one part of the body

to think they don't need the other.

It's foolishness. The body is incomplete and

severely handicapped if all the parts were the same.

I mean, think about it, just in the flesh again.

So some of you guys ate a chocolate doughnut when you came

in here this morning. And you go to the bathroom

afterwards and you realize for the past hour you've had a smear

of chocolate on your cheek. Now what if you had no hand to

wipe that chocolate off your cheek?

It'd be torture, right? You walk around for the rest of

your life with doughnut on your cheek.

It's like your eye sees it but you're you got no hand to do

anything about it. Your head perceives this car

that is barreling towards you, but you have no foot to move you

out of the way. That is disaster.

The eye needs the hand. The head needs the foot.

Think about it. In the church, what if we had

all leaders but no administrators?

We'd have people trying to charge the rally, the troops,

but no one to actually organize it all and pull it all off.

What if we had teachers but no evangelists?

Right? We're just teaching the same

people over and over. We got no new believers coming

in to be taught. What if we had all evangelists

but no shepherds? Now you got a bunch of new

believers and there's nobody there to walk with them through

life and help them grow up in the faith.

What if we had a bunch of prophets, but no one with a gift

of discernment? That's trouble.

People proclaiming things in the name of the Lord, but no one

with discernment to be able to say.

I think that's off. That sounds a little fishy.

We need all the parts. A car with no tires does not get

very far. A plane with no wings can never

take off. A computer with no operating

system is just a chunk of plastic.

All the parts are needed for the church to glorify God by loving

God and loving others and making disciples of all nations.

You just heard Gordon say. That's our mission, our mission

statement. We need all the parts working

together. It's true on a local scale and

realize it's actually true on a broader universal church scale

too. My wife and I were had a retreat

this past week up in northern Georgia with 31 couples from all

different kinds of groups and denominations and it was so

wonderful. Our community group leader was a

Methodist minister. We had a Scottish Presbyterian

pastor who was in our group, another guy who was an army

chaplain, another guy with a kind of a more Pentecostal non

denominational church from Tampa.

We had Southern Baptists and General Baptist and Independent

Baptists. And it was just such a

beautiful, I thought we need all of you, right?

The church need you all bring something different to this

body, this party, and it's a beautiful, beautiful thing.

He goes on to verse 22. He says, On the contrary, the

parts of the body that's 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. He's probably talking about your

unpresentable. He's talking about your

unpresentable parts are treated with greater modesty, which are

more presentable parts do not require.

So what's he saying here? He's saying that the parts that

seem weaker, less honorable, he refers to them as unpresentable,

are actually some of the most necessary and should be treated

with the most honor because they are essential.

Excuse me for our health. Paul is speaking into Roman

culture here, where power and your family's name and your

social status and your wealth, that was everything.

So if you're Caesar's nephew and you go to the restaurant, you're

going to be honored. Of course.

You're going to get the best seat.

You're going to get the best meal.

You're going to get the best treatment.

You're going to get the best special favor, he's saying, But

not in the church. That's not how it should be in

the church. In the church, we blow up those

worldly categories. All of the parts are necessary

and all of them should be treated with honor.

The parts that we view as weaker in our physical body think of

maybe like your intestine, your gut as a paired as as compared

to your something stronger like your bones or something that's

unpresentable. He is probably talking about

your genitals in this in this text.

We don't uncover them like we uncover our face or our hands,

right? We honor them, we take care of

them. We treat them with modesty.

We guard them, we protect them. We value them.

In society, the weaker, the less honorable tend to be pitched

aside, disregarded, demoted. But in the church, it's not

supposed to be that way. We realize that every part is

needed and that God arranged this body and everyone brings

something to the table and is to be treated with respect and

honor in Jesus Church. Again, you look around the room

and you say, you know, we have, we have young, we love that we

have young people, we have the younger generation at Vita

Springs Church, the the young adults, college students.

You bring a kind of zeal and energy and passion that is very,

very needed in God's church. And it's also wonderful that we

have the old, the older I should say, or maybe the more mature,

right? You bring wisdom and stability

that the youth do not necessarily have.

And it's wonderful. We both belong.

And let's not forget about our children, our zero to 5th

graders that are in our building across the way.

They're a part of the church. They bring a kind of awe and

wonder and faith. Jesus praises the faith of

children that we all benefit from.

It's beautiful. We are all needed.

We have a lot of Brazilians here at Vita Springs Church, and I

think the Brazilians teach the Americans about how to have

community. Amazing and food and laughter

and joy and community. We have Africans here at Vita

Springs and there's a kind of an exuberance and joy that that is

built into African culture that can be very different from what

Americans are more accustomed to.

We even have people who are in a season of life where their

bodies are breaking down. They have a lot of pain.

They're in some cases in constant pain and constant

suffering. And if that's you, please

understand you are needed in this body because you teach us.

You teach us how to persevere. You teach us how to have joy and

faith in the midst of sorrow and pain.

And we need that. I need that.

I will tell you about about some of our older folks here who are

going through hardship. I love it because I never hear

them complain. And that teaches me I want to

comply. I get sick, ask my wife.

I get like a little sniffle and I'm like, I'm dying and I'm

complaining and fussing and she's like, what's wrong?

You just get a Kleenex. You're fine, right?

I need to learn from those who who can endure well and with

good hearts and with faith. We're all needed, goes on in

these verses. Halfway through verse 24, he

says. But God has so composed the

body, giving greater honor to the party, 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.

So the conclusion here's He's saying those who are more

visible, those who are more gifted, they should not be

treated as more important or more necessary.

Those who are less visible, those who are left gifted should

not be treated as less important or less necessary.

There should be unity. There should be mutual care for

one another. There should be mutual respect

and honoring of one another because we're all needed.

In Corinth they were saying you're so smart, you're so rich,

you have an amazing family, you have a powerful gift of

prophecy. You got baptized by the apostle

Peter, You get special honor. And Paul's saying, no, no, no,

that's not the way it works in God's church.

He's saying you're a brick, I'm a brick.

Jesus is the cornerstone. He's the important.

He's the most important one. The rest of us are bricks.

We're going to honor or make much of anyone.

Let's let it be Jesus, not the bricks, He finishes in verse 27.

He says now you are the body of Christ and individually members

of it. OK, you take it personal.

Now you individual, you are the body of Christ, and individually

members of it. You are a member of Christ's

body. What an honor.

What an honor to be called a part of Jesus's body.

No matter how high, how low, how this, how that you are a member.

You are intimately linked with Christ and Christ's people.

To dishonor any part of the body is to dishonor Christ himself.

So this is where this is where please listen to me because I'm

kind of I'm trying to build something.

I'm going to end real practical here.

You need to be very careful about your relationship with

Jesus's body, OK? You need to be very thoughtful

and very careful about it. And in our culture, Christians

and church is usually easy come, easy go, right?

It's very consumeristic in nature.

I'm going to go here. It's like Sam's Club.

I'm going to go there. And as long as I get the

benefits that I'm, I'll be part of it.

But as soon as I'm, I'm out, you've got to be very careful

about that kind of thinking. Jesus links himself with his

people, right? So much so that if you mess with

his people, if you exploit his people, if you take advantage of

his people, you're doing the same thing to him.

Remember the story about the Saul before he was the apostle

Paul, He was a he was a zealous Jew and he is now pre salvation.

He is persecuting Christians, OK.

He is going to different cities and he's gathering up the

believers and some of the in some cases either being killed,

right. And Paul is behind that.

And while he's going to a town called Damascus, Jesus appears

before him. Remember the story blinds him,

knocks him to the ground, and you remember what Jesus says to

Paul, to Saul. Saul, Saul, why are you

persecuting me? He doesn't say, Saul, Saul, why

are you persecuting my church? Saul, Saul, why are you

persecuting those individual Christians?

He doesn't say that. He so identifies with his

people. Then with that, when Saul is

persecuting the Christian, she says, no, you're doing it to me.

We need to be very careful about our relationship with Jesus's

body, his church. And so let me end very, very

practically as I talked a little bit about church membership and

how this kind of all plays together.

It is very clear to understand how to express membership in the

universal church. You know how you do it.

You get saved, right? You put your trust in Jesus as

Savior and Lord, repent of your sin, and believe that Jesus is

the Christ. That's how you become a member

in the Universal church. You are just a Christian now.

How do you express membership in a local church?

How do you know or how do we know, IE the church and the

leadership of the church? How do you know and how do we

know if you are a member of this church?

Remember I told you at the beginning, it's important to be

a part of both, right? How do you express membership?

Do you just show up? Do you show up and serve?

Do you have to show up and serve and go to small group and then

you're a member? Do you show up and serve and

small go to small group and give?

What if you give but you don't go to small group?

What if you only come once a month?

What if you come twice a month? What if you come once every two

months? What if you go to Vita?

Sometimes in Salt, sometimes in Creekside, sometimes in Saint

Andrews, sometimes. Are you a member of all of those

bodies? Which body are you a part of?

If you are the liver, how does Vita Springs Church know that we

are going to have a liver this week?

That's really important for us to know.

We need our liver, you see. Do you understand what I'm

saying? Do you understand how do we

express the unity of the body that Jesus calls us to if we

don't know who is a part of this body?

We need some way to know and that's where formal church

membership comes in. It's a, it's a way that helps

define and clarify who is actually a part of this little

sea church, this local body. Many churches do not have any

kind of a formal membership process.

And I believe that is to their detriment.

I remember years ago we had a membership class and there was a

young lady. It was a, it was the last class.

We handed out the membership forms that we asked people who

want to be members to sign. And she came up to me.

She was a bit angry. She says, what is this?

I said that looks like a membership form.

She said, I can't believe this. I've never seen anything like

this in my life. You're going to make me sign a

piece of paper? And I was like, well, yeah.

I mean, that's kind of what we do.

That's how we know if you want to be a part of this particular

body, imagine a team, an army, a hospital, a school who did not

know who the players were, who the soldiers were, who the

doctors were, or who the students were.

What if it changed every week? And this week this guy's your

quarterback, and next week that guy's your quarterback, and this

week this guy's your surgeon, and next week that guy's your

surgeon. All of these kinds of

relationships have formalized commitment, so there is clarity

and there's accountability on both sides, right?

So you have a roster, you have enlistment, you have a contract,

you have enrollment. The church needs this too.

The church needs this too. A way for church leaders and

church members to know to say I'm a part of this body, you can

count on me. I'm accountable to you, you're

accountable to me. This is the local body that I'm

a part of. It shows who's accountable to

who. It shows who you are committed

to working alongside for the gospel in our city.

It clarifies where you are being helped and where you can offer

help. It tells here's where I'm

primarily investing my time, my energy, my spiritual gifts, my

money, my prayer, my relationships.

It clarifies who your spiritual family is, where you go for

comfort and wisdom and care and correction.

You know people are going to AI now because they need a friend.

That is a sad state of affairs. You should join a church and get

a real human friend. And of course, this doesn't mean

that you can't get any of those things from other places because

remember, we are a part of the universal church and you can

find all these blessings in other places.

But it's of great value to you and the local body to say, but

this is my family. This is my little C church.

So the way we do this at Vita Springs, very, very simple.

We ask you to take the membership series.

We're offering another round in October.

It's been completely revamped. So we're this is kind of our

pilot for our new membership curriculum and structure.

We do ask you to sign a form and it is a covenant.

It is a two way agreement between church member and

church, church members to one another and church leaders to

church members. We're saying we are in this

together. So if you have not done that,

it's coming up. October 19th is when we're

starting it, where they're going to be for like an hour and a

half after church on Sunday for four weeks.

I would encourage you to devote yourself to membership here at

Vita Springs Church if Vita Springs Church is the place

where you decide to call home, and if it is not, then we are

very happy to help you find another local church community

in this community, gospel preaching, Bible believing local

church where you can link up with that family and be a member

of that body. We're not competitive about

that. We want you to be connected in a

body because you need it and the church needs it.

You need a church. The church needs you.

Do not live as a disembodied part.

It's not good for you. It's not good for the church.

You are made for a body.