The Church | A Contributing People - 1 Corinthians 12:12-31 (Oct 22) Myles Holmes

Hello and welcome to the Redemption Church Podcast.

We're a church in Newmarket, Ontario, Canada that exists to glorify God through the fulfillment of the Great Commission.

The spirit of the Great Commandment.

Thanks for joining us today.

If you ever Bibles, I hope that you do.

You can open them up to 1 Corinthians chapter 12.

1 Corinthians 12 · chapter mention

And if you don't have a Bible, the ushers are going to make their way to the front of the worship center, and you can stick your hand in the air and just flag them down, and they'll get a copy of God's word into your hand.

If you don't own a copy of God's word, you can just take this home.

This is our gift to you.

We're praying that you would read it, and we trust that as you read this, uh you will find words of life, words of hope, that it will change everything about your life.

We uh are finding ourselves in the middle of a series called the church.

And we are really thinking about what has God designed in this thing that we're really doing right now, and this life that we live together as a community, what is God's design for?

Why did Jesus declare in Matthew 16 that he would build his church?

We're looking at the church, and and much of really what we've been addressing as we've thought about the church together is this kind of individualism that lives, that is, that is so strong and prominent in our day.

As a culture, this isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it definitely is a thing we need to recognize as we try to do this life together as a community.

We uh exalt individuals.

In fact, if you think about any of the movies that you have seen recently, I'm sure that much of that movie revolved around uh uplifting this one maybe hero.

We're often in the movies today, maybe a villain, and exalting that person and their character or the things that they do.

And it's good for us to recognize that as a as a culture, we often exalt and look for and try to place ourselves in the presence of individuals that we find breathtaking, maybe, or we find interesting, or we find worthy of our attention.

So whether it's CEOs or superheroes or athletes, I'm sure that you and I can agree that as a culture, we have exalted rather than communities, rather than groups of people, we've really exalted the individual.

And our question in this series has really been this that what if the way that we are as culture, as a culture, as human beings in this day and age, what if that individualism that's kind of inherent in us that you and I have both grown up in and now kind of live in now, what if that culture is actually making it not only, if not impossible, very hard to do life together as God has designed it to be done in the church?

What if you and I are being conditioned in a way so that when Jesus says what his church is to be, it actually makes it very difficult for us to do because it's against our natural inclination.

See, in many ways, this is the reality.

As we open up God's word, what we see of the church is foreign to us, and it's not only foreign, it's difficult to us because it requires us to push out of our comfort zone into something that God is calling us into that in many ways is not natural to us.

See, I think what is natural to us is what's happening in really many churches today, and it's a danger that it could happen in our church as well, and it's this reality that church can become sort of like a spectator sport.

Church becomes this thing that you kind of show up to on Sunday, and you know you hear the worship, and the worship's awesome, and you listen to the message, and you know the message is engaging enough at least.

Then you leave, and there's really no participation apart from the fact that you were a body with eyes and ears, and you were there present on a Sunday morning.

And in many ways, church has become much more of a spectator sport.

We treat it kind of like we would treat maybe hockey or football.

In fact, I was thinking about it this week.

There's something happening in the hockey world that's kind of special in this time.

There's a rookie this year, and you know, there's conversation around this guy.

His name's Connor Bedard.

Some of the husbands are with more with me now than they ever have been while I'm preaching.

And Connor Bedard is a bit of a spectacle.

There's conversation around him that perhaps he could be one of the best, if not the best, of this generation, this new generation of hockey.

And over these last few weeks, as the NHL has started up, there's been a lot of attention around Connor Bedard.

In fact, the first night that he played for the Chicago Blackhawks, the uh viewership on ESPN broke records.

It was the most uh NHL hockey game in a regular season has been watched.

And if you uh follow hockey at all, then your YouTube or whatever social media you're on has been blown up with Connor Bedard highlights.

I saw one this past week said, Connor Connor Bedard gets hit, you know, with a thousand exclamation marks.

I thought, oh man, this is gonna be a nasty hit.

Connor Bedard's gonna be like out for a few weeks, and I saw it, and it was just like Connor Bedard getting brushed up against the boards, which happens like 7,000 times in every hockey game.

All that to say, there's all this attention around this boy because there's this kind of like fear of missing out.

If something amazing happens, I want to be the first one to see it.

I want to be there when it happens.

And many of us are looking for the same experience in the church.

So that as we think about what to look for in a healthy church, so often it is, well, well, how does the worship, how do how does the worship make me feel?

How does the community embrace me?

How about the preaching?

How does how do I like listening to the preaching?

And so all these things are good things, but you'll notice that they're very one-sided, and that the only question that's asked is, how will I enjoy spectating this thing?

And what we're gonna find this morning in 1 Corinthians chapter 12 is that when we treat the church as though it can be a spectator's sport, we actually cannot experience the church for all that it was designed to be.

1 Corinthians 12 · chapter mention

In other words, you will get nothing from this experience if all you're looking for is for something to watch.

That's because Jesus designed it to be different than that.

It's because the strength of the church, the glory of the church, the exaltation of the church is not in its individuals, but in the participation of the body.

And so I want you to see that in 1 Corinthians chapter 12, and we're gonna read from verses 12 to 27 here.

1 Corinthians 12 · chapter mention

You can follow along with me.

It says, For just as the body is one 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, slaves are free, and all were made to drink of one spirit.

For the body does not consist of one 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 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 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 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.

On the contrary, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and on those parts, the body of the body that we think less honorable, we bestow the greater honor.

And our unpresentable parts are treated with greater modesty, which our 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.

I think this life that God is calling us to, we're gonna see in these verses, is so counter-cultural, it's so unnatural to us.

And I truly believe if if God is going to accomplish in our midst what he talks about here, it's got to be a work he does.

And so let's just start our time by praying and asking God to accomplish this work in us in this time.

God, we bow before you.

Lord, and we've just read these words that this body that you are building is, Lord, it's built in the power of the Holy Spirit.

And it is arranged by the wisdom of the Father.

And as we consider the wisdom of the body of Christ, this community that you are building that you have promised, you will build, and that the gates of hell cannot stop, Lord, we recognize that in every way we are dependent on you.

And so, God, we bow ourselves before you in humility and ask, Lord, that we would receive this message ready to be confronted in maybe ways we need to be confronted, ready ready to repent, in ways that we might need to repent of the ways that we've treated the body of Christ.

Lord, the very one whom you call your bride.

God, you love your church.

And so I pray, Lord, in this time as we consider the wisdom of your church, as you have called us to be the body, God, that you would grow in us a deeper love for your church.

God, accomplish this work in us, we pray, by the power and presence of your Holy Spirit Spirit that is here with us now.

God, we pray this all in the name of your Son.

Amen.

I want you to see three realities from 1 Corinthians chapter 12.

1 Corinthians 12 · chapter mention

The first I want you to see is this God has called you into the body.

First thing I want you to see is that if you've placed your faith individually and personally in Jesus Christ, then the theological reality is that along with calling you into salvation, God has called you into the body.

That is the church.

Now, in verse 12, Paul introduces us to this illustration that he's gonna kind of be pushing throughout this whole verse, and that illustration is of the body and its members, that is its body parts.

Paul says, for just as the body, speaking of our physical bodies, is one and has many members, another way you could translate that is body parts, maybe more relevant to today's language.

And all members of the body, though many are one, Paul says, so it is with Christ.

Paul says, look at your body and notice how many different parts there are.

There are parts that you can see, like your fingers and your feet and your ears and your eyes, Paul will talk about.

There's also innards.

I believe there are some doctors in our presence this morning, so I won't talk about, you know, how all those work, because I'm sure they work somehow, and I'll probably screw it up, but we have organs, the heart, the liver, all of these things are part of the body.

The body is one, it's made up of many parts.

And the point of Paul bringing this up, he tells us at the end of verse 12, is to illustrate that just as our body is like this, so the community, this church that Jesus is building is also like this.

So he says, so it is with Christ.

Then in verse 13, he says, for, which he's going to explain exactly how this illustration is so fitting.

He says, For in one spirit we were all baptized into one body.

Jews are Greeks, slaves are free, and all were made to drink of one spirit.

In other words, what Paul is telling the church, what Paul is telling us this morning is this the work that God is doing in you to save you is not just an individual work.

God is saving you, and he is bringing you into an institution, he is bringing you into an organization, he's bringing you into a family, into a body, in order that you might, along with those people, accomplish his kingdom purposes.

This is the work that Jesus is doing.

The primary work that Jesus is doing while we await his return is this.

He said, I will build my church, this gathering of people called out from darkness into light, I will build my church.

That means Jesus is saving people.

And if we're to read this in context with all of chapter 12, you'll notice that probably the heading of your chapter of chapter 12 for you is something along the lines of spiritual gifts.

And we get the sense of the work that Jesus is doing, is that he is saving people and he's bringing them into this organization, each uniquely fitted and suited with spiritual gifts, in order that the church might be able to accomplish its mission.

In other words, God's not saving a person and telling the world, hey, get behind this person.

God didn't save Joel, we can use as an example, to say, oh, if you just see Joel and him lead worship, oh man, you're gonna see how great Jesus Christ is.

God didn't save me and call me to preach just so that you might get behind me.

What God is doing is he's saving a people, and then he's accomplishing a mighty work through them.

This is why Paul says in chapter 12 at the beginning that he gives to these, to each spiritual gifts so that that person has something unique to contribute to the mission that God has sent us on to make disciples.

This is what it means to be the body, that the body is one, though there are many parts accomplishing many different tasks because they're each suited for many different things.

Now, this is so important for us to hear.

Like as we talk about countercultural, I want you to know that what Paul is talking about here in very many ways kind of like grates up against our understanding of what salvation is.

Because in our day and age, in 21st century Christianity, we often think about salvation on an individual, personal basis, and very rarely is it kind of presented in this community basis that when you are saved, you are not only saved individually, but you are saved into a community of people, which Jesus is building, a community of saved people.

And I think part of this is kind of the language that we use around salvation often.

Often, you know, the the typical, you know, going back a few decades, typical language surrounding salvation was that it was a personal decision that you needed to make Jesus the Lord of your heart.

You needed to invite him into your life.

And so it wasn't so naturally maybe you being invited into this thing that Jesus is building, his church.

It was you inviting Jesus into your life.

And you start to understand how that language, you know, invite Jesus into your life, invite him into your heart, can kind of like start to create this sort of like individual Christianity because it's not about Jesus calling you to anything, it's about you inviting Jesus into your life and making him a part of your routine.

And what we discover here is radically different than that.

What Paul is saying is that when you were saved, the work that God was doing is not just a work in you, it was a work in his church where he is saving you to the body and connecting you to the body so that you can now accomplish his work.

In other words, salvation is not just of me, salvation is a we experience.

God is doing a work in a group of people that he here calls his body.

See, if we have this sort of like personal, individual understanding of faith and how that is worked out, then this verse will make absolutely no sense.

If our understanding of faith is so personal, individualized, it will make no sense that Paul talks about salvation and he says that salvation is when the Holy Spirit baptizes us not into Jesus here, which he says elsewhere in Scripture, he says into one body.

That just as you can say that salvation has come into your life, you can also say that salvation has brought you into the church.

And so you need to understand this.

Listen, this is this is pretty strong language in our day and age, but salvation in Jesus Christ and entrance into the body of believers that he is building, entrance into the local church, these things go hand in hand.

Again, this isn't me saying this.

This is Paul saying this is what salvation is.

In one spirit, we were all baptized into the body of believers.

So that salvation in Scripture, you need to understand this salvation, personal salvation for you, cannot be separated from entrance into the local church.

This is what Jesus is doing.

He is building his church.

I want you to notice that that God here loves his church.

He is passionate about this work in verse 13 that we're reading about.

He's passionate about bringing lost people into his body that he is building, into this church that he is creating.

Jesus said that he came to seek and save the lost.

And as we look at all of Scripture, what we start to discover is that God loves the church.

In fact, the the building of the church is really a triune work.

Have you ever thought about that?

Like the whole Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, each of the persons of God are working to build this church so that it is Jesus in Matthew 16 who says, I will build my church, and the gates of hell will not stop it.

In Ephesians 5, 25, Paul says that Christ loved the church and gave himself up for it.

Jesus is the one who offers himself on the cross in order that he might reconcile to himself a people, a community of believers who now live their life to follow him and to give him praise.

This is what Jesus has done.

He has declared that he will build the church.

He has made the way possible to build the church.

Well, the spirit, we are told here in verse 13, is the one in whom we are all baptized into the body.

This is the work that the Spirit does as he builds his church.

He is calling and baptizing those who have placed their faith in Jesus into this community of believers, we're told in verse 13.

Well, the Spirit loves the church, the Son loves the church.

Look at verse 18, and you'll discover that the Father is immensely interested in this corporate group of believers that he is building.

So then in verse 18 of chapter 12, he says, But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each of them.

And so you get this picture that the triune God loves the church and is adamant about building the church.

It is Jesus who comes to seek and save the lost.

It is the Spirit who brings that lost one through baptism, both spiritual and water baptism, into the body of Christ.

And it is the Father who then gives that Christian spiritual gifts and arranges them in the body as he sees fit in order to accomplish the mission that he has done.

And I want you to understand that if you're here and you're an unbeliever this morning, this is the best plan that God has for your life.

God wants to save you, and he wants to bring you into a community in which you will receive care and then can be uh emboldened to take the gospel and preach it to the lost.

This is the work that God offers to you.

It's an offer of salvation.

Jesus is calling you through the church, he's calling you through the members of this church, he's calling you right now through this message to believe in him and find salvation in him and be a part of this work that he is doing in the world, to become a part of the people that he is returning for at the end of time.

So I hope you understand here as we consider all that Paul has to say.

God loves his church.

God loves the church, it is his work, he is building it.

And as we consider this, uh, my hope is that in this message, and really over throughout this series, my hope is that you are getting a higher view of the church.

Like the the place of the local church in your theology and your thinking, but ultimately in your heart is becoming more and more central.

As you come to understand that what is what God is doing in our midst is so primary to what he desires to do in our world.

The church is his idea.

The church is his answer to the many problems of our world.

And so we as Christians, we love the church because Jesus loves the church.

Now, this kind of begs a question for us, doesn't it?

In fact, it's a question that we find ourselves being asked pretty consistently in this day and age.

And that that question is this what about those who follow Jesus without the church?

What about those who say, you know, like Jesus is me and Jesus were good, but I don't, I just don't, I don't need the church.

And I don't want to speak too decisively on this, but I would just ask you to consider this verse and and and ask yourself, how can you make sense of what Paul is talking about in 1 Corinthians chapter 12 if you are not a part of any local body?

1 Corinthians 12 · chapter mention

How can you make sense of being a part of the being being a unique member with spiritual gifts of the body when you're unwilling even to meet with the body?

And I'm not gonna say definitively, like as though it's like black and white, because I truly don't believe that it's black and white.

But I will say this that if you are a believer who is not an active part of a church, you are in really dangerous territory.

In fact, there is not even really a category in the New Testament for that.

What you see is that those who place their faith in Jesus Christ then become mobilized in the context of a local church in order to accomplish the mission that Jesus Christ has placed them on.

And so it's very dangerous ground.

In fact, it begs some other questions.

It begs this question.

How can you love the body?

How can you say that you love Jesus and yet not love his body?

What's happening here, what's being built here is the very body of Jesus Christ.

And so for you to reject that body, well, it says some certain things, I think, about what you how you feel about the head of the body who is Jesus Christ, Ephesians 4 tells us.

For instance, if you come over to my house this afternoon, you know, and we're having lunch together and it's a really friendly time, we're having a great time, and you say, you know what, Miles, I love you, but I've always noticed when you preach, you know, you have really fat fingers.

And your head is ginormous, and your, you know, your leg to body ratio, it's like all off, and it's just, it's honestly very disgusting.

I can't even watch you.

Well, I'm gonna be really hurt, and it's gonna really be really hard for me to believe what you said at the beginning when you said, you know, I love you.

That's it.

So it is with the body of Christ.

Christ is the head, and we are the body, Scripture says.

You know what else Scripture calls us?

It calls us what God is doing here, the family.

And in the same way, if you come to my house and you and you start saying, you know, Miles, I love you, man, but your family, uh like I have them in kids and I cannot stand them, I'm quitting because your kids are in my class.

And your wife, I don't, I just I'm here to hang out with you, Miles, okay?

I I can I do not get along with your wife.

Now, the reality is that never happens, it's always the opposite way around.

People come to our house to hang out with Amber, and I'm thankful for that.

But you get the picture here.

That to reject one is really to, in most contexts, reject the other.

Well, Paul here is answering the question how do we get into the body?

And notice what he says.

Again, such such stark language for us, he says, in one spirit we were all baptized into the body.

That is very significant, isn't it?

How do we become a part of the body of Christ?

Well, Paul says that it is through baptism.

Now, does baptism save?

Well, I'm preaching again the message that we preached last week.

The answer is no.

And yet, as scripture looks at faith and both spiritual and water baptism, what you find is that there is no divide.

Believers who place their faith in Jesus Christ then take up as one of their first acts of obedience the command to be baptized.

I want you also to notice here the order.

Baptism, Paul says, is entrance into the body.

That is the thing that confirms you being one with the body that Jesus is building.

And so this is a good time for that.

There are many in our midst who are wrestling with infant baptism.

In fact, just last week, as we celebrated alongside five people who made that active step step of obedience, there are a few in there who were baptized as an infant.

I was baptized as an infant.

And the question that you have to wrestle with as you wrestle with infant baptism is this how do you make sense of this verse where Paul says that through the Spirit you were baptized into the body when you weren't actually a part of the body when you were baptized?

It's very relevant.

Like what we're doing in child dedication is not at all baptism, and we we make that really clear.

This has nothing to do with salvation.

And we're praying that these children place their faith in Jesus Christ, even at a young age, and that one day we'll be able to celebrate alongside them in baptism, and that day that they are baptized will be the day that they are joined then to the body of Christ.

This is part of what we celebrated, you know, like as we celebrated last week, these baptisms, we we were coming alongside these believers to say that the testimony that you have experienced, we affirm.

It's the same thing that happened to us.

You've been called from darkness to light.

And we see that work of God in your life, and we celebrate alongside you because we love that work, the same work that He has done in us.

Now, I want to say this that this is not to take away from what happened if you were baptized as an infant, especially if you were baptized in a believing church.

Like we're we're not saying that anyone who, you know, any church that baptizes infants is like out of their mind and not Christians.

In fact, we link arms with brothers and sisters in Newmarket, who they read scripture and they just land on different conclusions surrounding baptism, and and we link arms with them and say, hey, we're we're passionate about the same things.

We are linking arms in the mission that Christ has given us, but functionally, this kind of makes like like we can't really do life together because it just makes it functionally hard.

And so we're not taking away from what happened in your infant baptism.

I think that's really significant.

I think it's significant that a community kind of supported you and said, Hey, we're here for you.

We love you, we want to see God work in your life.

That's why we do child dedication.

Because we want to support these families with that same sort of love, that same sort of support.

We want an opportunity for us to vocally and in the midst of our service say, We support you in this.

And yet, we need to wrestle with the order here.

Baptism symbolizes something very important.

I love what Paul goes on to say here.

He says that we're baptized into one body.

And then he what he does is he pretty much lists as opposite as he possibly can, Jews or Greeks, slaves or free.

And I don't even really need like if you were here last week, I don't even really need to preach this message, this part of the verse.

Like that was preached so clearly that the work that Jesus is doing and calling people in his body, he is calling a diverse group of people into unity through the salvation that he has worked.

Did you notice that if you were here with us last week?

Five baptisms, two former Catholics, two people who formerly wrestled with uh the faith of Islam and Muslim, and a Jewish person.

And in our world today, that is especially a significant testimony to say that the work that Jesus is doing here, it is the only place that you can find hope, it is the only place that the world can find reconciliation.

This is the work that Jesus must do.

Jesus must bring reconciliation, Jesus must bring healing, Jesus must bring hope, and it's happening in our midst.

This is what Jesus is doing.

He's saving a diverse people, and he is calling them into a family together.

And so look around for a moment.

Can you do this?

Like it's gonna be really awkward, but just look around and make like some awkward eye contact with some people around you.

Look behind you.

Some of you aren't doing it yet.

I'm gonna wait here, it's gonna be really awkward.

Just make some awkward eye contact.

Don't say anything, just stare at them really awkwardly.

Okay, yeah, individual culture.

This is like you're getting really hard, isn't it?

Churches used to always do this for 2,000 years.

No, I'm just kidding, I made that up.

They didn't do that at all.

Do you notice something?

We're all really different, aren't we?

Like, I mean, one on the one hand, you can see that God is doing a multi-ethnical work here, but as you consider like the reality of who each person is that you just looked at or talked to, we're all just such different people.

We have different strengths and different weaknesses, we have different desires and different uh things that put us off.

And what Jesus is doing is he's making a family.

And if we're really honest, it's it's a pretty weird family, isn't it?

Some of us weirder than others.

I'm not making any eye contact here.

It's a pretty weird family, and yet God is calling us into this family to love each other.

And I truly believe that the work that God is doing, uh the way that he is putting the church on display in this world that we live in, is by creating a community of people in which the world sees and it says, they say it makes no sense that those people are together.

And they discover that the thing that unites us is this understanding that Jesus has provided redemption for a broken people.

You know what kind of is happening in this day and age?

In a day and age where like the internet makes it so possible to meet with people that are just exactly like you, is that many Christians are kind of pushing themselves away from hard communities like this where everyone's kind of different and there's some tough barriers you gotta get over, and they're pushing themselves into communities where everybody is the exact same.

And if if that's what you're doing, if you're kind of saying, like, okay, I'll do community, but I'll only do it with the people I'll pick, I'll only do it with the people I want to do it with, you gotta understand that that's not the love of other people at all.

That's just self-love.

All you're doing in that in that moment when you're surrounding yourself with people that you want to be around, all you're doing is saying, Well, these people make me really happy, so that's why I'm gonna hang out with them.

And there really is something to be said to being placed in a context like Jesus is talking about or Paul is talking about here in a church where everyone is different and where there's even difficult people, and the call is for you to love them, call is for you to care for them.

This is the work that Jesus is doing.

So he says, for the body does not consist of one member, but of many.

And so I want you to understand that this work that God is doing in salvation is a work in which he has called you into the body.

But the second thing I want you to see is this the body needs you.

The body needs you.

Jesus is building his body.

I want you to understand that the body needs you.

And so in verses 15 and 16, Paul really pushes the illustration a bit farther.

He says, if the foot should say, now I don't know like in first century Rome, kind of like what feet were doing, but apparently in this context, feet were talking.

Incredibly confusing.

He says, if the foot should say, I am not a hand, but I belong to the body, that would not like make it any less a part of the body.

If you try to like, you know, really picture and visualize this illustration, it really makes no sense because your feet don't have mouths to speak, and yet in this illustration, your foot has a mouth and it's saying to the hand, I don't want you to be a part of it.

Well, the foot is not a mouth, and so the foot can't talk.

It's a confusing illustration, and that's exactly what Paul is getting at.

He's he's saying this that ears can't talk, feet can't talk, hands can't walk, mouths can't grab things.

Each of these members has no right in and of themselves to look at the other members and say, you're not part of the body.

Paul's already laid out the foundation.

Only God has the right to do that.

It is God who is grafting us into this body, and being members of the body ourselves, we have no right to say who is in and who is out, whether that is of ourselves or of other people.

Only God can do that.

And what God is saying here is that if you've been saved by him, you have been uniquely gifted with something that the church needs.

This is so much stronger as you consider even the context.

Look up at verse 7 with me of chapter 12.

And look what Paul says here.

He says, To each is given the manifestation of the spirit for the common good.

To each.

Who's in each?

Can you put your hand up if you're in each right now?

Everyone should have their hands up in the air.

We are all eaches.

And God has said he has given you a manifestation of the spirit.

God has given you some of himself for what purpose?

In order that you may give of that portion that God has given you, you may give it for the common good of the church.

In other words, you could you could think of it literally like this: you've been given a gift, and you're holding that gift in your hands every day of every week, and the purpose of that gift is to give it to someone else.

Pay it forward was not invented in your Tim Hortons drive-through.

God invented that.

God has given you gifts, and he's calling you to use it for the good of other people.

Look at verse 11.

Paul says, All these are empowered by one and the same spirit who apportions to each one individually as he wills.

We already read verse 18, but it's worth reading again where Paul says, But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them.

In other words, what we're saying is this there is a theological reality here that you must embrace as a believer.

And the theological reality is this if you have been saved by Jesus Christ, you have been given a gift that the local church needs.

You have been given something by God that the brother or sister beside you is hindered without.

Do you understand that?

Let me say that again because this is so important.

You have been given something by God that if you do not use properly, the people around you are then hindered in their walk with God.

Is that not the illustration here?

Is that not the illustration that Paul's getting at?

He's saying, when you were saved, you were brought into the body.

Now, what happens when you're when you wake up in the middle of the night and you've lost all feeling in your leg?

Like you can't move your leg.

You you get up to go to the bathroom and you can't even get to the bathroom.

You're hobbling along.

Even if it's just like you're on your way to the bathroom, you stub your pinky toe, the smallest little member of your body, you stub it, what happens?

The whole body goes around that pinky toe.

Have you ever heard someone preach so passionately about pinky toes?

Goes around that pinky toe and says, We care for you, we support you.

That that pinky toe is important so that if it's not functioning properly, the body can't function properly.

So let me say this again: so essential.

You have been given gifts that the church is hindered without.

Do you see the weight of this?

See, when you come to church as a believer just to spectate, it's not just like a neutral thing.

It's not just like you're saying, oh yeah, well, it's fine.

I you know, I'm not doing anything, it's fine, it's just neutral.

You're actually hindering the body because you're like a limp body part, in which then the whole body has to come around and kind of make up for that limpness.

See, whatever you keep from the church, it it hinders its progress.

And listen, as I've thought about this, I've had to turn to the Lord in repentance.

Because I look at my life and I look at the things that that that I haven't given to the Lord, that I've been unwilling to turn to the Lord, and I think that that has to have consequence.

I don't know what it is, but I know, Lord, that it has consequence in your people because I'm not just an individual, I'm part of your body.

And there are ways I look at my life and I and I think, man, that that that that area of my life makes the body so limp.

It's like that part of the body is asleep because I just won't give it to the Lord.

And it's time for each of us to think as we are a part of the body of Christ, what are we giving to the Lord?

How are you giving your time to the Lord?

Or maybe not giving your time to the Lord?

How are you giving your treasures to the Lord?

Or maybe not giving it to the Lord?

How are you giving your talents to the Lord for the sake and building up of his people?

Or maybe not giving your talents.

See, the reality is that the picture we're getting here, like if the body illustration isn't good enough for you, I met with a number of men this week and we were talking about this verse together, and they kept changing the illustration to football.

And so I thought maybe that's a better, better, better illustration.

I don't know anything about football, but these men knew a lot, and so I'm gonna share it secondhand and probably get a whole bunch of things wrong right now.

Ready for this?

The illustration here is that when you're saved, you're you're put on the football team and you're put on the field.

And you can imagine what would happen if one day the line one of the linebackers just decides, well, I'm not gonna play anymore, I'm just gonna walk to the other side of the field, I'm gonna watch.

Well, you've lost an essential member of the team that is required in order to play that sport.

See, every person is required, every person has a different role that they play in, and to lose that person is to lose an important role in the church.

See, the reality is that if you are in a place where you're just not, there are things you're holding back from this organization that Jesus is building and accomplishing his work through, the reality is that there are other people now who are having to carry your load.

There are people who, week in and week out, are serving in kids' ministry and being asked to do so too frequently.

And yet they're willing to stand up because they recognize the importance of it.

We think about this in terms of giving as well.

The reality is that the work that God is doing in our midst is a work that requires resource.

And you understand that our giving is not just an individual thing, we give to this communal work that God is doing to say, God, fund the work that you're doing in Newmarket.

I'm saying, God, do this work in our midst.

This is what it means to be the body.

So we have a diverse number of people who do different things and have different gifts and desires and are naturally good at different things.

And so you need to understand that the degree to which you won't lean into the church is the degree that the church suffers because you're not there.

The reality is, it let me just say this: if you're not in a small group or if in some area you're not like rubbing shoulders with other people in the context of the local church, there are people who are losing out on your influence.

Like there's people whose lives could be changed.

If they could just be near you for a season in life, they would understand what it looks like to follow Jesus in maybe one degree of life.

This is what I love about our church.

You know what I love about our church?

God is working in each of the members of our church in such a unique way that many of us are passionate about different things.

And I, as the pastor, stand in a place where I often talk with people who come and say, Hey, we gotta be doing this about evangelism.

You know what does it fires me up about evangelism.

And I talk to someone else who says, Hey, we gotta be doing this about, you know, caring for people in the context of our church.

You know what does it fires me up as I spend more time with that person to care for people.

And there are people who are saying, we gotta care for, you know, the poor in our midst in this way, and all of these things are good things.

And if the the reality is that these people aren't in our church influencing other people towards godliness, our church as a whole loses out.

We miss out on influence.

That's what I love about our church is that there are many who have such a heart for evangelism, there are many that have a heart for care and compassion, and all of these things encourage me.

And what we need is for each of the members of the church to influence each other so that we can be balanced.

See, part of what is making the church so weak in our day and age is we just think about it in terms of our individual what we get out of it individually.

And I, you know, small the small group leaders deal with this culture constantly.

He's like this, like, so sorry, I can't make it to small group this week.

And there's no concern, though the only thing that is acknowledged there is that they lose out on the benefit.

But there's not really any any concern for the people that then they do not get to speak the truth and love into their life.

See, the real heartbreak, there is, you know, like the consumption side of it.

It's like when you miss small group, you you miss people pouring into your life, but the real heartbreak of it is really that you miss the opportunity to speak into a brother or sister's life.

You miss the opportunity to hold that person accountable.

You ultimately miss an opportunity to serve.

It's not just consumption, it's also about contribution, about what you contribute.

What about what about the context of corporate prayer together?

You know, I honestly, as I look at this church and all the things that God is doing in it, and us just celebrating maybe what was the most exciting Sunday that we've celebrated as a church, where five people were baptized, and all the people that are growing in the Lord and coming into the church, I look at all of these things, and and you know what the elders and the leaders of this church look at?

We say, This has to be a work of God.

Like it's it's gotta be because of the times that we've prayed together.

Only God could do this work.

And so we look at things like our worship and prayer night, and like I would lose everything else before I'd lose that, because this is like the furnace of where God is working.

And my question for you is this do you believe what the Bible says about prayer so that your prayers are effective?

So that God answers your prayers.

And there is there any part of you that that is as you you know, if you miss that, is there any part of you is that like I missed the opportunity to contribute to the church, to pray in faith?

Maybe if I had prayed, maybe there would have been six people baptized.

And I know what you're thinking right now.

No, that's not how prayer works.

Well, let me challenge you to read what the Bible says about prayer.

The Bible says that if you're a believer and you pray and ask in his name, he will answer it.

It says that the prayers of a righteous person are effective in their working.

And I wonder, I wonder if one day we'll get to heaven and we will see all of the things that we could have had if we had just been a people of prayer.

And think, man, we just we just missed out.

There was so much I could have changed if I just committed to the work of prayer.

You see, this is what I'm telling you.

The body needs you.

The body needs you.

And we suffer without your help.

But the third thing I want you to see here is that you need the body.

You need the body.

So then in verse 21, what Paul says, as the eye cannot say to the hand, I have no need of you, nor again the head to the feet.

Another way you can illustrate this is by thinking about, like, you know, when your elbow gets like immensely itchy?

You ever had that before?

Am I alone in this?

I'm the only one who's ever been itchy in my life?

Okay, well then let me tell you what it's like, alright?

Well, when your elbow is itchy, what needs to happen?

You're like, wow, this is like the most basic sermon I've ever heard in my life.

Well, what needs to happen is you can't just like will that elbow to be itched, right?

Your brain has to send signals to your right hand.

I just stop there to think about which one's left, which one's right.

This is my right, alright?

Your right hand to then itch your left elbow.

And that itch cannot be solved unless the brain and the right hand are then working in conjunction.

In other words, what Paul is saying here is we need other people.

We say it often around here like this: we are community projects.

We're community projects.

So that the work that God wants to do in you, He will not do apart from the influence and contribution of other people.

The ultimate work God wants to do in your life, it cannot be done individually.

I'm not saying that individual, personal worship, reading the word, praying personally are unimportant.

Those things are incredibly important, but I am saying this: that there is a clear place that Scripture has given us in which we will grow.

And that is the place of being our lives being knit together with other believers.

Jesus has made it so clear.

There's a place that provides the power for growth in your life.

And there are many of us who are saying, I want to grow, but I'm unwilling to plug into community.

I'm unwilling to be vulnerable in the midst of other people.

And we're wondering why we never overcome that sin.

We're wondering why we never change.

And it's because God has given you a source of power and you're unwilling to plug your life into it.

See, the reality is that many of us need to stop asking God to work in our life while refusing to place ourselves in the portal of his power, which is his community.

There are many of us who look at our problems and we say, you know, God's it must be who I am.

God can't change me.

Reminded of a family that my wife told me about, she grew up with.

She was friends with this neighbor on the street, and the family constantly complained about this, you know, genetic physical weight problem they had.

They just could not stop gaining weight.

And it was like a it wasn't dietary, it was this physical genetic problem.

My wife went over for a sleepover one day with her friend, and they woke up in the morning and they were eating chocolate cake.

And it was really clear.

Like, there's a problem here, it's probably not genetic, it's probably that you're eating chocolate cake for dessert or for breakfast.

And the same is true of us.

Like, some of us were complaining that we can't overcome the sin.

We're fearful that we won't be able to walk in faith and obedience, but we're not plugging into the source of power for change.

That is his community.

We're community projects.

This is why I want to just put a strong push to the men in the church right now.

That tonight at 7 p.m., you come to the church office.

That if you have plans, you change them.

You come and join us as we dig deep into God's word, and as we do what scripture promised will happen when men meet together, iron sharpens iron.

And so tonight at 7 p.m.

at the church office, 69 Davis Drive, the men of this church are gathering together.

We're getting deep into God's word.

We're gonna challenge each other to think deeply about what God says about biblical manhood, and it's gonna be an incredibly necessary time.

Listen, it's not just gonna be a helpful time.

It's not that like that's not what it's about.

It is a necessary time.

If you want to be the husband God's calling you to, if you want to be the father God is calling you to be, if you want to be the man God is calling you to be, God has said you need interactions like this, where you are rubbing shoulders with brothers and the word of God is being pressed deeply into your life.

You need it.

And so make every effort to be there.

Notice here that as Paul is talking about the body, it centers around care.

The question is like, why does Jesus want us to be a part of the church?

Why does Jesus want us to be a part of the body?

And look here at verse 25.

He says that there may be no division in it, but that the members may have the same care for one another.

Remember verse 7.

You've been given the gifts that God has given you for the common good of other people.

And what Paul is telling us here is that the gifts that God gives us, they're not to show off, but to serve.

We're given unique gifts in order to provide a context of care for the believers that God is calling into our midst and making a part of this local body.

This is why this church, you need to know this.

This is why this church is so serious about step one, step two, and membership.

See, step one is an opportunity that we invite that maybe you're new here, you've never been, we we invite people to come and hear what our church is all about.

And what we're doing by inviting you to step one is one, you know, the staff and elders love PETA pits, so we love to have PETAs every other month, and that's a great thing.

But really, the the bigger desire here is that we the best way that we can care for you is for as quickly as possible to help you decide if this is the church for you.

So up front we say this hey, this is what we're all about.

This is who we are as a church.

And then step two is an opportunity for you to come and hear what we mean by discipleship.

When we say that our our task as a church is to go and make disciples, then we talk about discipleship.

We don't want you to get in and say, hey, this is what you're this is what being a disciple is all about.

I gotta abide in Christ and connect in the community and reach the lost.

We want to be upfront about that because the the way that we can best care for you is telling you what it looks like to be a Christian.

This is why then we talk about membership, because how can we care for you best?

Listen, Jesus has created a place where you will receive spiritual care.

It's so clear in scripture.

It's as clear as like when you're physically injured, you go to the hospital.

It's clearer than that in scripture.

The only soul care that you can receive is found in the church.

Jesus created an institution to care for you, to grow you, and it is the church.

So listen, how can we best care for people that are coming into our doors?

Like there are some who have made the accusation to us as elders that we're we're being too pushy, that we're being too harsh.

And I just can't help but think like it's not a bad thing to push people to the place where they can actually grow and receive care.

That in fact it's like the only loving thing you can do to quickly say, hey, listen, God is working in the midst of our family, and we want you on the inside.

We want you to be committed to this work that God is doing.

We want you to be genuinely cared for.

Listen, we're not saying that we don't care for people that aren't members.

In fact, I think you can look at the way that we care for people that aren't members and reach out and constantly are trying to uh help and serve everyone who comes through the doors of our church.

We are saying this though, that the best way that we can care for you is to call you into this organization that Jesus is building for which He designed you to be cared for.

Being a part of the body.

See, the question is, how do we best care for all people that come through our doors?

And the answer is by shepherding them as a church, shepherding them into the place where they will receive care.

When you're walking on the side of the road, you see someone injured, maybe they're biking, they've broken their arm or something, what do you do?

You don't say, Hey, like, let me let me take a lot of time with you, okay?

Let me, I'm gonna help you.

And they say, Are you a doctor?

No, but I'm here for you, okay?

I'm gonna help you.

No, what you do right away is you get them to the place of care.

And you need to understand that as a church, this is our responsibility.

From the moment someone comes into the church parking lot, that's when the sermon begins.

That's when they uh need to start receiving care.

They need to start receiving a warm welcome.

Hey, you're welcome here.

We start ushering them into the place where they can experience true spiritual care.

I want you to know, as a church, um, I'm I'm so encouraged by this.

I think that as a church, we do incredibly well with welcoming people.

In fact, I I hear pretty constantly, and we even heard in the baptisms last week, that that we do, and and yet I'm just reminded there's so much more we can do.

We could be so much more adamant to welcome and care for the new people in our midst.

And so, what's one thing practically can do?

Well, let me just give you something really practical, okay?

In the first two minutes, after every service ends, make it every effort possible to talk to someone you don't know.

There are like ninjas in our midst, okay?

As soon as the service ends, there are people who are already in the parking lot.

I don't know how they do it.

They do like a somersault flip roll to the door and they get out.

And yet I have had moments where that person is stopped and then they talk, and there's such a meaningful conversation here.

I love what I saw the other week.

I talked about it, but I've been thinking about it ever since when one of our ushers pretty much tackled one to get to welcome them into our midst.

It's so important.

It says, hey, you're loved here, you are important here, you are a person that is going to be cared for in this midst.

Verse 26.

Notice what Paul says here.

If one member suffers, we all suffer together.

If one member is honored, we all rejoice together.

Do you see what God's building here?

He is building a place where your deepest hardships and your greatest joys are truly received.

You know what functionally then the body of Christ is?

Functionally, the body of Christ is Jesus' care for you.

So many of us, we look to Jesus, Jesus, I just want you to reveal yourself to me.

I just want to walk beside you, I just want to be cared by so intimately by you.

And and and this is what Jesus is saying the church.

The church.

It is this supernatural place where when you suffer, there are brothers and sisters there who are committed to suffering alongside you.

And when you rejoice, there are brothers and sisters there who are committed to rejoicing alongside you, so that it is all it is equivalent to if I were beside you.

This is the way that Jesus cares for us.

He calls us into the church, and then he calls the church to do what he did with his disciples, so that we understand the weight of what's said in verse 27.

Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.

Church, this picture that God is painting of the church is so unnatural to us.

And yet this is the only place in which Jesus has created that we can find care, that we can experience firsthand in a practical, physical, personal way.

His love.

We need it, and the body needs us.

Let's pray.

Father, God, we thank you, Lord, for your wisdom in creating the church.

Or this was your idea.

It's not a pragmatic institution that we've that we think will work well.

Lord, it's what you've created to care for the people that you care about so deeply.

And so, Lord, we pray that, God, as we've heard about the body and understood its significance, Lord, we pray that you would call us deeper into it.

Lord, recognizing our need of the body to change and grow us, and recognizing the way that the body of Christ needs us, needs our influence, needs our practical help, our time, our talents, our treasures.

God, we give it to you, trusting, Lord, that you will faithfully work in our midst and work in our world.

So, God, we give this to you.

We pray this all in the name of your son.

Amen.