Date : Third Sunday after the Epiphany, January 24, 2010

Text : 1 Corinthians 12:12-31a

Title : The many form the one

Before I begin the sermon, I have been asked to make to announce that, after church, everyone is directed to go to the Port Hope medical clinic, where the following will occur:

What do you think? Does this sound like a good idea? Why wouldn’t it be? If you can see, fine and dandy, then why do you need two feet? And, you can get along, perfectly well, without any one of the organs that I mentioned, so what’s the big deal?

When you know a person who, let’s say, must use a walker, or a wheelchair, but has all of his other faculties, do you say, "He shouldn’t complain. At least he can see and hear, so he can still enjoy life"? If that is true, shall we cut your legs out from under you?

Is any one body part unimportant? Just because your piggy toe doesn’t allow you to drink in the beauty of this world, as do your eyes, does this make your piggy toe less valuable to your whole body? Therefore, is one body part truly more important than another?

Here is the faith connection: as every part of your body is important, every member of Christ’s Church is important, "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 or free"—

When I begin most sermons, "Dear brothers and sisters in Christ," this is not simply a lovely way to address you. It’s a fact. You are united into the one Christian family—the one body of Christ—after the fashion of the human body. Yes, some of you are eyes, and some are ears . . . and some are mouths! . . . and some are pinkies, and some are appendixes, and some are tonsils. And, don’t anyone dare say that an eye is more important or valuable than a pinky, or a mouth than the tonsils, for just as the Lord made each of the body parts for its particular function, so He made each of members of Christ’s body for its particular function.

Maybe our problem is that we don’t have a clue what the function is for some of our Christian brothers and sisters. "God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gift of healing, helping, administering," etc.

As the parts of the body all don’t have the same use—what good would we be if we were all eyes, but had no pinkies?—neither do all of Christ’s people have the same use—what good would we be if we were all pastors, or organists, or secretaries?

The Holy Spirit led Paul to conclude this section of teaching us to see that we are all different, but we are all valuable members of Christ’s body, by saying, "But earnestly desire the higher gifts."

What are the higher gifts? The higher gifts are not to be an apostle, or to speak in tongues, or perform miracles. The higher gifts are these, and they are three: faith, hope, and love. But, since faith and hope will pass away—we will no longer need them in the resurrection to Paradise—that makes the greatest of these gifts to be love, because we will always love.

Or, we won’t—if we don’t love, now, we will hate, for eternity, in eternal damnation.

Are you loving every member of the body of Christ? If Christ loves every member, can you do less? Has He given you permission not to love your neighbor as you love yourself?

Loving every Christian does not mean that you will be a friend with every Christian. We all have different personalities. There are some folks with personalities to which you match up, and you want to play cards with this one, or go snowmobiling with that one, or bowling with another, just as there are folks with personalities to which you do not match up, and you would never invite them over for dinner, or be on their team, or take a vacation together.

But, that has nothing to do with loving them. And, where it makes no difference to the body of Christ if you don’t befriend certain folks, it makes all the difference to your eternal life if you don’t love every eye, and pinky, and that roll of fat that so frustrates you.

Thus, I pulled the following from my sermon, from two weeks ago: With whom do you need to reconcile? From whom are you separated? What members do we have, who need you to be the bigger person, to reach out to them, to be reunited with the body of Christ? With what family, what former friends, are you estranged? Is there any guilt, any shame, any remorse, any longing in you, because you have something in your power, that you have left undone, that keeps you separated from anyone? Is there anyone, whom you can’t stand the thought of sitting next to in church, kneeling next to at Christ’s altar, being with in heaven?

This season of Epiphany is all about Jesus Christ being made known to the world. The singular thing Jesus came to make known is the love of God the Father. Everything Jesus did was borne of the love of His Father—preaching, healing, rebuking, and laying down His life as a ransom for your sins.

His love is now your love. This is the love into which He had you baptized, to make you an eye or ear or roll of fat. This is the love with which He feeds you at His altar. This is the love which your pastor proclaims to you, and of which you sing in the hymns and liturgy.

You are better than no one. You are less than no one. No matter what part of the body of Christ you are, you are part of the body of Christ. All of the parts make up the whole.

As a member of the body of Christ, you are little Christs. This is your privilege, to show the love of Christ as the body part which He made you to be. Thus, you rejoice with all the other members, and you suffer with all the other members, because Christ suffered for you that you have this rejoicing in your hearts, to go forth from your mouths.

Wherever you are in the body of Christ, Christ is the head—thankfully, He’s the brains of the operation—and, in His loving wisdom, He is leading you, dear members of His body, to the resurrection to the eternal life of Paradise. Amen.