“If the whole body were an eye where would the sense of hearing be?” (1Corinthians 12:17)
The story is told of a doctor who came out of the delivery room and told an expectant father, “I have some grave news for you. Your wife has given birth to a 7-pound eyeball. And that’s not all. It’s blind!”
If you came home one night in the dark and found a 185 pound eyeball in the corner of your front porch, would that give you a rush of anxiety?
In the verse above the Apostle Paul uses an illustration like the illustrations I just shared. He does this in his inspired letter to the Corinthians because he wants to make a point: the beauty of diversity.
One of the fingerprints of the Church of Jesus Christ is that we celebrate diversity. Diversity in the body of Christ is to be celebrated rather than resolved. If two of us are exactly alike one of us is unnecessary. Some members of the First Church of Corinth were telling others they were not authentically spiritual unless they had the same spiritual gifts that they had.
Paul’s remedy for that kind of thinking was the metaphor of a body being just one member and not a body with the beauty of many diverse parts. Other members of the body of Christ have what you do not have and you have what they do not have – that means you need them and they need you.
The body of Christ is a team sport. Are you willing to be a team player? If so, step up and play your part.
Dick Woodward, 05 February 2013
4SpiritualSecrets 