June 2, 2024
Read Joshua 13, Proverbs 28, 1 Corinthians 12
I remember being fascinated with the human body growing up. In school we would learn about various different systems in the body. The circulatory system, the digestive tract, the endocrine system, the nervous system, and on and on. There were all the muscles in the body, all the bones we had to memorize and name, and all the organs that made up the body. The body is truly amazing. It gets even more amazing when we look at the body under a microscope. The individual cells and our DNA that is far more complex than most computer programs today.
In 1 Corinthians 12 Paul uses the body analogy to describe the church. “The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ. 13 For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body—whether Jews or Greeks, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink” vv. 12-13.
Paul distinguished between the parts of the body that are seen and the parts of the body that are unseen. “But God has combined the members of the body and has given greater honor to the parts that lacked it” v. 24
Finally, Paul says that no one part of the body is any more important to the whole than any other. Paul was not making a medical observation here, we know that we need our brains and hearts more than we need a little toe. But he was saying that the body needs to be whole so it is functioning at its best. “25 so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. 26 If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it” vv. 25-26.
Do you know your role in the body of Christ? More importantly do you submit to the head, which is Christ?
What else do you see in these chapters? What words, phrases, or themes stand out to you?
Add your thoughts below.
DId God Really Say... 