Christians Belong Together

We are saying COVID times are soon to be over. We are now well and truly, physically and legally, starting to be able to meet together as God's family face to face, and there is a God-given biblical mandate for us to belong to a local expression of God's universal church. If you profess Jesus Christ as Lord, you belong to the church. And if you belong, therefore, you are saying that I have serious rights in belonging to that church and serious responsibilities to live that Christian life within the community of Christ. And it is for this reason that over the next two Sundays, today and next week, we're going to be looking at the topic of church membership. We're going to be introducing it.

The truth is, when we become a Christian, God doesn't simply save us from our sins. He saves us into a new reality. He forms us into a new community. The Bible calls the collection of saved individuals the church. And this morning, we are given the power and the memorable metaphor to explain what this community life looks like.

And this morning, in First Corinthians 12, we are told it looks like the human body, that we are members of a body like legs, hands, ears, and eyes are to a human body. So if you have your Bibles with you, let's go, and we're going to read how the apostle Paul, inspired by the Holy Spirit, gives us this concept of what it means to be in the church. First Corinthians 12, verse 12. 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 baptised into one body, Jews or Greeks, slaves or 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'm 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'm 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 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 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 of the body that we think less honourable, we bestow the greater honour, and our unpresentable parts are treated with greater modesty, which our more presentable parts do not require.

But God has so composed the body, giving greater honour 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 honoured, all rejoice together. Now, you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles and gifts of healing, helping, administrating and various kinds of tongues.

Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? Do all possess gifts of healing?

Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret? But earnestly desire the higher gifts, and I will show you a still more excellent way. And then it's where Paul goes on to that great chapter, chapter 13, on love. This is our reading so far, and this is God's word to us. We find Paul writing to the church in Corinth, one of the most divided churches you will find in our history. It is difficult to overstate just how divided they were.

It was a community split between ethnic backgrounds, Jews and Greeks, Jews and Gentiles. It was a church split between the wealthy and the very poor. They were split between a very strict charismatic-like spirituality and those who were seen as not spiritual at all. It was a church split between well-educated nobles and uneducated slaves.

And to this divided church, Paul writes a letter that has built to this crescendo in chapter 12 and 13, where he tells the church that they are members of the church, a member of a body called the body of Christ. To be a Christian is to be the body of Christ. And here are some of the points that he makes in this chapter. Firstly, number one, that as a Christian, he says, you are inseparable from the church. As a Christian, you are inseparable from the church.

In the first section of the passage, verses 14 to 20 in First Corinthians 12, Paul talks about how inseparable and indispensable the members of the body are to the body itself. Verse 14 states, for the body does not consist of one member, but of many. If the foot should say, because I'm not a hand, I do not belong to the body, that would not make it any less a part of the body. Verse 17, if the whole body were an eye, where would be the sense of hearing? In fact, verse 19 says, if all were a single member, where would the body be?

A body, a human body, cannot be a body unless it is made up of many different parts. A body is a body because it has an interdependence on all its other parts. The body cannot be separated from its members, and the different members are indispensable to the body, inseparable from the body. So as a Christian, to imply that you can be part of the broad, spiritual, intangible community of the universal church without first being part of the smaller, physical, local church is an impossibility. Just like you can't be a part of Westpac International Bank without having first an active account at a local branch.

Similarly, you can't be part of the worldwide universal church of God without being part of His local expression. It's not possible. Paul is saying it is not logical to think of ourselves in that sort of way. But KJ, some might say, you forget that I'm a Christian not simply because I belong to a church, but because I have given my allegiance to Jesus Christ. Let me ask you this.

Can Rob be an Essendon football supporter? It's Essendon, isn't it, Rob? Without him ever going to any of the games, watching any of the games on TV, never opening the newspaper to read the news about how the football match went. He doesn't own any of their merchandise, he doesn't know any rules of the AFL game at all, and he never ever talks about footy or the Essendon football team. I guess Rob could call himself a fan of Essendon, but people would think he's pretty mad.

If the church is not simply a club, but a living body of Christ, then not being present, being a part of that church community, not being actively engaged in it, is not simply leaving a club. When you live away from the church, when you disengage from the body of Christ, you dismember yourself from that body. Jesus and the rest of that body sorely misses you, and like an arm ripped out of its socket, it haemorrhages that body. Likewise, when we cut ourselves off, we are cutting ourselves off from the only source of life and nourishment that you have. An amputated arm is not an arm anymore, it is a piece of meat.

And from the moment it is pulled out of that socket, it is rotting, it is dying. Paul is saying, a member without a body is a piece of dead meat. It is useless for anything. It is already starting to rot and stink. There is one body and there are many parts that belong to it.

So firstly, as a Christian, you are inseparable from the church. The second thing is, as a Christian, the church is indispensable or essential to you. People have tried to argue with me that there is no biblical evidence for church membership, and I guess it's true. There is no form of membership in the Bible that says, to belong to Open House Church, Leon, you must do these things and sign here. People have argued that the idea of committing yourself to one physical church through a membership process is not found anywhere in the Bible.

But asking where the Bible commands you to belong to a local church is like asking where in your marriage vows is it insisted that your spouse be human. It's a given. That's what it is saying. Paul is assuming that people will belong to the church, a local church. How can I say this?

Well, almost the entirety of the New Testament is addressed to what? Local churches. It's the church of Corinth. Local churches which we see, as we read these letters, are as imperfect as ours. They have members as annoying as ours.

They have disunity. They have differences of opinion on worship preferences. They have theological debates. They have different opinions on politics. They are as varied as ours.

And nine times out of ten, when we struggle with being members of the local church, you will find the same issue being addressed in the New Testament. Why? Because it's always been hard to be a part of the church. But here's the main difference between us now and the church back then. Somehow, we started to assume that somehow we don't need to belong anywhere.

For them, it wasn't an option. In Corinth, there was just one church. You couldn't go down the road. You had to belong. You had to make it work.

And so in the second section of our passage, verses 21 to 26, Paul discusses how the various members of this metaphorical body interact with one another. He says that I can't say to the head, I don't need you. The head can't say to the feet, I don't need you. No, says verse 25, there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another.

The same concern, the same goal. In other words, as the body of Christ, we have been formed, we have been cosmically brought together into a new organism, a dynamic family, and all of Scripture is about teaching us how to get along in that body. How to encourage the weak, who are wrestling and struggling with their faith. How to conduct ourselves in relation to those outside of the body. How to love those in the body who we disagree with.

We are taught to submit to our elders by having proper order in the church. We are told to discipline our weekly routine so that we can attend physically to see one another. And all of these truths are written to ordinary people like us. And all of it is telling us to do stuff where? In the local church.

In other words, the Bible is telling us that some of us will need to be eyes, and some of us will need to be ears, and some of us will be hands and feet, but all of us will need to work together. All of us will need to be dependent on one another. And so a church will need members who will become elders. It needs other members to encourage and pray for those who are struggling. It needs Bible encouragers, gospel sharers, hospitality showers.

In other words, the church needs you. Whether you are extroverted or introverted, shy or upfront, the church needs you. You have an obligation to us. But here's the thing that we overlook the most. The rest of the church is indispensable to you and your faith walk.

You cannot do your faith walk without the church. You can't develop and grow as an eye, if you're an eye, without the hand. You can't be a foot without the leg. You will not find lasting, satisfactory growth as a Christian if you are not part of the local church. Why?

Because my faith is tied intrinsically to the person next to me. My faith is tied to all of you. You are a reflection of me. I am a reflection of you. Let me explain.

At youth camps, some of us may remember this, we used to have a one-legged race. Not three-legged, one-legged. Where we would have to hold the leg and we would have to hop a certain distance to see who won that race. A one-legged race. You can imagine the fun that that was, seeing people stumbling and falling and tripping towards the finish line.

By doing that, you realise what happens when you've lost a foot or a leg. We're totally off balance. Why? Well, because we were designed to have two legs. In fact, that sort of balance is found all throughout the body, all throughout nature.

We have two eyes to give depth perception. We have two arms and two hands to provide dexterity. We have two sides of the brain that work in tandem to produce complementary expressions between thought and feeling. All these things come in pairs because there are many things in the physical world which work best when they are balanced and when they complement, when they complete each other. Paul is saying that this is what Christianity is.

You will not be able to be a good leg without another leg. You can't be a Christian without having another stubborn Christian like you next to you in that church. As a Christian, the church is indispensable to you. You need the church for your faith. And then our third and our final point: As a Christian, you and I need to continually overcome our loveless hearts.

Theologically, the Bible repeats the message that humanity has fallen into this spiral of autonomy. The desire for us to choose for ourselves how we live, to determine for ourselves what is right and wrong. This autonomy, the Bible says, is the heart of sin. It is what causes us to idolise everything, to worship absolutely everything but God. And ultimately, the Bible tells us this autonomy is our self-destruction.

It starts to break down all that is good in life, and it is something that Paul addresses so strongly in the letter of First Corinthians. If you had a quick flick through, you will see that after our passage in chapter 12 dealing with the body of Christ, Paul will head in chapter 14 to talk about the various interdependent gifts in the body, the eye parts and the ear parts and the hand parts working together. But wedged in between chapter 12 and 14, obviously, is chapter 13. And at the end of our passage this morning, verse 31, Paul begins to introduce it by calling it the most excellent way. And that is the concept of love.

Chapter 13 will tell us that without love, I can be the most gifted, the most spiritual, the most well-read and most zealous Christian alive, but if I have not love, Paul says, I am nothing. Remember the words, famous words of First Corinthians 13. I'll put them up for us. Love is patient and kind. Love does not envy or boast.

It is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way. It is not irritable or resentful. It does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Now, while these words are often read at weddings, the reason we actually have them according to the context is because Paul needed people to know how to relate to one another in the church. The church as one body with many parts must love like this. And so here's the bottom line. The biggest reason we don't commit ourselves to a church doesn't come down to our commitment issues or busy schedules. It comes down to a lack of love.

It means you have a stunted, underdeveloped love. You have a stunted love that causes you to ignore God's will, to choose autonomy over dependence, dependence on Him, but also dependence on fellow brothers and sisters. How can I say that? Well, because genuine love is patient. Genuine love is kind.

Genuine love is not self-seeking. It is not easily offended. It is not easily angered. It rejoices in the truth that is spoken over it. It mourns over sin.

Genuine love perseveres and presses on. And so, chapter 13, that leads from the body of Christ passage we've read, tells us that as Christians, we have to overcome loveless hearts to be a part of the body. Because without developing this love in a context of Christian fellowship and community, your capacity to love will remain stunted and deformed. Without church membership, you remain an unhealthy Christian. And so for us to be healthy, you and I need the lesson in humility of doing things like submitting to the elders who speak truth.

You and I need the encouragement of sharing with one another the little victories of life that our fellow Christians have won that week. You and I need the fellowship of sharing in the sufferings of other believers in the church. Do you truly know what it means to belong to the body of Christ? So for us to say that we join a church is to use a club word. You join a club.

You join an RSL or a sailing club. You pay your dues. You receive the benefits. In that club, you come and you go as you please, and nothing about your identity is changed because you've joined that club, because the people there share the same identities and the same interests that you have, ones that resemble your own. There are no real demands that are placed on you.

But the word for membership in the body of Christ is not the word join. The word is submit. Ephesians 5:21, submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. Submit is a kingdom word. To submit is to talk of a citizenship.

It recognises the presence of an authority established over you as a king. To submit speaks to a new identity, not a hobby or an interest that is held in common. It suggests that you belong to something altogether new, a new nation, a new people, a new family, a new body. And so to lovingly submit oneself to membership suggests that all the benefits that you receive as a member will come with a set of obligations as well. The church, because it is not a club, but it is a body, means you can't come and go as you please.

But then again, because well, then again, maybe the church is a type of club if you think of it another way. Maybe the Christian church is a club of sorts. It is a club of sinners. People united in a shared experience of brokenness and imperfection. And if you think about it, it's probably the only society in the world in which membership is based upon a single qualification that you, as the candidate, are totally unworthy of membership.

You and I don't deserve entry into that club. Yet the thing that has established our membership into this community, this membership of a community that is called to love one another, well, our entry has never been guaranteed by our ability to love perfectly, but by the truth that we have been loved perfectly through Jesus Christ. It is only because of His great love shown on the cross that we are now able to overcome loveless hearts. It is because of the power of His great love that we are compelled to live out our lives within the community that is called beloved. This is who the church is.

We are Christ's body and we are His body, meaning that His blood runs through us. And if we are His body, then His spirit, His soul animates us. And if we are His body, it is His will that moves us. And if we have been formed as His body through His love, then we will also love one another. Friends, is this love shown by your time, shown by your patience, shown by your endurance, shown by your graciousness to the members of this church?

Is this love worth it? Well, in closing, I wanna share with you a story of a study, rather, formed in 1938. A group that studied a collection of 260 men, who for the next 75 years, were investigated, studied on a range of psychological, physical, economic and spiritual characteristics. This study was called the Grant Study, named after its patron.

It became the longest longitudinal study of human development. With the remaining participants now reaching well into their nineties, of these 268 men, the last director of this study, George Valiant, decided to bring to a close the study by publishing what they had learned across those 75 years looking at the same men over that time. And he wrote in a book called Triumphs of Experience, that after 75 years of research, they learned that while factors such as education, a stable marriage, a healthy lifestyle, while those factors were all good for life, there was one thing that mattered above all for a vibrant life. Guess what it was? Love.

Ability to be loved and to love. Valiant wrote, the only thing that really matters in life is your relations with other people. I wanna encourage us to think about the importance of church membership and what it means to be part of the body of Christ. It is good for us at the start of a new year to think about and reflect on what it means when I say that I'm a member of this church. Whether you are a formal member or not, I'm gonna encourage you to participate in this eight-week membership class.

Because through that process, we need to unlearn some of the rubbish that we've come to believe about what the church means to me, and what the church needs to be for me. As a Christian, you are inseparable from the church. As a Christian, the church is indispensable to you. And as Christians, you and I need to overcome our loveless hearts. Let's pray.

Father, we thank You for our church. We thank You that in the presence of one another, even in the strange situation of being separated physically through this pandemic, Lord, we pray that You will lead us out of this time with a renewed understanding of what it means to belong to one another as Your body. Father, we admit and we know that it is hard and there will be things that we feel very strongly about and there will be real and deep disappointments that we share in this life together. We pray for Your grace, we pray for Your wisdom, and we pray for the insight-giving light of Your truth.

To guard our hearts, to correct our motives, to love deeply, and Lord, to transform ourselves as well as our fellow believers. Father, we thank You again for Your word, that You are at work in us to will and to work in us what is good and pleasing to You. And so thank You, Lord, for even these challenging words that it comes with a promise that You are transforming our desires to line up with Yours. And so, Holy Spirit, we say to You, transform us, renew us, strengthen us, encourage us, also that we may love with a patient love, in kindness, in endurance, without seeking our own, without being easily offended or angered. We pray for our church.

We pray for one another. May Your will be done in us. In Jesus' name. Amen.