The Spirit placed us all into one body.

John Farley
Pastor-Teacher
Sunday,
November 3, 2019

 

www.gbcpakistan.org

 

GBC Pakistan has increased their goal for this year to ,000.

200+ Grace Academy School “student packages” at each,
and 1,200 “village packages” at each, plus travel expense.

Make checks out to GBC Pakistan
Note “student package” or “village package”

Deadline for donations is December 1st

The Spirit placed us all into one body

1CO 12:12-20

Here in chapter 12, Paul has already introduced the subject of spiritual gifts.

There are varieties
of gifts but the same Spirit.

The Spirit decides which spiritual gift will be given to each believer.

The Spirit distributes these gifts as He wills for the common good.

A metaphor is a figure of speech that makes an implicit, implied, or hidden comparison …

between two things that are unrelated, but which share some common characteristics.

 

Paul will use the metaphor of the human body to reveal truths about the church - Body of Christ.

He will use the metaphor of the human body to teach the saints about how the spiritual gifts are designed to work together.

The body is made up of many different limbs and organs and systems.
 

But they cannot function alone, apart from the human body.
 

The Corinthians would have expected Paul to say “so is the church” or “so is the assembly”.

The church is the body of Christ.

How did each individual believer find himself in the body of Christ?

The same Spirit who provides a spiritual gift to each believer also places each believer into the body of Christ.

The gifts are useless unless they function together in the one body of Christ.

EPH 4:4-6

1CO 12:13

The one baptism for the church is the baptism by the Spirit into Christ.

GAL 3:27-28

And we were ALL made to drink of the one Spirit. This describes the indwelling of the Spirit.

JOH 7:37-39

The Spirit dwells in the heart of each believer in Christ during the church age.

1CO 12:14-16

Think of all of the wonderful things the human body is capable of doing.

 

The failure of one muscle or valve or vein or bone can shut down the entire body.

In verses 14-19, Paul addresses those saints who felt that their gift was inferior.

He will tell those with the less coveted gifts that they are every bit as important to the proper functioning of the body as anyone else.

Eyes and ears speak as if they were people.

Imagine your foot declaring independence from your body because he’s not a hand!

Let’s consider poor Mr. Foot. He spends his days in the dust of the ground. And he bears the weight of the entire body.

God designed the entire human body, and He gave the foot a special function.

How often does a lover say “when I look into your ears,…”?!

But without so many of you operating in the gift that the Spirit has given you, …

 

Notice that the foot does not say “I am not an eye”.

But he imagines he could possibly function as a hand.

 

We often look at the fella with the gift that is just a little better than ours and wish we had that.

1CO 12:17-20

Imagine an eye trying to hear…. Ridiculous!

 

The only thing that matters is that you are a member of THE Body of Christ!

It is His great desire to see you thriving - really fully alive! - in the place where He’s placed you.

 

 

If we were all evangelists, where would the giving come from? Or the helps. Or the prayers.

If the whole assembly spoke in tongues, where would the sanity be?!