Being the Body of Christ

I believe I've mentioned in the past that the tiny congregation at Corinth was, at the very least, a tidy little group of divided and divisive people. There is speculation about what the problem was in Corinth. Just a point of reference, Corinth may not have been all the different from New York City, for instance. A good-sized metropolitan area that was the home to many differing forms and expression of faith. Believers who proclaimed their allegiance to this Jesus of Nazareth were, in a sense, the new kids on the block, a minority in an area of the world where other religions and faith-expressions had long-since taken root. What this meant is that, with some on-going influence from their former faith communities, some of the new Christians may have been struggling, having a difficult time letting go of some of their expectations about how and what their congregation should be and do. "I have heard that there are quarrels among you," Paul writes early on. The word “quarrels” may not begin to describe how splintered the Corinthian people could have been. One writer goes so far as to say that "we can infer that there were divisions, disputes, infidelities, and a host of other problems that made this group a candidate as poster child for Paul’s worst congregation. Yet to them, with all their problems, Paul says 'now you are the body of Christ.' "

Describing the church as the body of Christ may be Paul’s best-known image of what it means to be Christian. It's not the only image Paul ever used, but it is the one he called upon when he encountered disunity and division.

Given the state of so many churches today, Paul’s words to the Corinthian Christians just might strike a relevant chord for some congregations.

With the transitory nature of life being what it is, it is not unusual for a church to be populated by people who have come from another faith tradition. I have attended and pastored churches that were comprised of members who represented a spectrum of understandings and expectations. While on the one hand, this provided an interesting mix of talents and ideas, there was always the possibility that someone would say, "well, that's not the way we did it in my former church." That kind of statement could easily have been countered with that age-old phrase "that's the way we've always done it."

There were times when compromise was achieved between the new and the familiar, and other times when mediation and reconciliation were in order. After a while you just learn that those sorts of things can happen when a group of people come together for what they believe is a common cause, only to discover that not everyone has the same perception of what that cause is or how it should be pursued. It happens in community groups and in fraternal and sororial organizations, and it most certainly happens in churches, doesn't it? And that's where life begins to get interesting. What some see as a rich, diverse mix, others may perceive as a mish-mash of ideas, some acceptable, some of which are not.

For some time now, the United Church of Christ has carried the label of a liberal, even far-left group of Christians. In fact, a majority of people in the United Church of Christ might even describe themselves in those terms today. Yet, from its very inception, the United Church of Christ has actually been quite a mixture of different ideas and traditions.

Over thirty years ago, the forerunner to the newspaper format of United Church News was a glossy magazine entitled "A.D.". An article in the September 1975, issue of A.D. described the United Church of Christ as a "beautiful, heady, exasperating mix." In fact, the United Church of Christ is all that and more. I realize that not every one agrees with some of the visions and goals that our denomination pursues. You know what? Sometimes, neither do I. But that's okay! Such is the nature of a free church. The unifying thought for us all is that Christ is still affirmed as the head of the church. This means we don't have a hierarchy of leaders who tell us what to do or how to live out our faith. Living out our own ministry means that we rely upon Christ. Led by the Holy Spirit, individual congregations like ours follow the dictates of their faith and conscience as they serve Christ in the world. The ministry of Congregational Churches in New England may only slightly resemble the ministry of a Congregational Church in the Midwest or in the South. For that matter, a Congregational Church in Portland may be quite different from a church in Kittery, Fort Kent, or even Wells. How each church hears Christ and perceives the activity of the Holy Spirit is a unique event for each congregation. These differences do not make one group wrong or misguided, and another right or correct. In the words of that A.D. story, that's the sort of thing that makes the United Church of Christ a "beautiful, heady, exasperating mix." Sometimes there is no one way to describe what ministry in the united church of christ actually looks like. I'd like to think that the differences that might appear to divide people could actually be opportunities for acknowledging and celebrating our various gifts, talents and perspectives.

The apostle Paul used the human body as an analogy of the body of Christ with good reason. The body, whether human or spiritual, is composed of different parts. No one part takes precedence over another. Each has an important contribution to make. This is a lesson has been carried down through the generations because Paul, and certainly Christ himself, understood how people can choose to divide and fragment themselves into groups that are not always productive for what should be their common work. It's a lesson we receive in our own time and place because we know full well how that can happen here.

I encourage us to take Paul's words seriously. Our unity in Christ just has to be more important than the individual agendas we might like to lift up. Yes, of course we should continue to have constructive conversations about the direction our ministry and missions should take. No one idea or viewpoint is necessarily more important than the next. But when all is said and done, our essential unity is in Christ should be affirmed and lifted up. As Christ taught, we are individual branches of the same vine. We need Christ and we need each other in fundamental ways, in worship, in service, and in fellowship, relying upon the life and inspiration which flows from Christ himself. Despite our limitations and our diversity, we are called be a group of people whose primary desire should be to make a positive and uplifting change in the world, not for our own glory, but to the glory of god.

To my mind, heart and spirit, that's what it means to be the body of Christ.

Amen.