Body of Christ

So lately, I’ve been hearing a lot about the importance of the body of Christ. We’ve been talking about it at Elevate, last weekend on the Belong Retreat, and then I have been reading on it. In journey groups last week, we went through 1 Corinthians 3. Some of the things I learned through this passage have really been sticking with me, so I thought I’d share them. Again, be prepared for this to not make sense, if you have read my blogs before, you know the craziness that goes on inside my head. ;-)



In 1 Corinthians 3, Paul was addressing how the Corinthians were quarrelling over things that didn’t even matter, and how these dumb arguments were preventing their spiritual growth. One of the main problems was the disagreements about whose teaching was better, Paul or Apollos. When I read that, I thought, “How silly! They were fighting over who was better presenting the same message!” (which is exactly what Paul tells them, but we will get to that in a minute) But then I thought, how many times in our churches today do we take our focus off the gospel and the amazing-ness of God in general to worry about whose preaching style better fits us or whether or not we liked the songs in worship today. How dare we come into the house of the creator of the universe who CHOSE to save our lowly selves and demand for entertainment? How much more silly and selfish does it get than that? Just like the Corinthians, we take our focus off what it should be and worry about silly things. When we do this, we are choosing to prevent our own spiritual growth. How much different would coming to church be if we were all coming with the attitude of “What worship can I bring to God today to show my gratefulness to him?” Just a thought…


Actually, that’s totally not what I was wanting to talk about when I sat down to write this blog, lol, so back to what has really been on my heart lately-the body of Christ.


So I don’t know about you, but I have always thought that my personal relationship with God is just that, MY personal relationship with God. I’ve always thought that it doesn’t affect anyone but me. Lately, I have realized that is not the case. In 1Corinthians 3, Paul starts talking about how who is presenting the message doesn’t matter, because they are all just servants of God. They are both just trying to complete the task that God has given them. Then he relates each person’s individual task to a part of a building that is God’s master plan. (stay with me here) This reminded me of the story of Nehemiah. He needed to build a wall to protect the city and he needed to do it pretty fast, like impossibly fast. Nehemiah gave each person in Jerusalem the task of building the portion of the wall that was in front of their house, and miraculously, the wall was built in time and the city was protected!


So your probably wondering how this relates to the body of Christ. I think this shows how our relationship with Christ, doesn’t just affect us. If one person would have decided to take a day off and not finished their part of the wall on time, the whole city would have been left vulnerable to attack. Let’s relate this back to us. When we aren’t right with God in our own personal relationship with him, we aren’t doing our part in the task that he has given the body of Christ as a whole, and therefore, we are leaving the WHOLE body of Christ vulnerable to Satan’s attacks. (makes you think twice about skipping your bible study, right?)


An example, I’m usually an encouraging person, I feel like that is one of the gifts God has given me. (notice I said usually) But if I don’t have my personal encouraging time with God, then I am not such an encouraging person. I also struggle with insecurity, so if I am not having my time with God, I forget how secure I am in the fact that I am his child and I let that get to me as well. Basically, if I’m not getting my Jesus time, I’m not encouraging and I’m whiney, overdramatic, and insecure. (yay for character flaws :-/) A few weeks ago I was having a rough day and I didn’t have my friendship time with Jesus that day, or the day before…In other words, I was a yucky version of the Courtney God made that day. Because I was so yucky, I wasn’t encouraging and supporting Matt the way he needs me to be there for him. That night was a band practice night and I remember him calling me and telling me that on days when he is supposed to be trying to really serve God like that, it hinders him to be bickering with me over silly things just because I’m in a yucky mood. I started thinking about that. What if it had been a Wednesday night and he was supposed to be leading worship? My yucky mood would have led to him being hindered in leading the Journey as a ministry into the presence of God. In other words, me not doing my bible study would affect the whole Journey ministry. Now say someone didn’t get the worship they needed that night and then is yucky to someone else because of it. Because I didn’t “build my part of the wall” that day, the body of Christ was left vulnerable.


Now obviously, we aren’t going to be perfect. And thank goodness God is great enough to step in when those kinds of situations occur and fix our messes and protect my part of the wall when I fail. But I’ve just really been hit with how the body of Christ is much more connected than we realize and how we each have an effect on the body and the task God has given us a whole.


I hope this makes sense! Feel free to leave comments and tell me where I’m wrong! Love you all!