66 Sermon Illustrations on Body Of Christ

If someone said to me, “I love you, but I can’t stand your wife,” I would be devastated. My wife is a part of me. Such a negative attitude toward my wife would always be a barrier in our relationship.

We hear a similar statement in our culture: “I love Jesus, but I don’t love the church.” This statement is made by those who have been hurt by people in the church, or who have found commitment to the church too demanding or difficult. Whatever the reason, this sentiment is far from the heart of God. The church is the bride of Christ. We are to love that which Christ loves, and that includes His bride, the church.

Our physical bodies provide a great illustration of how we are one in the church. Consider how incredibly different your hands, feet, nose and eyes are from one another. Each one functions separately and certainly doesn’t look at all like the others, but all of them are part of you.

You are one singular body, made up of different, unique and amazing parts. While your right thumb or your left eye is a distinct part of your body, both are still parts of your body, and that reality simply can’t be changed or altered. So it is with the church.

Paul took it a step further. It’s not just that you are connected to Christ and I am connected to Christ, but we are “individually members of one another.” We need each other, and we belong to each other! My role in the body of Christ is integral to your role in the body of Christ, and your role is equally essential in how I carry out my role. Christ has formed His church so that we need each other if we are to function as a healthy body.

Sermon in 1 Corinthians series. Chap 12, the church as the body of Christ.

1. In contrast to society, the Bible is in favor of groups.

a. Family.

b. Church.

2. The church needs to be revitalized.

a. It needs the Holy Spirit.

b. Christians need Christ's body.

c. Christ's body (the church) needs Christians.

3. Diversity of the body.

a. Each Christian has something unique to do.

b. But we still make up one body.

4. Inter-dependence of the body.

a. Parts need the body.

b. Parts should not reject one another.

c. There should be mutual concern.

5. How to build mutual concern.

a. Emphasize relationships.

b. Emphasize spiritual gifts.

c. Emphasize God.

Couier's Law is: "Every organized being forms a whole - a complete system - all the parts of which mutually correspond. None of these parts can change without the others changing also; consequently each taken separately indicates and gives all the others.

Randy Frazee has written a book called THE CONNECTING CHURCH. He has a son who was born without a left hand. One day in Sunday School the teacher was talking with the children about the church. To illustrate her point she folded her hands together and said, “Here’s the church, here’s the steeple; open the doors and see all the people.”

She asked the class to do it along with her - obviously not thinking about Frazee’s son’s inability to pull this exercise off. Then it dawned on her that the boy wouldn’t be able to join in.

Before she could do anything about it, the little boy next to Frazee’s son, a friend of his from the time they were babies, reached out his left hand and said, “Let’s do it together.” The two boys proceeded to join their hands together to make the church and the steeple.

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In the last few years of his ministry, Chuck Colson became increasingly concerned with the extreme individualism he witnessed in American Christianity. He became dismayed at what he dubbed the “Jesus and me” attitude he saw among Christians, especially younger ones.

In fact, the last column he worked on for Christianity Today was in response to the You Tube sensation, “Why I Hate Religion But Love Jesus.” While he understood the frustration people feel towards some churches, he reiterated what Martin Luther taught: “he who would find Christ must first find the Church.”

Or to put it another way: “you cannot answer the question ‘how now shall we live?’ on your own.”

This emphasis on the Church was not new for Chuck. On the contrary, it was the subject of one of his most important books, The Body, which was re-released in 2003 as Being the Body.

In it, Chuck and his co-author Ellen Santilli Vaughn examined the consequences of what they called “the improbable plan Christ put in place two thousand years ago.” That plan was to “leave the evidence of his continuing presence in the world in the hands of a motley crew of flawed human beings.”

That “motley crew,” of course, is the Church.

The Body was Chuck’s response to the realization that the Church was “infected with the most virulent virus of modern American life...radical individualism.” The radical individualism of “Jesus and me” can never be the light in the darkness that Christians are called to be.

It can never provide strong moral resolve, feed the soul, care for the needy, and guide those who have lost their way. The idea, Chuck and Ellen wrote, that “one can be a Christian and develop one’s own faith system” is “ludicrous.”

It is every bit as “ludicrous” today as it was twenty years ago, yet, if anything, the desire to distance oneself from the institution of the Church is even more pronounced today. An increasing number of Americans decline to identify themselves with any religious tradition. Because they’ve check “none of the above,” they’ve been dubbed “nones.” While some cite these findings as evidence of a growing secularism or even atheism, that’s not the case at all.

Many of the so-called “nones” say they believe in a personal God. A lot of them even want a religious funeral! They want the personal and emotional benefits of faith without the commitment to something bigger than themselves.

The rejection of individualism and emphasis on the church isn’t the only area in which The Body anticipated ideas and themes that Chuck would revisit over the next few decades. It also marked the beginning of Chuck’s worldview ministry.

While Chuck had always been engaged with the question of Christian worldview, in The Body you saw it begin to assume the kind of prominence it would have for the rest of his life. As he was fond of telling audiences back then “it does no good to tell people that ‘Jesus is the Answer’ if you don’t know what the question is.”

Understanding the questions and Christianity’s answers to them is an essential part of what it means to be the church and, so, it became an essential part of Chuck’s mission. It’s a mission that will continue here at Breakpoint and throughout Prison Fellowship.

Anything else would be, well, ludicrous.

________

Copyright (c) 2012 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

Sermon in 1 Corinthians series. Chap 12, the church as the body of Christ.

1. In contrast to society, the Bible is in favor of groups.

a. Family.

b. Church.

2. The church needs to be revitalized.

a. It needs the Holy Spirit.

b. Christians need Christ's body.

c. Christ's body (the church) needs Christians.

3. Diversity of the body.

a. Each Christian has something unique to do.

b. But we still make up one body.

4. Inter-dependence of the body.

a. Parts need the body.

b. Parts should not reject one another.

c. There should be mutual concern.

5. How to build mutual concern.

a. Emphasize relationships.

b. Emphasize spiritual gifts.

c. Emphasize God.

When we’re called to follow Christ, we’re also called to belong to the Body of Christ.

When Jesus walked the earth, God worked through the physical body of Christ; today he uses his spiritual body. The church is God’s instrument on earth. We are his hands, his feet, his eyes and his heart. He works through us in the world. We each have a contribution to make.

The Apostle Paul tells us, “He creates each of us by Christ Jesus to join him in the work he does, the good work he has gotten ready for us to do, work we had better be doing” (Ephesians 2:10, Msg).

Yet one of the biggest hurdles we face as pastors is convincing attenders that they need to commit themselves to the church family and become members. Today’s culture of independent individualism has created many spiritual orphans who move from one church to another without any identity, accountability or commitment.

Here are several biblical reasons we can teach to our congregations on why every believer needs to be committed and active in a local fellowship --

A CHURCH FAMILY IDENTIFIES US AS GENUINE BELIEVERS.

I can’t claim to be following Christ if I’m not committed to any specific group of disciples. Jesus said, “Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples” (John 13:35, NLT).

When we come together in love as a church family from different backgrounds, race and social status, it is a witness to the world. No one believer can be the Body of Christ on his own. We need others in order to fully express the shape God has given us. It is when we are together, not when we’re separated, that we are his Body.

A CHURCH FAMILY MOVES US OUT OF SELF-CENTERED ISOLATION.

The local church is the classroom for learning how to get along in God’s family. It is a lab for practicing unselfish, sympathetic love. As a participating member you learn to care about others and share the experiences of others: “If one part of the body suffers, all the other parts suffer with it. Or if one part of our body is honored, all the other parts share its honor” (1 Corinthians 12:26, NCV). Only in regular contact with ordinary, imperfect believers can we learn real fellowship and experience the New Testament truth of being connected and dependent on each other.

Biblical fellowship is being as committed to each other as we are to Jesus Christ. God expects us to give our lives for each other. Many Christians who know John 3:16 are unaware of 1 John 3:16 (NIV): “Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.” This is the kind of sacrificial love God expects you to show other believers -- a willingness to love them in the same way Jesus loves you.

A CHURCH FAMILY HELPS US DEVELOP SPIRITUAL MUSCLE.

No one will ever grow to maturity just by attending worship services and being a passive spectator. Only participation in the full life of a local church builds spiritual muscle. The Bible says, “As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love” (Ephesians 4:16, NLT).

Over fifty times in the New Testament the phrases “one another” or “each other” are used. We are commanded to love each other, pray for each other, encourage each other, admonish each other, greet each other, serve each other, teach each other, accept each other, honor each other, bear each other’s burdens, forgive each other, submit to each other, be devoted to each other and many other mutual tasks.

This is biblical membership! These are the “family responsibilities” that God expects every believer to fulfill through a local fellowship. We need to ask those who attend our services, “Who are you doing these with?”

THE BODY OF CHRIST NEEDS EVERY ONE OF US.

God has a unique role for every believer to play in his family. This is called your “ministry,” and God has gifted you for this assignment: “A spiritual gift is given to each of us as a means of helping the entire church” (1 Corinthians 12:7, NLT).

The local fellowship is the place God designed for his children to discover, develop and use their gifts. Even those with a wider ministry need to understand that their first responsibility is to the local Body. Jesus has not promised to build anyone’s ministry; he has promised to build his Church.

A CHURCH FAMILY HELPS US STAY FOCUSED ON DOING WHAT IS RIGHT.

None of us are immune to temptation. Given the right situation, you and I are capable of any sin. God knows this, so he has assigned us as individuals the responsibility of keeping each other on track. The Bible says, “Encourage one another daily ... so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness” (Hebrews 3:13, NIV).

We are called and commanded to be involved in each other’s lives. If you know someone who is wavering spiritually right now, it is your responsibility to go after them and bring them back into the fellowship. James tells us, “If you know people who have wandered off from God’s truth, don’t write them off. Go after them. Get them back” (James 5:19, Msg).

SATAN LOVES DETACHED BELIEVERS -- unplugged from the life of the Body, isolated from God’s family and unaccountable to spiritual leaders -- because he knows they are defenseless and powerless against his tactics.

The Christian life is more than just commitment to Christ; it includes a commitment to other Christians. The Christians in Macedonia understood this. Paul said, “First they gave themselves to the Lord; and then, by God’s will, they gave themselves to us as well” (2 Corinthians 8:5, TEV).

We must remind those who fill our buildings each Sunday that joining the membership of a local church is the natural next step once they become a child of God. You become a Christian by committing yourself to Christ, but you become a church member by committing yourself to a specific group of believers. The first decision brings salvation; the second brings fellowship.

In the last few years of his ministry, Chuck Colson became increasingly concerned with the extreme individualism he witnessed in American Christianity. He became dismayed at what he dubbed the “Jesus and me” attitude he saw among Christians, especially younger ones.

In fact, the last column he worked on for Christianity Today was in response to the You Tube sensation, “Why I Hate Religion But Love Jesus.” While he understood the frustration people feel towards some churches, he reiterated what Martin Luther taught: “he who would find Christ must first find the Church.”

Or to put it another way: “you cannot answer the question ‘how now shall we live?’ on your own.”

This emphasis on the Church was not new for Chuck. On the contrary, it was the subject of one of his most important books, The Body, which was re-released in 2003 as Being the Body.

In it, Chuck and his co-author Ellen Santilli Vaughn examined the consequences of what they called “the improbable plan Christ put in place two thousand years ago.” That plan was to “leave the evidence of his continuing presence in the world in the hands of a motley crew of flawed human beings.”

That “motley crew,” of course, is the Church.

The Body was Chuck’s response to the realization that the Church was “infected with the most virulent virus of modern American life...radical individualism.” The radical individualism of “Jesus and me” can never be the light in the darkness that Christians are called to be.

It can never provide strong moral resolve, feed the soul, care for the needy, and guide those who have lost their way. The idea, Chuck and Ellen wrote, that “one can be a Christian and develop one’s own faith system” is “ludicrous.”

It is every bit as “ludicrous” today as it was twenty years ago, yet, if anything, the desire to distance oneself from the institution of the Church is even more pronounced today. An increasing number of Americans decline to identify themselves with any religious tradition. Because they’ve check “none of the above,” they’ve been dubbed “nones.” While some cite these findings as evidence of a growing secularism or even atheism, that’s not the case at all.

Many of the so-called “nones” say they believe in a personal God. A lot of them even want a religious funeral! They want the personal and emotional benefits of faith without the commitment to something bigger than themselves.

The rejection of individualism and emphasis on the church isn’t the only area in which The Body anticipated ideas and themes that Chuck would revisit over the next few decades. It also marked the beginning of Chuck’s worldview ministry.

While Chuck had always been engaged with the question of Christian worldview, in The Body you saw it begin to assume the kind of prominence it would have for the rest of his life. As he was fond of telling audiences back then “it does no good to tell people that ‘Jesus is the Answer’ if you don’t know what the question is.”

Understanding the questions and Christianity’s answers to them is an essential part of what it means to be the church and, so, it became an essential part of Chuck’s mission. It’s a mission that will continue here at Breakpoint and throughout Prison Fellowship.

Anything else would be, well, ludicrous.

________

Copyright (c) 2012 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.