Friday Communication - 5th May 2023
A community Gifted by Grace
While Clinton and Andy are preaching through Philippians in the morning, Andrew and I are returning to 1 Corinthians in the evening, resuming at 1 Corinthians 12, Paul teaching the Corinthians about how God sustains the body of Christ with the diverse gifts of grace the Spirit gives to Christ’s people.
The encouragement of God’s gracious provision
As someone entrusted, along with my fellow elders, with oversight of our common life I have always found this passage very encouraging. While the lists of gifts in 1 Corinthians 12 reflect the Corinthian preoccupations they illustrate, along with the list in Romans 12, a great truth – that our God supplies through His Spirit a great diversity of gifts to His people, gifts which He gives to us in each other for our common good [12:7]. We are never without His provision of what we need for the health and growth of the church, His body – which in 1 Corinthians is the local church.
And He gives us these gifts out of grace – they are in Greek charismata, gifts of charis, Greek for grace. They are expressions of His generous kindness to His people. They are not given reluctantly, not cajoled out of a reluctant giver, not rationed in a context of want. His grace is rich, inexhaustible. We should not fear that we will ever be left without what we need.
Thirdly our God is sovereign in His provision – the “Spirit apportions to each one individually as He wills” [12:11]. The gifts amongst us are not the results of our planning or asking, but of God’s sovereign provision, a provision which anticipates our needs for God is the creator of the body [12:24].
A generosity experienced in our life together
What Scripture teaches I have found time and again in the life of the congregation to be true. He has provided what we need in the gifts He has given us in each other. We have an extraordinary array of charismata amongst us – whether it is the capacity to teach in youth group, Sunday School, growth groups or in our gathering; to run AV and PA; musical gifts, organisational gifts – whether that is organising the program for mainly music and explorers, or planning a breakfast; administrative gifts – in the office and the Board; infrastructure gifts, keeping the computers and the building working; gifts of people who are so encouraging amongst us, or of those who do acts of mercy, or visit with a timely word, and more; gifts provided at the right time, whether that was with the building, with the growth of Kid’s Club, in so many ways; some gifts more public, some working away unseen. All used for the building up of God’s people, and all causes of thankfulness to God, and reason to keep trusting God to provide all we need in each other through His Spirit. His grace is never failing, and His Spirit never at a loss to provide what Christ’s body needs.
But we also need to remember what 1 Corinthians 12 says about our involvement in our common life, especially where, for good reasons, we have had to give some prominence to voting, formal, membership, and where Covid has caused many to re-examine their commitments and our lives change as we are carried along through different life stages.
All believers members of the body
God’s Word is clear that every believer is a member of Christ’s body, whether we are formal members or not. We are all part of the living whole, and all have a role to play in the life of the whole [12:12-13]. And every believer is gifted for service [1 Cor. 12:11] by the Spirit for the common good, and we need every believer using their gifts. For the body to be healthy every part needs to be active in being the part of the body God has made us to be. Every member ministry is not a strategy for congregations or congregational leadership to achieve their goals. It is God’s plan and provision to ensure the unity of, and mutual care in, local congregations. As Paul writes “Instead, God has put the body together, giving greater honour to the less honourable, 25 so that there would be no division in the body, but that the members would have the same concern for each other. 26 So if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; if one member is honoured, all the members rejoice with it.” [1 Cor. 12:24-26].
And it is as each part ‘is working properly’ that the body makes growth and builds itself up in love [Eph. 4:16].
Some of our service will be more prominent, some less. Some will be noticed, other service unseen. Our service may change over time, but God has gifted each of us with what together we need to be a healthy body of Christ, and none of our serving with the gifts we have been given is unnecessary.
The service of all needed, as all are gifted
As we come out of Covid and as our lives and energy levels and opportunities change we must remember that all believers need to serve with the gifts God has given us through His Spirit. But we must serve out of grace, not guilt. There can be no other basis for service than thankfulness for and reliance on the grace we have experienced in believing in Christ. Our gifts are provisions of grace, our inclusion in the body of Christ by our confession of Christ as our Lord is by grace, and it is grace that will sustain our service, the grace that the Lord says will be sufficient [2 Cor. 12:9-11] to enable us to keep on doing His will. Sustainable service doesn’t come from a desire to be well thought of by others, to satisfy a need to be needed, to gain status in a community. It comes from knowing the grace of our Lord Jesus.
Love the key
The key, as Paul reminds the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians 13, is love. Love is not just the key to the way we use our gifts – whether we use them for self-aggrandisement with indifference to the needs of others like the Corinthians, or whether we use them as God’s word teaches us to, for the building up and encouraging of our brothers and sisters, conscious of their needs and seeking their good. Love is the key to whether we use them at all in the service of Christ’s people, whether we are willing to spend our time and energy to build up and encourage our brothers and sisters with the gifts God has given us.
Yet love, remember, is the great non-negotiable in the Christian life, the way our Lord said others would know we are His disciples [John 13:34-35], a love sustained by knowing His love for us – Love one another, our Lord said, as I have loved you. We are nothing without love.
So, as you from time to time re-assess your commitments, and especially now as the momentum of our common life is returning after the difficult Covid years and there are many needs and opportunities emerging, recognise that in being gifted by the Spirit we are God’s provision for the health and growth of each other in the faith, and for the sustaining of our community and collective witness in the world. And ask, not ‘am I using my gifts’ but the more fundamental question – How, with what God’s Spirit in His grace has given me, am I loving my brothers and sisters? And if you are uncertain or dissatisfied with the answer, talk to your growth group leader, or an elder or pastor about it. It is a conversation we are delighted to have for we want to be known as Jesus’ followers in the world by our love for one another.
