38 1 Corinthians 12:14-31 Understanding the body of Christ

Krisan Marotta: Welcome back to the Wednesday in the Word podcast. I'm Krisan Marotta, and this is Serious Bible Study Applied to Real Life. This is the podcast where we explain not only what Scripture means, but how we know. We are studying 1 Corinthians 12, verses 14 through 31 today. This is the 38th talk in the series on 1 Corinthians. Lecture notes for today's talk are on the link below the podcast, and you can find them on the website at wednesdayintheword.com slash 1 Corinthians 3.8. Glad to have you along. We're finishing chapter 12 today of 1 Corinthians, and in chapters 12 through 14, Paul is addressing a problem in the church in Corinth involving manifestations of the Spirit or the way we see the Spirit at work. We are in the now concerning section of the letter where Paul is addressing specific questions that the Corinthians have asked him, and each time he starts a new question, he says now concerning and then the new topic. With chapter 11, Paul began answering questions related to how they're handling themselves in their church gatherings, and then in 12.1 he started addressing the problem of tongues. Some of the folks in the Corinthian church believe that speaking in tongues marks a person as truly spiritual. So the Corinthians think, well, if you have this obviously visible physical manifestation of the spirit, like speaking in tongues, then that is the mark of spiritual maturity because the Spirit of God has so obviously overtaken you. And Paul is speaking to the situation where a group of believers are grading and judging each other based on whether or not they speak in tongues. So those who speak in tongues see themselves as spiritually superior and they're looking down on and rejecting those who don't speak in tongues. So far Paul has made two points in this argument. First, while the Corinthians believe that tongues is the true mark of spirituality, Paul has said no, the true mark of people who have been influenced by the Holy Spirit is that those people say and mean Jesus is Lord. If you want to see evidence that the Spirit is at work in someone, that's what you look for. Can they say and mean in a profound way that Jesus is Lord? Second, while the Corinthians believe that everyone ought to have the same gifts from the Spirit, Paul says no, there is both unity and diversity in the body of Christ, and he highlighted under that second point two ways the Spirit works, and it's important for us to see the difference. One is how the Spirit works the same in all of us, and the other is how the Spirit works differently in each of us. So on the one hand, the Spirit gives us all the same saving faith, the same spiritual awakening, the same perseverance in the faith, and the same desire to follow Jesus. We are all saved by the same Lord and we have the same Spirit. On the other hand, the Spirit gives us very different roles to play in the body of Christ. Each of us have different functions, like different parts of the body have different jobs to fulfill to keep the body healthy, so each believer has a different job to fulfill in the history of God's people to bring about God's purposes and his glory. The section we're looking at today is part of that second point. And to make this point, Paul compares the people of Christ to a human body, and we're going to finish up his analogy today. I want to back up to twelve twelve because that's where he starts his analogy and review a little bit what we talked about last time. This is first Corinthians twelve twelve through fourteen. For even as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ. For by one spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves are free, and we were all made to drink of one spirit. For the body is not one member, but many. So let me remind you what we talked about last time in the last podcast. Paul is making an analogy. He's saying just as the body is this way, so also are the people of Christ. Just as the human body is made up of lots of different parts and pieces, so is the Church of Christ. My body is a unified whole made up of many different parts, and each of those parts has a different function. My eye plays one role, my finger plays a different role, my heart plays a role, but together it is all me. My body is one unified entity made up of lots of different organs and joints and muscles and things that play different roles. So there is a variety of members of my body, but together it's me. So in the human body we see this picture of unity in diversity. I am one unified body made up of all kinds of different parts that do all kinds of different things, and by God's design, the human body is meant to be a coherent whole made up of these parts, and Paul is saying so it is with the Church of Christ. Now why does Paul pick this analogy? Why does he think this is a good analogy to make his point? I think the reason is that both the body and the church are designed by God, and both of them have been designed with a similar principle in mind. There's a logic to the way the human body functions that is applicable to the body of Christ. The human body is not a one cell physical organism. It's not made up of just one kind of physical thing that does everything. It is a collection of parts. Our body works and functions well because we're made up of these variety of parts with a variety of functions. If one part stops functioning, the whole organism becomes sick. And when all the parts are functioning properly, we're healthy and we can do amazing things. And Paul says that analogy holds for the church. As a church, as the people of Christ, we are one people together. We're a collection of individual parts and pieces, if you will. So just like the body has a hand and an eye and a foot, we have a variety of individuals who play different parts in the body of Christ. Ultimately, the point he's making is that it makes no sense to think there's something wrong if the Spirit does one thing in one believer and a different thing in a different believer. That makes no sense because of this principle of being a unified whole made up of a variety of parts. God designed the church to be a unified group of people with a variety of things to do. We've been designed to be multifaceted, a multi-functioning group of people, and so we should expect to see the Spirit working differently in different people. That's the main point he's making in the section, but he makes a couple of interesting sub points along the way. The first one is in verses twelve fifteen through twelve seventeen, and in this section he's talking about how each part views itself. So this is first Corinthians twelve fifteen through seventeen. If the foot says, Because I am not a hand, I am not a part of the body, it is not for this reason any less a part of the body. And if the ear says, Because I am not an eye, I am not a part of the body, it is not for this reason any less a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would hearing be? If the whole were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? Now Paul's making this analogy by personifying the body parts the eye, the ear, the hand, they don't speak or have minds of their own. This is a literary device. And he wants the Corinthians to change how they're thinking about themselves. They're saying things like, Well, gosh, I don't speak in tongues, so I must be a second class Christian. Maybe I'm not even a believer. And Paul's point is that's like the eye saying I'm not really part of the body. He wants them to say, Well, that's silly, of course my eye is part of the body, it's part of me. It's me, it's my own body. And he wants them to begin to view the church as they view their own bodies. I don't accuse my hand of being useless because it can't see, so why do I think I'm worthless because I don't speak in tongues? So in this part of the analogy, his sub point is how each part of the body views itself. And that makes sense because if there's a group saying, Well, you know, you're not really a believer if you don't speak in tongues, then there probably is another group who's saying, Gosh, I don't speak in tongues, I am really worried. And they're wondering if they really belong in the church at all, and maybe there's something wrong with them. So Paul starts with that fear. He says, think about the human body. If the whole body were an eye, all you could do is see. You couldn't hear, you couldn't smell, you could see a flower, but you couldn't walk over and pick it up and smell it. In fact, you couldn't do much of anything at all. You can accomplish what you accomplish precisely because the parts of the body are different. The human body depends on diversity and depends on each part of the body doing their different things. He goes on then in twelve, eighteen through twenty, but now God has placed the members, each one of them in the body just as he desired. If they were all one member, where would the body be? But now there are many members, but one body. So again he's emphasizing the body is a collection of parts that God purposely placed. God purposely gathered all those parts into one person, and this is also how he makes his church. He gathers together a diverse group of individuals and makes them one people or one tribe. If there were only one body part, there wouldn't be a body, it couldn't function the way God intends the body to function. And God designed his church the same way. In the church we are one people who all follow the same Lord, but we serve Him in a wide variety of ways. And God has taken each of us and put us into this people who belong to Christ by design, and he gives each of us a different role to play in that body, a different way to function, just like the different organs do different things in the human body, or the way different instruments in an orchestra play different parts, but they're all playing the same piece of music. If everyone did the same thing, then the church wouldn't function the way God wants it to. And that plays itself on both the local level with the local church, but ultimately I think Paul's talking about the universal church across all of history. Now he turns to how we think about each other. This is twenty one through twenty five. And the eye cannot say to the hand, I have no need of you, or again the head to the feet, I have no need of you. On the contrary, it is much truer that the members of the body which seem to be weaker are necessary, and those members of the body which we deem less honorable, on these we bestow more abundant honor, and our less presentable members become much more presentable. Whereas our more presentable members have no need of it. But God has so composed the body, giving more abundant honor to that member which lacked, so that there may be no division in the body, but the members may have the same care for one another. So in this section, Paul changes the emphasis. Before he was looking at how does each part of the body think about itself. Now he's talking about how does one part think about another part. So before it was I'm not an I, so I'm a lesser part of the body, and Paul says that's a foolish way to think because God designed the body with many different parts. Now the issue is, well, you're not an I, so you don't belong. I'm the I, I'm important, but you're not, so there's something wrong with you. And again, this is the attitude we see causing strife in the Corinthian church. They are judging each other and grading each other on whether or not they've ever spoken in tongues, and the tongue speakers are rejecting or dismissing everyone else. And Paul turns to that attitude and says, Look, if you realize that God designed the church to have the same kind of unity and diversity as the human body, then why would you say such things? You don't treat your body that way. You don't say you have no need of your foot or your hand, so why are you saying you have no need of your fellow believer? The church requires diverse functioning parts just like the human body. And he makes a couple of interesting points here. First he has this language about some parts may indeed be weaker than others. As you might expect, there's some debate over what he means by weaker. There are a number of good options, but they all basically have the same flavor. So the idea is something like the weaker member works behind the scenes as opposed to front and center in the spotlight. Or the weaker member has a less visible or less obvious impact. They don't play as public a role. Something along those lines. My hands and my mouth play an obviously visible role in what I can do and what I can say. How well my stomach functions also plays a role in what I can do and what I can say by providing nutrients and energy so that I can say and do those things, but you don't really see it. You don't see the role it's playing. It's weaker and that it's not so obvious, it's not so visible. Or Paul could be saying, Some parts of the human body just are weaker, they require more protection than others, but they're just as important. So I use my eyes every day. I'm very conscious about how important my eyes are to me. I wear sunglasses, I protect them from harm. I'm less conscious of my spleen or my kneecap. I don't think about protecting those as much. So he could be making that kind of analogy. But again, you can see that's a similar flavor of some parts having a highly visible, public, understandable role, and others having a less tangible, less visible, less obvious role. However, we understand weaker. His point is that there are weaker parts of the body and the weaker parts are necessary. All the parts of my human body have a function. That function may not be as obviously strongly necessary as, say, my beating heart or my breathing lungs, but all of them are necessary. They're part of me, they all contribute. You might not think about your kneecap, but the minute it gets bruised or broken, you discover how significant it really is. Likewise, in the body of Christ, in the church, you may not appreciate or understand the role that someone else is playing, but by God's design it's necessary. This is why one body part does not reject or dismiss another part. And likewise in the church, everyone has a role to play. Everyone is necessary. We are placed in the church body by God's design, just as He placed each organ and joint and ligament and nerve in the body. God has given each person a role to play in the body of Christ, and therefore each person's role contributes in some way. No one can be dismissed as unimportant or negligible. And now when I say role, I'm talking about more than sign up sheets and jobs. This is not a pitch to get out your clipboards and have some sign up for cleanup duties or some people for childcare and some people for music and some people for snacks or whatever. True, those are roles or jobs we can do in the church, but I think Paul is speaking more generally about all the various opportunities God gives us to serve, including things like being a friend, being a sister or a brother, being a parent, the roles we play in each other's lives to encourage each other, to rebuke each other, to offer a shoulder to cry on, or leg up when you've been knocked down. This could be anything from driving someone to their cancer treatments to teaching them a second language, to offering a word of encouragement on a bad day, or giving them a lift when their car breaks down. It's not limited to the kinds of professional ministerial jobs we tend to think about, like pastor, teacher, evangelist, missionary. The ways we can serve are incredibly multifaceted. His point, though, is that everyone has a role to play and contributes to the body of Christ in some way, and we have no cause to judge or dismiss anyone else because we don't like their role or we don't understand it. Paul has a second point in this section. It's not just that some members are weaker, there's another point he makes that's a little more subtle and harder to follow. Some translations make it easier to see than others, but I think it's a really important point. In twelve twenty three he says that those parts of the body which we think to be less respectable, we clothe these parts in more abundant respectability and our less presentable members become more presentable. What's going on there? This word respectable has the idea of honor or dignity, respectability, importance, glory. And I think his analogy is that in the human body, some parts play a very public role in who I am. My face is intended to be public. You see my face and you recognize me. You hear the sound of my voice and you recognize it's me, or you see the way I walk and you recognize it's me. These are the parts that have a publicly visible, beautiful face. And he says to our unpresentable parts we give more presentability. I think he's being euphemistic there. Essentially, I think he's saying our indecent parts, our private parts, the parts of our body that we cover up and we don't expose to the public in the way that other parts of our body are presentable and exposed to the public. You can understand what he's saying by the contrast. There are those parts of the body that have a certain honor and dignity, and we publicly display them. And then there are the indecent parts that we cover up. They don't have the same honor and respectability, and they're not something we show to the world. Now what's the analogy? What's he saying? I don't expose the flaws and the indecent and the private parts of my body, but I don't reject them. I honor them. Why? Because it's all part of me. It may not be perfect or presentable or honorable, but it's still me. It gains honor and dignity because it's part of me. I don't make a distinction. What do I do about the indecent, dishonorable parts? I clothe them. I clothe them with more respectability. I wear clothes that might disguise the faults, or I use makeup to cover the blemishes. I try to make myself look as good as I can by clothing the indecent parts, covering the flaws, and trying to make them less obvious. I adorn them to make them more presentable. Because I want all parts of me to be honorable. I don't divide myself up into these parts that I care about and parts that I don't care about. It's all me. I care about all of me, even the less presentable parts. And Paul's point is we make our less presentable parts more presentable, whereas our presentable parts don't have a need of it. I don't need to make those parts intended for public view more presentable because they're already presentable. I might brush my hair, wash my face, but fundamentally good to go. If I don't have time to do that, I'm still presentable. But the rest of me, well, it needs a little help before I walk out the door. I have to cover it or adorn it and give it some honor to make it presentable. And this is how I think about myself, and Paul's point is this is how you should think about the church body. The weaker parts, the parts that are not as public, that aren't given as much. Much honor. We don't reject them, we don't dismiss them, we should adorn them, we should treat them with even more care and honor than the parts that don't need it. I don't have to worry about my face, but I better make sure the rest of me is properly presentable. Everyone takes a certain amount of care to make their entire body presentable before they go out in public, and that's Paul's point. You should think about everyone in the church that way. The parts that have less honor that seem less public, that seem less obvious, you should adorn them and honor them. Now Paul sums this up in twenty four through twenty six, but God has so composed the body, giving more abundant honor to that member which lacked, so that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another, and if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it, if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it. Now he's getting to the heart of the point, so that there may be no division in the body. God has created the various parts of my human body and put them together to make me. The fact that they are separate but put together to make me changes the way I think about them. I honor them equally. The parts of me that are not presentable or not particularly honorable gain honor because they're part of me. In my mind there's no difference. I don't reject or dismiss them. So by putting them together in one body, God has made it so all the parts have the same dignity and honor because they're all one. My body parts are not at war with each other. So what's the analogy to the body of Christ? Well, Paul is not saying that some people in the church are indecent and need to be hidden away. That would be taking his analogy too far, and it would be contrary to what he's just said about how God designed and placed each person in the body of Christ. He's making a point about how we are to think about each other, how we are to view each other. Some roles are more striking and visible than others. Some roles get the kind of attention that the face or the voice gets when I present myself to the world. Some people are more up front and publicly visible, others work behind the scenes or in quiet. Some roles we all seem to covet because we secretly want to be rock stars, and other roles we don't value as perhaps we should. The Corinthians have made a mistake in focusing on speaking in tongues, and Paul's going to argue that point strongly as we get into chapter fourteen. Of all the gifts of the Spirit, tongues is on the less significant side, and they've elevated one of the least significant to the top spot, and in that they've made a mistake. But we need to see that Paul is not at all concerned that some roles are more public than others, that some roles have a more visible, tangible impact on others. Some roles are done in the spotlight of human history, and some roles are done backstage in the shadows, and that's okay. And he's going to have more to say on that in chapter 14. He is going to argue there that doing something that edifies the entire church is more significant than something that doesn't. Thus, doing something that edifies the worldwide church is more significant than something that edifies only a few. It has a greater impact in the functioning of the body. But his point is it's all one body. The analogy is those high impact, glamorous roles are like the public parts of my body. The roles no one notices and everyone takes for granted are like the indecent parts. But the point is they're all necessary. They are equally part of the people of Christ, and therefore they are clothed with the same honor and dignity. The importance of our role in the grand scheme of history and measured by certain human standards should have nothing to do with how we think about each other. The honor of the body covers everyone in it. I am not to judge you or dismiss you because of the role you play. I'm not to give more honor to say the apostle Paul or Mother Teresa or Billy Graham than the person sitting next to me in the pew. Paul is saying take that same attitude toward the body of Christ that you have toward your own human body. Some parts of your body are more public, some are more private, but you see them all as you and you give them equal honor, and so it should be in the body of Christ. You should be concerned about everyone in it. The Corinthians have made this exact mistake. Not only did they elevate tongues and give it more importance than the rest of the gifts in the body, they have used it as a measuring rod to reject and dismiss other parts of the body. And Paul's saying that's a foolish way to think. God puts the human body together so that there's no division, no strife, and no part is graded or rejected by the role it plays or by how public or private it is. And that's the way the church should be. You should take the same care for everyone in the church. Measuring each other and grading each other by what role you play is foolish. But that's not what we've seen in Corinth. Division seems to be their middle name. We've seen that there are divisions in the church since chapter one. There we saw some rejecting Paul as an apostle. Later we saw some people looking down on others who didn't eat meat sacrificed to idols. We've seen divisions because the wealthy are mistreating the poor, and now we see divisions because some think they have the cool gift and other people don't. And Paul says think of the church the way you think of your own body. To divide over these sorts of issues, especially whether or not you speak in tongues, makes about as much sense as lopping off your hand because it's not an eye. Whatever role that other person is playing in the body of Christ, it is a necessary role to play, whether it's public or it's private, it has local impact or it has global impact, or whether you understand or value it or not. You and that other person are both part of the plans and purposes of God in the same way your organs are part of your body. You're in this together. You are both part of God's plan and God's design, and it is not your place to judge, reject, or dismiss each other. It is your place to think of each other as part of you because you are both people whom Christ has saved and in whom the Spirit of God is at work. To wrap this up then, Paul gets very specific. He's been implying all these ideas through his analogy, and now he makes it clear. Along the way he didn't explain it to these points, but now he brings it home. So this is first Corinthians twelve twenty seven. Now you are Christ's body and individually members of it, and God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, various kinds of tongues. All are not apostles, are they? All are not prophets, are they? All are not teachers, are they? All are not workers of miracles, are they? All do not have the gifts of healing, do they? All do not speak with tongues, do they? All do not interpret, do they, but earnestly desire the greater gifts, and I show you a still more excellent way. First we notice that Paul lists various roles that God has given to various people in the church. These are analogous to the parts of the human body, these are various roles that various people have been given to play by the Spirit. And Paul says, look around you, not everyone is an apostle, not everyone is a prophet, not everyone is a teacher, not everyone works a miracle. God intends there to be different roles. This is the way God wants it to be. And you'll notice that this list is not the same as the one he gave earlier. And I think the reason is because he's not working from some comprehensive master catalog. This is not an official list of official gifts. These are just some of the many ways that the Spirit gives various people to work and to serve in the body. I think if you were to ask Paul, is this the list? He'd say, look around you. Is this the only way the Spirit works in the world? Is this the only way individuals can serve the church? Of course not. And the more individually we want to look at it, the more we could multiply the list. For example, Peter and Paul were both apostles, but their apostleship looked very different. They both served as apostles, but they served in very different ways. So how specific do you want to get? If we get detailed enough and specific enough, we could probably see that the list is as long as the number of individual believers. Of course, there's some overlap, there's some generalization, but potentially we could individualize the list to the same as the number of believers. Notice that apostle is first on the list and followed by prophets. I think this clues us in that Paul has the universal church in mind, not a particular local body. The apostles are servants to the entire body of Christ throughout history. Paul's ministry continues today because we're here studying his letters. Hopefully what you get from me is what Paul thought. You've probably heard the joke that the greatest insult you can give a Bible teacher is that your work is both original and good. The part that's original is not good, and the part that's good is not original. That's funny because we selfishly want to be original geniuses, but if we are original geniuses, then we're not explaining what the author meant to say. So to the extent that I tell you something that is not what Paul meant to say, it may be original, but it's not good. And to the extent that I tell you what Paul meant to say, it's good, but it's not original. So to the extent that this podcast is good, it's because it's not original, and it's a continuation of the ministry of the apostle Paul as we understand his letters, and hopefully prayerfully that's the case. When Paul starts this list with apostles and prophets, I think that tells us he's talking about the universal church comprised of all believers throughout history and not a particular local gathering. He says, first there are apostles, and I don't think he means in time, they have a priority over the other gifts because Jesus taught them personally. Jesus and the Spirit at work in them gifted them with a clear, accurate understanding of the truth. Christ came to teach that truth and he taught it to the apostles. Christ laid the foundation and the apostles are the first ones to build on that foundation. Everyone else comes after them. And again, we see this idea that some roles are more public and visible than others. There's no question that the apostles have had a more important, visible, widespread global public impact on the universal church than, say, me or any local teacher. It's not even a comparison. Now I do realize if you took me out of the equation, it would make a difference. This is part of the point that Paul has just made about each individual in the body being individually placed there as part of God's plan and purpose and design. But clearly, my impact is nowhere near the historical impact of Paul, and that is by God's design. So how should I think about that? Should I be jealous? Should I feel like I was gypped? Should Paul look down on me and judge me because I have such a small, insignificant role to play? Paul say no, you should think of that difference like you think of your own body. Yes, when compared to the apostle Paul, I am the weaker, indecent part of the body, but I have honor nevertheless. Paul and I are on the same team. We are serving the same Lord, we are part of the same body, though we have vastly different roles to play. Our honor comes from the fact that the Spirit of God is at work in both of us such that we can both say Jesus is Lord. We have different roles to play in the universal church, and that's by God's design. We don't need a church full of apostles, just like we don't need a body full of eyes. Now Paul's going to go on to say zealously desire the greater gifts, and he's going to explain what he means by that as we go on. We shouldn't be afraid that some gifts have more impact than others. Paul is trying to establish the idea that our worth, our value, our dignity as human beings, our worth as individual members of the body of Christ has nothing to do with the role we play in that body. Our roles are different by God's design. Our roles have different impact by God's design. Some roles are weaker, less obvious, have less public global impact. Some roles have more of that. That's by God's design. This is all part of the Spirit's gift to us, and it has nothing to do with our worth because we are all part of one body. We are all necessary to a healthy functioning church. Alright, just one more thought to wrap this up. Diversity in the church is God's intention. It's not appropriate for me to dismiss myself as unimportant because my role looks different than yours. If I'm doing that, then I have misunderstood what the body of Christ is all about. Likewise, it is very wrong for me to judge, grade, or reject others because I don't see the value in their gift. It is inappropriate for me to look down on anyone else because they don't serve the way I do. By God's design, we all contribute something to Christ and his church and we all contribute differently. That's part of the plan. Everyone has a different part to play. And Paul is quite prepared to say that some people are given big impact parts to play and others aren't, but in the end we should all see ourselves as part of the grand design. If you think of history as a grand tapestry that God is weaving, we are all threads in the fabric. Some colors may be more prominent than others, and they may stand out more, but we are all part of the final picture and we are all necessary, and that's the attitude we need to take toward each other. But there's another very important point here. It is true we all contribute something, but it is equally true that our worth, our value, and our dignity is not dependent on what we contribute. That's the point he's trying to make. The issue is not what role do you have to play in the Church of Christ and who has the best role and who got the bigger role and the more impact role. The issue is are you part of his church at all? If you are, you have worth and value and dignity the same as every other member of the church. Paul is not more worthy as a Christian than any of us today. We all have the same Lord, the same Father, the same spirit, and the same grace. In what truly matters, we are equal. This is a really hard concept to grasp because it is directly opposite of what our modern world tells us. Society teaches us that role matters, and if you have an impact role, then you're an important person. And if you don't have an impact role, then you've just wasted your life, you're nothing. That is worldly thinking, and we are all inclined to think that way. We are all inclined to think that God gives us spiritual gifts so that we can solve the problem of our self-image and see ourselves as important people and feel good about ourselves. I don't think that's why he gives us these roles to play, and thinking like that sets us up for disappointment. Because no role, no matter what it is, is going to fill up my self-image. Just ask anyone who hit the role lottery and they'll tell you that role didn't really satisfy. No role is going to solve the problem of my worth and my self-image in part because we are sinners. We will never be good enough. No matter how exquisitely we might execute our roles, we know deep inside we could have done better. And roles that we are given to play were not made to fill that void. That's why it's extremely important that we understand Paul's distinction between the roles we play in the body of Christ and the honor and the dignity we have as human beings saved and redeemed by Christ. Our role is all the different things God allows us to do and gifts us to do and calls us to do, but our identity, our worth comes from being part of the body of Christ. And that worth is not dependent on what role you play. If you are part of Christ's body, you have a dignity that is the same as every other part of his body. Christ died to save Paul and to make him part of his people, and Christ died to save you and me and make us part of his people, and that gives us worth. Now, all human beings have worth because they're made in the image of God, but that's not the point Paul's making here. He's saying, as believers, we are people in whom the Spirit of God is at work, maturing and strengthening our faith. We are the people Jesus died to save and we are in this together. We are one in a way that someone who has rejected the claims of Jesus is not. And just as I think of all the parts of my body as equally significant and part of me, so all of us in whom God is working this miracle of saving faith are part of Christ's body, and we are equally significant no matter what roles God gives us to play in history. It is by God's design that we have these various roles, and you could argue, well, Paul got the best one and the rest of us got gypped, but if we argued to God that he's not playing fair because look at what role let's say Martin Luther got compared to someone like me, he would say that's not what your roles are intended to be. You were not designed to find your worth in your roles. You were designed to find your worth in being part of the body of Christ. Your roles are supposed to be different. You are destined for glory because of what Christ has done for you, and you should find your worth in that, and then gratefully play whatever part God gives you to play in the body of Christ. You've been listening to the Wednesday in the Word podcast. My mission is to explain not only what a passage means, but how I reach those conclusions. I don't accept any advertising on my website, nor do I ask for donations, but it does encourage me to hear what you've learned. I hope you leave a positive comment on your favorite podcast platform, and please share what you've learned with a friend. Our theme music is graciously provided by Reggie Coates of Heartfeltmusic.org. I invite you to check out his other music. You'll be glad you did. Thank you for joining me today. I'm Krisan Marotta, and I'll see you next week at Wednesday in the Word. In the meantime, I hope you find some time to visit my website, wednesdayintheword.com, and take advantage of some of my free Bible study materials.