The way GOD designed our bodies is a model for understanding our lives as Christians coexisting together within the church of Jesus Christ. The analogy drawn between how the human body works and our existence as Christians in the new nature is found in Scripture and is laid out in 1 Corinthians 12:12-27 NKJV/MSG, and today’s anchor reading is 1 Corinthians 12:21-26. According to this divine model, every member of the church is dependent on every other member, pretty much in the same way that the different parts of the body depend on each other for the human body’s overall well-being. Every person in the church is important. Not everyone is visible or popular in church but they are still just as important to the church. The members who receive mentions weekly are equally as important as (if not less important than) those who are hardly ever mentioned; The members we see in the forefront are equally as important as (if not less important than) those we do not see [1 Corinthians 12:25 MSG]. The same goes for those who appear to be weaker in their walk of faith, those still struggling and stumbling at times.
When we get born-again, we are brought into an already existing body (church) of Jesus Christ. When we enter into the body (the church), GOD has already completed our assignment and divine appointment in the church—Who you are in the body, your placement in the body, and what you ought to do in the body is already completed and predestined. GOD is the architect, the orchestrator, the composer of the church. The makeup of the church comes from GOD; It is not a man-made construct. GOD laid the foundation and, in accordance with His glorious magnificence, He created a church that is absolutely perfect. He intended the church to remain a place that is schism-free, crack-free, division-free, strife-free, and rift-free. We are tasked to retain the architectural makeup, the integrity, and the workings of the church as GOD had designed it, schism-free in every way; And to do this we must understand the nature of the church, how GOD made it, and what GOD made it for.
All throughout the Bible whenever there was something required to be made or created for GOD (in GOD), we see various instances of how GOD has either created the thing Himself or He has given someone explicitly detailed instructions of how to make and create that thing that He required—Moses received the Ten Commandments from GOD Himself exactly the way GOD had written them [Exodus 24:12, Exodus 34:1]; When the Ark of the Covenant had to be made, GOD gave Moses specific details about the pattern and specifications of how it must be made [Exodus 25:10-22]; GOD gave Noah detailed instructions on how to build the ark [Genesis 6:14-16]. The reason for this is that GOD will not and cannot inhabit something that was not made in accordance with His will and His purpose, He will simply not show up. So it is crucial for the church which GOD has founded to retain the foundational integrity with which GOD created it if we want Him to manifest and show up for us. And make no mistake, we need GOD to show up because a church without GOD is no church at all.
If we understood the workings of the body (the church) — namely, Who the Founder of the church is, Who we are in the church, and What we are meant to do in the church — and we went about doing what we ought to do quietly, diligently and faithfully, the church would be effective and productive. And this would be pleasing to GOD. The reality of what happens in our churches is however far from this model. As Believers in the Kingdom of GOD, we are supposed to be living examples of the “All-For-One-And-One-For-All” model, a unified cohesive body in Christ. But instead, the church is full of divisions, strife, rifts, and factions. There is no decency and no order in our individual lives and amongst us, as Christians, and as a result we fail to bring order and decency into the church. GOD will not manifest or show up for messiness and nonsense. The fundamental basics of good order are a prerequisite, and no one can force GOD’s hand or wring GOD’s arm to force Him to do what we want Him to do in the midst of disorder. We must return to the basics to repair the members’ and the church’s foundations to their rightful standing with GOD.
The “All-For-One-And-One-For-All” model of cohesion essentially calls each and every one of us to be of service to one another. We must show love and compassion towards each other. We must preserve our fellowship with each other. The community of believers is the corporate body of Christ, it is the church. Believers, we need each other. All of us with our varying degrees of strengths and weaknesses must be cared for and supported by all the other members within the church because of how closely related we are to each other within the body of Christ; And in the Spirit, if one member sneezes, the whole body catches a cold. So as members of the body, we must love and care for each other so that the body maintains and retains its overall health and wellbeing. The cavalier, nonchalant, and somewhat dismissive way of handling things that we have adopted, will just not work to our benefit as individuals and as a church. All it does is signal to the devil how disconnected we are in spirit and how disconnected our church is in spirit from all the other members that are within the body of Christ.
My calling as a believer is to take care of the other brethren in the church equally, without any favoritism, preference, or bias. As a believer, it must be ingrained into my spiritual DNA that if one member of the body suffers, all members suffer with it [1 Corinthians 12:25-26]. This is how GOD composed the body, this is where I fit in within the body. When I walk in compassion, walk in fellowship, and walk in love, I attract the favor and pleasure of the LORD in me, to me, and to the church where I fellowship. Ten out of ten times, walking in compassion activates GOD in the spirit. It is the compassion that moves the power of GOD. It is the compassion that moves the anointing to work. It is the compassion that brings GOD to the scene. It is the compassion that you have shown another person that will provoke GOD and move the hand of GOD to provide for you. Love is at the root, at the foundation, of the church. GOD designed the church in this way—(i) for us to take care of each other; (ii) for the church to be self-sufficient; and (iii) for the members to be always provided for, lacking nothing, having need of nothing.
Everything that GOD has called you and me to do is already within the church. All the help, support, riches, and secrets that we need to prosper are already with us in the church. But we lack the discernment to see and appreciate them for what they are because we are blinded by the spirit of individualism. We have been brought into the body but we dismember ourselves from the body every time we choose not to lean on the body for help and support because we lack the discernment. GOD has called us into a corporate to bless and anoint us, but we want to stand on your own and then get surprised that we do not make it despite being in the church. This is because individualism was never GOD’s will or plan for us BUT it is a spiritual tactic that the devil used to isolate you and separate you from the body. The devil knows the corporate is a safety net meant to break our falls and catch us Christians, and he cannot have us steadfast surrounded by a healthy support system. The devil wants us isolated and separated from the body (corporate) so that he can break us down.
GOD has placed you within a body (corporate) with the deliberate aim that when HE raises you, HE raises you for the benefit of the collective. Joseph is a fantastic example of this—His family and indeed Israel benefitted from him being sold into slavery because it was there where he fulfilled his destiny to save Israel during the time of famine. In the same way, it will be the people around you, the people walking in compassion, in fellowship, and in love with you, that GOD wants to benefit when HE raises you, blesses you, and prospers you [Ephesians 4:16]. This is the oneness and unity in the community of believers that GOD intended when He made the church. Christ has brought us together on divine assignment. Be careful not to find yourself pulling away from the body. The latest narrative making the rounds globally is that—“I am okay by myself, as long as I have Christ”, “I am okay as long as I have the Bible / the Holy Spirit”, “I am okay as long as I can pray”. No friend, you are neck deep in deception; You are dismembered, isolated, and separated from the body; The spiritual safety net of the body is not there to support you.
The will of GOD and the plan of GOD was to design the body and for man to come together in fellowship in the body. GOD then made fellowship a compulsory spiritual command; He placed fellowship in Scripture as an obligation that we must meet if we want to remain in the body as members. A member that is removed from the body, for whatever reason, cannot survive outside of the body and will die because the life supply, the life force, of the member is in the body. We are all living stones and building blocks in the church of Jesus Christ and it is imperative that we each mind where we are placed by GOD Our Architect. What each one of us contributes and does in the body is important for the whole body to work effectively and efficiently. When every member of the body does what it is supposed to do in love, with pure motives and intentions, the church will be fully supplied and will grow exponentially. Let us love and care for one another because a church that loves and cares, is a church of Jesus Christ. And that is pleasing to GOD.
As Believers in the Kingdom of GOD, we are supposed to be living examples of the “All-For-One-And-One-For-All” model, a unified cohesive body in Christ. In the same way, it will be the people around you, the people walking in compassion, in fellowship, and in love with you, that GOD wants to benefit when HE raises you, blesses you, and prospers you!
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