“Spiritual gifts”
were given by God's Spirit to the church, and Paul the apostle not
only listed some of them, but declared, “all
these works that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man
severally as he will”.
In
chapter twelve and verse twelve of First Corinthians, Paul shared
with the church members how, “the
body is one, and... so also is Christ”,
where we read:
For as
the body is one, and has many members, and all the members of that
one body,
The
verse begins, “For
as the body is one, and has many members, and all the members of that
one body, ...”. Paul
began with the word, “for”
which means “even as, indeed, no doubt, seeing then, verily and
therefore” “as the body”
which refers to “the living corpse” “is
one” which
means “united and solely one” “and
has many”
or “and contains much and large numbers of” “members”
which means “parts”, “and all”
which refers to “each, every, the whole and everyone of” “the
members”
or “the parts” “of that one body”
which means
“of the sole and selfsame living corpse”. Paul referred to the
way the human “body”
has many parts, and yet, all those parts belong to that same “body”.
The
verse continues, “...being
many, are one body: so also is
Christ.” Paul
added the words, “being many” which
means “the much and large number of parts”, “are
one body”
or “are a sole and united living corpse”: “so
also” or
“even as and indeed” “is Christ”
which refers
to “the anointed One, the Messiah and the Son of God”. Paul
likened the “Messiah” to the vast number of parts that exist in
“one human body”.
When
we meditate upon these words from Paul, we realize the Holy Spirit is
multifaceted with many parts and functions, and yet, still “One
Spirit”. The church in Corinth was experiencing many of the
“gifts” of the Holy Spirit, and Paul needed to “reign”
in the control of the use of those “gifts”. It was
important to show how they all were subject to the unified “Holy
Spirit”, and the “Holy Spirit” distributed them as
He saw necessity. Jesus Christ desires for His church to be blessed,
gifted and filled with the testimony that He exists and has come to
save people from their sins. When the church is functioning through
one loving unified body, it is able to fulfill Christ's mission to
seek and to save those who are lost, and we as believers are blessed
to be a part of His work.
Next
time Paul tells the church members, “by
one Spirit are we all baptized into one body”,
so read ahead, and we shall join together then.
Until tomorrow…there is more…
Look for the daily devotional book “Equipped for Battle – From Generation to Generation”, the marriage book “So, You Want to Be Married”, and the new devotional “One Year in the Sermon on the Mount” in all major bookstore sites, http://www.amazon.com ; http://www.barnesandnobles.com ; download to e-books, and find it locally at www.mrzlc.com/bookstore.
No comments:
Post a Comment