Paul’s discussion of the church as a body (1 Corinthians 12:12-31) reminds us that there is unity in diversity. The Godhead mirrors this perfectly; Jesus said ‘I and the Father are one’ (Jn 10:30) and prayed for His followers to know the same kind of unity (see John 17:11, 20-21); unity does not equate with uniformity, however. As Rend Collective say, ‘the beauty of church is that it champions unity while adamantly rejecting uniformity.’
In Corinth, it seems that – as everywhere else! – people struggled to embrace unity without uniformity. We tend to like the people who are like us and there can be two extremes which are equally dangerous to church life: feelings of inferiority (being a foot but longing to be hand, to continue Paul’s body analogy) and feelings of superiority (believing that because we’re an eye, we don’t need ears.) Paul adamantly rejects both extremes and by using the picture of the human body – which is made up of many different parts but which is one complete body – shows us how ridiculous these extremes are. A body that was all eye would look utterly strange; a body that had great hearing but no sense of smell would not be perfect.
Whether we realise it or not, ‘God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be.’ (1 Cor 12:18) This is true of the church as well as of the human body: ‘Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it.’ (1 Cor 12:27) Our task is to find our ‘part’, our role, our function, in the body of Christ and work for His glory. We all need each other; there is no place in the church for self-sufficiency (pride or arrogance) or for feelings of uselessness (which ultimately do not reflect the truth that we are valuable and chosen by God.) The Message version of 1 Cor 12 says the human body is a model for how our church lives fit together: ‘every part dependent on every other part, the parts we mention and the parts we don’t, the parts we see and the parts we don’t.’ Lone rangers and condescending arrogance have no part in the church. We’re called to love each other, suffer with each other, rejoice with each other and bless each other, because we’re all needed, important, loved and put in our particular place by God Himself.