Today’s reading from 1 Corinthians is a continuation from last week’s. For some reason when I read today’s passage earlier this week, I started thinking of it literally. (Now, you may think I’ve gone “over the edge” but stay with me.)
The images that came to mind were absurd: You sitting out there in your chairs at Crissey Farm…One of you an eyeball. Another an ear. Another a heart. One a head, and so on. In thinking of it in that silly way, I was able to “hear again" the part of today’s passage that says, “If all were a single member (like an eyeball or a heart), where would the body be?” The parts have to be assembled together as a body, in order for there to be a body at all—instead of a bunch of silly, isolated parts.
Then my mind went from the literal-absurd eyeballs on chairs to more abstract images of some of Picasso’s work, especially the cubist-Fauve-influenced ones from the late 1930s. In these parts of things, and especially faces, are fragmented and perhaps reconstructed in shocking ways. In some of his paintings Picasso used this style to communicate great emotional distress, like the shattering experience of grief.
To state the obvious, a fragmented body or face is not a whole body or face. And I believe it is God’s will that the Body of Christ be whole—all parts in their proper place. Working together. Complete. And in being whole, then the Body of Christ can give light in the darkness to this sinful and broken world.
So we must use and honor all the parts, because they are all necessary to make the body whole. Think about it…An eyeball that can see a glorious sunset, is of no use unless it has a heart and mind to process and enjoy it. A heart full of love needs arms and lips and voice to express the love.
So as I look out at you today, in your chairs at Crissey Farm, I don’t see an eyeball in one chair, a foot in another. I see people who bring many, many gifts to this place. If I could step up on a little balcony, I could see you as a whole, as the body of Christ at St. James. Some are teachers. Some prophets. Some mercy givers and helpers. Some healers. Some offer hospitality. Some nurture others. Some are young, fragile, or frail and need our protection. Some have remarkable abilities to exercise leadership. Some have brilliant, disciplined minds. Some have great pragmatic wisdom. Some remind us to exercise caution, while others are way ahead, boldly out there “leading the charge.” And some have great artistic gifts, which you generously share. But we’re all together, part of an organic whole, sharing our gifts and relying on each other’s gifts. We do this because we know that each of us has a piece of Wisdom and Truth, and none of us has all the Wisdom or Truth, but together we will have a much better opportunity to be Wise and know Truth. So we rely on each other’s gifts in order to best take light into the world and build up the Body of Christ. While we are many parts/members, everyone who is in Christ belongs to the one Body…through our baptisms and through the Holy Spirit.
So our distinctions, the things that make us unique individuals, never bar us from the community. We’re all together in this, and no one part of the Body can claim to be more necessary than another. All of us are equally essential. The gifts God gives us are of equal value. So we must highly regard each other…
It puts a different light on, “Love your neighbor as yourself,” because our neighbors are all part of our self, which is the Body of Christ. And, because we are united as one body, we feel the suffering of any one of the members, and we share the joy of any one of the members because they are part of us and we are part of them.
This way of thinking and being together in this parish family will serve us well as we continue in our process towards discerning the future God is calling us into, and as we discern the kind of building that will best help us live into God’s mission. When we realize we cannot be isolated parts: We’re not eyeballs and ears sitting in the chairs, trying to do our thing without regard or relationship with all the members and those we will serve. When we realize instead we are essential parts of one Body sitting in these chairs, then we’ll know in the depths of our beings, “The body does not consist of one member, but of many, and if we were each just a single member, then there would be no body.”
As we of St. James move forward, and so we’re not fragmented or disassembled like a Picasso painting, we’ve got to stay in right relationship with all our parts, so that we are indeed, together, the Body of Christ, a light in the darkness to this sinful and broken world. Amen.
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