One Body - Unity in Diversity (Romans 12:4-6a)
INTRODUCTION:
Romans 12-16 is the practical section of Romans, Paul used the first 11 chapters to teach us the doctrine of salvation, now he makes that doctrine practical for us. He teaches us how we are to live out this salvation that is ours by grace through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul begins by teaching us that the practical side of the Christian life begins with how we as a believer relate to God in view of the many mercies of God bestowed upon us through salvation, our response should be proper worship, the worship that God desires in which we surrender our will, our soul, our body, everything that we are to His will. Second, Paul taught us that the practical Christian life had to do with how we relate to others, especially other Christians and this begins with a proper attitude of humility, recognizing that everyone is gifted by God differently and all these gifts are necessary for the church to function as it should.
This morning as we move on in this passage, we will learn that living the practical Christian life also involves proper relationship, or how we are connected to others in the church. Then Paul teaches us that the practical Christian life in relating to others requires proper service, using our gifts to edify and encourage the church. Let’s pray and then get into our passage for this morning.
SCRIPTURE:
Turn in your Bibles this morning again to Romans 12:1-8, we are going to continue to work through this passage this morning. I do not think we will get all the way through verse 8 this morning, but we shall see. Please, if you are able, stand in honor of the reading of God’s Word.
Romans 12:1-8,
“Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect. For through the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think; but to think so as to have sound judgment, as God has allotted to each a measure of faith. For just as we have many members in one body and all the members do not have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another. Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, each of us is to exercise them accordingly: if prophecy, according to the proportion of his faith; if service, in his serving; or he who teaches, in his teaching; or he who exhorts, in his exhortation; he who gives, with liberality; he who leads, with diligence; he who shows mercy, with cheerfulness.” (Romans 12:1–8, NASB95)[1]
PROPER RELATIONSHIP (Romans 12:4-5)
Over the past two weeks as we have begun to look at the practical side of our Christian life and how we live out our salvation, what does it look like to live as a Christian? We have learned that it begins with proper worship, offering ourselves totally and completely to God as our spiritual service of worship. Next we learned that as believers in relation to other believers we have to have a proper attitude, an attitude of humility, understanding that everyone is different and gifted differently and no one gift is more important than another but are all equally important for the proper functioning of the church. This morning we want to begin by looking at a proper relationship within the church, looking at how we are all connected.
Paul began this chapter by urging us to present our physical bodies as a living and holy sacrifice. In verse 4 he begins speaking of the body again, but this time he is not speaking of our individual physical bodies but is using the body as an analogy of who and how we are connected in Christ. This is not the first time that Paul has used this example of a body to describe the church. In our Scripture reading this morning from 1 Corinthians 12 that Nathan read for us we find Paul using this picture of the church as a body, this passage is a parallel passage to this one in Romans 12 but written two or three years earlier than Romans. Paul also makes mention of the church being one body in the epistles of Ephesians and Colossians. For example, in Colossians 3:15 Paul writes, “Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body; and be thankful.” (Colossians 3:15, NASB95)[2]
As we will see from these verses written here in Romans 12, this is a good comparison. Paul writes in verses 4-5, “For just as we have many members in one body and all the members do not have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another.” (Romans 12:4–5, NASB95)[3] Paul uses this figure of the body to represent the church, the universal church is what Paul is speaking of, not just the local church body, but the Body of Christ, of which every believer is a member. Paul uses this figure to show us unity in diversity. One body which he mentions in both verses is used by Paul to represent the unity of the church, but the fact that it is made up of many members that do not have the same function represents its diversity. Just as in the natural, physical body with its many body parts, unified diversity. This word translated “members” in these two verses is the word used to refer the parts of the body. He writes that our physical body has many parts, you have a head that has ears, eyes, a nose, a mouth with teeth and a tongue, you have limbs, arms and legs, hands and feet, fingers and toes, all your internal organs, and the list could go on describing our many members. Paul writes that all these body parts do not have the same function. This word “function” is a word in Greek that refers to doing something, a deed. Its use came to mean something that was ordinarily done or practiced, a normal function.
Paul begins by describing a physical body and likens it to the body of Christ. We, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another. We are all connected in a spiritual body and as a human, physical body we are to all work together. Every believer, from the youngest believer to the oldest believer, from the newest believer to the most mature believer, has a gift, an ability given by the Holy Spirit, that is to be used to minister to the church, to the body of Christ. It is the use of this gift that is the believer’s God-ordained function in the body of Christ.
As in our physical bodies, it is also true in the body of Christ, every part, or every member is a necessity, whether it seems vital and essential, such as an arm or a leg, or seems insignificant, or hidden and unnoticed, such as a small blood vessel or a gland, each part is critical and necessary for the whole to properly function as it should. We who are many are one body in Christ and individually members one of another. It is only with great diversity that we can work in unity and harmony so that the body of Christ is and does what God directs it to be and do.
We must consider the wonder of our own physical bodies and the many diverse parts each doing its own function. Because our bodies most often work normally and are dependable, we do not fully appreciate or are even aware most of the time of the normal, proper operation of our bodies. We only have to subconsciously think, and our hands, feet, and eyes move and do what we want them to do. Some things are basically automatic because we have trained them to respond in certain ways in certain circumstances. Think of those functions that are vital for us to live, breathing, our heart beating, pumping blood through our bodies, these functions require no thought and they just continue on minute by minute, day by day, year after year without stopping. The way the parts of our bodies are interrelated and work together is so intricate that medical science continues to discover new functions and relationships all the time. This marvelous design by our wonderful Creator is a picture for us of many diverse parts functioning in harmony and unity, and is an example to us of how the church is to function in unified diversity. This can only happen when we begin with proper worship, coupled with proper attitude and recognize the proper relationship of the members of the body, that we each have a function that is essential to the unity and the harmony of the body as a whole.
PROPER SERVICE (Romans 12:6-8)
The key to the body functioning as it should, functioning in harmony and unity, is diversity. Every member of the body is gifted differently and there is no value to a gift that is not used. You and your giftedness is unique in the body of Christ, just as I and my giftedness is unique in the body, and if you or I do not do what we are gifted to do, it cripples the body. There is only one of you and only one of me. Just as the body only has one of each, only one right ear and only one left ear, only one right eye and only one left eye, even in pairs like I just mentioned and like our arms and legs, there is only one on each side. If one does not function, there is nothing to take its place. I do not have an extra right arm or an extra left eye, the function is lost. Unified diversity is what makes the physical body work and what makes the Body of Christ work. Proper worship, proper attitude, proper relationship is followed by proper service, taking the gift that God has given you and using it in the body of Christ to edify, build up, encourage the church. The rest of the body depends on you to use your spiritual gift so that the body is able to do and be what our head, the Lord Jesus Christ wants us to do and be.
Before we go on looking at our spiritual giftedness I need to say something about gifts so that you know where I stand, I have said this before when I did a series on spiritual gifts, but I believe it bears repeating. When we look at lists of gifts in the New Testament, like the one given here and the one given in 1 Corinthians 12, there are three categories into which the gifts fall. Those categories are sign gifts, speaking gifts and service or serving gifts. They are easy to remember because they all start with “s”: signs, speaking, and serving.
The sign gifts were intended for that reason, for signs pointing to something incredibly significant. They were unique to the time of the Apostles. They were unique to the New Testament age and the early church. They were unique to establishing the new covenant, when Israel had rejected Jesus as the Messiah, when the Apostles’ teaching needed to be authenticated. They were unique to the time of the writing of the New Testament Scriptures. In 2 Corinthians 12:12 they are called gifts or signs of a true apostle. Paul writes, “The signs of a true apostle were performed among you with all perseverance, by signs and wonders and miracles.” (2 Corinthians 12:12, NASB95)[4] The sign gifts of the apostolic age are prophecy, tongues, interpretation of tongues, healing, raising the dead, and other miracles. Before the New Testament was written men had no standard for judging the truthfulness of someone who preached, taught or witnessed in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, so these sign gifts were given to authenticate the teaching of the apostles, which was the standard and measure of all other teaching, and when the apostles died the signs ceased, they were beginning to fade even earlier as more and more of the New Testament was written. The author of Hebrews speaks also of these gifts being given as signs to authenticate the message of the apostles, he writes in Hebrews 2:1-4, “For this reason we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away from it. For if the word spoken through angels proved unalterable, and every transgression and disobedience received a just penalty, how will we escape if we neglect so great a salvation? After it was at the first spoken through the Lord, it was confirmed to us by those who heard, God also testifying with them, both by signs and wonders and by various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit according to His own will.” (Hebrews 2:1–4, NASB95)[5] Sign gifts were given to the apostles so that people would know they were from God, authenticating their message. The New Testament was just being written and what was written was not in wide circulation to compare teaching with, so it was these sign gifts, tongues, interpretation of tongues, prophecies, healings, miracles that confirmed the message that was taught. In 1 Corinthians 13 Paul writes in verses 8-9 that prophecy will be done away with and tongues will cease. Once the New Testament was written there was a standard by which to judge a person’s message and it no longer needed to be authenticated by signs.
One of the proofs that the sign gifts were for a specific time is found in the chronological sequence of the New Testament books. In 1 Corinthians 12 the sign gifts are included in the list of spiritual gifts. 1 Corinthians was written in A.D. 54-55. Romans was written in A.D. 57-58 so two to three years later and prophecy is the only sign gift that is mentioned that we will look at next Sunday. Ephesians was written in A.D. 61-63 and again of the sign gifts only prophets are mentioned. In 1 Peter 4:10-11 Peter writes about gifts and says, “As each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. Whoever speaks, is to do so as one who is speaking the utterances of God; whoever serves is to do so as one who is serving by the strength which God supplies; so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.” (1 Peter 4:10–11, NASB95)[6] Peter only refers to the speaking and serving gifts, nothing is said concerning the sign gifts and 1 Peter was written A.D. 64-65. So, in the chronological sequence in which the books of the New Testament were written we see a diminishing of those gifts called sign gifts. With this evidence it seems that Paul did not mention the sign gifts in Romans because their place in the church was already coming to an end. As the canon of the New Testament was completed and the last apostle stepped into glory the sign gifts completely passed away with them. We will see that the seven gifts that Paul lists for us in Romans 12:6-8 all fall into the categories of speaking and serving.
Paul introduces this list of gifts by again emphasizing the unity in diversity that he had just pointed out in verses 4-5. Paul writes in the first part of verse 6, “Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, each of us is to exercise them accordingly…” (Romans 12:6a, NASB95)[7] Since we have gifts that differ refers to the diversity that Paul had emphasized in the previous verses, according to the grace given to us speaks of the unity that we have in Christ. This grace mentioned here does not refer to saving grace, but the sovereign grace of God which all believers share, that same grace that called Paul to be an apostle. We each share in the grace of God in that we have gifts that differ according to the specific ways that God in His grace has individually gifted each of us. Paul is speaking to those who have already experienced saving grace, who have already put their faith in Christ and have become the children of God. Paul is explaining that God has allotted a measure of faith and given gifts that differ according to the grace given to each of His children. Grace is God’s unmerited kindness to us on His part, it is only by His grace that we are able to carry out our gifts. Our gift is not something that we can earn or deserved because nothing we do in the flesh could merit them, and if they were earned or deserved then they would not be by grace. This grace is sovereign grace in that God alone chooses what gift each of us receives. God’s gracious, sovereign choice is perfect for each believer and we are to use them, the gift He gives us to His glory.
These lists of gifts that we find in the New Testament I believe are general categories of giftedness which can be manifested in many different ways, each unique to the believer who possesses them. For example, if you took 100 believers who all had the gift of teaching you would see a distinction in every single one of them because of the uniqueness of God’s design. We are not being stamped out like some cheap toy that all look and act the same. These are categories of gifts that have tremendous diversity and God blends them to make you uniquely gifted for the good of the church and for the glory of God. You are crucial to the church because you are the only one gifted as you are gifted. That is the point that Paul is trying to make. Whatever your gift is, use it. Do not hide it or store it away for another time or place. This is an important message for you who are believers, you have a gift given to you graciously and sovereignly by God, designed especially for you, use it.
CONCLUSION:
I am going to stop here this morning. I have already gone long, next Sunday we will look at each of the gifts individually that Paul has listed in the end of verse 6 through verse 8. Then the following wo weeks I will not be here, but Dr. Vern Wilkinson will be doing a two-part series from the epistle to the Philippians.
This morning we have learned that we, who are believers by faith in Jesus Christ, believing that He died for us, suffering God’s wrath against sin and paying the penalty required for sin by His death, believing that He was buried and on the third day rose from the dead proving that sin had been paid for and death had been conquered, we who are God’s children by faith are all interrelated in spiritual unity. Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior has designed us to each exercise the unique gift given to us so that the Body of Christ functions as it should harmoniously and in unity to the glory of God. When we do this then we become the hands, the feet, the voice of our Lord to the world. We have a common goal to bring glory to God and this is accomplished in the common life, the common ministry, the common power that we possess because of our common Head, who is the Lord Jesus, but it is accomplished by the diversity of the gifts that are bestowed upon us in countless different combinations so that in the diversity of our spiritual gifts we exhibit unity of spiritual service.
[1]New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update. La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995.
[2]New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update. La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995.
[3]New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update. La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995.
[4]New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update. La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995.
[5]New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update. La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995.
[6]New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update. La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995.
[7]New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update. La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995.