Called to Serve
1 Corinthians 12:1-11[1]
One of the preoccupations we have in this culture is with
“reaching your highest potential.” It has taken different forms over the years,
from “I’m Okay and You’re Okay,” to the “Feeling Good Handbook,” to “The Seven
Habits of Highly Effective People,” to the “Kaizen Method” of getting one
percent better every day. I would say that all of these contributions have
helped people in some way to improve their lives. I have personally benefited
from some of them. And I applaud anyone who is trying to do what they can to
effect personal growth. I think one of life’s most important tasks is to
continue growing as a human being all of our lives.
But one thing that concerns me is that at the heart of many of
these self-improvement methods is the belief that our identity, and perhaps
even our worth, is measured by how much we achieve in life. That’s great if we
have a nice list of accomplishments that we can use to bolster our ego. But if
we think that we have somehow fallen short of our potential, or are lacking in
terms of what we could have or should have done with our lives, it can be a big
problem. When we measure ourselves by how well we perform what we do, we can
wind up in a downward spiral of self-criticism. After all, no matter how much
we may achieve in our lives, there’s someone out there who’s done more. Even
when we’ve done the best we can, it’s easy to look at someone else’s “best” as
“better.”
To some extent, our lesson from St. Paul’s letter to the church at
Corinth for today addresses this problem. This was a church that lived
literally at one of the major cultural crossroads of the ancient world. You
could find just about any of the expressions of the human spirit in Corinth. It
was a genuine melting pot for the various cultural currents in that day. More
than that, the church at Corinth is a fascinating case study. They seem to have
experienced all the “normal” challenges most churches still struggle with, and
also some of the more “extreme” problems. Because of that fact, Paul’s letters
provide pastoral advice that is still relevant today.
One of the challenges they dealt with in the church at Corinth was
interpersonal rivalry. In fact, the struggle for power in that church was so
intense that they actually had four different factions. One claimed loyalty to
Paul, one to Peter, one to Apollos (a teacher who had spent some time there),
and the last one claimed to belong to Christ. Perhaps the last group saw
themselves as “above the fray” of all that dissension. But the reality was that
they were a congregation badly divided by loyalties, by questions of morality,
by the extent to which they believed they could or should interact with the
culture in which they lived, and by the divergent lifestyles of their Greek and
Jewish members.
One of the ways in which this rivalry apparently played out in the
church at Corinth was in the area of spirituality. Some of the folks in the
church were convinced that they were more “spiritual” than the others. And the
way they measured their spirituality was by the particular “spiritual gifts”
they had. Interestingly, the “gift” that found its way to the top of the totem
pole was “speaking in tongues.” This was not the ability to understand other
languages, but a kind of unintelligible prayer-speech that was uttered in a
trance-like state. Why this particular gift was valued above all the others was
probably due to a combination of false teachings they encountered and the
religious environment in which they lived.
Again, the upshot of all this was that those who had this
particular gift claimed to be at the top of the spiritual “food chain” in the
church of Corinth. But St. Paul wouldn’t hear anything of it. In response, he
emphasized clearly that there was no “hierarchy” in the area of spiritual
gifts. He makes it clear that all spiritual gifts come from the same God,
Father, Son and Spirit: “Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit;
and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; and there are varieties
of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone” (1
Cor. 12:4-6). And rather than claiming “credit” for their spiritual gifts, Paul
reminds them that they are the work of God, “who activates all of them in
everyone” (1 Cor. 12:6).
But, perhaps equally important in our day is the message that St.
Paul had about the availability of spiritual gifts. He makes it clear that
these abilities are given to everyone in the church. In fact, he says that they
are “allotted to each one individually as the Spirit chooses” (1 Cor 12:11).
That doesn’t leave anyone out. St. Paul also makes clear the reason why the
Spirit distributes these gifts to us all. He says plainly that they are
intended “for the common good” (1 Cor. 12:7). The gifts God gives us are for
the purpose of building up the body of Christ. That eliminates any kind of
spiritual “hierarchies” or any kind of spiritual pride about certain gifts in
comparison to others. Everyone in the church has a gift of the Spirit to share
for the benefit of the whole body of Christ.
As I reflect on
this Scripture, it occurs to me that the point of the Christian life isn’t any
kind of “self-fulfillment.” In fact, it’s not about us at all; rather it’s
about what the Spirit of God is doing through us. And the intention isn’t about
being able to total up our accomplishments. The purpose of all this is to
enable us to serve others. Whatever ability the Spirit has given you, it’s
there for you to use “for the common good.” It’s a very specific means by which
you can give yourself away in service to the body of Christ and the world at
large. After all, that’s what Christ called us to do. He called us to serve. As
we make use of the gifts we have from the Spirit, I think we reach our highest
potential by serving others in love.
[1] ©2019 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Dr. Alan
Brehm on 1/20/2019 at Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.
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