Members of One Body: A Sermon for Proper 13

 I love Paul’s letters because they are addressed to Christian churches, made up of mostly well-intentioned yet sinful Christians, and usually addressing some sort of disagreement, heresy, or conflict. Paul – like the prophets and messiah who preceded him, was the master of speaking “the truth in love.” And those truths that he spoke – or wrote – have grounded the Christian Church for nearly 2,000 years.

I’ve been preaching through Paul’s letters to the Colossians and Ephesians this summer, and more times than not, these ancient letters have had a providential Word for us. And that certainly is the case today.

So here we are, once again wearing masks and suffering from the effects of pandemic anxiety and fatigue. And just as we were during the most recent presidential election, we Episcopalians and we at Christ the King are divided on this issue. And I, like so many of you, am tired of it all.

I’m tired of many things - false information, finger pointing, and most of all, our wider culture’s inability to be curious. So many Americans don’t make an effort to listen to and learn from a wide variety of sources and people. So, when we are faced with a crisis like this pandemic, our nation and our communities oftentimes become divided. And I grieve over that, because it doesn’t have to be that way.

The Apostle Paul likely felt the same way when he’d catch wind of conflict that was brewing within his own Christian communities. Many of these conflicts were also grounded in false information, poor communication, and an unwillingness to be intellectually and theologically curious. As we’ve seen the past few weeks in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, the conflict was between the circumcision party and the non-circumcision party. Lines were being drawn as to who was in and who was out – based on how folks chose to understand the limits and scope (or lack of limits and scope) to God’s grace.

What seems to ring true for Paul is that more times than not, he felt as threatened by schism, division, and lack of unity within Christ’s Body as he was any particular theological disagreement. That is why so many of our greatest quotes from the New Testament about love, unity, and human relations come from Paul. It’s hard to find a wedding liturgy without a reading from Paul – particularly the most oft-used ones from 1 Corinthians and Colossians. Of course, when Paul wrote those lines in those two letters, he wasn’t addressing a couple about to be married. He was addressing Christians trying to be in community with one another in their newly formed churches.

And so, when he was addressing the Ephesian Christians who were in conflict with one another, he wrote, “[I]beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”

What if we all – as Americans, as Christians, as members of Christ the King, as members of our particular households – “made every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace?” What if we were more humble, gentle, patient, always bearing with one another in love?” I know that personally, I’d be a much better son, brother, husband, and father – not to mention a priest – if I more consistently and faithfully lived by this admonition from Paul.  

But how might we appropriate Paul’s ecclesiology – meaning, his theology of the Church – to our current situation? I think we can find a good example from his first letter to the Church in Corinth, and a reflection I found on it from Loyola Press.[1]

“Paul recognizes that some of the Christians in Corinth would have no problems eating meat from the temples. Nor should they do so.

So, about the eating of meat sacrificed to idols: we know that "there is no idol in the world," and that "there is no God but one." (1 Corinthians 8: 4–6)

The Christians in Corinth who realized that there is one God and that Jesus was the Son of God were not troubled by eating the meat that had once been offered to idols... Meat was meat, and those gods did not exist.

There were other members of the church, however, whose understanding of Christian teaching was not as clear. They were unsure of the relationship between pagan gods and the one God. These Christians were uncomfortable being served meat that had been used in temple sacrifices. As Paul notes:

‘But not all have this knowledge. There are some who have been so used to idolatry up until now that, when they eat meat sacrificed to idols, their conscience, which is weak, is defiled.’ (1 Corinthians 8:7)

The problem for Paul is that those Christians who rightly did not have problems eating the meat from idols would too many times criticize those who were having problems. The Christians who ate the meat thought that they had greater insight into the freedom won by Jesus Christ because they were not worried about pagan gods.

Paul was critical of those Christians who thought they knew better than their fellow Christians. He agreed with them in principle that meat was meat, and so they were technically correct in eating it. However, these Christians had to make sure that their sense of being right did not become a stumbling block for their weaker fellow Christians.

Paul emphasized throughout his writings the need for Christians to support one another and love one another. This is especially true because

‘Now you are Christ's body, and individually parts of it.’ (1 Corinthians 12: 27)

Paul is urged his fellow Christians to understand that with the freedom won through Jesus Christ is the responsibility that the individual has towards the community. Decisions that we make that we might think are our own private business in fact have social consequences. There is no such thing as a sin that hurts no one. Paul emphasizes that rather than think of our choices as simply our own business we have to recognize our responsibility to others as well.”

And while our nation continues to lack imagination and empathy as we disagree over how each of us thinks we should respond to the Delta variant of the covid-19 virus, let us, as members of Christ’s Body here at Christ the King, choose a different way forward. Let us, as Paul wrote, speak the truth in love to one another, remaining unified in Christ, which always seemed to be Paul’s first priority.  In his words, “We must grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by every ligament with which it is equipped, as each part is working properly, promotes the body's growth in building itself up in love.”

My friends, we can do this. But we have to do this together. There is no way that we can expect to all be in agreement over how we are to respond to this latest spike in covid cases. I know that after doing quite a bit of reading, learning, and listening, I have come to a different and more nuanced understanding of how we might respond to the pandemic. But as a member of Christ’s Body, what I personally feel, and what I personally think isn’t what is most important. What is most important is for me to always make our unity in Christ my first priority. When we do so, I truly believe that the fruits of the Spirit - love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness,  gentleness, and self-control -  will sustain us through this challenging time.

[1] https://www.loyolapress.com/catholic-resources/scripture-and-tradition/jesus-and-the-new-testament/saint-paul-and-the-epistles/st-paul-on-making-moral-choices/