Where the Nut Lands

 

Tuesday, June 9, 2020

1 Corinthians 12:12-13

The human body has many parts, but the many parts make up one whole body.  So it is with the body of Christ.  Some of us are Jews, some are Gentiles, some are slaves, and some are free.  But we have all been baptized into one body by one Spirit, and we all share the same Spirit.

When we were studying for ministry at New Orleans Seminary we lived on campus.  The road circling the campus was just about a mile loop, and, being exceedingly typical students, Elizabeth and I were also exceedingly poor.  Walking the loop was our entertainment mostly.  During the months of October through December, nuts fell from the pecan trees that encircled that loop, and we learned to bring bags along on our nightly walks.  It was there I developed my addiction for pecans.

In a previous pastorate there was a husband and wife who had pecan trees.  Being fond of my addiction to pecans, each year at the church’s annual benefit auction I would make sure we got some of Joyce and Jack Fagg’s crop!  For a month or so after the auction I munched day in and day out.  I stashed them everywhere.  I am truly a nut – nut! 

                       (O.K., I got that out of the way…now to the main point.)

The old saying about a nut not falling too far from the tree is true, except if there is a sower, or gardener, who wants to do something with the nut, and, in that sense, where the nut lands is a matter of what hands hold the nut.  Joyce and Jack always dedicated part of their crop to raising funds for the church’s mission.     Once I got my hands on them, they were likely to end up on top of vanilla ice cream, inside pancakes, or the top right drawer of the desk where I wrote sermons.  Ultimately all of them found their way into the ministry…that is, the minister!

Paul’s point about the body of Christ can’t be ignored; we may look different from each other, talk differently, and have vastly different gifts, calling, and background, but we are ONE body with differences, and that is the Sower’s choice.

Paul wrote a companion sentence to this concept of one body that the church (and this violent, turbulent, self-destructive world) needs to hear:

No one hates his own body but feeds and cares for it, just as Christ cares for the church.  Ephesians 5:29

Nut trees, like every living, growing thing, can get infected.  If the church is like a body with many members, all deserving care, so our human family tree needs care from the infection blight of hatred and violence.  It is a self-inflicting illness that destroys from within. 

But the church cannot do anything at all when it comes to addressing hatred if the church is busy proclaiming hatred.  Sweet and bitter water do not come from the same fountain, in the same way that truth and lies do not come from the same heart and mouth.  If the church is going to truly be the church of Jesus Christ, it must not, in any way, represent the anger and violence we see in the culture today. 

I was once told by a well-meaning friend that I shouldn’t let certain people, who were part of the church I was serving, do what they were doing.  He said, Russell, this is your church; don’t let them do that to you.  I had to tell my friend he was wrong; it wasn’t my church; the church belongs to Jesus.  My job, as a nut from the Jesus tree, was to teach and work with the other nuts God put in my pathway.  It was not my prerogative to shell and crush them.

As for this world, and the so-called movements we see against hatred and racism, whatever is done in the name of Christ isn’t always what the Sower-in-Chief designed.  If you fight fire with fire, you’re going to (at the least) wind up smelling like smoke.  And, very often, that will be the least of it.  Resorting to beastly behavior to combat monsters, makes a monster of he who would combat monsters.  Movements against hatred and racism ought not adopt such as their tactics.

 Let’s Pray Together:

Father, you sent Jesus to be our Peace, and to teach us peace.  He did so by sacrificing his divine rights for us.  He did so without retaliation and vengeance.  Our prayer is for wisdom to know how to be peace-makers, not just people who talk about peace, and for courage to act like the Prince of Peace.

For You Today

If you’re truly a member of the body of Christ, you’ll not fall too far from the tree that gave you new birth.  Stay in the Sower’s hands until he plants you where you’re needed.

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road today.  Have a blessed day!    

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Title Image:  Pixabay.com  Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation©

For other posts on 1 Corinthians 12 see So, Which Gift? and Holy Mixtures – Part 5 and We Are the Body of Christ