“For the body does not consist of one member but of many. If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body.” – 1 Corinthians 12:14-15

Christians aren’t meant to go it alone! It’s been quite popular for many years in our hyper-individualistic culture for professing Christians to say they don’t need the hassle or messiness of church. They argue they can pursue their faith and relationship with Christ on their own. They say they can worship God anywhere, which is certainly true. However, as a consistent pattern for life, all that is unbiblical!

When we accept Jesus Christ as Lord, He doesn’t just save us from our sins and call us to Himself. Jesus calls each of us into His body, which is the local church. He gifts us specifically to participate in, and contribute to, a local body of believers called a church. He shapes each Christian for specific service and ministry, fitting us together as one body, united by our faith, our baptism, His Spirit, and His presence.

Just because a Christian declares they’re “on their own” doesn’t make it so. That’s the point Paul is making in these verses. Whether God shapes you to be a hand, a foot, or a spleen in His church, He has shaped you to be in His church. So quit wasting time and the gifts of God and get in a church if you aren’t!

For your sake as well as the Kingdom’s sake, find and commit to Christian community and service as a member of a local church. Get to know and love people there. Lean into the messiness and find meaning. Lean into the hassle and find home. Lean into the challenges of ongoing relationship and experience true family in Christ. Lay down personal preference and experience the power of gathered worship.

“But if we judged ourselves truly, we would not be judged. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned along with the world.” – 1 Corinthians 11:31-32

In Christ, we are a new creation! The old has passed away and the new has come! There is no condemnation for those in Christ! This is wonderful news, glorious truth, and your present reality as a follower of Jesus. However, that doesn’t mean that Jesus Christ, the Lord of your life, the absolute boss over every aspect of life, doesn’t have an opinion about some of your actions, words, and thoughts. He absolutely does!

Salvation in Christ comes with the invitation and command to try and live, speak, and think increasingly like Christ through the power of His Holy Spirit. We fall short of that in standard in many ways, so Jesus invites Christians to regularly, thoughtfully, and thoroughly examine and evaluate ourselves. If we’re faithful in looking for ways we fall short of Christ’s standard, He reveals them to us, forgives us for them, and helps us leave those sins behind.

However, our Lord isn’t afraid to discipline us if we aren’t doing the hard work of self-examination! Christ will absolutely use hard times, setbacks, failures, and seasons of disappointment to help us see our sins and shortcomings – for the purpose of repentance and transformation. Because of Christ’s great love for us, He uses seasons of adversity to reveal sinful attitudes, words, and actions to us and purify us from them. He does this because we won’t be condemned with the world. He has saved us and He will sanctify us. The question is whether we’ll examine ourselves or whether we require Christ’s discipline to see what we refuse to look for in ourselves.

“And said, ‘O Lord, God of Israel, there is no God like you, in heaven or on earth, keeping covenant and showing steadfast love to your servants who walk before you with all their heart’” – 2 Chronicles 6:14

Let us praise God, Who is faithful at all times and in all ways! The Almighty Creator of the Universe also keeps faithful covenant with His people. It’s mind-boggling to consider, yet the Bible is the glorious testimony of the reality of God’s steadfast love despite our all-too-frequent failures, rebellions, and rejections of Him. This is what makes His covenant of grace so stunning!

That God faithfully loves us, pursues us, and remains faithful to us when we have been so unfaithful toward Him is almost impossible to comprehend. That God sent His beloved Son Jesus into this world to redeem us from our sin through His own sacrificial death on the cross stands as the ultimate expression of that steadfast love. In Christ, God established a new covenant of grace, and He invites all who believe to walk before Him with complete devotion.

We are saved by faith in Christ alone, but as those saved by God’s grace, we’re called and invited to enjoy the ongoing blessings of a life dedicated to the glory and the Kingdom of God. Our new life in Christ isn’t one of burdensome rules, but one of joy! We’re called to a life of significance and purpose, a life of relationship and friendship with our Father in Heaven, and a life of transformation and proclamation.

Commit your heart to God the Father through Jesus the Son. Walk before Him with all your heart and enjoy His steadfast love and companionship all the days of your life!

“Thus, sinning against your brothers and wounding their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ. Therefore, if food makes my brother stumble, I will never eat meat, lest I make my brother stumble.” – 1 Corinthians 8:12-13

It’s a wonderful thing to know just how profoundly free you are in Christ! We can eat, drink, dress, look, sing, worship, and do however we like as long as it doesn’t violate God’s Word. We aren’t bound by old traditions, norms, standards, and expectations that have been added by our culture beyond what the Bible commands.

However, please understand that not every brother or sister fully understands all the dimensions of Christian liberty, as perhaps, you do. Not every Christian can separate the cultural from the truly biblical (there’s been ample evidence of that lately)! For them our freedom can look like sin. Are they correct? No. But that doesn’t mean we can simply ignore them and their concerns. As lovers, followers, and imitators of Christ we must be very thoughtful and selfless in how we choose to exercise our Christian liberty. If our choices, actions, and words (which aren’t sinful in themselves) confuse less knowledgeable or mature Christians into thinking we’re sinning and encourages them to do what they believe to be sin, then we’re sinning!

As adopted children of God, we should voluntarily lay down our freedoms whenever necessary to build up other Christians. We shouldn’t make a big show of it, nor should we be patronizing or condescending. We should just choose not to do the thing that offends the sensibilities of other believers.

Of course, it’s good to gently and lovingly teach truth about Christian freedom. But that can’t be done harshly, abruptly, or in a manner that’s hurtful, arrogant, or otherwise damaging. In Christ, we have extraordinary freedom, but we’re so blessed by God’s abundant grace that we must always stand ready to lay that freedom down to help our struggling and only partially formed brothers and sisters in Christ.

“Honor belongs to the person who ends a dispute,
but any fool can get himself into a quarrel.”
– Proverbs 20:3

We live in an age that constantly demonstrates the second part of this proverb! Any fool truly can get himself or herself into a quarrel, and they do. We see it on the roads. We see it on the news. We see it on social media. We see it on email. We see it in the workplace, in schools, and in homes. We see it in sports at every level. We live in an age of short tempers, thin skins, easy offense, and exaggerated outrage. “Any fool can get himself into a quarrel.”

Followers of Jesus must not be fools in this way. We can’t be getting ourselves into quarrels. If we find ourselves in one, we must immediately get ourselves out of it. We must ALWAYS resist the very human rush of emotion and anger that easily turns differences of opinion and disagreements into full-blown and sinful quarrels. When we fail to resist, we must recognize that we have sinned. Our sin isn’t in holding to a different perspective, but in becoming agitated, angry, and quarrelsome, thus bringing shame on the name of Christ.

Jesus was very clear, “Blessed are the peacemakers.” That wasn’t intended to describe a special kind of Christian. Making peace is the appointed job of every Christian. We aren’t just supposed to be peaceful and avoid quarrels, but must actively get engaged in making peace. That’s where the first part of the proverb comes in. Followers of Jesus should be actively investing ourselves in ending disputes, even when it’s risky and messy. We are to MAKE peace, not just enjoy it or keep it.

In our quarrelsome, angry, divided culture, we who follow Jesus are meant to be radically different. We’re meant to be lowering temperatures, modeling humility and forgiveness, bringing people together, and demonstrating how to love those who think and act differently than we do. Any fool can get himself into a quarrel. Don’t be any fool! Live with honor and be the peacemaker Jesus called and equipped you to be!