Members

“ For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office: so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another. ”

What does membership in the Church of Jesus Christ mean? Who is a member, and in what way does that person differ from every other person, even those who come here to worship who are not members?

Our American society is in confusion about the individual and society. It is a necessary confusion, but one in which we can't find out who we truly are, or who we're meant to be by joining the confusion. On the one hand, there is the fiction that says the individual is of a supreme value and each person's value, rights and opportunities must be maintained and permitted in whatever direction or lifestyle or manner of occupation he or she may determine to follow. The unalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness have become the rights to live anyway I want to, freedom to do anything or nothing at all, to kill my offspring, and a guaranteed entertainment and free health care. If I want to smoke pot, dress as a woman, and create an Internet site that denounces Christianity, I can claim to be an oppressed minority and apply for government aid. There is obviously a need for some kind of limits on individualism and the tyranny of the self-guided life.

The cure we are too-often offered is a collective view of society, our mutual obligations to community , a common cause by virtue of being part of a greater mass of humanity. The bee-hive or the ant-hill denote an ideal society where the good of the many supercede the good of the one . We've almost outlived man's first run on really trying this: communism has run its course in a large portion of this world. The result was financial ruin, demagoguery and a dictatorial power that destroyed millions of lives. The legacy of 20 th century communism was the murder of 100 million people and the impoverishment of a billion more. So much for the good of the many .

We see membership or being part of a group as a decision to join a smaller part of humanity, a decision that demands a price or a sacrifice of time and commitment. Hence we become members rather cautiously. We're not sure we can afford the fees or spare the time. A private golf club, a children's soccer league, the Republican Party, a Safeway Club Card, and the Audubon Society all ask us to join, and we ask the cost in money, and just what this commitment is going to mean to us. Do we fit? Who else is a member? How much time every week is involved?

Truly, we are social creatures. Even after work, after school, when the meal is over, and a simple time might be spent alone, reading, learning an instrument, praying or meditating—using the solitude for our advantage: we so often do what we call “relaxing.” This means slouching in a sofa and watching TV. TV programming represents countless thousands of man-hours spent to produce continuous entertainment and advertising engineered to keep you watching, if not entranced. You stare at the ever-changing array of people and images, voices set just a little too loud, and folks doing what you aren't doing. (How many people on television are just watching television?) But rather than shut it off, we stay hooked up to our society-via-cathode ray tube. We are never less alone than when we are alone .

And we're never more alone than when we are in a crowd . New York City was constructed for the benefits of having everything close and available for the most people on the smallest real estate. Few cities in America can boast the population density of New York. As a result of this mass of community, the people of New York have a well-earned reputation for being tough. It's hard to live so close to so many people, and the resulting inconvenience of so many other people so close-by makes its residents hard-bitten, harsh speaking, anti-social, and even rude. The opening scene from the movie As Good As It Gets has Jack Nicholson sending a small dog down a tenth story garbage chute with the words: “This is New York. If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere.”

So what does membership really mean? Do we wear the same clothes, talk alike, have the same hairdos, pay at the door, worship the leader and laugh at all his jokes, on cue? (laugh) Collective-style churches—and there are those that seem more like collectives than the Church, especially the ones shown on TV—may ask for sycophants : mindless followers who faun on the guru and learn to speak Christianese, send their kids to parochial schools and don polyester pants suits . I was never admitted to those kinds of clubs: my hair just wasn't big enough.

When St. Paul speaks of being members , he really means something very different than what we mean by the word, if that means becoming the same as others in a group. He says, “For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body: so also is Christ.” 1 Cor. 12:12 … now hath God set the members every one of them in the body, as it hath pleased him. 18 But now are they many members, yet but one body.” 20 When he speaks of us as being members of a body, he isn't talking about being part of a bacterial outbreak. Rather, he tells how we, as members, are like the various parts and organs of a body: one of us the hand, another the eye, another the ear and so on. We are still as different from each other as that, while having the common good of the body as our purpose for belonging. This does not make us equal, or equivalent. We understand that each person has a place, but we all have varying functions. St. Paul says, “Nay, much more those members of the body, which seem to be more feeble, are necessary: And those members of the body, which we think to be less honourable, upon these we bestow more abundant honour; and our uncomely parts have more abundant comeliness.” 23 “… there should be no schism in the body; but that the members should have the same care one for another. And whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it; or one member be honoured, all the members rejoice with it. Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular.” 25-27

The humility required to become a member of Christ's Body, the Church, is the gateway to greatness . This is paradox , the realm of God. In our pursuit of personal fulfillment and individual greatness, we find ourselves to be small, insignificant, alienated and greatly overlooked. If we join a great society, a collective good, we are even more neglected and made to feel like cogs in a machine.

But the Body of Christ, which requires that you submit yourself, admit yourself a sinner in great need, commit yourself by faith even unto death, and remit your tithe: gives you for the first time in your life the purpose for which you, and you alone, were created. You were never realized in all your self-realization. You could never have a purpose worthy of your person as a member of a political party or a common cause. Our assumptions about those things are inverted from reality. The highest good is not found in you yourself. And a better good is hardly found in your being part of a class or a citizen of Butte County. Citizenship should serve the persons who reside there. But as a person, alone, you still have finite value, and you don't know what you were made for. Ask any famous person whose life has shone above the rest. If they've found the secret, it shows. If they haven't, their sayings don't bear publishing, even though the used bookstore shelves are filled with their autobiographies.

What you are as a member of Christ's Body is an inkling of what it means to be truly human. You are a person, and your individuality in Christ is retained , but transformed . St. Paul speaks in today's Epistle about “ present[ing] your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be[ing] not conformed to this world: but be[ing] transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.” Our minds need transforming because we were born fallen in a fallen world. Our government is collective because, as individuals, none of us can be trusted with too much power. But in Christ , with Him as the head of the Body, our minds might be transformed and our bodies live sacrificially for the sake, not of humanity or for a better world, but for God and His divine purposes. Living in Christ, we are eternal, and these minds will remember the universe when it has long been replaced with a new heaven and earth.

When faced with an angry and confused set of parents, the young Jesus unblinkingly told them He knew His purpose was to be about His Father's business. And so should we. “ For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones.” Ephes. 5:30 And being, all of us, members of one body, “we are members one of another.” Ephes. 4:25

What do we then mean by membership? It is nothing so tepid and cerebral as attending services somewhere or preferring this or that type of service, liking the preaching at one church, but going somewhere else for the music. How epicurean the American church-going consumer has become! You don't go to Church to be entertained: you go as members of a Body , each with a differing role, each necessary, each interacting with others in a way that builds up the whole and one another. And the more we learn to serve humbly, the more honor we shall have. Freedom outside of service is a fiction. Pleasure outside of discipline is a mist that disappears in an instant. Contentment outside of Christ is to sell your eternal soul to a world scheduled to be destroyed.

If we are members of Christ's Body, it is for each of us to find what part we play, and to appreciate the importance of that role and give our lives to it. For in this symphonic orchestra, our voice may not be heard above the music being made, but were our voice to go silent, the whole piece would miss it. You are members of a Body, and must be about your Father's business, transformed by renewing your minds into the likeness of Christ. He means to fulfill His great plan in creating you. That was why He came, and shed His light throughout the world.

We celebrate the season of Epiphany today, and the coming of the wise men to Christ's bassinette. The entire world and all its empires were failing, as they always do, to make life meaningful and triumphant. Alexander died a young, frustrated conqueror. Jesus died a young, innocent conqueror. The difference between the men is that one only sought the world, and found it too easy. The Other sought the kingdom of God, and found it inexhaustible. In Him, we shall always find eternity worth the wait, and membership well worth the cost to our lives. PFH+