-Transcript-
00:37 Amen. Glory to God. Good to be here.
00:40 Today, we are concluding our series, a four-part series on the body of Christ. You think of a body, what does it mean? It means harmony and productivity, all the parts working in alignment with the head. You know, the church body, the body of Christ is mentioned often in Scripture by preachers, and yet we don’t know that much about it, do we? We even partake in the Holy Communion with the bread and juice symbolizing His body.
01:08 So we have a body ourselves that we can relate to this concept, this idea of being the church body. And as we wrap up this message here, I want you to think about your role in the church body. Are you involved in a local church? You know, COVID really threw a curveball to a lot of local churches.
01:29 Amen. I wish I could say that that was the only reason our attendance isn’t amazing, but that’s another story. Amen.
01:41 We’re just a small little storefront church out in Lincolnton, North Carolina. Amen. But many churches did see, I think, a significant drop in attendance and even drop in membership, so to speak, or active membership because of COVID.
01:56 And I’m not criticizing that at all. I understand people have medical needs. I understand that there’s times the church building needs to be closed.
02:03 Amen. But let me just ask you this. Are you involved in a local church here today? Are you involved in the body of Christ? Are you bearing one another’s burdens? I know that sometimes you may think, okay, I’ve got so much going on on my plate.
02:18 I don’t know how I could help anyone else. But you know, sometimes that’s the best thing you can do. One way to really lift your own spirits by the working of the Holy Spirit is to be a blessing to others, to get your mind off of yourself and help others and be there in time of need for others and encourage others.
02:36 It’s like a shot in the arm again in these last days and these crazy quarantine days and these days and times where, you know, church has become something that some people don’t go to. And I drive by some churches that have full parking lots, and I praise God for that. Amen.
02:54 And I praise God for those that are involved in the church. And I know some, again, are shut in. They can’t go to church or physically there’s a threat there because of a virus or whatever else.
03:04 I get that. But you can still pray for the church. You can still do your very best to be there for your brothers and sisters in Christ, even if it’s a letter, even if it’s a pat on the back, even if it’s a note, even if it’s a text message, whatever it is, you know, it can mean a lot.
03:22 And we are called as a body to love one another. Now, that being said, as we pick up here in the fourth part of this four-part series on the body of Christ, this is the part of the message where I’m diving into not accepting sin. And so we don’t accept sin in the body of Christ.
03:39 We don’t want to accept sin. Sin isn’t disease. The Bible says the wages of sin is death.
03:47 Amen. And when we have sin, it festers in the body and it can hurt the body like a disease would hurt the body. I’ll tell you what, when I’m sick, I don’t accept that.
03:56 I want my body and my cells and everything to beat that back as quick as I can and get healthy. Amen. And so we need to make sure that we’re not accepting sin in the body.
04:06 It doesn’t mean we don’t love the sinner, but we don’t love the sin. Amen. We love the sinner.
04:08 We don’t love the sin. We have to call a spade a spade, so to speak. And we have to tell people the truth out of love in a loving, peaceful way, not to embarrass them and not to be obnoxious, but to help them understand that we are called to a holy calling, that we are to be set apart, a separate people, peculiar people.
04:28 We are to be one that is trying our very best to live as far off from sin as we can. No, we’re not perfect. Yes, we’re in the flesh, but we need to identify when there’s sin in the body and we need to deal with it directly because the Bible calls us to do that.
04:43 Amen. And that’s part of being a mature Christian, understanding how to deal with it and understanding that it’s for that sinner’s benefit that we deal with that directly and that we don’t accept sin. So we’ll pick up here, last part here, four-part message on the body of Christ, dealing with sin in the body.
05:03 Now that doesn’t mean, the Bible is very specific about this, and I think there’s a reason why it’s specific. If you have someone in the church body and they are living in sin and you are trying to show them their sin as privately, right? Not in public and not with authorities or people that are not in the church, but you’re privately trying to tell them, hey, this is what’s going on. This is a sin.
05:22 You shouldn’t be doing this. The Bible says you shouldn’t do this. I’m telling you because I love you.
05:25 God’s going to bless you when you get right with him. You got to repent and stop doing this. And that person is angry and doesn’t want to deal with you, and you’ve tried to bring it up with him.
05:32 The Bible says, turn away. Amen. Just turn away.
05:34 Get away. Okay? So I’m not saying to accept sin in the church. Amen.
05:38 God forbid we do that. But what I’m saying is the petty stuff, the dumb stuff, the stuff that does not really matter. When we’re creating divisions, okay? Somebody didn’t invite you to their birthday party.
05:54 Who cares? You know, just love them, pray for them, and let the church body be edified. I hope that makes sense. Finally, the head of the body.
06:04 Who’s the head of the body? That’s Christ. And to give Christ all honor and due and everything, I want to put this point first, but I guess it flows better in the third part. He’s the head of the body, okay? Christ is the head.
06:15 All preeminence goes to Christ. He is the boss. As the head of our body, the brain tells our body what to do.
06:22 Christ should be telling us what to do. Amen. Through the working of the Holy Spirit and His word.
06:26 Amen. Colossians 1, 12- 20, giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light, who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son, capital S Son, in whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins, who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature. For by Him were all things created that are in heaven, that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether there be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers, all things were created by Him and for Him.
07:01 And He is before all things, and by Him all things consist. And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things he might have the preeminence. For it pleased the Father that in Him should all fullness dwell.
07:17 And having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself, by him I say whether they be things in earth or things in heaven. Okay, so here we see in Colossians 1:12-20, that the head is Christ. We see Christ’s role.
07:35 He is the one that brought reconciliation. You know, you might hear that we’re in the ministry of reconciliation. The idea is man is lost in sin ever since Adam and Eve sinned in the Garden of Eden.
They need to be reconciled to God. How are they reconciled to God? Amen. They’re reconciled to God through the blood of Christ, the perfect, sinless, spotless lamb, dies for our sins.
07:54 We accept him as Savior. We are now reconciled with God. We now have peace with God.
08:01 We can now enter the throne room boldly with God. We’re told that there’s no condemnation to those that are saved, Amen, to those that love the Lord. We are reconciled to God through Christ and He is the preeminence.
08:15 He’s created everything. Do you know Jesus was there and created the earth and everything we see? That’s Jesus, Amen. Do you understand that? He is the visible of the invisible God, Amen.
08:25 People think Jesus was just here in his earthly ministry. No, He was there from the beginning and he is all things and everything was made for Him and by Him and nothing was made without Him, Amen. So his position is the head of the body.
08:37 He is, for lack of a better term, the boss, the brain, the everything, the all in all, the one that we seek, the one that we follow, the one that we are obedient to. He is our master, Amen. Oftentimes in the Bible, in the New Testament, people that interfaced or dealt with Jesus would call Him master.
08:53 He is our master. So we are like slaves to Christ. He is our master.
08:59 So if you are the foot and master says step, you step, Amen. You’re the hand and master says grab, you grab, Amen. That’s how it should be.
09:06 We see power here. I love that word preeminence. Oh, He is preeminent in all things.
09:11 He is first. I preached that many a year or two ago about preeminence. God is first.
09:16 Jesus Christ is first in all things, amen. He is preeminent. He is first in all power.
09:23 He is first in all knowledge, all wisdom, Amen. He is also first in our lives. He should be first.
09:31 And you may have something else that’s first. Maybe it’s a BMW. Maybe it’s a comic book.
09:37 Maybe it’s a fashion designer. Maybe it’s a individual. Maybe it’s a college.
09:43 Maybe it’s a job. Maybe it’s a whatever, you know. Is Jesus Christ preeminent in your life? We as a church body should have him preeminent in our lives individually so that he’ll be preeminent in the church body overall.
09:59 And we see that he made peace through his finished work on the cross, salvation. This is how we’re saved. And this is how we are bought into the church body.
10:09 We are bought with a price, Amen. We are not our own anymore. We are the Lord’s, Amen.
10:14 And we are part of the church body. And when you get this whole idea, this doctrine of the church body and Christ being the preeminent head, it will change the way you act because you will no longer think I’m going to pursue what I desire, which by the way, when you pursue what you desire will leave you feeling empty and alone. And that’s a promise.
10:33 The only way you have true peace is pursuing what Christ wants you to do because he made you. He made every part about you. And He said, I made you the foot.
10:41 And I have a great plan for this foot. And this foot has all the little things that it needs to be a wonderful foot. But here you are over here trying to be the hand.
10:50 And I know it’s a simple example, but the idea is God made you a certain way and he has a wonderful plan for you. And you’re saying, okay, preacher, I’ve heard that a million times. Well, it’s true, Amen.
11:03 I lived for myself for 30 some years and dealt with every kind of misery and sorrow and snare you can imagine. And I gave my life to God. And it was like the biggest, just lift off of my shoulders.
11:14 And the Lord just sort of working things out. And I’m like, I didn’t even do anything. And he works this thing out and that thing out.
11:19 And He gave me a wonderful wife and a wonderful family. And I could testify how he has blessed me richly simply by me being obedient to him and saying, I’ll fall in line with what you want me to do. Amen.
11:27 And I’m willing to try my very best to bear the burden of others in the church body and know how many people in church, they just want to turn their back on those things, but we can’t, He is preeminent. We must put Christ first in our lives and we must put Christ first in our Christian service. It shouldn’t be about what we want to do or what we think is right.
11:48 Amen. It should be what Christ calls us to do. And Oh, what a difference that makes.
11:54 We will think in our heart that there’s a good idea that we should do. And the Lord may not want us to do it. And yet we should, we may talk ourselves out of something God wants us to do.
12:03 So put Christ first in your life, right? And all that you do. And the rest, by the way, will follow. If you are seeking the Lord every morning and you’re going to him, you’re praying, you’re repenting, you’re saying, Lord, please forgive me of any sin that’s gotten the way between you and myself and Lord, show me that sin so I can identify it and I won’t do it anymore.
12:21 And you’re reading the word and you’re drawing close to him. He’s going to draw close to you. And guess what? The rest is going to start to fall into place.
12:29 You put Him first in your life. You’re going to put him first in your Christian service. You’re going to be very concerned with what He calls you to do.
12:38 You’re going to be very concerned with his commandments. You know, Bible says, Christ says himself, if you love me, keep my commandments. Well, if you love Christ and you want to keep His commandments, how can you keep His commandments if you don’t know what they are, if you never get in the word.
12:49 Pray, repent for the sin that’s driving a wedge. Seek God’s will above your own. We are like the head in a lot of ways.
12:58 You know, he is the head and we are like the head in a lot of ways because we are part of that body. And so we are buried with him when we die to self, when we accept Christ as savior. We count that cost and realize we’re a sinner and we need a savior.
13:11 And this is the only way. The Bible says that the only way to God is through Christ. He is the door.
13:16 Amen. And the only way to get to God is through Christ. The only way to get to God’s heaven is through Christ.
13:22 Everything is through Christ. We’re buried with him. We die with him.
13:24 We suffer with Him. We’re risen again and we suffer with Him. We go through trials and pains and tribulations.
13:32 We suffer with Him. And guess what? We gain a great inheritance with him. That’s Romans 8:17. Being buried with him is Colossians 2:12. So here’s what we’ve learned.
13:42 The body of Christ is one body with many different members. We need to bear each other’s burdens. The body of Christ, while different, is to think alike, Christ-like in all that we do.
13:52 And Christ is preeminent. He’s the King of kings and Lord of lords. Being in the body should instill obedience to the head, to Christ, the King, the Lord of lords.
14:02 Thank you so much for listening. Please don’t let this message just go in one ear, out the other. Apply it to your heart.
14:09 Get on fire for God. Be excited about being part of the church body and watch what God will do with you.