A More Literal View of ‘the Body of Christ’

Ihave preached 1 Corinthians 12 more times than I can count. I have preached it at staff retreats with lukewarm coffee and chairs arranged in a circle that no one wanted to sit in. I have preached it at volunteer-appreciation dinners, between the baked ziti and the certificates. I have preached it to a teenager in my office who could not stop crying and wanted to know if she mattered. Every time, I said roughly the same thing: The church is like a body. We all have different gifts. The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you.” Find your role. Play your part. Do your thing.