The Apostle Paul wrote about
the spiritual gifts in the body of Christ, “The eye cannot say to the hand, “I
don’t need you!” And the head cannot say to the feet, “I don’t need you!” (1 Cor 12:21 NIV). In today’s Christian environment we marginalize
one another’s gifts. Unfortunately, rather than saying I don’t need you we say, “I may be a hand, but I can see better than the eye.”
1 comment:
Gail;
-----There are places in each of us no other eye can really see but our own. Even if we try to lay them out for another to see, he won’t see it completely as we see ourselves. What defines our personalities, characters, and beliefs are highly complex networks of thoughts, emotions, and perceptions. More complicated than we can even explain to ourselves, let alone to another. Moreover, we are not static creatures. We are dynamic. Even the act of perceiving an aspect of ourselves has a slight effect upon that aspect, leaving it at least subtly effected.
-----Also, Jesus was sure to state that only those with eyes to see and ears to hear would recognize Him as God’s Son and come calling for new and eternal life. Since Paul is talking about all those who have called on Christ for life as being various parts of a complete body, everyone he is talking about has these eyes to see and do see, somewhat.
-----Metaphor and analogy are only good for so much. That we all have eyes to see and ears to hear neither speaks to how well those eyes see and those ears hear, nor to how much we use them. All of us have aspects of ourselves we do not see which others do. And nobody has seen everything there is to see. We’ve each seen but a tiny portion of it.
-----Yet, you are right in that God gives some the ability to see more than most. He gave prophets the ability to see into spiritual realms and to know bits and pieces of the future. As many as saw He expected to speak. And these folks in His body who do see better than most are obliged to properly handle what they’ve seen according to God’s direction. Ask the prophet God commanded to not eat at Bethel who ate there, and the lion who tore him but only stood by the body. When God gives He expects honor.
-----Alas, not all of us having “eyes to see” (else we would not be members of His body) properly understand the nature of their seeing. Some get it wrong. When actually seeing for themselves, they think they’re seeing for others. A fine case in point is Rick Warren and the tragic destruction he wreaked in a lot of hearts by trying to convince the entire of Christ’s body that he had a vision for what all of it should become. For Rick, his vision definitely applied. But convincing folks of lesser vision that they were great visionaries by doing as he did broke apart a lot of fellowship which had been more rightly hung together in counting one another’s interests as important as your own, pleasing one another to build each other up, and outdoing one another in showing honor.
-----It is important to understand when we’ve seen for another. We are to help one another overcome sin and to discern life‘s complicated courses. But it is as important to know when the seeing is just for the self. Though the New Testament often refers to us as being slaves of one another, it refers to absolutely no one, except Jesus, as being masters to one another. Seeing can be dangerous, for when it comes to knowing and correcting, there is a very, very thin line between being a slave to someone’s need and trying to master him.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
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