Body Functions - Pt. 1 - Covenant Series

Body Functions

Pt. 2 - Covenant

I. Introduction

In our constant search and longing for a miracle we often overlook what is the pinnacle of all the creative miracles. The intricacies and precision that was required to perform this miracle is mind boggling. It is breathtaking. It continues to confound and elude the scientific minds of our most brilliant. David recognized the incredible handiwork of God in creating man's body. His recognition is captured in Psalms 139:13-14. He examines his own physical body and declared. "For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well." Some of us just need to have this revelation. God fearfully and wonderfully made us . . . even when we fail to match up to Hollywierd's unrealistic scale/standard of perfection. God miraculously formed us and He did so by establishing biological systems that carry out specific functions. These systems are necessary for everyday living. Our physical body survives by maintaining or restoring its internal environment.

The body is constructed so perfectly that when God needed an illustration of how the entity that He sent and sacrificed His only Son to establish the church He resorted to the body as the visual representative. And exactly like our physical body our spiritual body consists of individuals and relationships carrying out specific functions! (SLIDE 2) Our survival depends on our ability to maintain and at times restore our internal environment.

Paul taught us in Romans 12:5-6 that, "In this way we are like the various parts of a human body. Each part gets its meaning from the body as a whole, not the other way around. The body we’re talking about is Christ’s body of chosen people. Each of us finds our meaning and function as a part of his body. But as a chopped-off finger or cut-off toe we wouldn’t amount to much, would we? So since we find ourselves fashioned into all these excellently formed and marvelously functioning parts in Christ’s body, let’s just go ahead and be what we were made to be, without enviously or pridefully comparing ourselves with each other, or trying to be something we aren’t." Then in 1 Corinthians 12:14-18, "I want you to think about how all this makes you more significant, not less. A body isn’t just a single part blown up into something huge. It’s all the different-but-similar parts arranged and functioning together. If Foot said, “I’m not elegant like Hand, embellished with rings; I guess I don’t belong to this body,” would that make it so? If Ear said, “I’m not beautiful like Eye, limpid and expressive; I don’t deserve a place on the head,” would you want to remove it from the body? If the body was all eye, how could it hear? If all ear, how could it smell? As it is, we see that God has carefully placed each part of the body right where he wanted it."

1 Corinthians 12:25 The way God designed our bodies is a model for understanding our lives together as a church: every part dependent on every other part, the parts we mention and the parts we don’t, the parts we see and the parts we don’t.

So in our attempt to continue to confront and combat the principality of isolation that is so deadly and disruptive in the body's ability to function we have talked about being connected. Our survival and significance is directly tied to our connectedness. We need each other.

So let's go one step further because although it is possible to be attached at a surface level and settle for acquaintance deep. However, that level doesn't allow us to function properly. Our connection must move beyond surface and our connection must become covenant. In the following weeks we will talk about carrying/comforting and confronting one another, which are all part of the body's function, but that will never be possible until we enter a deep covenant relationship with one another. David goes so far as to declare in Psalm 92, when talking about the righteous, in verse 13 that, "planted in the house of the Lord, they will flourish in the courts of our God." Did you catch it? Our ability to flourish is connected to our plantedness. I believe our lack of plantedness is directly attributable to our lack of covenant. We can't be fruited because we aren't rooted. Surface level connection never equals planted. In this day without covenant every wind and wave drives us to something else. I believe We have confused relationships of convenience with those that are covenant. Therefore, what happens is that we avoid or abandon covenant relationships for convenient relationships that we can enter and exit at will with no accountability or responsibility. Then we get confused and sometimes even angry when we expect to reap the fruit of covenant relationships when we haven't paid the high cost of covenant.