Join us for the final Family Night of the season, this Wednesday @ 5:30pm! Pizza, followed by a lesson on the Lord’s Supper – for all ages!
April 9, 2024
Dear Friends,
A brief word about weaknesses in the body of Christ:
Weaknesses are incredibly easy to spot in others. In fact, they’re so easy to spot that we tend to fixate on them. We identify people with their weaknesses. It’s all we can see.
It’s like the moment that you notice something’s out of place or askew, like a dent in your car. Before you saw it, you were free! But now that you’ve seen it, you can’t unsee it.
That’s how it is when we notice the weaknesses of others.
Here’s an exercise that can help: find the corresponding strength.
Generally, if somebody has a weakness, they also have a strength that goes with it. Can you find it? If you can find it, you can rejoice in it and begin to see the other person not as the sum of their weaknesses, but as a different member of the same body all working towards the same purpose in Christ.
Here’s how Paul puts it in 1 Corinthians 12:
[14] For the body does not consist of one member but of many. [15] If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. [16] And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. [17] If the whole body were an eye, where would be the sense of hearing? If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of smell? [18] But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. [19] If all were a single member, where would the body be? [20] As it is, there are many parts, yet one body.
[21] The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” [22] On the contrary, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, [23] and on those parts of the body that we think less honorable we bestow the greater honor, and our unpresentable parts are treated with greater modesty, [24] which our more presentable parts do not require. But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, [25] that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. [26] If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together.
God bless and keep you,
Pr. Buchs
COMING EVENTS:
Wednesday, April 10
9:30 am – Chapel
10:00 am – Bible Study
5:30 pm – Family Night
7:00 pm – Vespers
Thursday, April 11
6:00 pm – Elders’ Meeting
7:00 pm – Council Meeting
Sunday, April 14
9:00 am – Divine Service
10:30 am – Sunday School/Bible Study