Quote:
Originally Posted by Cassidy
OBW,
Your description of the Body of Christ sounds like you are talking about the 82nd Airborne. :rollingeyes2:
Besides the direct declaration of the Lord Jesus himself that we are members of His Body there are many examples in the Bible that are difficult to interpret any other way other than an organic life relationship - the Vine and the branches, the church being produced from Christ as Eve was from Adam, the seed and the harvest, rivers of water springing up from within the believer, the Body of Christ, etc.
However, I did agree with you specifically on one point. You said: "And since we actually are the hands and feet (and even voice) of God on earth today, there are some analogies in that way."
That is not a small point.
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No one said it is a small point.
But to arrive at the conclusion that it is so thoroughly "organic" in the way that Lee taught, you have to take every one of those passages and milk them for every possible analogy you can dream up.
The vine and the branches speaks of a source of supply. It does not speak about every possible nuance of the trunk/branch relationship that can be dreamed up.
Of course the church came "out of Christ." It is the result of accepting Christ, and obeying Christ. Of becoming His follower/disciple.
Seed and harvest is quite different. That actually makes us no more than "relatives" of each other. Seed doesn't make you the body of the seed — it makes you the offspring.
The problem is not that all of these are separate items are not true. It is that there is nothing that makes any of them join up with all the others to cause any reference to the church as the "body" to mean more than what it means where it is written. In 1 Corinthians 12, the "body" reference is about the multitude of differing functions in the church, like it is in a body. It does mention Christ as the head. As it should. When and how we function should be a matter of interaction with Christ.
And since the term "body" is used in a lot of similar "organizations" such as the 82nd Airborne, a legislative "body," and others, I suspect that using the term "body" back in the 1st century AD likely also conveyed meaning without requiring such an all-encompassing meaning to be included without mention. This is the problem with Lee's teaching here. It is not that there is not a valid reference to "body," but that there are specific things meant by the analogy, not every possible connection imaginable. It does not mean that we should require the most unified connection with Christ and each other that we could be referred to as being there with Christ in the Trinity.
I suspect that if that kind of thing were said to Paul, he would have ordered that such a thing never be said again.