Henri Nouwen Society - Daily Meditation
Tuesday October 29, 2013 

 

One Body with Many Parts

 

The Church is one body.  Paul writes,  "We were baptised into one body in a single Spirit" (1 Corinthians 12:13).  But this one body has many parts.  As Paul says, "If they were all the same part, how could it be a body?  As it is, the parts are many but the body is one" (1 Corinthians 12:19).  Not everyone can be everything.  Often we expect one member of the body to fulfill a task that belongs to others.  But the hand cannot be asked to see nor the eye to hear.

 

Together we are Christ's body, each of us with a part to play in the whole (see 1 Corinthians 12:27).  Let's be grateful for our limited but real part in the body.

 

- Henri J. M. Nouwen  

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Text excerpts taken from Bread for the Journey, by Henri J.M. Nouwen, �1997 HarperSanFrancisco. All Scripture from The Jerusalem Bible �1966, 1967, and 1968 Darton, Longman & Todd and Doubleday & Co. Inc. Photo by V. Dobson.