The human body that God created is absolutely incredible. The average human heart pumps over 1,000 gallons a day, over 55 million gallons in a lifetime. This is enough to fill 13 super tankers. It never sleeps, beating 2.5 billion times in a lifetime. The lungs contain 1,000 miles of capillaries which the body uses to exchange oxygen for carbon dioxide in a complicated process. The DNA in your body, which contains your genetic code, if stretched out would circle the sun 260 times. To write out the DNA information in one cell would take 300 volumes, each volume 500 pages thick. Your brain contains 100-500 trillion synapses and is far more powerful than the largest supercomputer. All of these different parts of the body have been created by God to work together in harmony and unity. The Bible teaches us that the human body is an illustration of the body of Christ, the church.
1 Corinthians 12:12 (NIV) The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ.
In the same way that the human body has many parts that work together in unity, so God’s plan for the body of Christ is for each believer to work together in unity with one another. As the parts of the human body work together, the body can accomplish wonderful things. Similarly, the church can accomplish great things as each believer works together.
My message title today is “Serve One Another.” We’re going to be talking about God’s wonderful plan for His body, the church, as each person grows in serving one another. In our society, we have the concept of rugged individualism, where each person tends to think mainly about themselves, rather than others. There is an aspect of self-centeredness in each one of us that cares more about our own comfort and needs, than the needs of others. God wants to help us overcome thinking only about ourselves, so that we can grow in serving one another.
Today, we’re going to look at a passage of Scripture from Ephesians 4, which shows how unity in the body of Christ leads to growth of both each person in the church, but of the church as a whole. As the church grows spiritually, it positively impacts every person who is part of it. Serving one another is like having a workout program for your body. As you exercise in serving others, you grow stronger spiritually and the whole body grows stronger as well. However, what happens if you don’t have a regular exercise program? Your body grows weaker and doesn’t function as efficiently. The same is true if we neglect serving one another.
Serving one another leads to personal and church growth. So today, we’re going to answer the question “How can I grow in serving others?”