Communion of Saints

 

[This was my letter to my congregation today - 5 June 2024]

Here is a little something to contemplate and let move around in your heads and hearts. In Romans 12:3-8 (as well as all of 1 Corinthians 12) Paul states that we are a body, and that means that each body part has God-given abilities and functions. He then announces that each of us have Jesus-given gifts that are to be used for the good of our congregation. “Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them” (Romans 12:6). This goes along with what Paul states in 1 Corinthians 12, “To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good” (12:7). 

Part of our assignment, then, is to employ and engage the gifts we have; think through ways we are to be involved with each other for the larger good of our congregation. Now, there are seasons of life when other things restrict us from doing this – like raising little children or caring for aging parents, for example. But as soon as we can, and even with what spare time we have, we are to be involved with each other, using what gifts we have for each other. 

And the Westminster Confession of faith has a fairly clearheaded chapter on just this point (Chapter 26 “Of the Communion of Saints”). It goes like this:

1. All saints, that are united to Jesus Christ their Head, by His Spirit, and by faith, have fellowship with Him in His graces, sufferings, death, resurrection, and glory: and, being united to one another in love, they have communion in each other's gifts and graces, and are obliged to the performance of such duties, public and private, as do conduce [bring help] to their mutual good, both in the inward and outward man.
2.  Saints by profession are bound to maintain an holy fellowship and communion in the worship of God, and in performing such other spiritual services as tend to their mutual edification; as also in relieving each other in outward things, according to their several abilities and necessities. Which communion, as God offereth opportunity, is to be extended unto all those who, in every place, call upon the name of the Lord Jesus. 

Let that percolate in your mind. And ask, “How am I performing such spiritual services that tend toward mutual edification? In what ways am I helping to foster communion in each other’s gifts?”

 

Pastor Mike