In my last message about Church to you, I told of my church adopting as its mission statement “Do the stuff Jesus said.” We might forget how peculiar, and how special the Church is. We are the only organization (to my knowledge) that is all about just one guy. Church is all about Jesus – and with a startling twist. You can join a Churchill Society, or maybe you’re a Swiftie. Churchill died in 1965, and is remembered. Taylor Swift is still out and about – but once she’s gone, will she even be remembered? Jesus is remembered, and yet he’s not just past tense. We believe he is out and about, risen, active, with us.

And even visible in and through us! The Bible offers us various images of what the Church is. We are a fellowship. We are the people of God. We are “the way” (a term the book of Acts loves, reminding us we’re on the move and going somewhere). We are “called out” (the literal meaning of the Greek word for Church, ekklesia). We are a light in the darkness.

But no image is bolder, or more humbling and challenging, or more encouraging and even ennobling, than this: we are the Body of Christ. Talk about pressure! But God entrusts the world’s need for Christ to us. God came in Christ so the world could see and know the heart and mind of God, and be healed and inspired by his hands and actions. Now, we are the hands and feet, the eyes and heart of Christ in the world. Not me or you alone, but us, together.

Body is a better image than we might realize. Your body has various, almost laughably differing parts (as Paul explained in 1 Corinthians 12), and we need them all. An elbow, a thyroid, a toenail, an eardrum, a belly button, an aorta, eyes, muscle, on and on, all almost magically coordinated as you make your way through the world. God’s Body on earth needs all kinds of people with all kinds of interests and gifts and passions to be the Christ the world is eager to see, know and love.

Bodies also have flaws, and they break down. The Body of Christ gets its scrapes and bruises, various maladies and imperfections, keeping us humble and needing the risen Christ as the head, the brain. And in our foibles and weakness, we are still as loved by God as your family member who’s dealing with suffering, and perhaps more useful to a broken world.

Church, Christ’s Body, knows what to do and how to be by watching and learning all we can about Jesus. Our cues are his words and behaviors. Jesus loved with immense compassion. Jesus touched those others shunned. Jesus encouraged. Jesus brought and gave hope wherever he went. He perceived the wonder and potential in everybody. He wasn’t scared by bullies or impressed by the wealthy. Jesus didn’t play it safe or look out for #1. Jesus was for others.

So we have no option but to live for others. We don’t grab what the world has to offer. We offer ourselves and all God has placed into our hands for others, and especially the vulnerable, the wounded, those nobody else likes, whoever’s harmed by the way things are. And so our priorities are pretty simple, and hard to get wrong. Our questions are always What would Jesus do? and then Do we look, sound and act like Jesus? {And we’d best study hard to be sure we know the real Jesus, not one we manufacture out of our pet biases or fantasies…}