Called to Reach a Higher Standard
211
scruples of those who might be weak in the faith. “Whether therefore
ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God. Give
none offense, neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the church
of God.”
The apostle’s words of warning to the Corinthian church are ap-
plicable to all time and are especially adapted to our day. By idolatry
he meant not only the worship of idols, but self-serving, love of ease,
the gratification of appetite and passion. A mere profession of faith
in Christ, a boastful knowledge of the truth, does not make a man a
Christian. A religion that seeks only to gratify the eye, the ear, and the
taste, or that sanctions self-indulgence, is not the religion of Christ.
By a comparison of the church with the human body, the apostle
aptly illustrated the close and harmonious relationship that should exist
among all members of the church of Christ. “By one Spirit,” he wrote,
“are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles,
whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one
Spirit. For the body is not one member, but many. If the foot shall say,
Because I am not the hand, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of
the body? And if the ear shall say, Because I am not the eye, I am not
of the body; is it therefore not of the body? If the whole body were
an eye, where were the hearing? If the whole were hearing, where
were the smelling? But now hath God set the members every one of
them in the body, as it hath pleased Him. And if they were all one
member, where were the body? But now are they many members, yet
[318]
but one body. And the eye cannot say unto the hand, I have no need of
thee: nor again the head to the feet, I have no need of you.... God hath
tempered the body together, having given more abundant honor to that
part which lacked: that there should be no schism in the body; but that
the members should have the same care one for another. And whether
one member suffer, all the members suffer with it; or one member
be honored, all the members rejoice with it. Now ye are the body of
Christ, and members in particular.”
And then, in words which from that day to this have been to men
and women a source of inspiration and encouragement, Paul set forth
the importance of that love which should be cherished by the followers
of Christ: “Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and
have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.
And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries,