Body/Building: It All Starts With the Head

I love my wife. She is such a great treasure to me. Every day when I wake up, she’s there with me. Every night when I go to bed, she’s there with me. I want her by my side for the rest of my life, and I’m working to make sure she will be.
I love my wife, so I want to see her achieve everything she can. When I give her gifts, sometimes it’s just because I love her. Other times it’s because she needs something to accomplish her daily tasks and life’s goals. I’m willing to lay down my life for her, and I give what I have to her so that she knows that I love her and want her to grow in her love for me.
There are a number of reasons I love her—her beauty, her pure heart—but one thing that makes me crazy in love with her is knowing that she only has one husband. I love knowing that there’s only one man she turns to for her needs. There’s only one man she confides her deepest hopes and fears in. There’s only one man whom she trusts completely to be by her side forever.
Now, I could go on telling you about my love for my wife for quite some time, but I don’t want to monopolize your entire afternoon and, frankly, you’d probably get tired of hearing me gush about my wife after the first hour or so. And of course I’m not here to do that. But I am here to talk about something important to our lives as God’s church, and the easiest way to help us understand what we’re going to talk about is by comparing something we know—a man’s great, great love for his wife—with something that we may not fully understand: Christ’s love for His church.
The Bible tells us the way Christ loves His church is much like the way a man loves his wife. He treasures His church. He died for His church and lives with His church. He gives gifts to His church so that it may succeed. His church trusts only in Him, confides only in Him, and He alone is the loving Head of His church.
Over the next few weeks we’re going to be in a sermon series called Body/Building. It’s kind of an interesting title: We have two words that are synonymous with the word “church”: “body” and “building.” Both words describe Christ’s Church. But if you say them together—“ bodybuilding”—we have a word that describes the process of making a body stronger and healthier through discipline and exercise.
It was last year about this time that we spent forty days studying and discussing God’s five purposes for His church, remember? What we talked about then were the five things that made a healthy, Bible-based church: worship, fellowship, discipleship, mission, and ministry. Those are all things the church does.
But what I want to do with this sermon series is explore the relationship between Christ and His Church. We’ll talk about how He equips His church to accomplish her tasks and goal. We’ll talk about how the Church is guided by love. We’ll talk about how the church chooses methods that get desired results. And we’ll talk about one of the central objects of the Church’s faith: the resurrection of Jesus Christ. But for today there’s just one thing that we are going to focus on: Christ as the head of His Church.
Ephesians 1:22-23 says, “22 God placed all things under his—that’s Christ’s—under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, 23 which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.”
That verse says a few important things. First, Christ reigns supreme over everything. He has absolute, final authority in all of creation. Christ reigns supreme in Heaven. He reigns supreme over the angels. He reigns supreme over the world. He is truly the King of kings and the Lord of lords. His word is final. His rule is absolute. The governments of the earth are subject to Him. The surgeon’s hand, a mother’s child . . . there is nothing that is not under Him.
But as true as that is, that verse also tells us that Christ was given a special relationship to His church. Yes, He is the supreme ruler over all, but He alone is the head of his church. Now, a head is intimately connected to the body. The head dictates where the body goes, what it does. We know that the head controls all of the body’s functions. Whether voluntary or automatic, every muscle that moves, every function that the body performs, is controlled by the head. It doesn’t stretch the point too much to say that the head defines the life of the body.
What would the body be without the head? It couldn’t survive. When we apply that terminology to Christ and His church, we must remember that this remains true. This isn’t just idle speculation, it’s not just a nice metaphor. Christ isn’t just the figure-head of the church, some sort of titular leader that guides us, but He is the very one who gives the Church life and breath. He alone is the One who gives the Church direction. He alone is the One who defines the life of the Church.
Now wait a minute . . . didn’t we just hear in the epistle reading where it’s the Holy Spirit that gives gifts to the Church? So how can I say that Christ alone defines the life of the Church? Am I just overstating my point, or does God Himself, in every member of the Trinity, point the Church to Christ?
No, I’m not overstating this. Even if we look to our God, every member of the Trinity points us to Christ. The Father speaks from a cloud in Matthew 17:5 and says, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!” The Father points us to Christ. Jesus Christ Himself says that He has come so that we might be with the Father, but to get there? He points to Himself. John 14:6, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” The Son points us to Christ. And the job of the Holy Spirit, according to Jesus in John 14:26, is to “teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.” The Holy Spirit points us to Christ.
Our very relationship with God, with each member of the Trinity, points us to Jesus Christ as our head. Christ defines the life of the Church.
Christ defines the life of the Church. Think about that for a minute or two. Our church-year calendar . . . that revolves around the life of Christ, so He shapes our lives of worship. The whole of our Scriptures point solely to Christ: the Old Testament points forward to Him, the New Testament focuses us on His work 2000 years ago even as it draws us into His work today. Our hymns and praise songs focus our attention on Christ. Even our traditional church furniture, from the altar to the pulpit to the Paschal candle . . . they all in some way focus us on Christ . . . His work . . . His person . . . Himself. Because He alone is the head of the Church.

Bodybuilding . . . the process of making a body stronger and healthier through discipline and exercise . . . it all starts with the head. This is Paul’s point from the epistle lesson. Paul is about to launch into several chapters that detail how the Body of Christ—the church—works together as one to accomplish the things of God. He’s going to tell us how to work together, but first he focuses our attention on the rightful head of the church: Christ Himself. No one can say, “Jesus is Lord”—that is to say, “Jesus is the head”—except by the workings of the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit whose job it is to point us to Christ.
From there Paul jumps into a listing of seemingly different things, but notice that his focus isn’t on diversity, but on unity. 1 Corinthians 12:4-6: “4 There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit. 5 There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. 6 There are different kinds of working, but the same God works all of them in all men.”
We are united as one body, with one head. One Lord Jesus Christ whom we all worship and serve. And though it is true that we are a diverse bunch, each with different tasks—and to a certain extent we’ll talk about that next week—Paul’s overall thrust in this passage is our unity. 1 Corinthians 12:8-11, “8 To one there is given through the Spirit the message of wisdom, to another the message of knowledge by means of the same Spirit, 9 to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, 10 to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in different kinds of tongues, and to still another the interpretation of tongues. 11 All these are the work of one and the same Spirit . . .”
Every task, every role in the church, they are all there to serve one purpose, and that is to point to Jesus Christ. That means that the Church pulls together towards one goal, in one direction. It’s against our nature to pull against each other, to each serve our own agendas, because we are united as one. It doesn’t matter what I say, what he thinks, what she feels, what you do, what matters is what Christ says, what He does . . . and where He leads.
If all this is true—if Christ alone truly is the head of the church, the head of Our Saviour Lutheran Church—then what is our primary responsibility as His church? To follow Him. To go where He goes. To do as He does. To do as He says. To truly be His body.
Now, we have a lot more to talk about in the coming weeks. We’re not even ¼ of the way on knowing what it means to be the Body of Christ. So stick with me; good things are coming! But as we finish today, even though we don’t yet know all the things we need to know about being Christ’s body, we do know the most important thing: Christ is the Head of His church. And it all starts with the head.