But in fact God has arranged the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. I Corinthians 12:18

From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work. Ephesians 4:16

Building a body of believers is like the man who set out to build a house. He had seen some beautiful houses made of brick, and determined that his house would also be made of bricks. He began searching for the strongest and most beautiful bricks, because he wanted his house to be both strong and beautiful. He took great care in his search for bricks. He read books on how to find lots and lots of great bricks. He spent long hours perfecting his strategic plan for collecting more and more bricks. He became an expert at finding and collecting bricks. He wrote books and taught seminars on the subject. His brick collection was one of the largest the world had ever seen—piles and piles of bricks covering acres and acres of land. Nobody knew more than he knew about how to collect bricks. The entire world recognized him as a wildly successful expert when it came to finding and collecting bricks.

He never built the house.

Another man set out to build a house. He too would build with bricks. When he had found his first two bricks, he began to examine them closely to determine how they might fit together. When he had determined how they would best fit together, he used mortar to join them together. In this bond, the two bricks supported one another and made each other stronger. Then the man found a third brick and, again, took great care to figure out how it would best fit with the first two. And then there was another and another. With each new brick, great care was taken to examine it and place it just perfectly along with the others, and then bond them together. With the mortar, the bricks supported each other and made each other stronger. Before long, the man had a house. It was much smaller than the pile of bricks the first man had collected. And it didn’t necessarily grab the attention of the world with its size or beauty. But it was a good house, useful to the man for many purposes.

And he was a good builder.

© Blake Coffee

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