All Gifts Are Necessary For The Body to Work
OPENING PRAYER:
Lord, help me to determine how I can best use the gifts you have given me. Amen
“Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body, so it is with Christ. Now if the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But, in fact, God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body.” I Corinthians 12:12
“For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you. For just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.” Romans 12:3-5 (NIV)
REFLECT:
Ecclesiastes 4:9 states, “Two people are better off than one, for they can help each other succeed.” I found this to be very true when I assumed the principalship of a brand new open- space elementary school. None of my staff, professional or support, had taught or worked in open space before. It was even more complicated by the fact we had 530 students in a building built for 430 students. We were all extremely frustrated trying to make it an environment in which we could teach the students. I knew we could not continue like we were.
I received a grant to bring in an outside consultant to help us figure out how to make the building work. We brought all the staff, certified and classified, together for several sharing and training sessions. Over the rest of the year, we had weekly brainstorming meetings where we discussed what was going well and what was interfering with student learning. By Christmas, we had made enough changes as the result of the input from ALL staff, that the building was functioning well and providing a much better educational environment.
At the completion of that first year in the building we brought EVERYONE together to evaluate the first year. With everyone’s input we revised our instructional strategy for the next school year. We continued doing the annual evaluations for several years and the staff was very comfortable working there and felt successful. The success proved that by utilizing the gifts/skills of all personnel, we could turn the building into a strong instructional environment.
APPLY:
Remember, “a person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer. Three are even better, for a triple braided cord is not easily broken.” (Ecclesiastes 4:12 NLT) Our focus Scripture today reinforces the idea that God made the body of Christ to work together using all their individual gifts.
CLOSING PRAYER:
Lord, help me to draw on the gifts of others when I need to work through a difficult situation. Amen