Chapter 1: I Need You, You Need Me

I once visited a church that had operated a parking-lot worship service for years. So-called “attendees” watched the church service from the comfort of their own vehicles. They drove up to a large drive-in movie screen and tuned their car radios to the church frequency. The service they viewed was a live projection of what was happening inside the church building. This was “church” for them. And the people inside the church walls were well pleased to provide the service. Essentially, the parking-lot Christians were saying to themselves, “We like the church (namely, the service) but we do not like the church (namely, the people).” And the pew-sitting Christians inside the church walls were saying, “Yeah, that’s fine. We don’t need you in here anyway!”

This picture illustrates a problem that existed in the Corinthian church in AD 55. No, they weren’t operating a drive-in ministry—it was a different problem. The Apostle Paul discovered the difficulty while ministering in Ephesus when a secret report came to him from Chloe’s people (1 Cor 1:11). Several issues had divided the Corinthian church. In chapter twelve of his first letter, Paul focused specifically on one spiritual wedge which brought further separation to a church already divided—namely, the misuse of spiritual gifts.

Paul describes two groups in the church—the ‘arrogant independents’ and the ‘falsely-humble enviers.’ The ‘arrogant independents’ were content to operate in the church on center stage without assistance from anyone with a seemingly weaker spiritual gift or anyone who didn’t measure up to their spiritual prowess. The ‘falsely-humble enviers’ sidelined themselves in the church because they didn’t have the publicly noticeable spiritual gifts. Since they couldn’t compete with the more publicly gifted ‘arrogants’ they selfishly removed themselves from all church activities.

To the ‘arrogant independents,’ Paul writes,

But now there are many members, but one body. And the eye cannot say to the hand, "I have no need of you"; or again the head to the feet, "I have no need of you." On the contrary, it is much truer that the members of the body which seem to be weaker are necessary (1 Cor 12:20–22).

And to the ‘falsely-humble enviers,’ he writes,

For the body is not one member, but many. If the foot should say, "Because I am not a hand, I am not a part of the body," it is not for this reason any the less a part of the body. And if the ear should say, "Because I am not an eye, I am not a part of the body," it is not for this reason any the less a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? But now God has placed the members, each one of them, in the body, just as He desired. And if they were all one member, where would the body be? (1 Cor 12:14–19).

Paul uses the analogy of a human body to show that all the members of the body are needed. No member can remove another. Nor can a member remove himself or herself. John MacArthur explains:

In a normal, healthy human body, all the parts work together. If they don’t, that body is disabled, unable to function normally. No single part functions independently of the rest. So it is also in the body of Christ. All the members must work together if the body is to function normally. And no member was meant to function in isolation from the rest of the body; the New Testament knew nothing of Christians who weren’t part of a local assembly.[1]

In 1 Corinthians 12, Paul wanted the ‘arrogant independents’ to be able to say to the seemingly less-gifted people in the church, “I need you. You can’t sit on the sideline. You need to do your part,” with a truly appreciative heart. And he wanted the ‘falsely-humble enviers’ to be able to say to the seemingly more-gifted people in the church, “You need me. I know my spiritual gift is important to the body. I want to serve faithfully,” with a truly humble heart. Only by loving and appreciating the input each person has to give to the life of the body, will either party experience corporate and individual spiritual growth.

Likewise, today we ought also be able to say to one another, “I need you and you need me.” This is true for the preacher and the listener. Neither can make it without the other. I am not referring to the simple issue of conducting a church service where a preacher and listeners are required to be present to make it possible—I am referring to the sanctification of both the preacher and the listeners. Their spiritual gifts may be very different to each other; the visibility of their functions may be more or less noticeable than the other; the honor and thanks received from other Christians may be more or less given; but in the end, they both need each other. The fellowship that takes place between the preacher and his listeners is vital.

If a preacher with a more publicly-seen spiritual teaching-gift were ever to say to his congregation, “I don’t need you folks to be here at church. You may all sit in the parking lot if you wish. You may watch me preach on a DVD or on live video feed from your own home if you wish. You may observe my ministry from a distance if you prefer,” that would be the height of arrogance, because that preacher would be revealing a heart of independence in which he believes he doesn’t need those people and their spiritual gifts to input into his life. I am not at all saying that this is what all preachers have communicated when they started their online audio sermon catalogues, began to make DVDs of their sermons, decided to go multi-site, developed a virtual church website, or broadcasted their sermons to people at a distance—the motivation for such developments is theirs alone to evaluate since it is quite possible to utilize new technologies to great effect with perfectly right motives. But the principle that says, ‘preachers need listeners in their lives’ and ‘listeners need preachers in their lives’ still applies. Preaching and fellowship go hand in hand. According to Paul Tripp, “Personal spiritual insight is the product of community. It’s very difficult to get it by yourself. . . . Every pastor needs people in his life in order to see himself with biblical accuracy.”[2]

Pastor, you need people of differing gifts and abilities around you to balance you and minister to you. Larry Osborne sounds a warning to the self-serving church member:

If you’re an eye, you’ll start to devalue the ears as ancillary and second-class appendages because they can’t see anything. You’ll attend some special vision conferences where you’ll gather with other eyes to celebrate the beauty of sight, learn new ways to sharpen your vision, and listen to guest eyes bemoan the terrible blindness that ails the rest of the body. Eventually you’ll join a vision-focused church where you can study the latest in biblical optometry and congratulate yourself for your clarity of vision in a world gone blind—all the while hardly noticing that you and your eye friends can no longer do much besides see. You have no feet for walking, no mouth for talking, and no ears to hear anything but your own thoughts.[3]

Conversely, if a church attendee said to his or her pastor, “Since I can’t preach, since I can’t serve to the same extent as others serve in the church, and since I am missing out on the public acclaim you’re receiving, I’m going to stay at home and pursue my own spirituality. I don’t mind being absent when you preach. I might listen to you sometimes online. I might listen to other preachers depending on how I feel,” that would be the height of spiritual individualism driven by spite and envy. Again, that’s not what motivates all church leavers since some church departures are biblically justified. But the principle that says, ‘preachers need listeners in their lives’ and ‘listeners need preachers in their lives’ applies still.

Larry Osborne quips, “It may not always be easy to be a foot in a world of hands. But if God has made you to be a foot in the body of Christ, don’t try to be a hand. Granted, the hands might not think all that highly of you and what you do. But trust me, they’ll never go very far without you.”[4]

In addition, sermon-listeners need the personal input and fellowship of other sermon-listeners. We each have unique spiritual gifts assigned to us by God in order that we would serve and care for one another (1 Cor 12:18, 24–25).

Are you able to say to the people in your church, “I need you (no matter what your spiritual gift is) and you need me (no matter what my spiritual gift is)?” Let’s acknowledge that preachers and listeners need each other’s fellowship and spiritual stimulation. Let’s also acknowledge that listeners need the fellowship of other listeners. The principle applies across the wide spectrum of gifted-individuals in any church. We all need one another. Far be it for any one of us to opt out of this divinely created organism—the church.

Far be it for any one of us to only do our sermon-listening alone.

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[1] John MacArthur, The Keys to Spiritual Growth: Unlocking the Riches of God (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2001), 160.

[2] Paul David Tripp, Dangerous Calling: Confronting the Unique Challenges of Pastoral Ministry (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2012), 73.

[3] Larry W. Osborne, Accidental Pharisees: Avoiding Pride, Exclusivity, and the Other Dangers of Overzealous Faith (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing, 2012), 164–65.

[4] Ibid., 169.