Members of One BodyBy Charles SpurgeonLet the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. Colossians 3:15-17
What the circulation of the blood is to the human body, that the Holy Spirit is to the body of Christ which is the church. Now, by virtue of the one life-blood, every limb of the body holds fellowship with every other, and as long as life lasts that fellowship is inevitable. If the hand be unwashed the eye cannot refuse communion with it on that account. If the finger be diseased, the hand cannot, by binding a cord around it, prevent the life-current from flowing. Nothing but death can break up the fellowship. You must tear away the member, or it must of necessity commune with the rest of the body. It is even thus in the body of Christ. No laws can prevent one living member of Christ from fellowship with every other. The pulse of living fellowship sends a wave through the whole mystical frame. Where there is but one life, fellowship is an inevitable consequence. Yet some talk of restricted communion and imagine that they can practice it. If they be alive unto God they may in mistaken conscientiousness deny their fellow Christians the outward sign of communion, but communion itself falls not under any rule or regulation of theirs. Tie a red tape round your thumb and let it decree that the whole body is out of fellowship with it. The thumb’s decree is either ridiculously inoperative, or else it proves injurious to itself. God has made us one, one Spirit quickens us, and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus. To deny any believer in Jesus is to refuse what you must of necessity give, and to deny in symbol what you must inevitably render in reality.
