Suggestions for leading a study:

• Familiarize yourself with the passage in context, including the book itself.  Who wrote it to whom, and why?
• Read through the study guide a couple times to get the “big idea” as well as the flow of the argument
• Have the group read through the passage in it’s entirety before beginning the study.  One of the goals is to try to get your members to learn how to study Scripture methodically, and this is an important step.
• Be prayed up
• Have fun!
  

Bodies in the Body

¹Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God--this is your spiritual act of worship. ²Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will.
³For 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 measure of faith God has given you. ⁴Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, ⁵so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. ⁶We have different gifts, according to the grace given us. If a man's gift is prophesying, let him use it in proportion to his faith. ⁷If it is serving, let him serve; if it is teaching, let him teach; ⁸if it is encouraging, let him encourage; if it is contributing to the needs of others, let him give generously; if it is leadership, let him govern diligently; if it is showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully.

Discussion Questions

-In verse 1, how is worship defined?  Does this differ from how you usually think of it?

-Verse 2 moves from talking about bodies to talking about renewing your mind.  What’s the connection?

-Which comes first—thinking right, or doing the right thing?

-What are we able to do, according to verse, 2 once we have accomplished these things?

-Read verse 3.  How does not “thinking of ourselves more highly than we ought” compare to being “conformed to the pattern of this world?” 

-Read verses 4 and 5.  Who belongs to who in the body of Christ?

-Could this help in not thinking of ourselves too highly?

-How might it effect your attitude toward the rest of the church to think of yourself as belonging to them?

-What about thinking of others in the church as belonging  to you? 

-In verse 4, what do we not have? 

-In verse 6, what do we have?

-What do these say about our need for each other in the church?

 Leaders' Guide

This lesson explores the issue of what it means to belong to each other in the body of Christ since we each have different gifts that God designed to work together to create a unified body.

-In verse 1, how is worship defined?  Does this differ from how you usually think of it?

            It is defined as offering our bodies as living sacrifices.  Normally people think of worship as coming to church, singing, taking communion, or whatever.  This makes worship an active, physical thing rather than just a spiritual, intellectual thing.  Given that the context of this passage is about the church, the body of Christ, Paul is saying that what we do to help accomplish ministry in the church is just as important an act of worship as praising, or praying, or listening to sermons. 

-Verse 2 moves from talking about bodies to talking about renewing your mind.  What’s the connection?

            To be committed to offering ourselves as sacrifices to God will require a new way of thinking.  Not like the pattern of this world, which is self centered and self indulgent (this comparison will be explored more later on).  The next question also explores whether getting busy with the work of the church will help us learn to think right about doing so.

-Which comes first—thinking right, or doing the right thing?

            It is hard to tell from this passage whether offering your bodies as living sacrifices will result in not being conformed to the pattern of this world, or if it is the transformation of your mind that enables that.  Perhaps Paul is being deliberately vague here because it can actually go either way.  Getting involved in the work of the church helps us learn to understand the importance of it, just as learning to understand the importance of it will help motivate us to get involved. 

-What are we able to do, according to verse, 2 once we have accomplished these things?

            We can discern what God’s will is.  Being conformed to the pattern of this world keeps us squarely in the driver’s seat of our own lives.  To worship God with our mind and our actions is to say to him, “not my will, but your will be done.”  That is the essence of worship: to acknowledge that he is God and Lord of your life rather than you being the one to call the shots and set your own priorities. The rest of the study applies this basic concept to being available for others in the church.

-Read verse 3.  How does not “thinking of ourselves more highly than we ought” compare to being “conformed to the pattern of this world?” 

            This is another way of stating the principle of what it means to worship, as Paul has pointed out in the previous verses.  We are no longer self centered and arrogant about being in charge of our own lives.

-Read verses 4 and 5.  Who belongs to who in the body of Christ? 

            This is how giving ourselves over to God’s Lordship and not thinking too highly of ourselves gets applied.  We recognize that in the church we all belong to each other.  The pattern of this world is individualistic, based on what people can do for you.  The pattern in the church is communal, based on what people can do for each other.

-Could this help in not thinking of ourselves too highly?

            It’s hard to get too big headed if you train yourself to feel “owned” by others.

-How might it effect your attitude toward the rest of the church to think of yourself as belonging to them?

            Hopefully, this way of thinking will make you available wherever and whenever someone may need you.  It will also help to not feel used by others when called upon to help since, after all,  that is what possessions are for: to be used.

-What about thinking of others in the church as belonging  to you? 

            Here it gets tricky.  You’d better have been transformed by the renewing of your mind to not let this become an opportunity to mis-use others.  In reality, it should increase our respect for other people and our willingness to care for them.  If we had no real interest in them, we would have no motivation to care for them.  But the things that belong to us we are intrinsically motivated to care for and preserve. 

-In verse 4, what do we not have? 

            We do not all have the same function.

-In verse 6, what do we have?

            We all have different gifts.

-What do these say about our need for each other in the church?

            This is why we need to belong to each other in the church.  Because we all have something unique to bring to the table.  Reading the rest of this passage will confirm this.  If the church was missing any of the gifts that God gave it because someone was being selfish with them and using them for their own benefit instead of that of the community, it would cease to function as well as God intended.

-What do you think you have to offer that others in the church could really use?  What is it that you could really use from others?  Is this church doing what we need to in order to put those things together?

            This is the wrap-up application question.  Talk about what gifts people feel they have and ask how they are using them to benefit the whole body.  But also talk about what needs they have.  Perhaps something will come out of this that will help match some gifts with some needs.  In any event, we need to always be in dialogue to make sure that we are creating a church that encourages the body to work together.