10/6/57

Scripture: (read John 3: 9-21) [he used John 3: 16-21 the 2nd time].

A broken body is a thing of pathos. You have seen strong bodies broken by grief. You may have seen bodies broken with undue toil: backs bent, fingers twisted, chest stooped. You have seen bodies broken by disease, wasted with fever. Now and then a siren shrieks, and a body broken by auto accident or other mishap is brought to the hospital in hope of repair.

25 [40] years ago, in a great European city, a traveler was struck by the number of shell-shocked and maimed victims of World War I lying in doorways, or upon the street, asking alms. And it seemed to the traveler that each one offered mute testimony of having given his body for many in the man-made conflict of war.

Of course, even in hospitals, there may be broken bodies of two kinds. 1) There are those whose state of health demands surgery for healing, or medication and nursing for disease which creeps up unawares. 2) There are also those whose own vice has incapacitated them for service. Some have become victims of self-administered drugs, of alcohol, of vicious social disease. And these might be said to be wounded for the own transgressions, bruised for their own iniquities; and whose stripes of suffering are the prison stripes by which no one is healed. They have little to say to their creator, at the end of their mortal days, unless it be “this is my body, which is broken for my own indulgences and sin.”

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There can be no doubt that Jesus’ body was broken, and for a different reason. He healed people’s diseases, but he never spared himself. A gospel writer speaks of the fulfillment of a prophecy that “not one of his bones is broken.” But that is partly because he died young, only about 33 years, long before the time of many men.

Jesus lived his last mortal days under terrific mental and physical strain. Though it is said that he rode into Jerusalem on a donkey, on the day of his so-called triumphal entry, in order to fulfill a prophecy, there has also been hazarded the guess that he was worn enough from the long and strenuous trip so that he welcomed the use of a mount. And on the day of his crucifixion, his body was already broken down before being nailed to the cross. His struggle with the ruling hierarchy had been a losing fight. He had slept not at all the previous night. He had been scourged with whips, tormented with thorns, slapped and spat upon. It is not surprising that his body fell under the weight of the cross he was being compelled to carry out to the execution hill, so that another was impressed (or drafted) by the guards to finish the carry. It was a body already broken that was nailed up to die.

O sacred Head, now wounded,

With grief and shame weighed down,

Now scornfully surrounded

With thorns thine only crown.

There can be no doubt that his body was literally broken. And it was not for himself that he braved his foes, but for the cause to which he had given his life. We are the inheritors of that cause! Yet, do we not continue to commit some of the same kinds of sin that nailed him to the cross?

A hymn writer does not exaggerate when singing:

We may not know, we cannot tell

What pains he had to bear;

But we believe it was for us

He hung and suffered there.

A Roman ruler caused to be placed, at the top of the cross, an inscription written in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew: “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.” [Matthew 27: 37]. Christian history and tradition spells another sentence, using a saying of his own: “This is my body, which is broken for you.” [Luke 22: 19; I Corinthians 11: 24].

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One of Paul’s particularly striking expressions speaks of the church as the “body of Christ.” [I Corinthians 12: 27]. The spirit, the life of Christ, needs a body now in order to be recognized and fruitful among mortal folk. The church is that body, suggests Paul. And we of the church are the hands and feet, the lips, the arms of Christ --the visible instrument through which the spirit finds expression.

Down through the ages the spirit of Christ is manifest unto mankind through this body. As we think of this, let us lift our vision from the petty proceedings, the crumbling walls, the bickering folk that, being human, are part of the church. And let us see the church as it ought to be -- the body of Christ. It is, unfortunately, a broken body. One part -- hand or eye or ear, says to the other parts: “You are really no part of the body. The only true church is this part.” The body is broken by mutual jealousies, theological controversy, racial and social discrimination. The scores and scores of groups calling themselves Christian make up more of a mosaic than a single body.

Through recent years, there is an increasing concern that the body of Christ become one --- not so much in organization procedure as in spirit. Organization can be adapted to express the spirit. But the spirit of cooperative and united effort must be first.

Some of the denominations of the church have merged (as did the Congregationalists and the Christians in 1931.) A major portion of Protestant Christendom has drawn into closer fellowship through the State, National, and World Councils of Churches. Those denominations which think they see sufficient affinity and common interest look toward possible union or merger with each other. Today, for the first time, we partake of the elements in World Wide Communion in the knowledge that the United Church of Christ is coming into being -- has already been consecrated at the national level, in an act of union last June, between delegates of the Congregational Christian churches and representatives of the Evangelical and Reformed church.

As we receive the symbols of Christ’s body broken for us, and of his blood shed for us, we are aware of the kinship we have with our Evangelical and Reformed brethren as one developing arm of the body of Christ. Further we are aware that people of most other Christian church denominations are today receiving the bread and the cup, each after its own manner. And we utter a prayer of dedication to closer fellowship in the knowledge that we are, and rightfully should be, members of the one body of Christ.

Does the man on the street think of the church as a body broken for him? Or does he think of the church as concerned, above all else, with its own self-perpetuation? Does it not cost concern, and effort, and giving and sacrifice -- the continual breaking of the body, to reach out unto those who have yet to hear and accept the gospel of Christ’s saving love?

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There is yet another sense in which we would consider the broken body. We have perceived that the essence of a body is not found in its chemical constituents or physical structure. A body is essentially the effective instrument through which the spirit reaches people. As Christ needed a body in order to perform his own ministry, Christ needs today the body of the church through which to minister to people; so likewise we may say of the broken bread, “This is my body which is broken for you.”

Interestingly enough, the Revised Standard Version of the Bible does not include the word “broken.” It translates the words of Jesus to his disciples: “This is my body” and ends the statement there. And yet we may still think of the bread, the body, as broken. Indeed we need to do so. His own body was not perfected to the fullness of stature of a healthy young man for nothing. It was spent, given, for his cause and his people. A loaf of bread is not merely prepared and then left on exhibit. It is broken apart to be eaten. The breaking of the bread was the beginning of the meal. And continues to be so. Jesus’ breaking of the bread with his disciples was a parable of the complete giving of himself to his disciples. But the breaking, the spending of bread and body ought to be a symbol of unified purpose; of togetherness -- not of divisive separation.

There may be some who are glad to commune with a broken body -- who desire to choose only a part of what is offered. They might like the comfort of Christ but not his challenge. They would have his peace, but not his sacrificial effort on behalf of right. They would like his crown but not his cross. The body of Christ is not broken that we may have delectable portions of it. It must be in shape to be spent as the whole Christ, available for all men.

The bread of Christ’s body is given not alone for our peace, but for our fighting, or effort, in Christian service.

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And so, on this day of World Wide Communion, let us receive His body with a resolve to become His body in a church that moves toward a reuniting in spirit and effect outreach in service.

“God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish, but have eternal life.”

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Delivered in Wisconsin Rapids, October 6, 1957.

Also at Waioli Hui’ia Church, January 14, 1973.