Green Skin Welcome: Everyone Deserves Flight in Christ
Daily Scripture
1 Corinthians 12:14-21
14 Certainly the body isn’t one part but many. 15 If the foot says, “I’m not part of the body because I’m not a hand,” does that mean it’s not part of the body? 16 If the ear says, “I’m not part of the body because I’m not an eye,” does that mean it’s not part of the body? 17 If the whole body were an eye, what would happen to the hearing? And if the whole body were an ear, what would happen to the sense of smell? 18 But as it is, God has placed each one of the parts in the body just like he wanted. 19 If all were one and the same body part, what would happen to the body? 20 But as it is, there are many parts but one body. 21 So the eye can’t say to the hand, “I don’t need you,” or in turn, the head can’t say to the feet, “I don’t need you.”
Daily Reflection & Prayer
Wicked showed how we resist diversity by giving Elphaba green skin. She said, “Everyone deserves a chance to fly.” * The apostle Paul, playfully yet deadly serious, wrote that God needs and welcomes all types of people as members of the “body of Christ.” “Paul compares the church community, the body of Christ, with the human body and its separate parts. Just as each part of the human body is necessary and interconnected with every other part of the body, so are the members of the church.” **
- Paul’s image of jealous, moping body parts (verses 15-18) can make you laugh if you try to picture your hands or feet behaving that way. But you wouldn’t laugh if it really happened. Paul was very serious, because it WAS really happening among the Christians in Corinth. And because people are people, it’s been happening ever since. What has helped you value and use your own gifts, rather than trying to be a poor imitation of someone else with different gifts?
- At times, we wish we were like someone who seems more gifted. But Paul also addressed our human tendency to think, “Everyone else should be like me.” “If the whole body were an eye, what would happen to the hearing? And if the whole body were an ear, what would happen to the sense of smell?” he asked pointedly (verse 17). How hard or easy do you find it to value people whose gifts fall in different areas from yours?
Prayer
Lord God, sometimes I struggle to believe that you love and value my unique mix of strengths and weaknesses. Sometimes I struggle to believe you value people who are different from me. Grow me beyond both tendencies. Amen.
GPS Insights
Janelle Gregory
Janelle Gregory, who serves as Resurrection's Human Resources Lead Director, wrote today's Insights. Janelle finds that her heart is constantly wrestling with the truth that she needs a Savior, and the times when she's at her very best are when she's just too tired to put up a fight.
The church in which I grew up hosted a potluck dinner in our Fellowship Hall about four times a year. There weren’t any dish sign-ups, you just brought your favorite dish. Someone would bring little smokies, another person would bring lime Jell-O with carrots (eww), someone would bring green bean casserole, and one person ALWAYS brought a bucket of KFC. It wasn’t a curated menu. Nothing was coordinated, and that was the beauty of it.
But imagine showing up to a potluck where everyone brought mashed potatoes. Don’t get me wrong-I LOVE mashed potatoes. But after the third scoop of mashed potatoes, I’d be longing for something else, anything else, really. I might even eat that lime Jell-O with carrots.
As Christians, we’re meant to live into the variety of the Body of Christ, but often we find ourselves drawn to the “same dish.” We want to surround ourselves with people who think like us, act like us, and worship like us. We may even want them to have the same spiritual gifts as us or think that our gifts need to be just like everyone else’s.
But God isn’t hosting a fast-food combo meal. It isn’t predictable, uniform, or easily copied. No, God’s building a potluck. He’s counting on your unique dish, your one-of-a-kind flavor. There shouldn’t be such a thing as a “stereotypical Christian.” You’re not supposed to make the same impact, sound the same, serve the same, or think the same. The church doesn’t need 50 of the same casserole. It needs a variety of voices and gifts. It needs your strange, little side dish, the one only you bring (even if it’s lime Jell-O with carrots). It needs others to bring their unique dishes as well. Because I believe that when we’re seated at the heavenly banquet table, we’ll realize that it’s not a fixed menu, it’s the ultimate potluck.
© 2025 Resurrection: A United Methodist Church. All Rights Reserved.
Scripture quotations are taken from The Common English Bible ©2011. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
References
* Stephen Schwartz, “Defying Gravity” – Defying Gravity lyrics © Universal Music Corp., Greydog Music, Grey Dog Music.
** Charles A. Wanamaker, study note on 1 Corinthians 12:12-27 in The CEB Study Bible. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2013, p. 325 NT. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2001, p. 555.
