By David ReayFriday 2 Aug 2019LifeWords DevotionalsFaithReading Time: 2 minutes
After all, who is Apollos? Who is Paul? We are only God’s servants through whom you believed the Good News. Each of us did the work the Lord gave us. I planted the seed in your hearts, and Apollos watered it, but it was God who made it grow. It’s not important who does the planting, or who does the watering. What’s important is that God makes the seed grow. The one who plants and the one who waters work together with the same purpose. And both will be rewarded for their own hard work. For we are both God’s workers. And you are God’s field. You are God’s building.
Because of God’s grace to me, I have laid the foundation like an expert builder. Now others are building on it. But whoever is building on this foundation must be very careful. For no one can lay any foundation other than the one we already have—Jesus Christ. (NLT)
People play different roles in our life stories. Our lives are like tapestries with various threads perhaps woven by different individuals. We are not the products of just one individual. And putting it another way, I don’t have to be totally responsible for another person’s life. I do not have sole input into their life. I do not create replicas of myself.
Paul especially refers to the church in our text when he speaks of different individuals playing their parts. The Corinthians tended to get fixated on individuals and became ‘tribal’ in giving their allegiance to individuals. Paul points beyond those individuals to the true foundation of life: Jesus.
In any church, different people play their part in building up the whole body. In doing so they display different talents and capabilities. The church needs introverts and extroverts, talkers and listeners, academics and hands-on fixers of things. Some people through love and good works prepare someone to hear the gospel preached by another person more gifted in that area.
And we may never know just what part we are playing in others’ lives. Seemingly insignificant words, seemingly random meetings, apparently forgotten acts, may be links in a chain leading to eternal life. We play our parts, sometimes not even knowing what those parts may be.
Blessings
David