I am constantly amazed at how God uses my test subject, the honey bee, to teach me about Him and His ways.
Honey bees form colonies which can be described as “superorganisms” – a collection of individuals that, as a group, possesses qualities of a single organism. The honeybee colony functions as a living, breathing organism. Single bees come together to form something that is more complex than just a simple collection of bees.
I think that is what God tried to teach us about the body of Christ in 1 Corinthians 12: “Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body, so it is with Christ.”
The church, as the universal body of believers, is a superorganism in which its members come together, use the spiritual gifts endowed to them, and function as a single entity.
This cohesion, or unity in function and purpose, makes it possible for us to do more together than we can individually.
The idea of the superorganism speaks to the importance of individuals (the believers) that compose the body of Christ, and what the body can accomplish when all individuals work together. This has been an important message God continues to teach me.
God designed the body of Christ to be a collection of individuals who have purpose. Paul speaks about this in 1 Corinthians 12: 18 – 19, 27. God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body.
You and I are of value to God. We have a purpose. We belong to something greater than ourselves. As academicians, we always have the call to be the outstretched arms of the body of Christ. We have a spiritual obligation to show Christlikeness to our students, postdocs, staff, and colleagues.
When Christians come together, properties begin to emerge in the whole that are otherwise absent in the individual. Christ’s church truly is more than just a simple sum of its members. It is a superorganism tasked with spreading the gospel message and love of Jesus Christ.
