One of the most lovely items I enjoy is homemade bread. It is so enveloping in so many ways. The smell of freshly baked bread wafting through the air when I walk in the door. The sight of a golden brown crust shiny with melted butter. The soft, dancing taste of its delicious warm crumb smothered in melting butter and warmed peanut butter. It engages so many of the senses.
And the bread itself is a miracle. Made of different ingredients, all working together to make it real.
Take the flour for example. Popular breads are made with wheat flour because of the higher gluten content found in the wheat berry. The gluten is what accounts for the dough’s structure, elasticity and stickiness. High gluten content helps to hold the dough together during its rising stage.
Sugar helps add to the flavour of the bread but because it feeds the yeast. A by-product of the yeast consuming the dough is carbon dioxide which is what causes the dough to expand. Sugar also helps keep the bread from drying out by attracting moisture.
Salt is added to the dough to help stabilise the yeast, strengthens the protein network, and helps increase the flavour of the bread.
Oils or shortenings are added to help improve bread volume, texture and softness. They also aid in prolonging the bread’s shelf life.
Eggs are also usually used in bread making to improve the dough’s handling properties and make for a softer crumb.
And water of course is used to activate the gluten and provide a medium in which the yeast can thrive.
The key to making a nice loaf, however, lies in more than just having the ingredients on hand. They must be combined. They must be kneaded together under pressure and over time. Then some time must be allowed for rest and so the combined ingredients can work together to produce the optimal stage of the dough.
The body of Christ (His Church) works in a very similar fashion. Paul teaches us in 1 Cor. 12:8–11 that different gifts of the Spirit are given to different people. While one person may be blessed with the gift of prophecy, for example, some other may be blessed with the gift of wisdom. While one may be blessed with the gift of faith, one other may be blessed with the gift of healing.
And just like the separate ingredients of the bread dough, each accomplishes very little by itself, but when brought together into one body all these gifts are able to work together and strengthen the whole body.
Just as an eye by itself dose nothing, for without the brain it sees nothing and without the mouth it can tell no one what it sees, we by ourselves cannot do anything in the Church of ourselves.
Just as the nose cannot say because it does not see, it is good for nothing, so too we cannot say because we cannot heal or we do not have great faith, we are good for nothing. All have a place in the Church.
So, too, should we as Christians help others to find that place.
