The Manifestation of the Spirit
1 Corinthians • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Now concerning spiritual gifts, brothers, I do not want you to be uninformed. You know that when you were pagans you were led astray to mute idols, however you were led. Therefore I want you to understand that no one speaking in the Spirit of God ever says “Jesus is accursed!” and no one can say “Jesus is Lord” except in the Holy Spirit. Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. For to one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the ability to distinguish between spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills.
OCC Fundraiser - Thanks to Ellie and Johanna Johnson and all who took part in running the fundraiser - and thanks to all who took part by enjoying some goodies - The Bake Sale raised almost $600 that will cover the cost for crayons, H2B pencils and some scissors - this gets us well on our way to our goal of sending out 1,000 shoeboxes to children around the world
Welcome - continuing in 1 Corinthians
Today we begin another section of the letter where Paul addresses a new topic. Kind of. And when 1 Corinthians is being preached, this is the section of the letter most people look forward to hearing preached. We all like to hear about the miraculous gifts of the Spirit. We all get excited for Paul’s take on tongues.
But we need to keep in mind that Paul is writing one unified letter, and, for the most part, he’s correcting the Corinthians on what they told Paul they believed. He has corrected them on a bunch of things already - from suing each other to how they take Communion and everything in between - and he is doing the same thing here.
He is correcting them on their understanding of Spiritual gifts. He actually tells them that based on what they wrote to him, they’re ignorant of such things. Mostly, they did not understand the reason God gives these gifts to the church.
And if we come to this section thinking this is about miraculous gifts and we get all excited about them, but we aren’t using our gifts to serve the church, we are ignorant just like the Corinthians were.
So while I don’t want anyone to be disappointed, or tune me out and start checking emails, or skip the next few weeks until we get to the section on the resurrection, I want us to know what we’re in store for over the next three chapters.
Because this section is not about spiritual gifts - it is about using our spiritual gifts the right way, for the right reason: out of love for and in service to each other, to the church, and to the world.
This section is not a teaching on tongues, per se - Paul does not explain what that gift is in this section. But he assumes the Corinthians know what he means. And he tells the Corinthians that their desire to speak in tongues is misguided. And he gives clear instructions on how that particular gift should be used and even more instruction on how it should not be used.
So regardless of your view on tongues, please don’t ignore the clear commands of Scripture regarding its use here.
Neither does Paul in this section address whether certain gifts will fade out of use or continue on until today - but he does point out that all the gifts end when we are with Christ in eternity, and every gift is to be used now, with that end in mind. We are by faith to look to our eternal hope and use whatever gift we have out of love for each other now.
And that is really the focus for Paul - our using these gifts, all together, for the sake of each other and the church. He focuses on our unity in and through the use of our individual gifting.
So I will ask you at the outset: are you using your God-given gifts to serve the church?
Because, as we will see, that is why God gave them to us, and they are to be used according to His will.
And that is what Paul tells the Corinthians.
And he begins with:
Now concerning spiritual gifts, brothers, I do not want you to be uninformed.
“Now concerning” - we have seen this a bunch before in this letter. Paul uses this to introduce a new topic, but it’s always a topic that the Corinthians wrote to him about. He is addressing in this section what the Corinthians said about Spiritual gifts.
And concerning what they said, Paul doesn’t want them to be uninformed. So what they wrote to him indicates to him that they are not well informed about spiritual gifts.
But here’s the thing: Paul doesn’t actually say “spiritual gifts” - he says literally “the spirituals” or “the spiritual things.” “Now concerning spiritual things, brothers, I do not want you to be uninformed.”
And so it may seem like Paul is moving from practical things like sexual immorality and the eating of food offered to idols, to spiritual matters.
But these “spiritual things” are not in contrast to the practical matters he has already discussed.
He isn’t moving on from concrete practical matters (divisions, marriage, modesty, etc.).
Because for Paul, this - these spiritual things - this is even more practical! What we do in those other things are how we live out the spiritual.
Think about his opening paragraph in this letter. After his greeting and right before he rebukes the church for their divisions, Paul gave us the controlling thought of the letter.
Let’s go back and look at that yet again:
I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that was given you in Christ Jesus, that in every way you were enriched in him in all speech and all knowledge— even as the testimony about Christ was confirmed among you— so that you are not lacking in any gift, as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ, who will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
The focus is on Christ. He is Lord.
And in Christ, Christians are made rich in speech and knowledge - two issues he addresses in chapters 12-14.
In Christ, we are not lacking in any gift. Because this refers to the whole church. The church as a whole has everything it needs to carry out our calling. And that’s what he addresses in these chapters.
And we use these gifts to carry out that calling until Christ is revealed when He comes and completes our salvation.
But also note that through this speech and knowledge - and gifts! - the testimony of Christ was confirmed among the Corinthians. This is because Paul’s focus is on Christ.
He believes that these gifts point to Christ. And they do, as we’ll see.
And he has actually returned to these ideas all throughout what we’ve already considered.
He has throughout the letter spoken about things like knowledge and ability. Knowing God and being able to live pleasing to Him.
And he has tied this in with the work of the Holy Spirit Who reveals Christ to us.
Like back in chapter 2 where he said:
For who knows a person’s thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual. The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one. “For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ. But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ.
These things of the Spirit of God - which not only confirm the testimony of Christ, but give us the ability to understand and believe the Gospel - that is spiritual knowledge.
But Paul said he could not address the Corinthians as spiritual. Why? Because the way they were living revealed their ignorance of the spiritual. Things like infighting, ignoring sin, not considering each other, breaking from the teachings of the Bible, in some cases - these outward actions showed where their hearts were.
The inward is always revealed in the outward.
So now, Paul wants to address the spiritual with the Corinthians. He already addressed the symptoms - all those things they were doing wrong - and now he wants to get to the source of all these issues they were having.
Now concerning the spiritual things, brothers, I do not want you to be ignorant.
Paul was now addressing the spiritual. Because they were, in fact, spiritual people because they belonged to Christ.
And we are “spiritual” people, after all, which is why so many people love this section of the letter and why so many misunderstand it - for Paul, the spiritual things he is about to address are very practical - more practical for the life of the church than the Corinthians understood!
Being Spiritual with no practical benefits for the church is not the “spirituality” the Bible talks about. That’s the new age idea of “spiritual but not religious” that’s so common in the western world - what nonsense - what do they mean by “spiritual” when they say that?
And what do we - Christians - mean by “spiritual” when we say it? Do we mean something inward and personal, something like a feeling, that is abstracted from how we live?
For Paul, Christian spirituality is practical spirituality. It’s about how we live. It’s about what we do, especially for each other.
It is about living out our calling with the mind of Christ.
It is about living as mature believers who are not divided over unimportant things and who live holy lives for the sake of those around us - believer and unbeliever.
And it is about using our gifts for the benefit of others. As we see in the closing of this section:
If anyone thinks that he is a prophet, or spiritual [there’s our word again] , he should acknowledge that the things I am writing to you are a command of the Lord.
Paul begins and ends this section with this idea of the spiritual.
Now concerning the spiritual things, brothers, I do not want you to be ignorant.
“ignorant” - same word used to begin chapter 10 when Paul tells the Corinthians he doesn’t want them to be unaware of what happened to those Israelites who became idolaters. There he reminds them of their past as part of God’s spiritual people. Here he reminds them of what they were before they were spiritual people.
Idolaters.
You know that when you were pagans you were led astray to mute idols, however you were led.
These “mute idols” - they can’t do anything. They lack power. As do the gods they represent when compared to the one true God.
Paul addressed this back in chapter 8 when he spoke about idolatry. We saw then that he was addressing former idolaters - which we all were - but they literally worshipped idols.
And he says they did this when they were “pagans” - before they were believers.
Why would Paul throw that in here? He has already moved on from the talk about idolatry. Since that topic, he has addressed modesty and he has talked about taking Communion. Why go back to idolatry here?
Because some of the Corinthians had made idols out of certain gifts. In particular, the gift of tongues.
There are whole denominations today that make the same mistake.
But there’s more to it than that. Because the Corinthians made an idol of what they believed. They had written him a letter, talking about how everybody has the knowledge they have.
Yet he has responded rather harshly to some of what they wrote. He has even pointed out that some of their views break from what the true churches teach.
But they were so sure of what they thought was true that Paul was afraid they wouldn’t listen to what he has to say. That’s why he ends this section harshly, reminding the Corinthians that these are commands of the Lord.
And there are many Christians today that make the same mistake.
There are within orthodox belief a variety of views on secondary matters - like whether or not there will be a seven-year tribulation before Christ’s return, or what the gift of tongues is exactly.
We can disagree on these things without losing unity.
But many have made an idol of their view.
There are some here who will disagree with me on what I believe the Bible teaches about tongues. And that’s okay, there is room for disagreement and healthy conversation should be encouraged.
But there are some of you here who won’t even consider what I say because you already know we disagree and you have no interest in even hearing anything contrary to what you already believe.
You have made what you believe an idol.
We make idols out of what we believe, and when someone disagrees - even about something as non-essential as what we think about tongues - we defend our idols. We don’t even consider we might be wrong and so we close our eyes and ears to anything that doesn’t prop up our idol.
That is what Paul is correcting the Corinthians on here.
Some of them had made an idol of their view of the gift of tongues. And Paul compares it to their former worship of actual idols.
He says he doesn’t want them to be ignorant of the spiritual, and then tells them what they do know: when they were pagans - when they were outside the covenant community of God - they were led astray and worshipped idols.
And they were being led astray now over their idol of tongues. So Paul says:
Therefore I want you to understand that no one speaking in the Spirit of God ever says “Jesus is accursed!” and no one can say “Jesus is Lord” except in the Holy Spirit.
He comes back to that opening paragraph of the letter. They have been enriched in speech and knowledge.
And they were preoccupied with speaking in tongues. Paul tells them what speech they should be worried about. Because when you have the Spirit of God, you now know Who Christ is, and you can’t say He is accursed.
Rather, you can now say “Jesus is Lord!”
Paul refers to his controlling idea. Jesus is Lord. If you want to speak in the Spirit, he says to say “Jesus is Lord!”
Forget tongues and prophecy for a second, Paul says. Can you, Corinthians, say “Jesus is Lord” and mean it?
Montclair Community Church, can we?
Because we have had the riches of God’s grace poured out on us in all speech and knowledge.
We have had the riches of His grace poured into us because we have been given the Spirit of God, and we can now know the truth and live the truth.
We have had the riches of His grace instilled in our mind, because have the mind of Christ.
We cannot be ignorant of the spiritual. If we want to know something, know what Paul says here. If we want to speak miraculously by the Spirit, say that Jesus is Lord and mean it.
Because that is the greatest miracle God performs - He turns our hearts to Him and empowers us to follow Him.
So Paul tells the Corinthians: instead of worrying about speaking in tongues, understand the miracle that has been worked in you.
If you can say that Jesus is Lord, you have the Spirit of God and you know Christ.
And you have been empowered to follow Him and use what the Spirit has given you.
And that’s what Paul moves on to next.
Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone.
There is one Spirit, and He gives us the gifts. There is one Lord, and He has enabled us to serve Him, each other, and others. There is one God and it is His power that works in each and every one of us to use the gifts we have been given.
And Paul says that there are a variety of gifts. And Paul’s emphasis here is the variety, not the gifts! The Corinthians were preoccupied with the one gift of tongues, and Paul reminds them that there are a whole variety of gifts.
Because there are varieties of service. It can be translated “variety of ministries.” There are different ways the church serves our Lord, and serves each other, and serves the world for the sake of the Gospel.
And God is so good that He gives us the means of carrying out these ministries. He gives us the power to work.
He gives the ministry, He gives the gifts, and He gives the power.
There is gifting, the ministry in which to use the gifting, and the power to use the gifting for ministry.
And why does God provide these things?
To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.
God gives all of this for the common good. For the benefit of each other. For the benefit of the church.
This is the key point here!
Remember, the Corinthians, as we have seen, were not really considering each other at all. Allowing sexual immorality. Dividing over who they identified with. Taking each other to court. Encouraging others to violate their consciences in the name of their individual rights. Not even waiting for each other to share in the Lord’s Table and the love feast.
And we tend to do the same thing.
Many tend to think of church fellowship and commitment as a “personal choice.” I will come when I want to, I will serve when I want to, I will do what I want to when I want to.
That is our default way of thinking since the enlightenment because our idol tends to be ourselves. I am the center of what I do. I am the center of everything for me.
And that’s why we tend to see bad people as people worse than us: I’m the gold standard. That’s why we're all so easily offended now a days - if it isn’t my way, it’s wrong.
But Paul in this section - as elsewhere in his writings - points out how wrong that kind of thinking is. You were not called by God and given the Spirit to make yourself the center of anything.
You cannot without the Spirit say “Jesus is Lord” and mean it. He is the center.
That’s why, at the risk of sounding like a broken record: what we do, we are to do for Christ.
Which means, what we do, we are to do for each other. With each other in mind. We are to consider each other as more important than ourselves because we consider Christ as supremely important.
Christianity is not an individual’s religion. And any true church of God is not an individual’s church.
Neither Montclair Community Church, nor the church in Corinth.
Think about all they were doing wrong, and how Paul corrects them.
Sexual immorality of one man
They thought it was none of their business. And we tend to look at a brother or sister’s sin the same way. “It’s not my business what they do.” But what did Paul say? Yes it is your business! Now do something about it. Do something about that brother’s sin.
Going to court to resolve personal disputes
That’s how we think: my problem with him - that is none of anyone else’s business. Paul says: yes it is! It’s all of your business. And rather than taking our differences to the world to mediate and get what I think I deserve, this issue is for all of you to mediate.
I may think that what I do and how I carry myself out in the world - or in my “personal life” - that that’s none of your business. Yes it is! I need to do what I do for your sake. That is very much your business.
This is what a church is. This is what we are supposed to be and supposed to do.
And it is with this in mind and for this purpose that Paul talks about gifts.
Again, this isn’t about the gifts, its about using them for the common good. For the benefit of everyone else, not my benefit.
So Paul points out that there are a whole host of gifts. We all have gifts, but we don’t all have the same gifts.
And Paul expands on that by giving examples:
For to one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the ability to distinguish between spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues.
Paul says once again that this is all of God. We can’t take these for ourselves. We don’t earn these. They are given by God through the Spirit.
He hammers this point home throughout this section.
These are of God, for God, and they reveal Him.
And he first talks about wisdom and knowledge yet again. And note that utterances of wisdom or knowledge are different from prophecy and all of these are different from the gift of tongues.
As we will see, the gift of tongues is for the purpose of speaking these utterances in other languages so others can understand, or interpreting from other languages for the purpose of others understanding.
Let’s look a little more closely at each of these gifts. And please keep in mind, this is in no way an exhaustive list. Paul has other partial lists elsewhere that are different. He lists other gifts later in this chapter.
And Paul speaks about these specific gifts, because of the specific context he is writing into, and because of the specific errors the Corinthians had made.
So he says:
For to one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit,
A variety of gifts, but the same Spirit.
And Paul is still on the speech, here. There are other types of Spirit-empowered speech than speaking in tongues.
Such as utterances of wisdom and utterances of knowledge.
Paul starts with the wisdom. Because remember where Corinth was. It was in the center of philosophical learning.
And Paul has already addressed the fact that worldly wisdom has affected their church. But he told them: God has made foolish the wisdom of the world and has imparted by the Spirit the true wisdom that had been hidden but decreed by God from before the beginning.
So these utterances of wisdom are given by the Spirit. They correct worldly thinking.
But there are also utterances of knowledge. God will gift some to teach the truth.
Remember the issue here: ignorance. Also remember the issue Paul took with their claim that everyone shared the same knowledge.
But this knowledge comes from the Spirit. That means, if I think I know something, and you think you know the opposite, at least one of us is contrary to the Spirit.
And Paul ties in this knowledge with other types of teaching later:
Now, brothers, if I come to you speaking in tongues, how will I benefit you unless I bring you some revelation or knowledge or prophecy or teaching?
Note all four are grouped together - they are all means of speaking forth God’s Word.
It is speaking the truth of Christ Who is the embodiment of these things:
And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.
Utterances of wisdom and utterances of knowledge are rooted in the revelation of God. They are rooted in what He has revealed in His Word.
They are rooted in the living Word, Jesus Christ.
So there are those given Biblical knowledge and wisdom.
These come from the Spirit.
to another faith by the same Spirit
Now Paul is speaking of various gifts that not all have. So this faith is not saving faith. Every Christian has that.
This is a supernatural endowment of faith for service. Because we can have saving faith, and not be serving. We can have saving faith, yet fail to act in any specific situation like we believe what the writer of Hebrews tells us.
That faith is the assurance of things hopes for, the conviction of things not seen.
In other words, some are gifted in certain situations to believe God and have their hope so firmly set on eternity that they do what they would otherwise not have the ability, or strength, or courage to do.
This is the faith the writer of Hebrews tells us Noah had when he obeyed God’s call to build the ark, or the faith Abraham had when he obeyed God and left his own family not knowing where he was going, because he looked to the inheritance of the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God.
This is faith to take that huge step in obedience, and we don’t always have that. Noah and Abraham didn’t always have it.
It comes from the Spirit for doing great things for God.
to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit
We see gifts of healing used in the Bible.
Christ, Peter, and Paul exercised this gift. We see it prefigured in some prophetic figures of the Old Testament. But it is employed as a means to prove the truth of God.
Jesus Himself said that His miraculous healings were to prove the truth of His teaching. The gift is subordinate to the communication of the truth. Paul will even say that explicitly later in this chapter. Jesus said it when He declined to heal people so He could preach in other places.
Jesus said that what He speaks, He speaks by the Father’s authority, and tells His own disciples to believe on account of the works
The cripple being made to walk so that we would know Jesus could forgive sins
In 2 cor 12.12 - Paul defends his apostleship by referring to his performing such miracles as a sign of an Apostle
Because in the Bible, these miracles of healing are performed as part of evangelistic efforts. As the Gospel spreads to new people.
So some guy who calls himself a “faith healer” with a big tent touching people and making them walk in rural Texas is not this gift. I would say he’s a con artist, in most cases.
But when I hear of missionaries performing miraculous healings deep in Africa or unreached areas of Asia, I praise God. Because that’s how the gift is presented in the Bible.
It accompanies the spread of the Gospel.
Now, that is not to say that God cannot miraculously heal someone today. He absolutely can, and He does. But that is God doing it directly.
But the Spiritual gift of healing is for the propagation of the Gospel.
Paul then lists the rest of the gifts he’s addressing:
to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the ability to distinguish between spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues.
Working of miracles = literally: working of powers
This refers to miracles over nature like walking on water, multiplying food, or raising people from the dead. These are momentary, occasional workings of power that only God has, but that He works through someone else.
And Jesus did this a lot, yes.
But Moses did it. A lot. Elijah raised the widows son. Elisha multiplied cooking oil and made axe heads float.
Peter walked on water. Paul raised Eutychus from the dead.
And once again, these are proofs God provides for His truth.
As we also read in Hebrews about the truth of God:
It was declared at first by the Lord, and it was attested to us by those who heard, while God also bore witness by signs and wonders and various miracles [or powers] and by gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to his will.
This gift - like all spiritual gifts - points to Christ.
It is proof of the truth of Christ.
Like these other gifts. Paul says the Spirit gives:
to another prophecy, to another the ability to distinguish between spirits
Prophecy is the giving of revelation. And there are two ways this happens. One way is through the teaching of God’s revealed Word by those gifted and empowered to do so.
The other way is when God speaks new revelation directly through someone, whether oral or written. This is what Paul is referring to here.
This is why the writers of the Old Testament are all called prophets. This is why the New Testament writers are called prophets.
This is why those who before and after Christ came who spoke new revelation directly from God were called prophets. And, yes, they often predicted the future, but that is not exclusively what prophets do.
They are called by God to give revelation to His people.
And while Paul does not address this here, the kind of prophecy that happened in his day and before, where God gives fresh revelation of Himself, does not occur anymore. The New Testament elsewhere makes clear the the revelation of Christ is the final revelation.
All that has been revealed about Him in His Word, is all that will be revealed until He fully reveals Himself again.
But that is not to say God cannot give someone - again, occasionally and momentarily as He deems it necessary - to reveal new general knowledge. Like when Agabus prophesies of what will happen to Paul in Jerusalem.
And the other side of that is this distinguishing between spirits. This is coupled with prophecy like tongues and interpretation are coupled together, because this refers to the gift to discern true prophecy from false prophecy. What is of the Holy Spirit, and what is not.
This is something Paul encourages the Thessalonians to do.
He says not to despise prophecies, but to test them and follow what is good - what is real.
It is something John encourages the Ephesians to do.
He says not to believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world.
The Spirit empowers some on the occasion of true prophecy to identify it as such, along with the ability to identify false prophecy.
And now Paul gets to the gifts the Corinthians were so eager to have. I think he intentionally leaves until the end to make his point.
The Spirit gives:
to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues.
As I said, Paul doesn’t address exactly what the gift of tongues is. But like healing and miracles, we see tongues - and possibly even interpretation of tongues - in the Bible.
Like on the day of Pentecost:
And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance. Now there were dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devout men from every nation under heaven. And at this sound the multitude came together, and they were bewildered, because each one was hearing them speak in his own language. And they were amazed and astonished, saying, “Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? And how is it that we hear, each of us in his own native language? Parthians and Medes and Elamites and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabians—we hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God.”
It has been argued that the Apostles here were speaking in tongues, and it has been argued that the people from these various countries were hearing - or interpreting - into their own language.
Either way, it is clear that this refers to actual spoken languages.
And what was being spoken of were the mighty works of God.
Or later in Acts, Peter is with the God-fearing Cornelius and his family, Peter preaches the Gospel and:
While Peter was still saying these things, the Holy Spirit fell on all who heard the word. And the believers from among the circumcised who had come with Peter were amazed, because the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out even on the Gentiles. For they were hearing them speaking in tongues and extolling God.
Once again, it may be that the Gentiles were speaking Aramaic, or the Jews heard them speaking in Aramaic. But again, it is a known language.
And this accompanied the preaching of he Gospel.
And they spoke in tongues in order to extol God.
We see later in Acts that when Paul is in Ephesus, he meets some disciples who followed the teaching of John the Baptist. He tells them of Jesus:
And when Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they began speaking in tongues and prophesying.
Again, this accompanied the spread of the Gospel.
And it’s important to note here that they spoke in tongues for the purpose of prophesying.
This is what the Bible teaches about tongues. It is speaking in or hearing actual earthly languages that the person speaking or hearing hasn’t learned. And it is done to prophecy, or speak the truth of God, or speak His praises.
And it is always an accompaniment to the spread of the Gospel.
And the use of the word “tongue” to refer to an actual language is not at all out of the ordinary. Like when the book of Revelation repeatedly speaks of every tribe, people, nation, and tongue.
Or like when we speak in English of someone’s native tongue.
And - like many other gifts - speaking or interpreting in tongues is given when the Gospel is being brought to new places and people. God miraculously removes the language barrier caused by the sin at Babel.
It is part of the church’s mission to reclaim the earth.
And the history in the Bible proves this out, as does church history from the first century on.
But if you disagree with me on what tongues is for whatever reason - or any of these gifts - and I am open to a lively and charitable discussion - it is really irrelevant for the point Paul is making.
So if you want, take your idea of these gifts, and apply that to what Paul is telling the Corinthians.
They are all graces of God, given by God.
They are all to be used to point to Christ.
Not everyone has these gifts and we shouldn’t expect otherwise.
Finally, idolizing any gift is living in ignorance of their purpose and their source.
And this is why Paul ends this passage with this:
All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills.
Paul returns to where he started this section - we are each gifted - we are each empowered by God to serve for His sake.
We are gifted differently. The Spirit apportions - He divides and distributes these gifts - among those in the church.
And more importantly, the gifts are given and worked through us by God the Spirit according to His will - not our will!
And most importantly - whatever the gift or your understanding of it - it is to be used for the benefit of others.
Let’s go back to verse 7:
To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.
Paul calls the use of these gifts a manifestation of the Spirit. It is a breakthrough of God into the world through what we do.
And what is the role of the Spirit?
According to Christ, the Spirit bears witness to Him.
That’s why the Spirit and His manifestation in us, is proof of Who Christ is.
The breaking through of the proof of the Holy Spirit’s power are a testimony to Christ and Who He is - NEVER LOSE SIGHT OF THAT. That’s what these gifts are for.
That means, we show forth Christ when we use our gifts. In a very real way - in a substantial, practical way. We manifest Jesus when we use our gifting.
As we saw earlier, the writer of Hebrews tells us this of the Gospel message:
It was declared at first by the Lord, and it was attested to us by those who heard, while God also bore witness by signs and wonders and various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to his will.
When we use our God-given gifts - whatever your gifts are - it is God bearing witness to the truth of the Gospel through you, all according to His will.
That means we do not use - or neglect to use - our gifts, according to our will.
So I return to my earlier question:
Are you using your God-given gifts to serve the church?
Because whether or not you should isn’t up to you.
And because there is no way to more practically manifest Christ, than to serve Him, His church, and the world with the gracious gifts you have been given through the Holy Spirit.
Jesus is Lord.
We all have to obey our Lord, and serve.
There are a variety of gifts, and a variety of ministries, and God, according to Paul, empowers everyone to be part of that.
Are you?
Because, as I said, this is in no way an exhaustive list. And no matter your gift, when you use it for the benefit of the church, do you know what you’re doing?
You are manifesting Christ for the rest of us.
You are showing forth the truth of the Gospel.
You are shining the light our Lord told us not to hide, but to set high for all to see.
Let us each consider if we’re obedient in this.
If you don’t know opportunities to serve or even what your gifting is, please see me or one of the other elders
Let’s all manifest the truth of our Lord together.
