Gifts That Commission Ministry
Gifts of the Spirit • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Over these last few weeks as we have discussed the gifts of the Spirit, we have taken time to share about how God is revealing His glorious nature through mankind.
Whether that be through the resident gifts you were born with — or whether that be through the manifestation, power gifts we access through the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
Sad to say, many people today do not see these gifts as a means of God revealing His glory through His creation. Instead, they see these gifts as divisive doctrine. The Church is great a dividing itself.
Cessationist Calvinist, Pentecostal, Reformed — almost as if we have taken our notes from the church of Corinth.
12 Now I mean this, that each one of you is saying, “I am of Paul,” and “I of Apollos,” and “I of Cephas,” and “I of Christ.”
13 Has Christ been divided? Paul was not crucified for you, was he? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?
Christ has not been divided, evangelical, pentecostal, Baptist, Wesleyan, Methodist — We have one Savior who’s name is Jesus Christ.
Historic Creeds and Confessions Nicene Creed
…begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made.
Who, for us men for our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the virgin Mary, and was made man; and was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate; He suffered and was buried; and the third day He rose again, according to the Scriptures; and ascended into heaven, and sits on the right hand of the Father; and He shall come again, with glory, to judge the quick and the dead; whose kingdom shall have no end.
The thing we have to understand about gifts is this — the purpose of the gifts has been hardwired into the gifts themselves. When speaking of the resident gifts — Paul said:
4 For just as we have many members in one body and all the members do not have the same function,
5 so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another.
6 Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, each of us is to exercise them accordingly: if prophecy, according to the proportion of his faith;
And when speaking of the manifestation gifts Paul again said:
12 For even as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ.
13 For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.
14 For the body is not one member, but many.
The gifts that God has given to His church are given to bring the body into a spirit of oneness, unity, and wholeness.
The Five Fold Gifts
The Five Fold Gifts
But there is more — there is more. And that is what I want us to look at today. Another set of beautiful gifts that God has granted to His body. For this set of gifts we will turn to the book of Ephesians chapter four.
Paul has spent the first three chapters of Ephesians dealing with:
The doctrine of predestination and election
The doctrine of redemption and atonement
The revelation and mystery of Gods will
The doctrine of the Holy Spirit
A total of 14 doctrinal topics — again, all stuff that the church loves to divide, debate, and deliberate about.
But he opens chapter four with a strong conjunction (Therefore). In other words, in light of all of these things, because of all that I have shared, with everything in these prior chapters in mind — do this. Do what Paul?
1 Therefore I, the prisoner of the Lord, implore you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called,
In the english language these two words “calling” and “called” are nearly identical, carrying the same root. But in the Greek they cary a significant weight.
The Word calling is GK klesis (implying a new relationship — situation, station in life
The Word call is GK kaleo (to refer to the proper name of something - to summon, an invitation.
We could read Ephesians 4:1 this way
“Walk worthy of your new relationship and station in life, by which you have been given a new name and appropriately called.”
And for so many of us, we read that and instantly begin to this of what we do! I’ve heard so many great lectures at pastors conferences where we are implored to “walk worthy” of our calling” — dealing with our integrity, our personal time with Jesus and such. Great sermons, needed. But I am here to tell you today, that Pauls preaching this not in the context of pastoral ministry, that would be in his pastoral epistles - 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus. Nor is this in the context of living worthy of your call to be an electrician, plumber, pastor, school teacher — but rather worthy of your call to be an individual member of a much larger body of Christ.
2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing tolerance for one another in love,
3 being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
The word Bond is GK syndesmos meaning (joint, ligament, sinew, band and bond.) In the
What is Paul saying? He is telling us that our “new identity” is The Body of Christ, that when summoned by God the whole body should surrender to the Head, with humility, gentleness, patience, and tolerance — work as one.
4 There is one body and one Spirit, just as also you were called in one hope of your calling;
5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism,
6 one God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all.
Now, Paul does something unique in verse 7, he ties all the gifts together.
7 But to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ’s gift.
To each is given a “Charis” — Stella talked about this two weeks ago. The Faithlife Study Bible says of Ephesians 4:7
Faithlife Study Bible Chapter 4
In this passage, Paul focuses on God’s gifts that build up the body of Christ (the Church).
But unto every one of us is given grace; either by grace he means gifts which are not common to all believers, but proper to some, according to their various functions and places in the church,
In other words — Paul is telling us you all a have a resident gift, you all have access to the manifestation gifts according to the amount, or volume that Christ has portioned — as Stella said last week — we all may have varying amounts of these gifts.
Now, let’s jump to verses 11 and 12.
11 And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers,
12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ;
Here Paul names five specific gifts:
Apostle, Prophet, Evangelist, Pastor and Teacher. These are what we have come to know as “Office Gifts”, or “Five Fold Gifts”. These gifts, just like the others, are unique in their function.
For Church Leadership
For Church Leadership
These five gifts have a specific function and role, and their delegation is specific. Paul helps us to know this when he says:
11 And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers,
Paul is letting us know, God has not given these gifts to everyone. Rather, God has hand selected from the foundations of the earth, men and women to carry this office in His church. C.Peter Waggoner in his book - Your Spiritual Gifts Can Help Your Church Grow says:
When it speaks of apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers — the focus is directed toward individuals who have been recognized in such official positions. Usually such people have been ordained or commissioned with a public laying on of hands.
One of the greatest mistakes made throughout church history — still prevalent today, is that we elevate men and women to the position of church leadership without assessing if they have even been gifted by God for the role. Just because you have the motivational gift of a teacher does not qualify you to lead a church. Just because you operate in the prophetic does not mean you are called to church leadership. As a result of this mistake — men and women are crushed under a weight they are not graced to lead — churches are remaining in an infantile state for lack of graced nourishment. We must understand that church leadership is a grace from God, not a skill we are taught.
Equipping Gifts
Equipping Gifts
The second thing we need to know is that these are equipping gifts. That word equip in the Greek means: to complete furnishing, a preparation or training that fully qualifies. The five gifts are five arena's that need multiplication.
But let’s look at this list of five offices and consider what Father God has done here. There are three outward ministry expressions, framed by two directional anchors.
The Structure of the Fivefold
The Structure of the Fivefold
1. The Outer Anchors of this five fold list are Apostle and Teacher. These two gifts define direction and doctrine.
Apostle — What God Is Doing (Forward Movement)
The word apostle is not a Christian word that means you are going to take the message of Christ to foreign nations and plant 200 churches, be imprisoned, write the 67th book of the Bible from a jail cell. But it is a specific gift for men and women graced by God for the purpose of carrying a message. There are three specific moments in the Gospels when Jesus sent his disciples ahead of Him -
Jesus sends the 12 ahead of Him into Galilee — Luke 9:2
Jesus sends the 12 ahead of Him into Galilee — Luke 9:2
2 And He sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God and to perform healing.
Jesus sends the 70 ahead of Him into Samaria
Luke 10:2
Jesus sends the 70 ahead of Him into Samaria
Luke 10:2
9 and heal those in it who are sick, and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’
Jesus sends two ahead of Him into Jerusalem
4 This took place to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet:
5 “Say to the daughter of Zion, ‘Behold your King is coming to you, Gentle, and mounted on a donkey, Even on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden.’ ”
This reveals to us the significant role that the apostolic office caries. The apostolic carries:
Vision - the Kingdom Is Near - Luke 9
Foundation - Building a church Jesus can come back for. Luke 10
The Apostolic office sees everything through the Kingdom lens. For this reason Paul rightly said:
28 And God has appointed in the church, first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, various kinds of tongues.
Ensuring that the church would be built, not upon the foundation of peoples needs, prophetic ministry, evangelism, or doctrine. All vital to the church — but the foundation is — The Kingdom is near!
Teacher — What God has said (Doctrinal Stability)
The second bookend found in the five fold office list is Teacher. While the Apostle if forward looking, focused on what God is doing, the Teacher is focused more on doctrinal stability — what God has said.
1 Let not many of you become teachers, my brethren, knowing that as such we will incur a stricter judgment.
Again, this role is an appointment from God for the church. This is not a learned function, this is not a motivational gift. And you will find that to be true when you sit under the instruction of a true Five Fold Teacher. What is the difference? It is how that Word grows, develops, and produces within the spirit of the recipient.
13 For this reason we also constantly thank God that when you received the word of God which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe.
Verse 11 says they fed this word to the church of Thessalonians as a father would feed his own son. And this is the grace of the Five Fold teacher. No other teacher can teach the Word of God as five fold office teacher, becuase it is a grace granted by God to fill the spiritual stomach of the church with His truth to bring the church into unity.
13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.
2. The Middle Expressions: Prophet, Evangelist, Pastor
2. The Middle Expressions: Prophet, Evangelist, Pastor
These are the relational and functional expressions that activate the body.
Prophet — Spiritual Sensitivity
Prophet — Spiritual Sensitivity
* Discerns what God is saying now
* Calls alignment
* Activates hearing God
Equips the church to:
* Hear God
* Respond to God
* Stay aligned
Evangelist — Missional Movement
Evangelist — Missional Movement
* Reaches the lost
* Carries urgency
* Mobilizes outward focus
Equips the church to:
* Share the gospel
* Reach people
* Engage mission
Pastor — Care and Formation
Pastor — Care and Formation
* Shepherds
* Nurtures
* Stabilizes
Equips the church to:
* Care for one another
* Build community
* Walk in maturity
What’s Your Proximity To The Five Fold?
The fivefold ministry does not exist to do the ministry— it exists to equip the church to do the ministry. So let me ask you plainly—what is your proximity to the fivefold? Are you standing at a distance, just observing what God is doing? Are you engaged, allowing yourself to be shaped and equipped? Or have you stepped into the place God designed for you—where you are actively ministering, using what He has placed inside of you? Because the goal of the fivefold was never to create a stage—it was to build a body. And when the body begins to function, when every part comes alive, the church becomes powerful, unified, and unstoppable. This is your moment to move closer—not just to the message, but to your calling.
