Unity in Diversity

Introduction

The Detroit News carried a humorous little story about Bill Cosby's aged mother that illustrates how useless gifts are unless they are used. She had been raised in poverty, and the family had very little money as Bill was growing up. As a result, she never had modern conveniences and had gotten accustomed to doing things the hard way. When the children were old enough to get jobs, they often gave their mother appliances as Christmas gifts to make her life easier. But she wouldn't use them. Bill especially remembered that after a while his mother had two or three toasters. But she left them in their boxes and put them on top of the refrigerator. At breakfast she would still do the toast in the oven. If the boys protested, she would say, "Leave them on the refrigerator. I'm used to doing it the old way."

I can attest to the truth of this story as my grandmother was the same way for quite a while when it came to things such as technology and appliances. After she “gave into” modern things such as computers, cell phones and appliances, she realized that these things made her life much easier for the most part (technology is not perfect by any means!). She could do things in half the time and talk to her grandchildren face to face through her cell phone instead of having to wait to see us at our next family gathering. You could say that these things helped her get through some difficult times (including losing her husband). Spiritual Gifts are similar in that they are things that help us in our daily lives. They help the life of the church and they aid in our evangelizing of the lost. While we sometimes can use them incorrectly (for our own glory), they are not taken away from us simply because we mess up. Tonight we are going to be looking at in order to see what Paul has to say about Spiritual Gifts and how they are to be used by the church.

We looked at last Sunday night, and tonight we are going to look at the Purpose, Plan, Personality and Practice of these Spiritual Gifts. Please turn in your copy of God’s word to as we continue our study on Spiritual Gifts.

1 Corinthians 12:1–11 ESV

1 Now concerning spiritual gifts, brothers, I do not want you to be uninformed. 2 You know that when you were pagans you were led astray to mute idols, however you were led. 3 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. 4 Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; 5 and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; 6 and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone. 7 To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. 8 For to one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, 9 to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, 10 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. 11 All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills.

Purpose of Gifts (1-3)

Gifts are useless unless we know how to use them! We talked about the purpose of spiritual gifts last Sunday night as we looked at and saw that Spiritual Gifts are given to us from God. We are all given at least 1 of these gifts and we are tasked with using that gift within the church and outside of it in order to reach other people for Christ! In these opening verses, Paul says that he does not want Believers to be unaware about these gifts as they were led astray before they came to know Christ. Paul uses their past to contrast life in Christ. He is showing that it was easy for them to be led astray to false, mute idols because they did not have discernment because that is a gift from the Holy Spirit (as he will show in the coming verses). In these opening 3 verses, it seems as though Paul lays out various religious experiences. Pagans being led astray, Jews rejecting Jesus Christ and a Christian who confesses Jesus as Lord! Paul is not saying that everyone who says “Jesus is Lord” is saved and led by the Spirit but those who speak with conviction and under allegiance of the Holy Spirit. For Paul, everything depends upon how someone aligns themselves with Jesus Christ. You are either with or against Jesus. There are not 2 Lords or gospels but 1. You are either of Christ and use your gifts to glorify Him or you are against Christ and have no spiritual gift inside of you.

As we talked about last week, the purpose of our Spiritual Gifts is to glorify God and expand the Kingdom. As a non-Christian you are led to various idols and false teachings because you lack a firm foundation. Think of the analogy of the house built on sand and how it lacks a solid foundation whenever a storm comes and the flood water rises. We see this seemingly every year when a hurricane hits the coast of Florida. Millions of people are forced to evacuate their homes and seek high ground and shelter because their homes lack a firm foundation and are at risk of collapsing due to the storm. Likewise, non-believers are led astray due to philosophy and society telling them that there are multiple ways to heaven or maybe that heaven doesn’t even exist! As Christians we know that these “idols” are useless and pointless, however people keep on coming to these wells that never satisfy time and time again. Paul goes on in verse 3 to say that no one speaking with the Spirit of God will say that “Jesus is cursed”. Likewise, no one can say that “Jesus is Lord” without with the prompting of the Holy Spirit. Like we talked about last Wednesday night with the church in Ephesus, we must keep our eye out for false teachers! We must see what they say and how they live their lives.

If people live their lives and bear fruit and we can see the Spirit of the Lord active in their life then we see that they are truly born again. On the other hand, if someone completely rejects Jesus then we see that they are not filled with the Holy Spirit and are on the opposite side of the coin. We must understand that there are false teachers out there, however one of the ways that we can “test” if they are genuine or not is by examining their gifts and to see if the Spirit is inside them.

Plan for Gifts (4-6)

In these verses, Paul illustrates that there is 1 God who provides different manifestations of His Spirit. There is similarity and difference in these verses. All of our Spiritual gifts come from the same Spirit, however they are manifested differently in our lives. Think of all the ways that God has revealed Himself to us. We see God’s greatness in creation. We see His presence in our lives each and every day. Some people have encounters with Christ in their dreams (Muslims, especially). Others see the love of God whenever the church acts as the hands and feet of Jesus. Just because there are different things that reveal the nature and love of God, it does not mean that there are multiple “Gods”. There is 1 God but different manifestations of Him. Think about what would happen if we witnessed a miracle in our congregation. There would be 1 action however there would many different accounts of the story. Likewise, the Holy Spirit manifests itself in our lives in different ways even though it comes from the same place.

I mentioned last week that sometimes we desire to have a different gift than the one that we actually possess. The reason that we are not called to wish or hope for one gift over another is because they all come from the same source. In the secular world, people often have “dream jobs” that they aspire to get one day. As a child, my “dream job” was to be a professional baseball player. As I grew into my teenage self, that dream shifted to wanting to become a neurosurgeon. There was nothing wrong with these aspirations, however in desiring these jobs I was searching for something that would be “MY” dream. In the secular world, this makes sense. For the church of God, though, this cannot exist. Our hearts desire must be to fulfill God’s purpose rather than fulfill our personal dream. One Biblical scholar noted that:

“Divine gifts become opportunities and obligations for service. The proper response to receiving such gifts is not boasting, which in effect suppresses the acknowledgment that these qualities stem from God’s endowment, but sharing God’s gifts with the whole church and world. We are to exercise stewardship of the varied gifts that God has granted with the result that the honor and praise offered to God increases.”

Verse 5 and 6 illustrate further the point that there are various ministries that the church does and different effects of the Spirit yet there is 1 God from whom all things come! If the President of the United States were to come up to you and tell you that you are now the US Ambassador to the nation of Liechtenstein (one of the smallest countries in the world with a population of just over 30,000 people), you would feel honored to be given this job by the President. Even if you had spent your entire life building up an impressive resume to be a government diplomat, you would serve in this position with the best attitude possible. As Christians, we are given an assignment from the Creator of the Universe. Our task is not necessarily to move across the ocean as in the example above, although it could be. Our task is simple: submit to His plan. Every Christian is to be respected because we all have the same assignment and we are serving a royal and holy service from the King of Kings.

So, you might ask, what is the plan for these gifts? Simple. For the gifts to be operating in the local church as God desires. Paul points out in that when this happens, the outside world will see the presence of God in our community and they will fall down and worship Him. The gathering of Christians on a Sunday morning is not simply a gathering of human beings but an activity in which God Himself works in our lives as we encourage one another and point one another towards Him.

Personality of Gifts (7-10)

There are 3 different types of gifts mentioned in verses 7-10. As we see in the coming slides, there are a variety of gifts mentioned in this passage and elsewhere in scripture! The 3 different types of gifts mentioned here are Support gifts, Service gifts, and Sign gifts.

The first gifts we see here in are Words of wisdom and knowledge. Something worthy to note about a “word of wisdom” is that it is the exact opposite in Greek as “wisdom of word” which would mean clever human speech. There were some individuals who could speak very convincingly in an attempt to boost their own credibility and empty the cross of Christ (as we see in )

1 Corinthians 1:17 NASB95

17 For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel, not in cleverness of speech, so that the cross of Christ would not be made void.

This gift of wisdom seems to mean a gift of speech that is given from the Spirit. Now this does not mean that wisdom and knowledge are not given to all Believers! The distinction here with this gift is that a special manifestation of this gift is given to some individuals so that the whole congregation can benefit! Sometimes knowledge can seem like a bad thing. Some individuals say that they are “too smart” for God or that they have figured out a new way to live their life because they discovered. What we see with this gift is not worldly wisdom but godly wisdom. If we look at the life of Solomon in the book of 2nd Chronicles we see that he was the wisest man in the entire world and he was able to put that wisdom to both religious practice and secular situations. That is the gift of wisdom and knowledge from the Holy Spirit. Something that helps out the church and something that can be used to benefit non-Christians as well!

The gift of faith is yet another interesting gift to talk about because as Believers, we all must have faith in our relationship with God! I think that we can all think of a person that has gone through an extremely difficult circumstance and remained faithful to God (Job, for example). These individuals are given the gift of faith and they are able to help show others how to persevere in difficult situations and remain faithful to God. The next couple gifts, gifts of healing and miracles, are thought to have been in reference to something that the reader of his letter would understood. There are some denominations that still believe in these miraculous healings and things such as that coming from their pastor or leader. Thankfully, God is in control and He is the great physician and can do all things. With that said, though, most scholars believe that these gifts were meant to be understood as things for the Corinthian church alone, not for us today. God still accomplishes miracles and healings, however most people would agree that the “gift” of miracles is no longer a “Spiritual Gift” in the 21st century.

Power was a key term in Paul’s arguments in both Romans and 1 Corinthians. The message of Christ Crucified is the “power of God”. Paul’s preaching was a demonstration of the Spirit and “power”. Paul shows how we can be filled with the spirit whenever we proclaim the truth of Christ Crucified. The end result of us doing this, though, is the edification of the church and confirming our faith in God instead of merely looking wise among other men and women.

The next set of gifts are, prophecy, distinguishing between spirits, speaking and interpreting tongues. As illustrated in the slides above, there are fleshly and satanic counterfeits to our spiritual gifts. One of the greatest things that some people are given, though, is the ability to distinguish between these gifts. Some people are given the ability to simply be able to discern what is of God and what is fake. There is a huge need in our world today for this gift as there are many forces that might seem good to our ear but they oppose the work of the Holy Spirit. As we mentioned on Wednesday night, the Ephesian church was good about testing the teachings of various prophets and teachers. Many times they found what these prophets to be saying was in fact false! We are called to do the exact same thing today.

The largest growing denomination of Christianity is Pentecostals. It is estimated that there are over 1 billion “charismatic” Christians around the world as of 2019. This group developed in the 20th century and has grown exponentially in the decades sense. Many of these believers still subscribe to traditional orthodox teachings that baptist and other groups believe in. One of the biggest differences, though, is that the Pentecostals strongly believe in speaking in tongues. Some even say that doing so proves that you are in fact a child of God. The Charismatic movement has expanded and grown so much that it now includes various false teachings and heresies such as Jesus being both God and the Holy Spirit (not a trinity) and the ever growing “prosperity gospel”. In this gospel, its proponents state that God only wants your best and He desires you to be successful and prosperous. Some go on to say that if you just give me some money, I will pray God’s blessing on you and you will be blessed… Sounds an awful lot like the Roman Catholic church in the Dark Ages.

Among the theological differences shared between Pentecostals and Baptist, one of the largest stems from speaking in tongues. Speaking in tongues seemed to be a large problem for the early church and that is why Paul makes mention of it here and he stresses that if someone is going to do this publically, there must be a translator! Paul seems to make the point that speaking in tongues is communication between that person and God but it is not edifying to the church body in the same way that a sermon or Bible lesson is. Because of that, many Christians believe that speaking in tongues is something that should not be done in church, however, Pentecostals disagree. The key for us to realize here is that yes, according to Paul, this is a spiritual gift when used properly. Are these the same “tongues” spoken today that were spoken back in Corinth? I don’t think there is any way we can know. Because of that, I believe that there is no place for this in the church pulpit today. One of the things that the Corinthian church got in trouble with was being very passionate about their gift and many idolized the gift of speaking in tongues. For whatever reason, I believe, that passion for speaking in tongues remains today. All too often, if we look at the chart on the screen, we see that what results from these phenomena are a boasting in our own gifts rather than what the Holy Spirit has given to us.

The warning that I want to give to us tonight is that, while we might have some disagreements on the continued use of speaking in tongues with our Christian counterparts, we must remain understanding that our focus in using our gift/s must be the glorification of Jesus Christ and His church rather than the boasting in our own accomplishments. We cannot use our gifts to manipulate people into a knee-jerk decision to pray and receive Jesus Christ as Lord, it doesn’t work that way! Discipleship, as we talked about this morning, is a lifelong process and it takes work and effort! The problem with some of these gifts is that they, if used incorrectly, can bring about emotional responses from people. That cannot be our goal in using our gifts. Our goal must be the edification, the building up, of the church in knowing the things of God and proclaiming His truth and His gospel.

Practice of Gifts (11)

We must realize that we receive gifts to use them and put them into practice. What good would it be to receive a million dollars and to do nothing while a family member loses their house due to not being able to pay their monthly mortgage payments? It would be useless and selfish on your part. Likewise, we are given a gift from the King of Kings! This gift is given to us so that we might use our gift to lift high the name of Jesus Christ and help those around us both in the church and outside of it.

We must keep in mind that the same spirit that gives us our gift gives other people their gift, because of that we cannot get jealous of others and their giftedness because we see that our gift has a purpose in the Kingdom of God. If God is perfect, all-knowing and all powerful, don’t you think that His will is better than our plan? We must submit to whatever gift we have and we must seek to use it in whatever way possible. We cannot sit on our gift when there is a huge need in our church and our world.

Conclusion

Just as Paul started out his message by stating that the world is being led astray by mute idols, our world is being led astray by idols as well. The problem with our world is that they believe that they are correct in their assertion that God is no longer necessary for life. “Science” has taken the place of “God”. What we must do with our spiritual gifts is to show them that we are different people because of the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives and our gifts affirm not only our salvation but the fact that there is a God! When we use our gifts, we don’t just do so because we are commanded to, we do so in order that the glory of God might be revealed to all people.