Spiritual Gifts #2

Recap

The spirit brings us gifts

Our gifts are for the common good [edification] (they are to be given)

All gifts have value and importance to the body

We can’t get caught up in our definition of belonging

Paul continues

1 Corinthians 12:29–14:1 NIV

29 Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? 30 Do all have gifts of healing? Do all speak in tongues? Do all interpret? 31 Now eagerly desire the greater gifts. And yet I will show you the most excellent way. 1 If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing. 4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. 8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. 11 When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. 12 For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. 13 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love. 1 Follow the way of love and eagerly desire gifts of the Spirit, especially prophecy.

Gifts apart from love are nothing.

Apart from the loving thing, and apart from God (who is love) and Holiness (Which is the other side of the coin) we are just making a bunch of noise.

How do we know what our gifts are?

Love reveals our gifts. Apart from love we are just deceiving ourselves about our gifts. We can’t know what our gifts really are apart from love

Love is a choice. We have the ability to do the loving thing.

Love is the essential

The more we neglect love, the more the body suffers. The more the world suffers.

By not loving we are saying “I don’t need you, and I don’t belong”, but when we love all parts are edified.

Challenge

What is the loving thing to do?

Who, in your life, needs overt intentional love this week?