Lessons from the Corinthian Church Part 8

In this transcription, the speaker discusses the gifts of the Holy Spirit mentioned in 1 Corinthians 12. The main idea is that the speaker wants to emphasize the importance of using these gifts in love and for the benefit of the body. They explain that the gifts are given by the Holy Spirit and that it is not about possessing the gifts, but about allowing the Spirit to work through us. The speaker also discusses the difference between natural and spiritual gifts and the categories of informative gifts, including word of wisdom, word of knowledge, and discerning of spirits. They explain the purpose and significance of each of these gifts. Overall, the speaker wants to encourage understanding and embracing the truth of the gifts of the Spirit, while cautioning against misusing or misunderstanding them. Alright, open your Bibles to 1 Corinthians 12. We are going to look at verse 7 to 11 and then 27 to 31. Ishmael did a fabulous job last week in preaching about the body, the need for each other, the unity that is there, and I want to finish up this chapter specifically talking about the gifts of the Spirit that are listed here. As we focus on these things, as I was preparing, I was thinking, so how high of a view do I want to take? How in-depth do I want to go? Like, where should we cruise in this chapter and over these verses? And as I was looking at the chapter, it came to me that in Paul saying, I don't want you to be ignorant concerning the gifts, that the way that he did that was not actually to describe what each gift is. He spends three verses giving a list of the gifts, but he doesn't actually go into detail of what each one is, and yet he said, I don't want you to be ignorant. So if we look at the chapter as a whole, what is it that he doesn't want us to be ignorant about concerning the gifts? I think we find it in the last verse of the chapter, and something that I have said multiple times throughout this series is that the best gift to be used in is the one that is needed in that moment. Verse 31 says, but earnestly desire the best gifts, and yet I show you a more excellent way. His desire for them not to be ignorant regarding the gifts was a desire to show them how to use the gifts. It was a desire to show them that it's not about what gift the Holy Spirit works through you, but that the Holy Spirit is working through you. It's not about what gift you can possess, because we can't possess any of them. It's the Spirit, the one that gives them, and it's the Spirit, the one who decides when those gifts are manifested and when they're not. So Paul's point in not wanting them to be ignorant was not so much to go into explicit detail of what this is and what this isn't, but to bring them into an understanding that whatever gift you are being used in, do it in love. Do it for the benefit of the body. So we'll go through these. We'll give a basic definition of each of the gifts, and then Paul brings it as he's coming into this topic of love in chapter 13. He, at the last verses, he lists some verses, and he says first, second, third, and fourth, and we're going to gain some understanding about that when we go through it. So one other thing to note when we talk about the gifts, and I started this series by saying this, that the church over the course of church history has done a fabulous job of making this complicated and messing things up, making it weird. I grew up in a church that believed in the gifts of the Spirit, believed in the empowering of the Spirit. I grew up going to a school that was the same, went to college that was very highly involved in the gifts of the Spirit. I have seen weird when it comes to the gifts of the Spirit. I have seen strange. I have seen things that make people go, yeah, that's not God, and in those moments I would tend to agree with them. That's not God, but that doesn't mean that the gift itself is not God, and so we need to understand truth taught badly does not negate truth, or truth lived badly does not negate truth. So what we are looking at in the Word of God is His truth. What happens within Christianity sometimes is we take the things that we don't understand and we say, well, I just don't want to touch it at all. Because, you know, Satan is the great deceiver, right? So he comes up with a counterfeit of everything that God does, and because of a lack of desire to understand, a lack of desire to pursue the knowledge that God would give us through His Word, people have shut themselves off to the truth simply because there is a counterfeit, and that is certainly not what we are to do as God's children. We are to embrace the truth. Embracing the truth, we can then know what the counterfeit is. We can discern what the counterfeit is. We can say, even I understand your heart. You're a little off. You're a little out of order, which is what Paul was doing in this section of Scripture. He didn't call them heathens. He didn't say you've completely missed it. You pagan people. He said you're missing the point. Keep doing what you're doing, but know the motivation behind it. So if we know the truth, if we understand the truth, then the counterfeit will have no place in any type of distraction. A definition of spiritual gifts is the abilities given to believers that exceed human natural abilities. They are supernatural giftings given by God, enabling us to function in a spiritual capacity. Enabling us to function in a spiritual capacity. Now, I want to reiterate that these gifts come when we allow the Holy Spirit to empower us. These gifts will begin to flow through us when we say, Holy Spirit, I don't want you just to live in me, but I receive your power. Jesus said that when we receive the power of the Holy Spirit, that out of our bellies will flow rivers of living water. That there would be an evidence of the Spirit's manifestation in us. And so, as we talk through these gifts and as we understand this definition that it enables us to function, to live, to act in a spiritual capacity, we need to recognize the difference between natural gifts and spiritual gifts, and embrace the empowering of the Holy Spirit to be used. In verse 7, it says that the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all. For to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, to another the word of knowledge through the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing, gifts of healings by the same Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another discerning of spirits, to another different kinds of tongues, and to another the interpretation of tongues. But one and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually as he wills. These nine gifts can be broken up into three different categories, and we're going to look at those different categories and which gifts are in there. The first one that we'll look at are the informative gifts. This would be word of wisdom, word of knowledge, and discerning of spirits. A word of wisdom is a message of wisdom on how to deal with a given situation. But it is not just earthly wisdom. It's not natural wisdom gained through experience. It's wisdom that is revealed supernaturally from the Holy Spirit that gives us a concept of God's mind or purpose or way as it applies to the circumstance. James 1 tells us if we lack wisdom, all we have to do is ask for it. And God will freely give it without condemnation, without reproach, without saying you should know better, without saying no, you've asked for enough. Wisdom is freely attainable. But a word of wisdom goes beyond just this wisdom that we all have access to from God that helps us throughout our lives. A word of wisdom is in a given situation where God speaks to somebody to share with the person in need of wisdom how to approach the situation that they're facing. What is the wise way through it? This also comes to place when we look at the word of God. How can we wisely take the word of God and apply it to the situation that we're facing? A lot of people will open the scripture, point to a verse and say, I claim this verse. This is my verse. This is great. And the Spirit has nothing to do with it. And it's just pulling out of the word of God something that you like. Something that sounds good. Something that makes your heart feel good. But it might not be what God is saying to you in that moment for that specific circumstance. And so we pray, God, I need wisdom in this. But also, Lord, I'll be open to you using somebody to come and share your wisdom with me. It's the ministry of the body. It's the body ministering to itself. The word of knowledge is a message given that reveals information regarding a person, an event, or other circumstance. A message that reveals information regarding a person, an event, or other circumstance. This information would be previously unknown to the individual giving this word of knowledge. It's not general knowledge. It's not something that somebody knew. It's that the Holy Spirit reveals to a person, perhaps even thoughts or conversations that you've had in private. And the Spirit reveals that knowledge in order to, not just to expose you, not to, because, you know, we really don't like it when people know our stuff. We don't want God to be telling other people what's going on with us because there's that difficulty, there's that shame, there's the privacy that we want to have, and yet God will, through the Holy Spirit, inform somebody else that comes to us and says, you know, I was praying and this is what God showed me. And it lays bare everything that you are going through. Why does God do that? To bring freedom. To bring an answer. To bring deliverance. And again, this can apply to the Word of God, how we understand the Word of God, how we use the Word of God. When we're talking about the Word together and we're listening to a sermon or we're trying to encourage somebody, the Spirit will put in us the right message for the right moment for the right situation. The third thing in this category of gifts is the discerning of spirits. It's the ability to detect what is going on in the supernatural realm. It's the ability to distinguish between whether something is of God or something is of Satan. Whether something is true or something is being driven by the counterfeit. He is the great deceiver. It says that Satan shows up as an angel of light. He doesn't show up as something horrible, something that's easily recognizable as false. He shows up looking very true. And this gift is used to be able to discern what is behind the spiritual aspect of what is going on. It is used to discern whether there is a spiritual aspect going on. Sometimes it's just our flesh. Sometimes it's just our selfishness. Sometimes it's not really that it is initiated by an attack of Satan. Now, in that moment, Satan can attack. In that moment, he can come and deceive. But the discerning of spirits is especially useful in the context where the gifts of the Spirit are being manifested. It's prime opportunity for the devil to interject something and bring chaos, which is what happened in the Corinthian church. So the discerning of spirits is not just general discernment, which we should all have, discerning between right and wrong. Hebrews says that solid food is for the mature who have learned to discern between good and evil. So discernment is a part of our lives as believers. It's a naturally spiritual part of our lives that needs to be present. But the gift of discernment is an operation of the Holy Spirit in a moment where there needs to be an understanding of what is going on in the spirit realm. Are you with me? The power gifts. This is the second category. They're called the power gifts. And in this category, we have faith, miracles, and gifts of healing. And it should be noted that miracles and gifts of healing flow in conjunction with the gift of faith. Because when God's doing miracles through you, when you're praying for healings, when you're praying for the miraculous to come about, you've got to back it up with a whole lot of faith. And so a lot of times we'll see these gifts kind of overlaying each other, working in conjunction with each other. And these power gifts must have faith behind them. So this gift of faith is a faith beyond natural faith. It's also a faith beyond saving faith. It's a faith that doesn't doubt but trust God's ability to work. It's beyond the normal level of faith that we should all live at. This faith can be described as a situational faith. There are people who live at high levels of faith that we can look at their lives and we can see, wow, that person has a lot of faith. I admire the level of faith that that person has, but that's still not the gift of faith. That is a person who has grown in faith, who has added to their faith, who has become mature in their faith. But the gift of faith, as I said, is for a situation, for a given circumstance, for a strong answer for God to move in a supernatural way, because no other way will get done what needs to be done. Recently I was listening to, I mentioned this before, a book about Reef Howells. He was an intercessor from Wales, and God used him and his school in an incredible way during the World Wars. And they have documented times where they have prayed in intercession, where they have this gift of miraculous faith was in motion in them, was in action in them, where they prayed through a certain circumstance, and a couple days later a report came from the battlefield that at such and such a time, this group gained a victory in the field where they were fighting. And that time coincided with when they were praying. And this gift of faith in Wales, while the battle was raging thousands of miles away, this gift of faith kept them on their knees, kept them before the throne, interceding, believing that their faith, believing that their prayers, their completely isolated from the actual battle, was going to have an effect. And it did have an effect. This is a supernatural level of faith. Miracles. Miracles are the show of power that exceeds what can be done in the natural. It goes against all the laws of nature. It goes against what makes any sense. It counteracts what has happened or what is happening in the natural, and it counteracts and overthrows what is being done by evil forces. How many times have we heard of people being healed miraculously? And the doctors at the end saying, oh, we don't know what happened, because doctors, most doctors are reluctant to call something a miracle. When I was, how old was I, six or seven, I got hit with a baseball bat and it broke this bone. And went to the emergency room. Six different doctors came in, looked at the x-rays, told my parents of the extensive surgery that was going to have to be done to put my face back together. It was an Easter Sunday. Our church still had Sunday night service, and so after we left the hospital, we went to church. I said, I want to go get prayed for. And so we went, got prayed for, went to the specialist the next day. He again looked at the x-rays, described the surgery that was going to happen. And by Wednesday, God had already started moving on my face. And we went to the doctor on Saturday, and the doctor said, okay, no more surgery. It healed. And my dad said to the doctor, so was it broken or not? Now keep in mind, seven different doctors looked at the x-rays and said, it's broken. And in the end, the guy says, well, I guess it wasn't broken. He had no way of explaining what happened. We have a way of explaining what happened. A miracle happened. So a miracle is something that is a show of power, whether it's healing, whether it is a miraculous door opening. I have another testimony about that. I'll give it at the end of the list of gifts, because it involves multiple gifts. So a miracle is what goes against the law of nature. It's what only God can do. We cannot manipulate a miracle. We cannot manufacture a miracle. Only God can do miracles. Satan can do false miracles. He can do counterfeit miracles. In Mark 13.22, Jesus says, For false prophets will rise and show signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect of God. The third gift in this category of power gifts is the gift of healing. This is the ability to bring supernatural healing to someone. It is not us in any way, shape, or form that performs the healing or the miracle. It is the Spirit of God that does it through us. Our responsibility is to be vessels that the Spirit can use to pray and to believe. The reason, or not the reason, but it is interesting to note that this, along with miracles, is plural. Gifts of healings, which denotes that as there are so many different types of sicknesses, there are also so many different types of ways that the Spirit can bring healing to that person. We do a disservice to ourselves, and we do a disservice to the Holy Spirit when we limit Him in the way that He is able to move and function supernaturally. The third category is the declarative gifts. This is prophecy, tongues, and interpretation of tongues. Prophecy, the definition would be divine disclosure, an edifying revelation from the Spirit, a message that shows what will happen in the future. 1 Corinthians 14, verse 31 says, All may prophesy. This is a gift of the Spirit that anybody who has been empowered by the Spirit, who has received that empowering, that indwelling, that baptism of the Spirit, can be used in. But what is prophecy? Revelation 19 says that the message of Christ is the spirit of prophecy. 1 Corinthians 14 says that prophecy is a message that edifies, exhorts, and encourages. But Jesus also said in John 16, 13, that as the Spirit is moving in us, that He will tell us of things to come. So prophecy can be multiple things. It can be the message of Christ, which some have boiled it down to just preaching. Preaching is prophesying. That's a nice, simplistic definition for those who can't understand or can't fathom or don't want to fathom that God still speaks to His people. It's not that prophecy replaces scripture, because that's the argument as well. If you say you heard a message from God, then the canon of scripture has already been written. We can't add to scripture. No, we can't. We can't add to scripture. Anytime somebody says this is a word from God, it must obey scripture. It must be submitted to scripture. If it doesn't line up with scripture, then we have to really ask the question, is this from God? We need discernment to figure that out. Now, although all may prophesy, in Ephesians 4, it says that Jesus gave gifts to the church, the apostle, the prophet, the evangelist, the pastor and teacher. Just because someone gives a prophetic word doesn't make them a prophet. There's a difference there. All may prophesy, but not all carry the assignment or the anointing of a prophet, and that's for a different discussion. Just know that there is a difference. Tongues. The ability to speak in a language unknown to the person speaking. To give a message in an unknown or unlearned language. Now, on the day of Pentecost, when the Spirit was given, it says that they came out of the upper room, each one speaking a tongue, a language, as the Spirit gave them utterance. This was not a language they had learned. It was not a language that they knew. It says that also those that heard them heard them doing what? Praising God. So it wasn't, in that instance, a prophetic message through the use of tongues. It was glorifying God, but they understood it in their language. In other words, the Holy Spirit moved upon those who were speaking to speak in a language they had not previously understood or learned, and it moved upon those who were hearing and received the interpretation in their own language. So the ability to speak in tongues, this could be tongues that are a known language. Tongues that are a language that perhaps is a dead language that the Spirit will use again. Or it could be a language from heaven. In other words, not used here on earth. A language straight from heaven. But what we have in this gift of tongues is that there must be an interpretation that goes along with it if it is going to edify the body. We'll get into more detail concerning this in 1 Corinthians 14, because Paul takes that whole time, after talking about love, he takes that whole section to distinguish between tongues as a prayer language and tongues as a gift for the edification of the body. Tongues as a prayer language is for personal edification, and that of tongues as a gift of the Spirit is for edification corporately. This gift, of course, will go in conjunction with interpretation of tongues. It doesn't always mean that it's the same person that has given the message in tongues and then gives the translation. It would be somebody who also does not know the language being spoken, but the message that is being spoken is given to that person to be able to speak it in the language of the corporate understanding for edification. This is not simply having an interpreter, as when Pastor Saul comes and Pastor Jose translates for him, that is a natural thing. Pastor Saul doesn't speak English, Pastor Jose does, and Spanish, so he's able to understand what is being communicated and then translate it for us. That could serve for us as a natural example, but that is not what is the gift of speaking in tongues or the interpretation of tongues. This deals with what is unknown. Still in chapter 12, verses 27-31, Paul brings us back into this understanding where he has just spent all these verses, the ones that Ishmael dealt with last week, he spent all of these verses talking about the unity of the body, that the eye cannot say to the hand, I have no need of you, that the nose can't say to the foot, I have no need of you, and all the examples that are given. Paul stresses the unity and dependence of the body on one another. He says earlier that the gifts are given for the benefit of all. When we get into verse 27, in verse 28 as well, where it says first, second, third, we should not read those things as if there is a preeminence of one gift over another, or a hierarchy of one gift over another. There is God's government, there is the anointing and the assignment that God gives where there is structure within his body. But that is different from what Paul is dealing with here, where he is saying it doesn't matter what gift you have. The body needs the gift that the Holy Spirit is going to use you in. The body needs the benefit from whatever gift it is that the Spirit gives you. It's not about who has the most dynamic gift. It's not about who has the most public gift. It's about the Spirit working through us so that the gifts are being manifested for the benefit of each person. So starting in verse 27, it says, Now you are the body of Christ and members individually, and God has appointed these in the church, first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, varieties of tongues. Are all apostles? No. Are all prophets? No. Are all teachers? No. That would be like saying is everybody a hand? No. Is everybody an eye? No. Are all workers of miracles? Do all have gifts of healings? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret but earnestly desire the best gifts? And yet I show you a more excellent way. The more excellent way, remember, are themes that are running through these chapters. One of those themes is love. If it is not done in love, it's out of order. It's out of order. It's misusing the supernatural ability that God gives us through the Spirit. It must be through love. And not like, you know, brother, I'm just telling you this out of love and calling it God. It's a love that is pure, and we'll look at those things in the next two weeks in chapter 13. Earnestly desire the best gifts. So let me end with this example. We had a family in the church that was needing an adoption. They needed this adoption to go through. And the judge that was in charge of that adoption had stated outright that she was against adoption. She wanted to see children restored back to their families. But this child had grown up in these people's home since being an infant. She didn't know her family. There was no restoration to be had there, because her family was this missionary couple. And they had contacted us and they said, you know, we need this to happen. We need the travel documents to come in, because they were getting ready to travel, I think, for Thanksgiving. And wanted to take her home with them. And the mom had said, if God has to change the judge, whatever he has to do, may God do it. And so I was praying and preparing for that service. I'd written my sermon. I was praying over the service. And God showed me, and we could call this a word of knowledge, God showed me that he was going to accomplish what they were praying for. But that it wasn't going to be a different judge. God was going to change the heart of the same judge. And they had also said that they needed it done before Thursday. And the Lord showed me that it would be done before noon on Monday. So this is supernatural insight. This would be, what we say, a word of knowledge. And so we went to church, we called them up, we prayed over them, we worshipped the Lord. And I said, as I prayed, I said, it's not going to be a different judge. Just like the unjust judge that Jesus talked about, who said, I don't fear anybody, much less this woman, but she is wearing me out. Give her what she wants. And so I said, Lord, as you have revealed, it's going to be the same judge. It's going to be before noon tomorrow. The travel documents are going to come in in time for them to travel on Thursday. So there is a combination that there was a word of knowledge, but then it was accompanied with the gift of faith, because we needed a miracle. There was no way it would have happened if it wasn't for a miraculous move of God. For him to miraculously change the opinion of this judge. For him to miraculously get all of the paperwork together so that they could travel four days later. We needed a miracle. Well, to see a miracle, we need faith. But the faith was based upon the word that God had given. And we knew it was him by the way that it was communicated to us. There was confirmation. And sure enough, Monday afternoon, we get the call. The judge changed her mind. She stamped the papers. The adoption is done. Now we're going to get the paperwork so that we can fly on Thursday. The paperwork came through. They were able to travel on Thursday. It was incredible how God did that. The next Sunday, somebody came up to me and said, what did you tap into that you knew that was going to happen? Did you go talk to the judge? Did you intervene in any way, shape, or form? I said, no. I tapped into the Holy Spirit. That was it. And he did all the work. We just have to believe and be the vessel that he uses. Don't worry about what the gift is called. Don't worry about the descriptions of these gifts. Don't worry if he's using you in a word of wisdom or a word of knowledge or what the definition of anything is. Because Paul didn't give us any, which means the Holy Spirit didn't give us any. It was the Holy Spirit that inspired Paul to write this letter. So if the Holy Spirit left out the word for word definition for us so that we would focus on a willingness to be used by him and a willingness to do these things in love, then that is what our focus should be. Amen? I hope this helps in understanding. Let's stand together. We pray every week that the gifts of the Spirit would be manifest in our congregation. That God would use people in these gifts. Now, remember that this is not an exhaustive list. It's just the list that was here. There are other places in Scripture where other gifts are given, are talked about. So again, don't even be concerned if it's one of these nine. Just be a vessel that God will use. Let's pray. Father, we present ourselves to you this evening. We present ourselves to you that you would use us as your instruments of righteousness. That we would be at the ready, Lord God. Always available, Father, for you to empower us to be used to affect somebody's life. Father, may we first be concerned with affecting each other's lives. As your word says in Galatians 6, 10, take every opportunity you have to do good, especially to those who are in the household of faith. Father, use us to encourage each other, to stand in faith together, to see miracles together, to receive, Lord God, the messages that you want to give to us. Father, may we not be deceived by the counterfeit. May we not be led astray, Lord God, by the deceptive words of the enemy. May we not miss out on what you want to do simply because of fear. Father, may we grow and be used by you. Fill us with your spirit, Lord. Empower us by your spirit. I encourage each one of you, if you have never been prayed to be filled with the spirit, if you have never received this empowerment of the Holy Spirit, I want you to pray this week, Holy Spirit, fill me with your power and use me in your gifts. Scripture tells us that God will not deny that prayer. He says in Luke, if you, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask. So, Father, I pray, since you are faithful to your word, that you would hear the prayers and that you would fill us, that you would fill us to overflowing and that you would continue to fill us, Lord God, so that we may be used by you, so that we may impact each other's lives and be impacted by one another, so that also we may be equipped to impact the lost and dying ones. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen.