Romans 12:3-8 (Grace Gifts, Pastor Jeff Kliewer)

The Reliability of Scripture and the Witness of Wes Huff

Spend more time thinking about what you said. Thank you for that. And by the way, guys, if you don't get my Thursday email that I send out, just send me an email. You can send it to cornerstone at cornerstoneSJ .org, and I can add you to the email list.

All right, guys, we are so blessed. Let's get into the word. Let's pray. Father God, thank you so much for the grace gifts. Thank you for my brother Ivan and bringing that word to us this morning about coming together, about the body of Christ as one.

United with you and united with each other, we thank you, God, for your word. And now I pray that as I stand here to preach, your Holy Spirit would come and fill me and give me the words to say. Every heart in this room needs to hear from the living God.

And I pray that your word now would speak to every heart, change us from the inside out to make us more like Christ. In Jesus' name, Amen. Wes was a 12-year-old boy growing up on the mission field in the Middle East, in a Muslim country.

At 12 years old, the year was 2004 when he got pneumonia. And recovering from pneumonia, he went into his bedroom and took a nap. It was January 8th. And when he woke up from his nap, he was paralyzed from the waist down.

There was some kind of neurological condition related to this virus or whatever was going on in his body that left him completely incapacitated. He was fully paralyzed, no motion, waist down, for exactly one month.

And at that time, the Lord completely restored him. He noticed that he was healed when he actually got up and walked from bed to his wheelchair and realized, wait a minute, I'm walking. There was no sign left of the paralysis when he went to the doctors.

There was no sign of atrophy of his muscles after that month, which the doctors declared was an absolute miracle. Anybody ever broken an arm and you had it in a cast or something? My arm came out so skinny after taking a, not that it's not already skinny, but after taking the cast off, the muscles had atrophied.

But by God's grace, Wes was fully healed. Not long after this, his family moved back to Canada in the Toronto area where they had been sent out as missionaries. And he grew up, went to college in Toronto, was running track for their team and planning to become a police investigator.

But what he encountered on the college campus was many people, Muslims, Mormons, Hindus, Sikhs, atheists that altogether sought to undermine the veracity of the Bible. They would claim that the Bible was a developed myth and that it drew on other religions and other traditions and couldn't be trusted, that it had been changed in translation and was only the work of man.

And so Wes Hough began to study the ancient manuscript and the more that he learned about the New Testament and the Old Testament and the other religions of the world and their texts, the more he developed a passion for that field.

He went on to get a PhD in Semitic languages. Paleo Hebrew language and Sumerian and Akkadian and all the languages of the Middle East where he himself had been a missionary with his family. Enter Billy Carson.

Billy Carson is an online phenom, kind of like Richard Dawkins and the other prominent atheists that always attack the Bible. Billy Carson claims to believe in God, but he does not believe the Bible. He thinks that Christ is a consciousness that all of us have and he attacks the Bible relentlessly, casting aspersions on all of the stories.

In fact, he has gained such a following that some of his videos have millions of views and so many young people have deconstructed away from Christianity because they see videos like this online. Not long ago, just three weeks, there was a podcaster who had Billy Carson on his podcast, but 24 hours before, he called his friend Wes Huff, the missionary kid who grew up and got his PhD in Semitic languages and studied these things in Toronto.

He ended up coming on a call with this Billy Carson. Right away, Billy Carson started ripping into the Bible. He said, well, the Enuma Elish and these other documents prove that what the Bible says is really only a developed tradition.

In fact, in the Egyptian Bible, there is no crucifixion of Jesus. That comes much later in the King James Version. Wes Huff sat quietly with his PhD, listening to what was being said, and then with words seasoned with salt, speaking very respectfully because church, listen, in the grain offering of the Old Testament, the grain offering always had to be filled with salt.

That was a picture of how we are to offer our words, seasoned with salt. We tell the truth, but we speak the truth with love. We seasoned our words with salt. In this way, Wes Huff began to answer Billy Carson in the video that was being recorded.

He said, when you refer to the Egyptian Bible, do you mean Codex Sinaiticus? Oh, yes, yes. That's the one I'm talking about. You would know, Princeton theologian. Codex Sinaiticus, which dates to the 400s AD.

Wes Huff said, well, here's a facsimile of it. As he reached back behind him on his shelf and opened it and demonstrated, here's Matthew 27 from Codex Sinaiticus, which describes the crucifixion of Christ.

And here's John 19, which does the same. And he demonstrated by a word of knowledge, a spiritual gift of knowledge, that what Billy Carson was saying was nothing but internet dribble. What he himself had heard and passed on.

Here was an expert in the languages who had access to the documents and began to prove time and again that the Bible is reliable. Billy Carson said, oh, I misspoke. I didn't mean Codex Sinaiticus. I was referring to the Gospel of Barnabas.

To which Billy Huff was, I mean, sorry, Wesley Huff was able to show that the Gospel of Barnabas is nothing but a forgery, as is the Gospel of Jesus' wife and so many of the internet lies that go about.

He showed from the evidence, from facsimiles of the documents, exactly what was the case. It was amazing because after this happened, Billy Carson tried to suppress the video. That night, he showed up at 2 30 in the morning at the podcaster's house, pounding on the door, scaring his family with a handwritten cease and desist letter to try to keep this video from going online.

Well, what happens when you try to suppress information? It's called the Barbara Streisand effect, if you've heard of it. What ends up happening is it builds momentum and once it does reach the light of day, it receives way more attention than it would have in the first place.

And so just last night I watched Joe Rogan, which I never do, but because Wes Huff was on it, I saw a video with six million views and Wes Huff was being interviewed about this exchange. It was amazing because Joe Rogan would say, well, what about the Dead Sea Scrolls?

Weren't those different than like what we have in the King James Version? Wes Huff was able to say that the earliest version before the Dead Sea Scrolls was the Masoretic text, which comes from the Middle Ages.

And that Masoretic text of the Old Testament proved to be word for word the same as the Great Isaiah Scroll, which predated the Masoretic by 1 ,000 years. For 1 ,000 years, nothing changed. And that proof of the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls validates the truth of our faith.

Now, I have a question for you. What if Wesley Huff were to just emote or begin to yell and carry on? Would he have been able to defeat Billy Carson in that debate? Absolutely not. What he needed is what is called a word of knowledge.

It is a spiritual gift that at some point in his life, in Wesley's life, as a young man at college, the Spirit of the Living God put a fire in his heart and he began to study and study and research, devoting his very life to the text of God's Word.

And when called upon by the Spirit of the Living God, he preached the truth in such a way that it is reaching millions of people. I'm sure today, hundreds of thousands of people more will see these videos.

It is how the church advances. The church advances in the world by spiritual gifts, by the Word of Truth and the Spirit of God, Spirit and Truth. Here you have a man named Wesley Huff, whom God chose to use to do a mighty work, to tear down the high places of this culture.

Every Mormon attack, every Muslim attack, every atheist attack against the veracity of this Word is right now crumbling online because of God's power in the Gospel. It is through a man, an ordinary guy who was paralyzed as a 12-year-old for one month, met his God as a 12-year-old in the healing that he received, defended the faith at college, and has since been chosen by God to have a grace gift.

Romans 12 and the Call to Humble, Renewed Living

A grace gift. Turn with me to Romans 12, verses 3 to 8. This will be the first thing that Paul says about specific application in the Christian life. Romans 1 to 11 was theology. Romans 12, 1 and 2 is practical application of that theology.

Romans 12, 1 and 2 is an overview of everything that will follow for the rest of the book. A very important transition, a therefore. Having laid down the great doctrines of Christianity, the theology of Romans 1 to 11, in chapter 12, Paul will transition to say, now live this way.

Christian, this is what you are to make of this theology, and he says three things in verses 1 and 2. One, you ought to be motivated by the mercies of God. Mercies of God is a phrase that summarizes the 11 chapters that went before about total depravity and justification by faith and sanctification, election, and the future destiny of Israel.

All of that theology is summarized by that phrase, mercies of God. What Paul is doing here is motivating us to live for Christ. He's saying it's not like a hamster wheel that you have to keep running on to try to get somewhere but never do.

It's not obeying a law to please God. Rather, the mercy of God was freely given in Christ. You have received grace and now live with grateful hearts. Be thankful. The mercies of God is your motivation.

There's a countervailing force, and that's the second thing he talks about. Do not be conformed to this world, chapter 2, verse 2. That is like a current, an undertow in the ocean that moves you along to be like the world when you don't realize it.

That countervailing force is against you. The world is trying to press you into a mold, but you are motivated by grace, the mercies of God to resist that pull from the world. But there's a third thing he says in verse 2, and that is it's not enough to be motivated to do right.

You also have to know what right is. You must have discernment. So he says, be transformed by the renewal of your mind that by testing you may discern the will of God. It's very important to remember that the will of God here refers to God's revelation.

His revealed will, also called his preceptive will, meaning the precepts of the Bible which teach you what to do, or the prescriptive will, what's prescribed for us to do. It's not the perfect will of God, as if God has aspirations of some great thing that he wants to do, but he's limited by your choices.

That's Wesleyan theology, the perfect versus the permissive will. Throw that in the garbage. The will of God in the Bible is about the secret will of God, which he will accomplish, and the revealed will.

Here it is, the revealed will. And what follows now from verses 12 -3, all the way to the end of the book, are specific applications of the revealed will. The will of God, what is good, acceptable, and perfect?

What do you think is the first thing, the first specific thing he will tell us? Let's read it. It must be very important in verse three. For by the grace given to me, I say to everyone among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think.

That's the most important thing. But to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. The first thing that Paul calls for is humble acceptance of his will. Humility.

Grace gifts call for humility. He's going to talk about grace gifts. Now, what is the first grace gift mentioned? Look at verse three more closely. When he says, for by the grace given or the grace gift to me, Paul is claiming to have a grace gift.

What is Paul's grace gift? He identifies that in Romans 1 -1. He at first says, Paul, doulos of Jesus Christ, servant of Jesus Christ, in which he rightly humbles himself as a servant, a bond slave. If you've never read John MacArthur's book, Slave, that book is one of the greatest books written because it shows the relationship between a bond servant and a master.

But after Paul in Romans 1 -1 says, servant of Jesus Christ, he says what? Called to be an apostle. Apostleship is a special grace gift that was given to a very select number of people who were eyewitnesses of the resurrection of Jesus.

And Paul, who was abnormally born, who saw Jesus in a vision, in that flashing light on the road to Damascus, in which he was called to be an apostle. Are there any apostles alive today? No, not. Good job, young man.

Not in the sense that this is, the capital A. There are sent ones as in missionaries, apostolos, sent ones. But here, what Paul is referring to is an office of apostleship. Turn with me briefly to Ephesians 4 -11.

Again, this is a section about grace gifts. There are four lists of the grace gifts. Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 12, 1 Peter 4, and Ephesians 4. Here in Ephesians 4 -11, Paul lists the particular people who hold these offices in the church as themselves being a grace gift to the church.

Paul knows himself to be an apostle. And here in verse 11, he says, and he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers. So how many of these grace gifts are given to the church?

If you're counting five, I understand. But I want you to notice that the fifth is actually one office. When it says shepherds and teachers, it does not have that definite article, tus, in this case, but it's linked with the word and.

Meaning the shepherd and teacher is one person. The shepherd and teacher, okay? So the first two gifts, apostles and prophets, are foundational. In the formal sense of an apostle and a prophet, look back a couple pages to Ephesians 2 -20.

The church is built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets. Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone. So when the church was born, a foundation was laid, and these particular apostles were foundational to building the church.

They gave us the word. They oversaw the writing of the Bible. And the prophets, in this case, are those who speak for God formally. They speak the word of God. They're just like Jeremiah or Isaiah or Micah.

These are foundational prophets. So go back to Ephesians 4 -11. Foundationally, we have apostles and prophets who give us scripture. When the apostle John, who was a prophet, died, having given us the book of revelation, no more holy scripture will ever be written.

So Muhammad, who got something from some demon in a cave, did not receive the word of the Lord. Joseph Smith and his Mormonism, whose so called discovered golden plates, did not receive that from the Lord.

The foundation was already laid. But look, there are two offices in the church that are ongoing. Apostle and prophet is foundational. What remains? Evangelist and the pastor teacher. An evangelist is like a missionary, someone who goes to the Middle East, or Gary and Terry Camlin who went to Portugal.

Missionaries who go out preaching the word. That can also happen locally, not just internationally. An evangelist who goes to Philly. This is an ongoing ministry in the church. But the second is the pastor teacher.

God has given order in the church such that he would give pastor teachers in the body of Christ for the building up of the body. This is very important. This is the order that God has given. It's how we grow.

There have been movements in Christianity that tried to do away with the pulpit, that the preaching of the word would not be central, such as the Quakers. There's a little Quaker church across the street.

You know how many people go there? Pretty close to zero. And that's the case all around the United States of America, because if you take away the pulpit, you remove the preaching of God's word, the teaching of the word, you have no power left in the church.

It's an empty building. It's a dead vessel. The word of God is living and active, and it must be carried by the preaching, the proclaiming, the heralding, caruso of that word. As Paul says in 2 Peter 4, preach the word.

Be ready in season and out of season. This is spiritual gifting in the church, the preaching of the word. Guys, when I write sermons during the week, I ask the spirit to teach me what this church needs to hear.

But I don't preach off of a manuscript. I preach off of an outline and from the text itself, but I'm praying every Sunday morning, Lord, give me some word that applies in some timely way to somebody listening to this word.

Somebody who's having a doubt that needs to be eliminated. Somebody who's having a struggle in their life that needs to be ministered to. The pulpit needs not just the word of God, but the power of the spirit through preacher, pastor, teachers.

And I'm just an empty vessel, a jar of clay. But to show that the all-surpassing power comes from God and not from me, this jar of clay carries a treasure of infinite worth. The spirit of the living God is in the preacher just as he's in each of you.

So go back with me to Romans 12. We need grace gifts. Paul as an apostle has a grace gift and he gives grace gifts to the church. Here when he says to everyone, he is not speaking as an ordinary man. How many of you have recently seen Jesus pitted against Paul?

Well, Jesus says this, Paul says these other things. I'll be a red letter Christian and only listen to what Jesus says and disregard that Paul, he gets some things wrong. Anybody who says that misunderstands that the gift of apostleship is the right to speak when carried along by the Holy Spirit for God.

Every word that Paul says is just as much the word of God as the red letters we have in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. And Paul is asserting that authority. He says, by the grace given to me, I say to everyone, meaning by the grace gift of apostleship, I am speaking as from God himself.

This is Paul's apostleship on display. And the first thing he tells you, listen, we better listen. Every one of us better listen not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think because therein lies the root of all kinds of bitterness, all kinds of damage, and all kinds of destruction.

Pride goeth before the fall. The most dangerous thing that can come into a church is pride. When anyone begins to think more highly of himself than he ought, he is prone to cause damage. Pride goeth before the fall.

Listen, church, beware of a flatterer. Pride begins to well up inside of a person when flattering words are spoken to the ego. Oftentimes, I think of it as being like one of those air blowers that fill up a mattress.

Anybody of you have like one of those fill-up mattresses? You turn on the air blower. It just keeps blowing hot air into the mattress and it'll never stop until that thing is inflated. And if you just kept it on forever, it would probably pop or at least spring a leak.

Flattering words inflate the ego. And an inflated ego is the most dangerous thing in a church. I think this is why Paul addresses it first, diluting words that build up. It can come from many different angles, from gossip in the church.

It can come from a Christian therapist. Very often, Christian therapists have learned what brings the client back into the office. Going into the office, the therapist inflates the ego. This is why you're a victim.

This is why you are good and the self-esteem becomes inflated. The therapist keeps speaking affirming words, affirmation only, building up and puffing up the ego of the person. And that client might go back to the therapist for the next six or eight years.

But I'll tell you what happens when the biblical counselor speaks euthetically. That means admonishing according to the Word of God, addressing sin issues in the life of the person in the office. They don't come back because itching ears like to be tickled.

And if that counselor speaks the truth of God's Word, he very often or she very often loses a client. And so a person in that industry is in danger of chasing the money and what brings people back. And so egos are inflated.

And this is what Paul is warning against. Do not think of yourself more highly than he ought to think, but think with sober judgment. To be filled with pride is to be drunk. And by the way, church, it can go in the opposite direction too.

When it says here, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned, it's possible for someone to become self-deprecating in an ungodly way. The measure of faith is what is true. What faith you have before God and the action that comes from that faith.

We don't have to beat ourselves up like Eeyore, self-flagellating. We should have a right appraisal of who we are in Christ. Do you know that when blood was shed for you, you were purchased by the blood of the Lamb?

You were raised with God in Christ. The mind of Christ was given to you. You became a child of God, a son or daughter of the King. You have an inheritance kept in heaven for you. We ought not mope around in self-deprecation.

Humility could be false in that way. Know who you are in Christ. Make a right appraisal and walk each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. When the church does that, it thrives. Now look, a second thing, verses four and five.

For as in one body we have many members and the members do not all have the same function, so we though many are one body in Christ and individually members one of another. When Ivan led communion, it was so beautiful because he talked about the unity that we have to each other and to Christ.

Can the hand say to the foot, I don't need you? Can an eyeball say to an ear, I have no use of you? This would make no sense. In a body, all the parts are connected and depend on one another. So in the church, we are one body and we rely on one another.

Anybody here still a fan of the Philadelphia 76ers after the start that they've had? Very few. See, no hands. Oh, we got one. Thank you, Chad. We went to a game before. I'm still with you, man. I'm still believing.

But here's the thing. Paul George is a superstar that they brought in from the Clippers this year and he was supposed to get us over the finish line. But recently, a ball hit his finger and severed a little tendon in the pinky.

One little tendon cut off. And wouldn't you know that for several weeks now, he hasn't been on the basketball court. And it's not that he's being a wimp. It's that you can't shoot right if one finger is floppy because it's missing a tendon.

You won't be effective. If that's the case in basketball and the body depends on one part and another, how much more damaging to the body if someone were to chop off a hand, to dismember a hand from the body?

What effect would that have on the body? What Paul is saying here, as in one body, we have many members and the members do not all have the same function. So we, though many, are one body in Christ. And individually, members one of another.

The church depends on one another to be in the assembly. As Ivan mentioned from Hebrews 12, verse 25, I believe it is. Do not neglect the assembling of yourselves together. And there again and again, it talks about the one another, that we are connected.

So the second major point then is that grace gifts function interdependently. Not independently, interdependently. We need each other. We need all the gifts. So let's spend a few more minutes now in some specific examples of grace gifts.

Specific Grace Gifts in Romans 12

Verses six to eight. Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them. If prophecy in proportion to our faith. He'll go on to say if service and our serving, the one who teaches in his teaching, the one who exhorts in his exhortation.

It sounds like only a tautology, meaning a repetition of the same thing without any meaning. But that's not the case. What Paul is doing here is not explaining in depth what each of the gifts are. He's saying you need to get into action.

If your gift is serving, get out there and serve. Join the team that mows the lawn in the spring. And see if you find delight in serving the church in that way. Move, do, act. It is a call to action here because grace gifts cooperate with good choices.

Now let's look at the first one briefly. When it says if prophecy in proportion to our faith, there's no sense given by Paul that the gift of prophecy has ceased. Cessationists would say that that's the case, but that's not indicated by the text.

In fact, being part of this list, he's actually encouraging the practice. And so therefore, he means something different than the formal giving of scripture. The office of prophet was foundational, but there's an informal sense in which we profess.

As I was saying, when I preach, I pray, Lord, give me words that matter to the hearts and lives of every person in this room. And I'm young as a preacher, trying to grow, hoping to get better. But I believe that God can do that even through a broken vessel like me.

Charles Spurgeon, heard of him? The prince of preachers, they would call him. There were times in his ministry when the prophetic gift, not to write scripture, but to apply scripture was so strong in Charles Spurgeon that he would say things that there is no way he could have known.

One time he pointed to a man in the middle of the great hall. This was a huge, you know, 10 ,000 person stadium. And he said, and you, sir, you kept your shop open last Sunday, and you collected nine pence and your profit was four pence.

And he said, your soul is sold to Satan for four pence. Well, that man went home with his head hanging low and began to think about what Spurgeon said. The funniest part of this story in Spurgeon's autobiography is that the man said, I wouldn't go back to that church for fear of what else the preacher was going to tell about my life.

He was embarrassed to go back. For two weeks, he didn't go back. Finally, he did. He went back, he heard the gospel and he got saved. How did Charles Spurgeon know to say that? It was a prophetic gift.

Another time he pointed to a man and he said, and those gloves you're wearing, you stole those from your owner. And the man came up to Spurgeon afterwards and said, this is the first thing I've ever stolen in my life.

Please don't tell my mom. It's in Spurgeon's autobiography. He mentions 12 times this happened in his preaching ministry. But Spurgeon is very careful to say that when something was that penetrating or timely, it does not compete with scripture.

In fact, scripture is the safeguard and the rule over the spoken word. Make sense? Spurgeon was very careful not to countenance any of the chicanery that happens in the world where people claim to be speaking for God, but say things contradictory to the word of God.

So when it says, if prophecy in proportion to our faith, I think as Matthew Henry said, this speaks primarily to the pulpit, the Sunday morning preaching. Although there are other examples like Philip's four daughters in Acts 21 .8, where these four girls would prophesy to people who stopped by their house.

And they would speak penetrating words and timely words. I gave you a definition of this informal prophecy in your notes. It is speech helped along by the power of the Holy Spirit being therefore sometimes predictive.

Remember when Agabus prophesied a famine or took his belt and prophesied that Paul would be arrested in Acts 21. It's sometimes predictive, but it's always exceptionally penetrating, insightful, weighty.

That was the word that Ivan used. The weight of building, encouraging, consoling, convicting, timely, or applicable. So this is the kind of spiritual gift that's needed for a church to thrive. What other gifts are listed here?

Quickly, service. Service is the expense of time for the sake of others. Whether it's mowing the lawn or serving in getting here, you know, to go to first service so you can serve in the nursery during second service.

You're giving yourself and your time to bless others in the church. James and John had this really upside down in Mark chapter 10. Remember the story? Teacher, give us anything that we want. That's how they started.

And then they made the request, grant that James and I can sit at your right hand and your left hand. Jesus answered that kind of prideful desire for position with what? Blessed, he says, are those who serve.

And he says in Mark chapter 10, verse 45, turn with me. We're almost done. Mark 10, 35. He called, he sat down and called the 12 and he said to them, if anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.

That's what it means to serve, to be willing to be last, to do the dirty work. To clean, to serve in whatever way is necessary. So return with me and we'll finish up now in the list. Romans 12, verse seven.

There's a gift of teaching. If you have it, what should you do with it? Teach, have a Bible study, teach in your house, teach your kids, teach the grandkids, teach at Sunday school. If the gift is exhorting, that's not the word for newthetic, they're admonishing.

It's really related to encouraging. It comes from paraklesis, like we have the paraclete, the helper. If your gift is an encourager, your encouraging words are needed in this church. Somebody needs you to come up and speak encouragement and life, not words that tear down.

We have a desperate need for encouraging exhortation gifts in the church. The one who contributes in generosity. Your money is a store of value from the time that you invested in work, in your industry.

You're rewarded with that and to contribute with generosity is to give your time to sacrifice what you've done in your work for the benefit of the church. It's a great spiritual gift that many of you have and not to be minimized.

A church thrives where the people are generous. The one who leads with zeal. Yes, we should be ambitious with a holy zeal to take ground for the kingdom, to plant more churches like we planted the rock, to expand the kingdom in places like Malawi and to the ends of the earth.

We should be zealous in our leadership. The one who does acts of mercy with cheerfulness. Now, mercy is alleviating suffering. We ought to care for the orphan and the widow and the handicap. We should give and serve and alleviate suffering.

We have a wonderful ministry in this church called Connect Care that maybe some of you are supposed to be a part of. Writing cards to those who are sick, bringing a meal and helping when some situation happens in the family.

This is how the church will thrive. When we are filled with the grace of the Holy Spirit and we have grace gifts operating. So, application and closing. We are to eagerly desire spiritual gifts but before we take off and you know you start running the aisles or I saw one charismatic worship service where the guy's so hyped up he dives into the baptismal.