TiL- A Defense of Cessationism part 2

Love podcasts. We are very thankful that you have joined us tonight.

We are going to Go back to our series on cessationism a defense of cessationism part to stick with us

You Welcome back.

We're glad to have you. How you doing, Dan? Great. How are you? I'm doing well. I noticed you have on the same shirt that you did last episode

That's true. It's because it was five minutes ago Again we are recording and our wardrobe is not changing in between these these sessions

So if that's if you've noticed that that's the reason we're recording, but that doesn't mean we can't see your comments

Notice that you've got way too much time on your hands You just watch these a week apart and recognize that I have the same navy blue shirt on Yeah, well now that we brought it up.

They'll probably even more noticeable. That's right Maybe I shouldn't even bring it up, but that's okay.

It's okay. Hey, maybe we wash them in between shows That can happen

We we are back enough But if we did them live there's a chance

I'm pretty gross, okay We Are back on cessationism we want to give it a defense of cessationism from our perspective the way we interpret and see

See it from Scripture based on our convictions, but we want to speak with love kindness and Humility because it's a secondary issue.

So we want to consider, you know continuationists our brothers and sisters as well

And we're together but work together with all these folks in the gospel gospel ministry

So with that being said we do want to speak truth based on our conviction of Scripture and we want to jump in we're ready

Now I think to jump into chapter 12 maybe We had a long introduction, but that's okay

So Chapter 12, let me read the the first three verses and and what we're doing is just going through these three chapters

The place the go -to place for the spiritual gifts and we're going to look at it from a cessationist standpoint

If you're wondering what a definition of a continuationist and the cessationist is we we kind of end of the podcast

With that but just a reminder continuationist means that the spiritual gifts that are mentioned especially here in 1st

Corinthians have Continued as the norm or we're supposed to have been the norm in the church throughout all of time after After they were given but a cessationist

They believe that at a certain point they cease to operate the way they did in the first century.

We'll put it like that They were used to confirm give give confirmation to the the speaker and the message that it was a revelation

That it was from God But then at the close of the

Canon the end of 70 AD the the close of the old When all that was finished then the gifts

Working in that way cease to happen. It doesn't mean that God doesn't still heal

Or do some of those type of things. He just it's not the norm in the church Is that correct?

Let's say that. Yeah decently. Okay Sounds good All right verses 1 through 3 in chapter 12

Now concerning spiritual gifts brethren, I do not want you to be unaware

You know that when you were Pagans you were led astray to the mute idols.

However, you were led Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the

Spirit of God says Jesus is accursed and no one can say Jesus is Lord except by the

Holy Spirit Yep. Yep Go ahead now, it'll be important to bring up something that we brought up last time you brought up That Paul was talking to them as infants in Christ He said

I wish I could talk to you like you're spiritual people like, you know, what's going on? But you you are just barely saved and we got a build from the ground up So when he comes here, he says now

Concerns new subject same thing from them from the ground up. We're gonna start with the basics and we're gonna move on from there

Concerning spiritual gifts brothers. I don't want you to be ignorant No, I don't want you to not know

I don't want you to be informed on the matter So I'm gonna tell you a little something about it and I want you to you know, don't run off the rails

Don't go this where that was. Here's what you need. Here's what you need to know. And I think that that crescendos in chapter 13, which is still a spiritual gifts chapter and Chapter 14 where he explains why chapter 13 it matters so much which is love um

So he says I don't want you to be ignorant. So remember back to when you were pagans you were led astray

By mute idols by things that couldn't talk there are stone

Metal wood they were just sitting there Dumb dead as a doornail.

I mean dumb in both senses. They couldn't talk and Dumb as a brick literally and And you were little you were however you were led

So some of them were just led astray because that's what their family had always done. Some of them were led astray by actual

Demonic activity, I'm sure. Yeah, so maybe some of them did have some experience

With some spiritual things that were happening. They came in contact with the spiritual world. That's nothing that's uncommon today

Even people who have been involved in new age or Hinduism Buddhism Who had who have been involved in some spiritual practices and come across some actual real spiritual beings and had some spiritual experiences

They would also need to be to be taught, you know, you were doing you were following Your own way in paganism over here now that you're a

Christian. We're going to explain this to you properly because However, you were led you were led astray.

So I'm gonna give you some proper good information and He says now here number one

Look at this before we go anywhere If somebody says that Jesus is accursed

No Don't do that. They are not from God, right? And then he says this and this is this a little bit more of a sticking point.

He says and nobody can say That Jesus is Lord except by the power of the

Holy Spirit Now it doesn't mean that everything that somebody says Jesus is Lord on is correct What it does mean is the

Spirit has allowed them to say the phrase that Jesus is Lord for God's own glory

Right, right It doesn't mean that just because you could have some some heretic false teacher come out of nowhere say

Jesus is Lord and And then be the biggest flame in heretic ever although that statement that Jesus is

Lord is correct, right So let me it's kind of where he sets them off.

He sets them off straight saying No, basically if anything happens That leads you towards Jesus being accursed or Jesus not being

Lord throw it out Jesus is considered Lord Test it right because Nobody can say that unless The Holy Spirit has given them the ability to say that so see what the

Holy Spirit saying the Holy Spirit saying Jesus is Lord, but this guy's a wackadoodle

Jesus is Lord, but that dude's a wackadoodle but if he says Jesus is Lord and he tells you to believe in him repent of your sins and trust in the gospel then

Kind of your sins and trust in the gospel because he's saying that Jesus is Lord, right? But let me bring bring up two things and get your thoughts on these two points so in in verse in verse 2,

I want to look at that last phrase and and see if I Believe that this last phrase

Yeah, I think you were taking this in the right direction you were talking about these these idols and How ridiculous they are because they can't talk they they're they're mute.

They're deaf dumb and blind because they don't exist and so you were you're accurate in your

Description of them and your tone about them. Do you think that that Paul?

Has that same type of tone a more sarcastic type tone?

In this book here in this phrase because you were you were led astray by mute idols however that happened

Because they they couldn't lead you because they don't exist So however that happened you were led by home.

I I I know for a fact that there was some sarcasm woven throughout 1st

Corinthians. Mm -hmm. I'll say that for certain I have not Looked into it deeply enough to know if if the

Greek bears out that this is one of those cases So it does exist. Oh, it definitely exists.

I preached in 1st Corinthians about 2002 2019

Yeah, it was all over the place Okay. Okay. So I saw that there that because I knew it was in other places

I felt like this may be another one of those places where he's just being sarcastic with them and I Bring that up because we're going to get into some places and maybe 13 and 14

Maybe even 12 where he's being sarcastic again, and you'll have the continuationist

Interpretation where they're taking it serious where Paul is probably being more sarcastic

Sure. Yeah answering his own rhetorical question in a weird way type of thing, right? Exactly.

Exactly. So we'll bring that back up and look at that later have you heard this story going back to verse 3 and It it makes more sense

And and I feel like it's it's accurate. I Trust the speakers the preachers whom

I've heard it from. Maybe you've heard this story. Maybe you haven't But it helps to make this

This idea more real because anybody I mean you can say it and even an unbeliever lever can

Make these words come out of their mouth an unbeliever can say Jesus is Lord. But what is he speaking of here?

The only the person with the spirit can say Jesus is Lord. Well, anybody can speak those words so what does it mean here and and I've heard tell the story about in in this time period where soldiers would come around and you would either either have to Say Caesar is

Lord or Renounce that and say Jesus is Lord and then they would of course

Execute. Have you heard that story? I have yeah. Yeah, it was it was uh, it was

It happened from time to time. The the Caesar worship was it was a real big thing In fact, there was big controversies over there were people who would they came around and they just they got scared

And so they threw the pinch of incense on the altar and then afterwards they felt horrible went back to the church weeping and repenting and One half of the church didn't want to let him back in the church and the other half said well

I don't know if it was half and half but one part didn't want to let him back in the church and one part did And so the yeah, they fought over it

So, yeah, that's a well for us I don't know if that was it was taking place here, right

But yeah, I've heard of this but it meant something sure it wasn't just words that come out of your mouth

It meant something and for us Yeah, here's the thing where it says Jesus is a curse or Jesus is

Lord. It's not talking about just those phrases, right? let's say somebody says Jesus is Lord and then come goes on in the next 5 -10 minutes and Their teaching is that well

Jesus isn't Lord it's no your prerogative to do X Y &

Z and Jesus is not really in control and and they go on saying Jesus is

Lord, but you know Will you really die if you eat the fruit?

Right. It's it's one of those things where where their message from start to finish is going to be

Jesus as Lord Yeah, and it's anywhere in their their their rantings and ravings they say something to the effect of Jesus Is a curse, you know

Jesus broke the law for you Jesus didn't break the law for you

Jesus is not a curse because everyone who breaks the laws is a curse and everyone who's hung on the trees of curse

Bruised for our iniquities His chastisement of our peace was upon him.

Was that our former Southern Baptist pastor that that said that I I Don't know if he's former or current.

I really don't know. I've lost track but I would be very wary of Someone who says something like that Well, if it's a guy that I'm thinking of they just recently

Renounced their membership with the Southern Baptist Convention live from Charlotte and have orange.

Yeah Yeah Same one yeah, now

I'm not saying anything about that dude, but That was suspect. Yeah That's one of those things where Paul is saying if they say this

They were not speaking by the Spirit of God At least in that instance. They were not speaking by the

Spirit of God, right? so maybe And that's that's thing it even comes up here later

Distinguishing the spirits is someone speaking by the Spirit of God. They speak about the spirit of the world Yeah It's a spirit.

One of the spiritual gifts is discernment now some people took that and went way over off the rails with it, but It to be able to to say this is what was said and they may have used different words

But these were the categories that they used and these are the things that were were said and this is what lined up with Scripture And this is what not didn't line up with Scripture That's that's a gifting from God to be able to do that.

It's just right down here in verse 10, right? so Yeah, and just one more thought on that that praise

Jesus is Lord it to me It goes beyond just the teachers. He goes beyond us in our everyday life

Seeing Jesus as Lord and recognizing him as Lord is recognizing him as as Majesty as King as supreme as Messiah as Christ as all in all

And so if you're living your daily life and you you say Jesus is Lord.

Yeah, I believe in Jesus I go to church and then five minutes later

You're Lit, you know, you're the words that come in your mouth do not reflect

Jesus being Lord You know the Holy that's not from the Holy Spirit right, right and Yeah Second Peter one talks about that how we ought to have it to our faith virtue and to our virtue steadfastness

Because those are the things that show that we we know God Now to the person who's thinking well,

I've definitely done some stuff that's not of the Spirit of God Me too, and it's one of those things where You turn from your sin and you repent of it, yeah, that's why

I absolutely love the Lord's Supper Because the Lord's Supper you need to examine yourself to make sure that you're in Christ examine yourself to make sure that you haven't offended a brother and and living in unrepentant sin

But for those who are who are weak and are struggling and are going to Christ and you don't know

You know what's going on? And I mean, you don't know which way is up, but you know that Jesus is

Lord and that's where you rest in your hat That's what the supper is for the supper. The supper is there to strengthen weary travelers on their way to the celestial city

So to speak yeah on our way to to the our final Resting place with Christ as we have found peace we find that grace in in the supper so when you go,

I mean you go with fear and trembling but go expecting a blessing from God too because He is really truly present in the supper.

Yeah, it's so Some eyebrows

What to your point is so interesting how it says do not come to the table unworthily

Well, the the only way that you can come to the table Appropriately Is to realize that you're coming unworthily if you come to the table

Believing that you're worthy Then you are coming to the table unworthily Right, if anybody wonders where we got this it's it's literally like four verses before this

Verse 29 for he who eats and drinks and eats and drinks judgment to himself if he does not judge the body rightly right

So we can we can discuss that some other time, but we need to press on Okay For four through seven now now there are a variety of gifts

But the same Spirit and there are a variety of ministries and the same

Lord There are a variety of effects But in the same but the same

God who works all things in all persons But to each one is given the manifestation of the

Spirit for the common good interesting Yep Now here's here's it's really interesting these four these four verses are just Fantastic verse four there are a variety of gifts for the same

Spirit So there are gifts there's variety of ministries So there's gifts and there's ministries so far that are being handed out by the same

Spirit by the same Lord Verse six variety of what did you say effects?

Mm -hmm That's what the NASB 95 says. Okay The legacy standard

Bible says workings. Okay, but the same God who works everything in everyone

Mm -hmm. Um, so you have Workings or effects or things that are taking place you have ministries you have

Gifts all of them coming from God who works everything out to his own Lord Verse seven, but to each one is given the manifestation of the

Spirit What is the manifestation of the Spirit that would be the gift the ministry or the working that God is giving to you?

In order for you to flourish and help the church. We'll see why I said to help the church here in a second because It said well, it's the next phrase

Manifestation of the Spirit for what is profitable or what did the the NASB say? The common good the common good it's for the benefit of the church those who are around you

Which is why he goes on in 12 through 26 and says all sorts of stuff about how we're one body.

You can't be a foot or a hand or whatever You need there's a diversity of gifts, but one

God who gives them, right? So what he's trying to do is he's trying he's trying to draw the mind of these people to their one

Lord Jesus is Lord and this one Lord Jesus has sent the Spirit to be our helper and our comforter. He's given us gifts

He's given us ministry and he's given us stuff to do and we should go out and do those things and we should do those things

Understanding that the reason why God has given us those gifts is to benefit our fellow churchmen

Our brothers and sisters in Christ those same ones who can call Jesus brother and can call

God father Same family were to benefit those people with the gifts that we have, right?

whatever that gift may be and this is so foundational because in the last episode that we you talked about the you talked to us about the the word you and how it was used in the plural, right and We're reading through in our scripture reading at church

We're in 1st Corinthians chapter 3 and you can see that even though he says you It's clear.

He's speaking to the the whole in congregation Right. It's a plural you yeah, the the

King James brings it out because it'll use you and ye In order to show the plural.

Yeah in in Greek class Depending on if you took it up north or in the south. I've done both

You Take it up north. It's you and then you have to Talk about it.

If it's down south you put y 'all in there. Yeah, I have Actions right here got a workbook a

Greek workbook. I've got y 'all all over the place in here Every time there's a plural a second -person plural y 'all

Yeah, he's been speaking that way The whole time all the whole time and there now that he started on gifts,

I mean at the very beginning of the conversation This is foundational that he's speaking to Them as a whole because he says these these things are for the common good, right?

It's for the it's for the benefit of those who are believing in Jesus Christ right, which is exactly what we said coming out of the last episode that that the purpose of of the gifts

Was to to confirm the message of the cross that was saving people The same message of the cross was saving people that the

Gentile found foolish They found foolish behaviors miracles, right? They didn't believe in in Christ, but here's wisdom

Here's tongues. Here's Healing. Here's some incredible faith, right?

so those things are showing up in order to to prove the message that Jesus is

Lord that What the people of the church have is something real That the old

Covenant has passed away and the new Covenant has come that the grace of God is no longer in type and shadow form but has now come to us in the reality of Jesus Christ and what he's done right and I don't know if this is what this

You know, the spirit was inspiring Paul to write. I don't know if this is what was on Paul's mind when he wrote it

But of course the spirit knew What the future held?

I mean he could see throughout all eternity when he was inspiring scripture, but This is what

I see when I read these these Three there's these three verses that we read together now.

They're a variety of gifts book same Spirit verse 5 same Lord verse 6 same

God What do you have there if you are tempted just in case you are tempted to over emphasize one person of the

Trinity Here's your foundation. You got one spirit one Lord and one

God right Generally speaking in Scripture when you have spirit, it's the

Holy Spirit Lord is referring to Jesus That's right. God is referring to the Father So you've got the Trinity laid out right there and one of the reasons why it hit me

So quickly was because a couple weeks ago I preached Matthew 23 1 through 12

He says don't let anybody call you teacher. You have only one teacher Holy Spirit Don't let anybody let don't be called leader.

You have one leader. That's Christ Don't don't let anybody call you father. You have one father and you have the

Trinity right there It's it's a it's beautiful picture that Matthew drew and you have that same beautiful picture here of the

Trinity Just in case you're tempted to overemphasize One person of the Trinity over the other.

Here's your foundation, right? We are at 26 minutes

Dan. Do you want to? Press on to a couple more you want to you want to wait? Yeah Yeah, let's let's press on because we don't actually have to describe what comes next

Okay in order to explain what come we don't have to explain in order to describe. I don't know

We'll just run on a little bit further Okay Yeah, eight through eleven.

Okay for to the one who was given the word of wisdom through the spirit and to the

Excuse me and to another the word of knowledge according to the same spirit to another faith by the same spirit and to another gifts of healing by the one spirit and to another the effecting of Miracles and to another prophecy and to another distinguishing spirits

Distinguishing of spirits to another various kinds of tongues and to another the interpretation of tongues

But the one and the same spirit works all these things distributing to each one individually just as he wills right, so Here it goes out in the list spiritual gifts

I use eight Nine of them depending on how you count tongues and the one who interprets or translates

So you've got a word of wisdom a word of wisdom being

Wisdom words Why wise things? So you got somebody who's going to be especially wise

Somebody's going to be especially knowledgeable word of knowledge according to the same spirit they give them

Gift of knowledge to someone else faith now people have faith one of the fruits of the spirit is faith

So this is talking about an extraordinary faith a faith that is a little little little stronger a little uncommon among the people some may doubt some may have

Questions, but this one is rock -solid steadfast in their faith One of them that you can you can you can lean on by the same this is by the same spirit gifts of healing

Healing being the healing of we saw it all throughout the New Testament Somebody's bleeding touch they stop somebody's died

Paul brought him back to life Christ brought him back to life You know somebody's sick they're made well fevers are gone stuff like that it just No, weird word.

They're just healing another who works miracles Moses did that that was pretty cool.

He was Old Testament, but still Aaron staff I should say

Prophecy who is the one who? Bound up it took Paul's belt off bound up his hands and said the simple person who has his belt will be

Bound by the hands and led off to to Rome or whatever His prophecy also,

I think prophecy has to do with the the telling and the preaching of God's Word, right? I think it was interesting that how

MacArthur broke that word down It just simply means before speaking and so he said basically it's speaking before men sure

Yeah, it can be before it happens It really means just just telling what God has told you to say

Right if it's future events tell that if it's something that's happened in the past or doctrine tell that yeah

Let's see where were we Prophecy distinguishing the spirits we talked about that earlier spirit of the world spirit of Christ Know the

Holy Spirit or even an evil spirit It gives us the the test for it

Jesus is accursed or Jesus is Lord being able to to walk through that and see How does that play out and distinguish?

those things speaking in tongues tongues are Languages now a little bit further on I will say

Maybe not a language that we know But it is a real language and not just gibberish, right?

So maybe I don't say a language that we don't know. I mean a language that maybe doesn't exist among humanity

It says I can speak in the tongues of angels perhaps Cool, but we'll look at the purpose of tongues later

Other could also and then one who could interpret or translate those words whatever language that is if it's because they know the language or You know and God gave them the the gift to know that language when they're in the situation or if they give them a supernatural

Sort of gift to interpret that or translate that Either either way they have a translation of the thing but but here's the important part

Of all these spiritual gifts But one in the same spirit works all these things

So it's one spirit the same Spirit of God and here's the point of all these trying to say

Because he gets on him here in a little bit this one spirit Does all of this and he is the one who is is working and testifying about Christ the one who you've believed in He goes on later and he gets on him.

I mean just in the next few verses he gets on him and says So why are you fighting amongst each other over who gets to do what?

And that's why he why he's he's saying these things Distributing to each one individually just as he will so G So the

Spirit is giving out these gifts and really it says and I forget where that Christ came and brought gifts to us, too

So it's it's not just the Spirit as we saw up above The Spirit Son and the

Father all giving gifts to mankind for the purpose of glorifying God and uplifting the church

So the purpose here is you were ignorant you were pagans. I don't want you to be ignorant

However, you got deceived before don't be deceived now Jesus is Lord. He's giving you out these gifts and these gifts are not for you

Well, let me rephrase that the gifts that you have are not for you You see you have her to build up the body of the church and confirm the word of the gospel

Now your brother has a gift his his gift is to confirm the word of the gospel and build you up However that happens

So you mean it's not to make me rich and have a private plane No, and in fact if you if you wish to if you get a little jealous

And you wish to go by the power of the Holy Spirit like Simon the sorcerer

Your money will perish with you, so please stop and Don't do that and then

What did he say? He said please pray that these things that you said to me would not happen

So I think he even got a little scared. So no, it's not supposed to make you And counterfeiting the gifts in order to make you rich is even worse.

Oh, yeah Yeah Gold dust and feather angel feathers like give me a break

That's not that's not listed anywhere like at least pick one from the list

Anyway, I'm I'm gonna go on a rant here. We're four minutes overdue Well Proclaim the gospel to us if you would

Absolutely. The purpose of all of these gifts was to confirm the one message of the gospel

And that was that Jesus Christ came to the earth as he said He would all throughout the Old Testament and he died in the place of men who deserve to die for their sins

Men like you men like me and I mean men as in men and women whoever has breath in their lungs

He died for people like us those who need someone to to Because they need forgiveness and so he died in the place taking the sins of men upon himself

He gave them gave us his righteousness He laid in the grave for three days and then arose in order to give us life

So he made sure that we weren't gonna be punished and then gave us eternal life. He did that he

Ensured that we had justification in in all and here's the here's the thing cause each one of us to repent of our sins to turn from our sins and trust in that message that he has forgiven those who come to him and Every single person that comes to him is going to find him to be the perfect Savior yeah, so if you have believed in your heart and confessed with your mouth that Jesus is

Lord you can have that assurance of your pardon that Christ is Your Savior your sins have been forgiven that they're as far away as the

East is from the West and they're never coming back together That is the message of the gospel that Christ what

Christ has done what we could not do. He has given us all things that pertain to life and godliness and He's called each one of us to come to himself and find peace there.

Let's pray together Father we thank you for giving us this opportunity time together time spent in your word.

We pray Seeking your promise to be fulfilled that your word will not return void that you would accomplish the tasks that you have

Sent and we're we're Beyond grateful for your grace and mercy that we would we could see

See the truth Receive the truth Be made alive

To the work of your son and the power of the Holy Spirit and that we can with our mind understand and be given wisdom and with the words of our mouth be speaking that message and Observe your power through the

Holy Spirit to work in this world to destroy

As you say That your enemies making your enemies your footstool and Conquering this world for your glory and by saving souls and us

Living in The fact that Jesus is Lord. We pray all these things in Jesus name.

Amen Thank you all so much for watching don't forget to leave a comment a question critique if you have a question about a particular verse a

Question about cessation ism or continuation ism that that you would like for us to answer We would love to try and do that, but we do

If you know where to find gold dust, please send it to us. We'll leave a link in the description