Spiritual Gifts For The Church

This sermon is from Grace Fellowship Church in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. To access other sermons or to learn more about us, please visit our website at graceedmonton .ca.

Spiritual Gifts, Hesitation, and the Aim of the Passage

Well, good afternoon, everyone. It's good to see everyone again. Happy New Year. It's good to see, again, people returning for visiting. It's a pleasure to see you, like my brother just read. Today we're back in 1 Corinthians, chapter 12.

We're looking at the hotly debated topic of spiritual gifts. So join me today as we explore this topic. I have to admit that when I first embarked on studying for today's passage, I was a little bit hesitant and somewhat anxious for two major reasons.

The first reason was that this is a big, weighty topic. This is the spiritual gifts to his church. So these are the spiritual gifts on which we're talking about. On a subject that is so weighty, has so much breadth and such depth, I felt a little bit out of water.

I was a little bit anxious as to how it is I would approach this topic, how I would preach it, how we would come to a faithful understanding of such a topic that has so many opinions and where people are strong on both sides of a spectrum, where there are probably as many opinions on this topic as you'll find people who read it.

So in one sense, I felt coming before the throne thinking, Lord, how is it that I'm supposed to preach this, that I'm supposed to do this text justice and preach it faithfully? Again, there are weighty topics.

This is a weighty one, and again, there's dissenting opinions on both sides. So how am I supposed to approach this? So that was one reason why it is that I was a little bit hesitant. And the second reason was because I made the preaching schedule and I assigned it to myself.

So in one sense, I said, okay, well, if this is providence, then I'll have to approach this topic. And the Lord has this laid out for me for a particular reason. And as he would have it, there's good things that actually have come about from this topic.

This has been an amazing study, an amazing study for me in particular as I've approached this topic and studied the text for what it's worth. And I found myself rejoicing at what it is that we're going to learn today.

One thing I've also been rejoicing, one thing I've also been looking forward to is the conversations that are going to come after the fact. So after I'm done preaching, after we have finished examining all 11 verses today, I'm looking forward to the conversations that are going to come about having looked at this topic in this way.

I'm looking forward to the sharpening of iron that's going to proceed from today. Again, because likely there's going to be some opinions that fall on one side of a spectrum or another, and I look forward to those sharpening conversations after the fact.

At one point, Shane had said, you know, there's some churches that do roast the preacher. Maybe this is going to be that. So we'll see. Like I said, I look forward to that after. Because in some sense, this would have been a very similar attitude to some of the believers in Corinth as we're going to learn today.

The attitude to study and to learn and to find confusion in some of these gifts and find confusion in what's happening. This would have been some of the attitude of the believers in Corinth as Paul is going to address today.

However, one of the differences that we have between now and the church in Corinth is now that we have the Holy Word. We have the Word in front of us. So we are to study it for all it's worth. Today's passage is meant to guide the Lord's Church as to how we are to see God's gifts and how these gifts are designed and given and divvied out for the building and the up-building of God's church, of his people.

So in other words, all giftings that believers are given by the Holy Spirit when rightfully understood, are used to build the church up in love. That is the point of today's text. Because otherwise, what Paul is going to address here is the same human condition that we all suffer from.

If we don't rightfully view the gifts, if we don't understand them rightfully in their context, we are all in danger of falling into the same sin, the same mindset that plagued many of those in Corinth.

It is this young church that was plagued by this mentality. That God gives the gifts, but man uses it to elevate himself. That's the danger. I'm going to say that one more time. So again, this is the danger that we're going to address, that the text aims to solve.

God gives the gifts, but man uses it to elevate himself. I'm getting some buzzing from behind here. It's a rocket ship that I'm about to take off here. I'll just use human, I'll just vocalize really loudly.

So, I don't know, I'll say it one more, one third time if you guys can hear over the buzzing behind me. So God gives the gifts, man uses it for self-glorification, to elevate himself. So regardless of what we think about the use of gifts today, if we fail to understand this, if we fail to understand this problem that the text aims to solve, then we all are in danger of falling right into the trap of self-glorification.

So let us keep that in mind. But before we do that, let's pray. Father, oh dear Father, we humbly ask, prepare our minds to receive all knowledge and wisdom, Lord, as you have imparted it to us. Lord, that we would come boldly, but also humbly, Lord, seeking to learn, but to apply rightfully, Lord, what it is that, Father, your Holy Spirit will impart upon us in terms of giftings.

Lord, I pray that we would immediately look at these gifts, Father, as we finish and we conclude today's study, Lord, that we would look at these gifts, and immediately, Lord, upon receiving them or rejoicing in the gifting of someone else, Lord, that we would stop and look to the Lord Jesus Christ and glorify him with whatever we see before us, Lord.

That we would not look to the gift, but the gift giver. That we would glorify the Lord Jesus Christ and that, Father, I pray, Father, that none of us would walk away here, Father, forsaking your gifts, and probably worse yet, Lord, taking these gifts upon ourselves and self-glorifying, robbing the Son of Glory, the very glory he's due.

Lord, I ask, make a heart within us, Father, that is humble, and one that prepares to come to the world boldly, Lord, looking to proclaim Jesus Christ with whatever giftings, Lord, you've imparted on each and every single one of us.

Lord, I thank you in this, and I pray this all in the precious name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. So if you haven't already turned to today's passage, again, we're in 1 Corinthians 12, starting at verse 1.

False Gifts, Idols, and Rejecting What Does Not Glorify Christ

So as we look at today's passage, we're going to start right in verse 1. At this point in Paul's letter, he has moved on from his discussion into rebuking, into correction, into now answering questions addressed by possibly Phoebe's people, or the person who has sent him the letter.

And the way we know that is if we look at where we're at in terms of the book, in 1 Corinthians 11, verse 22, he says this of head coverings. He says, So that's head coverings. And then of the Lord's Supper, which we spoke about last week, he says,.

So Paul is systematically going through questions and observations made by people that addressed the letter initially. So now he's moved on from head coverings in the Lord's Supper now to spiritual gifts.

And he says this. So looking at our first verse, it says, Again, Paul, his first point here, if we're looking at our bulletins, the first point is what the world gives. We're looking at Paul addressing misapplications and actually sinful application of what the Church of Corinth was witnessing.

And that's what Paul intends to address here. He says he does not want us to be uninformed. He wants us to have a rightful view of what these spiritual gifts look like. Sorry, just looking for my place here.

In other words, by first addressing this point, before we get to what God gives, Paul wants us to understand what the world gives, how it is that the world gives these gifts and how we misapply them. First, he wants us to apply this to understand this.

So in other words, he wants us to go from understanding fake gifts to real gifts. So first, he's going to address the fake gifts. In verse two, he says,. So Paul recognizes that regardless of how all believers got there, so remember this church in Corinth is a very varied group.

This is a young church with quite a diverse set of peoples and different backgrounds. But regardless, regardless of how they all got there, all have an understanding or a context for spiritual gifts. In some way, this is similar to how we are now.

We have all of us in one sense, believer, unbeliever, even the pagan world outside these walls, has an understanding of spiritual gifts, whether in mocking or in jest or in some form of reverence. But in some way, Paul is again speaking to believers in Corinth.

He wants them to have an understanding that is rightful and not what is witnessed by some of the people in Corinth. Again, so whether it was for former Gentiles, you know, those who might have had pagan gods like Aphrodite or some of the other Greek and Roman pantheon that existed in Corinth at the time, or maybe even possibly some Christians with Jewish backgrounds, ones who previously worshipped, you know, the gods of Baal or the Asheron poles, or, you know, many other instances in the Old Testament where there was old pagan worship.

Paul is addressing all these people, Gentiles and Christian Jews, all the same. And he describes them, and he tells them specifically that if you look at verse 2, when you were led astray to mute idols, that they are exactly that, they are mute, they do not speak.

Looking at Psalm 115 verses 4 to 8, if we look, this is the exact description of what Paul is talking about when he's talking about mute idols, powerless idols. So again, Psalm 115 verses 4, it says,.

Their idols are silver and gold, the work of human hands. They have mouths, but they do not speak, eyes but do not see, they have ears but do not hear, noses but do not smell. They have hands, but they do not feel, feet but do not walk, and they do not make a sound in their throat.

Those who make them become like them, note verse 8, those who make them become like them, so do all who trust in them. So when Paul says that they are mute, powerless idols, he means just that. They are powerless, they're useless.

They have no strength, and those who have written to Paul concerning these idols need to understand that these idols have no strength. In other words, what they are witnessing is something altogether.

Reading in verse 3, it says,. In other words, if you ever were to see a Christian, and I'm going to use scare quotes here, if ever you were to see a Christian using their gifts to curse the Lord Jesus Christ, and by extension, stealing his glory, these gifts are not from the Lord.

That's what Paul wants us to understand here. And to those that he was writing to in Corinth, if you ever see any instance where there is some type of self-glorification, or some cursing of the Lord Jesus Christ, or some blaspheming of any sense, these gifts are not from the Lord.

Turning to 2 Corinthians briefly, Paul had to deal with this later on in a future letter to the church in Corinth. Again, Paul's aim here is to correct false theology, false doctrine, and he had to deal with this later on in 2 Corinthians.

For those keeping notes, 2 Corinthians chapter 11, verses 12 to 15. Again, very similar circumstance. And what Paul says to the second letter to the Corinthians, he says,. In order to undermine the claim of those who like to claim that in their boasted mission, they work on the same terms as we do.

So in other words, in verse 12, Paul is saying, I am going to continue my mission to undermine those who say they are from us, but are not actually from us. Who say they are Christian, but not are actually Christians.

They are doing, they are walking, they are doing the things that make them seem Christian, but they are not. Continuing in verse 13, he says,. Again, you have people walking and doing things. However, they are enemies of the Lord.

And they are deceiving believers who lack that discernment. Verse 14, So again, similar circumstance. Paul is still writing to correct these things later on in the second letter to the Corinthians. This church in Corinth were observing gifts being used in this way to curse our Lord, and were highly confused.

These are highly confused people. So Paul sets the record straight. These are of the world and not from the Lord. So that is our main point. That is our main point for the first three verses of our text today.

These are from the world and not from the Lord. So let us not be confused. And this is where we can begin to apply exactly what it is Paul has set forward here. And the application is this. Reject false teachings and false giftings.

I will say that one more time. Reject false giftings and teachers. Again, although Paul is speaking directly to the use of gifts here, so in the context of 1 Corinthians 12, 1 -11, these are pertaining to spiritual gifts.

But we can absolutely apply this to false teachers, 100%. Anyone who would claim to be a Christian, who would have a gifting or a teaching, that in any way dishonors the Lord Jesus Christ, is not of us, and they are to be rejected.

Jesus Christ said in John chapter 4, verse 23, John 4, 23, he said,. But the hour is coming, and is now here when true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship Him.

In other words, if they don't have both spirit and truth, we are to reject them, brothers and sisters. Taking note of the theological landscape today, many have been won over or lost by the mysticism of healing ministries and prophecy ministries that have no basis in the Lord Jesus Christ.

This is a very popular thing. This is happening in many parts of the world, not excluding here in North America. Although we should always be sharpening our tools of discernment, so we should always be sharpening our edge on this blade, that we should always be discerning what is godly and what is ungodly.

There is one easy way to determine if someone's gift or motive is from the Lord, and that is to ask this, Who gets the glory? That is one quick question that will disarm most of what you see out there.

If you can ask the question, who gets the glory? Because if there's any doubt that whoever's being glorified is not Jesus Christ, or if there's any shred of evidence that denies Jesus Christ His full glory, His full due, then we can happily reject this, brothers and sisters.

And we should. We ought to. We ought to reject this person's gifting, and this person, they are a false teacher. So that is one quick way, one good application that we can use in these first three verses, is to reject false giftings and false teachers.

However, this does lead us to our next question, which you inevitably get to. What do we do about these gifts that do honor the Lord? How do we know? How do we know what is a gifting from the Lord? What does that look like?

So that's our next point, but before I do that, I kind of want to walk us through just a quick observation that some of us have probably partaken in. If we're honest, we probably all are there. But it helps kind of illustrate some of what happens in this next point.

So maybe to the kids here. Who here still has recess? Do you guys still have recess?

Okay.

At some point, we all had recess. I'm going to put my hand up. At some point, I went to recess too. So if you don't have recess, then you're starting to get to points where you get a little older in school.

I work in school, and you guys know this, and I love seeing this. I see this a lot, actually. But when you go to recess, and you see a field of kids, I'm talking to kids who do go to recess. If you guys go outside for recess, and you see just hundreds of kids, who is it that you run to first?

That's right. You're going to run to your friends. You're not going to run to the different grade people or whatever. You're going to run to people that you know. For those who don't have recess, I'm going to talk to maybe some of the other ones.

And maybe some of the university students, actually. That's fun too. So when you guys are on break, or when you guys are on study breaks, who is it that you're going to hang out with, who you're going to study with?

Suzanne is not going to answer. But Daryl, if you're going to hang out with someone, who are you going to go to?

Your friends.

That's right. Your friends. You're going to hang out, and you're going to study with people that are kind of like you. You're going to go to like-minded people. Walking through the hallways at school, and you see this.

I see this walking through the hallways, and I see people of like groups. I see, oh, there's people who like music over here. There's people who like to draw over here. You see some athletic kids over here.

Okay, that's that group. And you see these different groups, and there's intermingling. And if we're honest, if people were more loving towards one another, there would be more intermingling and less groups.

But this isn't always the case. And if I'm going to address some of the maybe university students or former university students, there was nothing worse than group projects. Yeah, or collaboration. Sometimes that strikes fear in people.

Because now you have to get in groups with people that you may not usually associate with. Different styles of work, different work ethics, different philosophies. All of a sudden, you're intermingling.

And again, if we're honest, we should have a biblical approach to this, to do it with a mind that honors the Lord. But this kind of, you know, if I can use the word, these groupings, these cliques that naturally emerge somewhat illustrate what was happening in the Church of Corinth.

The Unity of the Trinity and the Gifts Given for Building Up the Church

So if we're looking at our next point, you should have in your heading, you know, what our God gives. So if Paul is going to address the lies and confusion that the world offers in verses 1, 2, and 3, in verses 4 to 7, Paul says this.

Paul's trying to address this. He says, remember that this was a church that was divided in so many ways. If you guys remember, again, if you flip back to chapters 1 and 3, Paul rebuked the Corinthians for their divisions, their schisms over earthly knowledge and orators and teachers and mentors.

If you guys remember, he rejects, he rebukes them for their love of, you know, teachings from Paul and Apollos and Cephas. And he said, and Paul's very clear that we are not to have these divisions. We're to unite.

So if you guys remember, although Paul isn't doing this here, in these four verses, this isn't happening here specifically, you have to understand, you have to contextualize, and maybe it's implied that this is likely happening here as well.

Again, if we go back to our illustration just a minute ago of all these different groups, you can picture in your minds, you know, imagine for a moment that the same division was taking place in the Church of Corinth, but instead about teachers and mentors and, you know, their favorite teacher or their favorite preacher.

Now, it's taking place in regards to spiritual gifts. So imagine for a moment, if you guys can just picture yourselves there, imagine there's people everywhere after the service, and in one corner you have people who are prophesying.

You have a group prophesying in one corner over there, and there's a big group of them just prophesying over the Church and over each other, and they're prophesying. And in another corner you have people speaking in tongues.

You have just a big group of people speaking in tongues over there. And then somewhere else you have a lineup, you have a lineup that strings around the door for the faith healer, that people are in lineup for the faith healer for things that they need healed or looked after.

Now, hopefully you guys can picture that. It's easy to see in one sense. It's no different than if you're walking down a high school classroom, or a hallway, sorry, and a very similar idea, that there was divisions taking place.

But, instead of rebuking them, so Paul, instead of rebuking this Church, note what he says here. Oh, I've lost my place here. Paul points instead to the unity of the Church. And he points to it in the most emphatic way that he knows how to do that.

So he says that all these gifts are all to complement one another. And if they are to do that, they are to do it in the way that the Trinity complements one another. Look at verses four to seven. He says, In verse six, when you see the word used for God, it is also used in other places in the New Testament for the Godhead, the Father.

So in other words, the point Paul is making is this. In the same way the Trinity complements and is equal with one another, so should the gifts complement one another and be equal amongst all those of the Church.

There should be no overvaluing, no priority, no partiality given to particular giftings, because they are all meant to build up the Church. This is what God gives. God gives unity. Where the world might give lies and confusion, God gives clarity and he gives love and unity.

So in other words, these gifts aren't to be used as a source of division, but they're to be rendered back to the Lord in unity. And that's what we're going to do in this next text. That's how we're going to apply that as well as don't covet other people's giftings.

So that's how we can apply that today. Don't covet one another's gifts. Many of the areas of this Church and current spiritual, and if I'm honest, many of the spiritual gift ministries out there that exist, we see today, they come from the sinful man's desire to self-gratify, self-glorification.

In seeking to meet our own desires, our sinful desires, I should say, whether for the glory, for self-glory or self-gain, we divide against one another and fail to give God his glory. That's what's happening.

And that's what Paul is diverting from. He wants unity. We read this earlier. Shane read this and what a blessing it was. But we're looking at Ephesians chapter 4. And I won't read all of it because Shane was gracious enough to read this for us.

But I just want us to note Ephesians chapter 4. If we're looking at verses 11 to 14, it says,. And he, Lord Jesus, he gave the apostles, the prophets and the evangelists, the shepherds and the teachers to equip the saints for the work of the ministry, for the building up of the body of Christ, until we attain to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness and deceitful schemes.

So these gifts are not for division, to divide over, to covet, but rather they are to build up one another. And Paul is going to spend the rest of chapter 12 doing this. If you're looking forward to next week's study, we're going to look at what Paul says in chapter 12 about building up the body.

So this is his emphasis. But before he can even address that, he needs us to orient ourselves from the world to the Lord Jesus Christ. He needs us to unify. As the Trinity is unified, these gifts also should unify.

Again, rendering to the Lord his due. So, however, if we don't understand this, and we don't understand that they are sourced from the same Holy Spirit, from the Holy Spirit, we're going to covet and we're going to have issues of division, and we're going to have issues similar to what the Ephesian church was experiencing in their day.

So that is the second point. So as we look at this third point, I want to do something a little bit different with this one, because of the nature of the text today. At the beginning of the text, if you guys remember, I said that there was some level of hesitation for me when I approached such a weighty topic, because I knew that there was going to be different interpretations of the text.

How am I going to do it faithfully? So what I intend to do is two things. First is we're going to do a quick brief summary of these gifts. We're going to look at them individually, and we're going to see what the Bible says about them.

And then, Lord willing, I'm going to give you both positions, or I guess both sides of the same coin here, as how people view these gifts today. So, again, I won't exhaust all that these gifts are able to give.

There's a lot there, and if I'm going to be honest, there's a lot of diversity here. And this is something, if I'm going to reclaim a word from today's age, there's true God-honoring diversity in here, and this is something to be rejoiceful for.

However, there is also flexibility, and I won't be able to address everything as I want to. In one sense, this does make for great material for topical Bible studies. So I do urge you, actually, if you guys want to proceed to roast me after this, please do, but also to do some self-study, to really dig deep, because there is a lot here.

And I will not do every gift and every utterance of this justice. However, there's also good news that Paul is going to spend a significant amount of time going into greater detail over some of these gifts.

So, if you feel like you're not getting enough today, Jesus Christ wrote his word in such a way that we are going to get more of this. So we'll be here for a while. However, there's also good room for study.

So I urge you, brothers and sisters, to go and do that. So, anyways, with that kind of out of the way, let's just get into the last four verses, or verses 8 to 11. So, in this passage, all of what we've looked at today, Paul mentions nine unique gifts.

And depending on how you classify these statements, also at least nine instances of these gifts finding their source in the Holy Spirit, in the one Holy Spirit. These are gifts rendered from someone. There's at least a one-to-one ratio worth giftings and mentions of their source being the Holy Spirit.

And also note that as we look at these gifts, they fall in either one of two categories, in either serving or speaking. So, again, as you're taking note, you can start to classify. This looks like service, this looks like speaking.

And sometimes these gifts kind of waddle between both, but regardless, they fall into one of two categories. So, again, like I said, without further ado, we're going to look at verse 8. So, in verse 8, we have the gifts.

First, we have the gift of wisdom and of knowledge. So, best understood, the first gift of wisdom is being able to articulate or dispense of biblical knowledge. Or you might even say also apply biblical knowledge to your life.

Whereas knowledge is able to ascertain or comprehend or understand really deep theological doctrine. So, one example, if you're asking, well, what's the difference? One example is if you've ever met someone who's able to understand really technical biblical doctrine, really technical, deep theological learnings, but doesn't really have the strength or the ability to teach that, it's likely they're probably blessed with more knowledge than wisdom.

But that's one way I've thought about it. If you can teach it, that's godly wisdom and being able to apply it and to do it. But learning it is a separate gift altogether. Because there is, and anyone who knows anything knows that that's true.

That there is, it's different learning it and there's another thing teaching it. Looking at verse 9, Paul then mentions faith and gifts of healing. So, these are three and four. In the Greek, the word used for faith actually does mean to have a deep and abiding faith.

For example, Jesus Christ mentioned this, like the faith the size of a mustard seed in Matthew 17 to 20. That deep abiding faith that seems almost supernatural, otherworldly. One good example of this, if you're looking at a contemporary, is George Mueller.

If you guys aren't familiar with George Mueller, he's a phenomenal, phenomenal resource. And actually, I would even encourage the parents to maybe start reading with their kids some of George Mueller's writings and journal entries.

They're amazing. Because George Mueller, as history would have it, is one of the fathers of faith missions. The notion by living by faith, not asking for donations, seeking the Lord for all provision in faith and prayer.

In quite an incredible, again, incredible testimony by George Mueller, I really urge you guys to go and visit and just learn more of him. Ironically, he would not have said that he has the gift of faith.

Ironically, George Mueller probably, especially as you go through his journal entries and his learnings and just his struggles, he would have, of himself, he would have said that he didn't have that kind of faith.

But everything contrary to his life displays almost a supernatural level of faith, of being able to go out essentially with nothing and rely on the Lord to provide him with all that he would need, including all his ministerial work when he was the head of an orphanage, in all his preaching and teaching, everything, and all his leadership.

Amazing stuff. So I do urge you to look at that. And that's probably a good example of this gift of faith. As for healing, Paul's making reference to healing acts that the apostles and Jesus Christ would have done.

So in the book of Acts, in Jesus' ministry, in the gospel. These are the ones that people are most familiar with. So if you're going to ask people of healing, people understand these, people have a general sense of these, because Jesus Christ did these on many occasions.

So moving on, so looking at verse 10, we have the remaining five gifts. And Paul does something interesting here, because he just lists, almost rapid fire, five separate gifts. And then at the end, he bookends, in verse 11 he says,.

And these are all empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills. So instead of, I guess, due to repetition, there's a lot of repetition happening here, he just labels them all and he just reiterates that these are all from the same Spirit, who apportions as he wills.

It's the Holy Spirit who dispenses. So the first thing we're going to address here is the working of miracles. These are understood to be mighty deeds outside the realm of nature. That's what the biblical use is of this.

So for example, raising the dead to life and causing to lame to walk. This isn't a healing per se, but these are supernatural abilities that the Bible makes use of here, or that this is the biblical use of.

So for those taking notes, if you're looking at more information on how to understand mighty works, or the working of miracles, many of these are from Acts. If you're looking at Acts chapter 9, you're looking at verses 40 or 41.

You see them as well in Acts 14, verses 8 to 10, and Acts 20, verse 9. So you get to see just a few examples of what it looks like to work miracles. Next up we have prophecy. Prophecy is described as divine inspiration and declaring the purposes of God.

Grouped with the speaking of and interpretation of tongues, these gifts will be the study of chapters 13 and 14. So I'm not going to hit on these as deeply. There is much to say about them, and Paul will do just that in chapters 14 to 13.

He's going to really examine what it is these gifts are meant to do, and where they find their purposes. But again, these fall under the category of speaking, of speaking gifts. Again, so not to disappoint those who are really looking forward to learning about this.

Trust me, we'll have plenty of time to look forward to this. And like I said, I'd love to talk to you after. However, the last one I really want to dig into today is the ability to distinguish between spirits, or the spiritual gift of discernment.

This is a big one. So if we're looking at discernment as a gift, good examples of this are demonstrated actually by Peter in the book of Acts. Peter was one who exhibited almost supernatural discernment, and we get this in two places, primarily in the book of Acts.

The first one we see is the tremendous powers of discernment with Ananias and Sapphira. And if you guys remember the story, briefly, this is the story in the Acts, when Ananias and Sapphira aim to take advantage of the Holy Spirit, to actually lie to and to gain glory while looking to see, seeming as though they are going to give all that they have sold in their property, in their value, and deceive the Holy Spirit and the apostles.

But Peter, rightly, by Holy Spirit power, is able to discern the intentions of the heart. And we see that in, again, if you're taking notes, Acts chapter 5, verses 1 to 11. And again, later on in the book of Acts, we see Peter having powers of discernment again, but this time we see it with Simon the magician, who tried to do something very similar, who tried to ascertain the gifts of the Spirit, seeing all that the Holy Spirit was doing within the apostles, and trying to purchase this gift for himself.

So again, Peter, once again, through Holy Spirit discernment, ascertains the heart and mind of Simon, and he does that, again, in chapter 8, and the story is found in verses 9 to 25. So again, those are just two examples of spiritual discernment.