Spiritual Gifts | Rapp Report Weekly Wrap-up 0021 | Striving for Eternity

Welcome to the Rapid Bull, daily edition, where we provide a quick biblical interpretations and applications. This is a ministry of striving for eternity.

This week's weekly wrap-up. We're dealing with the issue of spiritual gifts. We start with discussing whether there is a specific gift of evangelism. Then we want to go through what a spiritual gift actually is compared to a talent and then we're going to go through the list of spiritual gifts that we see in Romans chapter 12 and 1st Corinthians chapter 12.

Whether Evangelism Is a Distinct Spiritual Gift

Some think, wrongly I believe, that there is a specific gift of evangelism. Now many take this from Ephesians chapter 4 verse 11 that says, so Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers.

And they try to argue that there is some form of gift of evangelism. Now what we do see from Ephesians chapter 4 verse 11 is that there are categories apostles, prophets, evangelists and teachers slash pastors.

Now the issue is, is there a specific gift of evangelism? Well Matthew 28 19 and 20 makes it clear that we're all commanded to make disciples of all people that we come in contact with. The first step of discipleship is to evangelize.

Then after they evangelize, verse 20 says to teach them all things that Christ has taught you. So the first step for us to do is to, in the making disciples process, is to evangelize. Once they become believers, we are to teach them all things that Christ has taught us.

There is no specific gift called the gift of evangelism. Evangelism is something that every Christian must do and in fact is instructed to do by Christ. When we talk about spiritual gifts, there are things we have to get straight because there's some people who make excuses that by saying well, I'm not gifted to do something.

Maybe you they want to teach, someone wants them to teach, but they're not gifted to teach and therefore they would say well I can't teach because I'm not gifted that way. Someone who's gifted should be the ones to teach.

Distinguishing Spiritual Gifts from Natural Talents

First, let's make a distinction between a gift and a talent. A spiritual gift is something you get at salvation where a talent you're born with. So someone may be born with a talent to be able to administrate things or to teach or musically talented.

They have that at a young age and all their life before they got saved they had that ability. That's a talent, but a spiritual gift is something you get at salvation. The Holy Spirit gives certain gifts to people.

Every Christian has a spiritual gift, some different variations of them, but those are given at salvation. So there's a difference between a talent and a gift. Someone could be talented to teach. They had it all their life.

They have an ability to teach, but some could be spiritually gifted to teach. That, like in my case, came after I was saved. And so people have to realize one other thing. When it comes to spiritual gifts, we are commanded to do all of them.

We're all commanded to encourage, to teach, to give all of them. It's just that some of these gifts will come more naturally to us because they're empowered by the Holy Spirit. So you always have to remember that it's not an excuse just because you're not gifted that way.

The Holy Spirit gives some people, but we're all commanded to do all of the spiritual gifts. We have two main lists of spiritual gifts in Scripture. Romans chapter 12 and 1 Corinthians chapter 12. When we look at this list, we have prophecy.

That is both foretelling the future and foretelling the past. This would be considered the preaching that can happen when someone proclaims God's Word from a pulpit. That would be explaining the Scriptures.

The Romans 12 Gifts That Continue Today

Ministry. Ministry is those people that like to serve in the background. They don't need to be seen. They prefer background type ministry. Teaching is the ability to communicate to others. Exhortation is the correction that's sometimes needed.

Giving is more than just your time, more than your money. It's also your time. There's the gift of ruling, which is the ability to administer gifts that is required for pastor, by the way, along with teaching.

The other is showing of mercy. Those are all in Romans chapter 12, and those continue to today. The list that we see in 1 Corinthians 12, many believe those ceased. Some of those gifts don't continue for today, but there's some believers who believe they do, and those include the word of wisdom, the word of knowledge, faith, healing, miracles, discerning of spirits, the speaking of tongues, the interpretation of tongues, apostles, and helps.

The 1 Corinthians 12 Gifts and the Question of Cessation

Now when we look at that list, many believe that those have ceased and do not continue for today. There's some debate on that subject, but the list in Romans 12,.

Those are for us today. This podcast is part of the Striving for Eternity ministry. For more content or to request a speaker or seminar to your church, go to strivingforeternity .org.