Spiritual Gifts 101 - [1 Corinthians 12:1ff]

Spiritual Gifts, Tongues, and the Question of True Spirituality

Just how spiritual are you? Do you speak in tongues? Do you interpret tongues? What are tongues? Does God speak to us today in still small voices? What are the manifestations of the Holy Spirit in a church?

What does it mean to be filled by the Spirit, baptized by the Spirit? Can you quench the Spirit? What about spiritual gifts? And so 1st Corinthians chapter 12, 13, and 14 deal with that issue. Now, we can't get through them all today, but we'll just dip our toes in the first few verses of chapter 12.

So let's turn our Bibles to 1st Corinthians chapter 12 as we go verse by verse through this great book. Paul is trying to correct a lot of the problems that are going on at Corinth. And as you know, they were really selfish at Corinth and they were really experience-oriented.

Everything was revolving around self. It caused all kinds of problems, as you know, in chapters 1 through 11. And they were really subjective. They were mystical. They were really affected by the culture.

And the culture, with all the paganism that was going around in Corinth and up at Athens, it affected them in terms of their mind and how they thought about God. And so Paul now, very pastorally, is going to deal with the Corinthians and try to teach them.

And before we look at the passage, the main question that I want to ask and then answer today is, are you spiritual? How do you determine just how spiritual you are? For some people that means, well, I speak in tongues, therefore I'm spiritual.

And I don't speak in tongues. Someone else might say that means I'm not spiritual. Actually, that was the problem at Corinth. 21 times in chapters 12, 13, and 14, the word tongues is used. And there was a group of people at Corinth who said, we speak in tongues.

That's the highest gift. That's the best gift. This is the gift that if you're really spiritual, you have. And anything else is second-class, second-rate citizen. Is that true? If I ask you the question, are you spiritual?

What would be the answer? Now, of course, our society, they always talk, I'm a very spiritual person. And spirituality, basically, in our society means, I experience God on the golf course. I don't like church in general, organized religion, I don't like.

And Jesus, if he's good for you, that's fine. But I just worship God in my own way, the way I want to. That's what spirituality means today. I'm religious. God has sent eternity in my heart, but I just do what I want to do.

And no book is gonna make me conform to its commands and demands. But what does Paul mean when he says spirituality? Are you spiritual? Should you want to be spiritual? Now, when I read accounts in books called The Father's Blessings, it says, quote, a delightful woman came to Toronto.

She came from an extremely theological and intellectual background. Too much thinking, she said. You can tell where this is gonna go. While under God's power, she had a vision. Jesus took her through events of her childhood, and they relived them together.

This woman used to play soccer, and Jesus told her gently that she took the glory for herself. So she wept and repented. Then they played soccer together. She laughed and laughed at his long robe. Then she asked him to be the goalkeeper.

He was so strong, he knocked all the balls away. But then he let her have a goal, and she laughed some more. I'm trying not to laugh myself. Then Jesus told her she always acted like a boy. She said this was true because her father wanted a boy, and it hurt her.

But Jesus showed her that he wanted her to be a girl. She explained that she saw like a movie before her eyes, The Yard. She used to play in as a child. She had a pretty flower dress on, and they danced together, and her hair blew in the wind.

Jesus told her, you know, forever I wanted you as a girl. She cried and cried. It's so wonderful because he planned me to be a girl. It was all so beautiful. Do you experience God like that? Is that the inside deal?

Are you constantly thinking about God this way, and God visiting you through dreams and visions and speaking to you? Because if you aren't experiencing God like this, there's probably something in you that says, I kind of wish I was.

I want a deeper relationship with Christ. I want more knowledge. I want more insight. I want a closer walk with thee. But is this the way we get it? First Corinthians will ask and answer the questions, what does it mean to be spiritual?

And you'll find out very quickly that it has nothing to do with Jesus letting you score a soccer goal. I don't know what Jesus that was, but it certainly wasn't the Jesus of the Bible. Now to give you a little more context, 1 Corinthians chapter 12 is basically talking about worshiping God and God governing the way we worship.

The triune God, Father, Son, and Spirit governs the way we worship. We don't make things up. God tells us what he wants. He created us, and then he tells us how we should worship him. And really the issue is building up the body of Christ.

It happened in chapter 8, chapter 9, chapter 10, 11, 12, 13, 14. How do we build up other people? And what is real spirituality? How can we exercise our spiritual gifts? And these Corinthians, as I said just a minute ago, radical individualism.

They were on their own. They did what they wanted, and Paul patiently talks to them for many chapters. When you email me a question, sometimes I just give you a short answer. One little sentence. Call Pastor Steve.

Something very simple. But Paul knew they had a problem, and for three long chapters, he just pastorally patiently pours out his heart so they can have their question answered. We don't know the question.

We do know his answer, and the answer is found in chapter 12, 13, and 14, and it says here in chapter 12, verse 1, now concerning spiritual gifts. Remember, every time you see now concerning, chapter 8, verse 1, Paul is answering a new question.

Remember, we don't have the letter that Paul received from them, but we do have the letter Paul sent to them. And this whole section is about spirituals. Actually, the New Testament would read, now concerning spirituals.

This isn't songs from the 1800s. This is spiritual gifts. Now, it could be translated spiritual gifts are spiritual people who have gifts, and so really it doesn't make any difference because only people have spiritual gifts.

So what about spiritual gifts that people have? That's the question, and just like today, we have lots of questions about spiritual gifts. So our outline in chapter 12, 13, and 14 is going to be very simple.

We're not going to get very far today, but it will have a first couple certainties. Let me give you several certainties in our Spiritual Gifts 101 series. Objective truths and facts in our day and age of all kinds of subjectivism.

Scripture Alone Versus Inner Impressions

Certainty number one, even though there's lots of confusion regarding charismatic issues, you can know exactly what you need to know through God's Word. In other words, even though there are a lot of issues when it comes to spiritual gifts, you can know.

You don't have to be caught up in the haze of spirituality. The Bible will tell us, and that's exactly what Paul is doing. Look at the rest of verse one. I do not want you to be uninformed. He's going to try to tell them this is what the Bible teaches.

And remember the Corinthians, they thought they knew everything and they were boastful and prideful. Remember the Bible says that they were puffed up. I love that Greek word to be puffed up. It's the sound that you make when you blow up a balloon.

Fusio. And they thought they knew it all and they were at the top and they couldn't be taught. And Paul just kept saying over and over, remember, do you not know? Do you not know? Do you not know? And now he says it in a little softer way.

I don't want you to be uninformed. I don't want you to be ignorant about spiritual gifts. It's a sensitive topic and Paul wants them to know. On a side note, may I encourage you that when you're talking to people and friends that you have, maybe that are charismatic, it's not unloving to talk about the issues.

It's not unloving to say, let's just work through this. I disagree with you. You disagree with me. Let's work through the issues. That's not unloving. That's good. And that's exactly what Paul is doing.

Love rejoices in the truth. First Corinthians chapter 13. So here's what Paul is going to do. What is the key mark of being spiritual? That's what he's after as he's moving towards this issue. What are the marks of spiritual Christianity?

Is it in fact tongues? Is it healings? Is it interpretation? What really is it? Is it something with inspired speech? And Paul says, I don't want you to be ignorant. You're running around thinking that you know everything with a badge of superiority.

You think you know the highest gift, the best gift is tongues. Paul says, let's find out. Then he says in verse 2, You know that when you were pagans, you were led astray to mute idols. However, you were led.

Paul is saying this in a kind way. What you used to be didn't really help you. You were led by your impulses, led by actually a demon. Remember, these just aren't pieces of wood that don't talk. Demonically energized paganism led you along.

It took you by the nose, as it were, and pulled you along. And he's saying that's the way you used to live your life. You can't do that now, just be led by your feelings and by subjectivism and everything else.

That can't be. You were being led astray. There's an urgency, Corinth, to know the right thing. You were led astray before, and now I'm going to tell you the right thing. Pay attention. I really want you to know.

And it's interesting when it says these mute idols. I said to the first service, it was Al Mohler, I believe, who said, our God Yahweh is invisible, but he talks. Their gods are pagan pieces of wood and stone and silver and gold, but they don't talk.

If I was going to teach kids, I would say their lips are zipped. They don't talk at all. And people at Corinth just worshipped and worshipped and worshipped. Remember in our reading today that Scott read for Habakkuk 2?

Woe to him who says to a wooden thing, awake, and to a silent stone arise. Try doing that with your kids sometime. I did that once. We drove by a particular brand of church, and I got out to, had all the kids get out, and they have statues of people and statues of men and statues of women.

You can just say all you want to those statues. They're nothing. They're not going to listen to you. Can this teach? No, it can't teach. So Paul is saying your paganism didn't help you, so let me teach you the truth as an apostle.

Your experiences were marked by deception in the past. Don't be deceived now. It is an untrustworthy guide to just experience and just get caught up in the flow. I'm just experiencing God, and just whatever comes my way, I'm just going to kind of empty my mind.

He says don't do that. You're proud and arrogant and boasting. That hasn't helped you. Now, let's just think about this for a moment. These experiential Corinthians relied on subjective experience and subjective hearing from God and all kinds of other things, and Paul is going to try to correct them.

Friends, today in the charismatic movement in general, I think the same thing is happening. Now, I want to say this because it's right to say, and I believe it to be true. I don't hate charismatics. I don't hate charismatics at all, and actually some charismatics are fine scholars from Gordon Fee to Wayne Grudem, but I think there's a theme in many charismatic circles and that things are subjectively experienced, and that is validated as truth, and Paul, I believe, would say to them, there's a subjective truth that you have, and it has to be confirmed and affirmed by the external Word of God, in other words, sola scriptura.

I don't hate charismatics, even though I think their theology contributes to the demise of sola scriptura. I grew up, my mom would drive us to school, Master's Elementary School, and it was in Nebraska, had nothing to do with Master's Seminary, and the Master's Monarchs, and mom would drive us to school, and I would listen to Jimmy Swigert on the way to school every day, thinking about Tarzan, but listening to Jimmy Swigert.

I went to a Lutheran church, and our pastor spoke in tongues. My pastor there was very kind to our family when my father died. I got saved. I went to a Calvary Chapel. My pastor had a private prayer language, he said, and so my pedigree is from the charismatic movement.

I don't hate charismatics. MacArthur was asked, do you hate charismatics? He said, no, I married one. So see, it has nothing to do with we hate people. It has everything to do with if there's a subjective influence and experiencing God based on, initiated by feelings, and impressions, and intuition, I'm going to try to tell you as nicely as I can that undermines sola scriptura.

If I want to say things a little more bluntly after I've given my, my, you know, I'm trying, I'm not trying to hurt anyone. I'm not mad at anyone, but I believe that the modern charismatic movement, or maybe if you want me to say the excess, the excesses in the modern charismatic movement, have done more to undermine sola scriptura than anything else in the last 300 years.

Because if experience trumps, then why do we need the Word of God? And you can just hear the way people talk. Think about Corinth. I speak in tongues. It must be true. Well, I have never spoken tongues.

This person over here then says, since you haven't experienced it, how can you contradict it? I would say, you say I've experienced tongues, therefore it's true. Your experience is leading you. I say I haven't spoken tongues, and therefore my experience is teaching that it can't be true.

Both arguments are wrong. What does the Bible teach? And Paul is trying to make it very clear. What does the Bible teach about these issues? Tongues, spirituality, what's at the top of the list for being spiritual?

If you are a charismatic here today, or a non-charismatic, here's what I want you to do. I want you to realize that seeing is not believing. I want you to realize the sufficiency of Scripture. Everything you need is found in the Scriptures.

And the second you turn inside and say God is talking to me, it's an impression. I have a hunch. I've got the peace about it. God is talking to me in a still small voice. I want to challenge you. Here's the challenge.

How do you know it's God when your heart is fallen? How can you know it's God talking to you, or it's your own heart talking to you? And remember, your heart is fallen. We believe in depravity. He who trusts in his own heart is a fool, but he who walks wisely will be delivered.

We are not to trust ourselves. The second you want to have an inner word from God, and you move away from the external word, you will be just like the Corinthians, confused. And you don't need to be confused.

The second you say it is Scripture plus experience, for truth, then you're going down the confusion alley. By the way, do I want you to have experiences? Do I want you to have love and joy and peace and wonderful experiences in life?

Of course I do, but experience doesn't determine truth. Two religions in the world. Religion one, the Bible from the external source influences everything I think about God. It alone contains truth. That's religion one, according to B .B. Warfield.

Religion two is that it's the Bible plus inward impressions and intuition and everything else. The second you go to the second one, you're going to be in trouble because intuition is fallible. Impressions are fallible.

Your heart is wicked. You need an external, outside source. The second you go to the inner word, John Calvin would call you a fanatic. You can't trust that. And we live in a day and age today where we are ripe with the fruit of mysticism, visions, and God talking.

Actually, if you looked at someone, if you talked to someone today, and they stepped back and said, let me explain to you what evangelical Christianity is, they would most likely describe to you a crazier, charismatic blend.

One man said, once a congregation or a person sees Scripture as less than the final, complete, infallible authority for faith and life, it has thrown open the door to absolute chaos. If you say, I've experienced something, there it must be true.

As David Wells says at Gordon-Conwell, you've now exchanged autobiography, you've exchanged theology for autobiography. It happened to me, therefore, it must be true. But the converse is true as well.

If it didn't happen to me, then that's true as well. No, we have to go to what the Bible teaches. And the Bible either teaches tongues for today, or it's not for today. It doesn't teach both. Even Gordon Fee, a respectable charismatic, said, quote, in general, the Pentecostal's experience has preceded their hermeneutics.

In a sense, the Pentecostal tends to exegete his experience. So if you're Pentecostal, I don't want you to do that, and neither does Gordon Fee. Mysticism, bypasses the mind. The plumb line is God's Word.

For many people, they'll say, we're Protestants, and we don't like the Bible plus sacraments, the Bible plus tradition, the Bible plus Mary, the Bible plus the Magisterium. And the Protestants who say no to Roman Catholicism, rightfully defend Sola Scriptura, the Bible alone as the sufficient Word of God.

But those same people who rightly say that, wrongly oftentimes say it's the Bible plus the mysticism, the impressions, the intuition, and everything else. And they, like the Catholics, deny Sola Scriptura in practice.

The Bible never, mark this, never commands you to tune into your inner voice. It says to meditate on Scripture, study Scripture, show yourself approved. It never tells you to go inside. Actually, when you go inside, the Bible teaches that it is the immature person who does that.

It's not a healthy thing for you to go, I'm looking on the inside. I've got a decision to make. I need help. God speak to me. I think that He just told me something, or I've got a sign or a fleece. Friends, that is a sign of immaturity, not maturity.

Actually, sometimes, you know what it is? I didn't say this first service, but I could have. Wanting to be confirmed in your actions all the time. I don't know if I really want to do this or not, because I don't know if God wants me to.

Do I marry this person? Do I take that job? Do I marry, do I move to this particular place? What should I do here at work? Desiring to have some kind of internal confirmation from God can end up being idolatry.

When God just says, I've equipped you, I've given you everything, you have the Word, you have my Spirit, you can pray, and then you just need to make a decision. The Bible is authoritative. It is exhaustive.

It is final, sure, and reliable. And if you say, yes, I believe that, but you don't believe in the sufficiency of Scripture, you believe in the deficiency of Scripture. Listen to Peter's account, marking Bible first experience underneath.

For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. Remember Peter, James, and John? Saw Christ Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration, for when he received honor and glory from God the Father, and the voice was born to him by the majestic glory.

Not just eyewitness, but ear witness. This is my beloved Son with whom I am well pleased. We ourselves heard this very voice born from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain, and we have the prophetic word made more what?

Sure. What's more sure than with your own eyes and your own ears seeing Jesus on the mountain? The Word of God is more sure than that. That's Peter's point. No wonder then, he says, in which you do well to pay attention to a lamp shining in a dark place.

What is more sure than experience? It is the Word of God. That's Peter's point. The Corinthians were wallowing around in, well I've had this experience, therefore it must be true, and it must be true, and then what you have not experienced must be inferior.

That is faulty hermeneutics. The only standard Zaspel says which can adequately answer such a question is scripture, not experience. Let me give you a modern-day illustration. How many people believe this next sentence?

Heaven is for real. I do. Is heaven for real? How do you know heaven's for real? Because the Bible teaches heaven, and to live is Christ, and to die, gain. You look at the eternal state in chapter 21 and 22, you see Paul.

Heaven is for real. Now, do you believe heaven is more real because some, I can say this because I'm from Nebraska, so for those of you who are visiting, you don't know, some hick kid from the middle of the Midwest of Nebraska had a vision and wrote about heaven as for real, and his vision, by the way, said things about heaven that contradict scripture.

Yeah, but you know what? God has really blessed that book. God has used that book to do mighty things in people's lives. That's exactly the problem. It's an unbiblical book written by a kid in Nebraska.

I remember when I was there in Nebraska, just 20 miles down the road. What they call a road back in Nebraska there, and everybody's like, what about heaven for real? What about heaven for real? You watch, within five years, somebody else will have supposedly died and will have gone to heaven or hell or purgatory or perdition or someplace, and then be on the circuit to say this is what's true or not.

Because you've experienced heaven, therefore it's real. It's exactly what Paul is against. It's exactly what the Corinthians were doing. You don't need that book. It's full of nonsense. False things about God.

But if your hermeneutic is, I've experienced it. It must be good. It was pleasant. Saw grandpa up there and a bunch of horses and wings and all whatever else he saw. Well, yeah, but you didn't do it. How can you say no to his experience?

I don't need to say no to his experience, because what does the Bible teach? And the Bible teaches if you actually do go to heaven, what happened to Paul? He was told not to talk about it, because it was such a great vision, and he was given humbling thorn.

Whether you're charismatic today or not charismatic today, may I encourage you to trust in the authority, the sufficiency of Scripture alone, and you interpret your experiences in light of Scripture, never the other way around.

And I think it's fair to say that the majority of the charismatic movement does the opposite. Are there exceptions? Praise the Lord, there are exceptions. But in general, don't fall prey to what the Corinthians did.

I had an experience, therefore, it's the best. You have an experience? Then, interpret it by Scripture. Spiritual Gifts 101. Certainty number two. Not only can we know, and that was more of an implied point, but this is a reason why Paul writes these three chapters, to tell them they can know, this is more an explicit point.

Jesus Is Lord: The Spirit's Work and the Highest Confession

Number two, the Holy Spirit gives all gifts to highlight Christ's supremacy. The Holy Spirit gives gifts to highlight Christ's supremacy. Found in verse three. Let's read verse three, and then let's talk about it a little bit.

Therefore, I want you to understand. Can you just hear him again? Just Apostle Paul, patient, kind. I want you to understand that no one speaking in the Spirit of God ever says Jesus is accursed, and no one can say Jesus is Lord except in the Holy Spirit.

All right, let's think through this. How do you know a person is under the control of the Spirit of God? That's the big point with Corinth. We say, Corinthians say, it's by speaking in tongues. It's by baptism of the Holy Spirit.

It's by being filled with the Holy Spirit. That's how I know I'm in total control, and God owns me through the Spirit of God, is that I have these manifestations. And Paul says, no, you want to know the top, the apex, the Mount Everest of saying that you've been experiencing God to the fullest?

Here's how it'll manifest itself. Jesus is Lord. Now you say, well, some people can say Jesus is Lord because as a pagan you can go, Jesus is Lord. But of course they don't mean it. Of course, it's not from the heart.

It's not with assent and an intellect and saving faith. Remember, many will say to me on that day, Lord, Lord, I didn't, you know, I did all these charismatic things. And you'll say, I didn't know you, you who practice lawlessness.

But to really mean it, to say Jesus is Lord, where does that come from? But let's look at this first part. Jesus is accursed. No one speaking of the Spirit can say Jesus is accursed. Now some people think that was happening in the Corinthian worship service.

Can you imagine somebody coming up to the front and saying Jesus is accursed and swirling around like some whirling dervish or something? I don't think that really was happening. If it did, it did. But Paul is saying, when you're a pagan, you say Jesus is accursed, especially if, I shouldn't say pagan, if you're a Jew.

Remember Deuteronomy 21? Cursed is the man who hangs on a what? Tree. You can imagine the Jewish people looking at the Messiah going, he's not the Messiah. You're a curse from God if you hang on a tree.

Paul's just using this to counterbalance the main point. You can't say Jesus is Lord without the Holy Spirit. And really mean it. Mean it. That is the oldest creed. Jesus is Lord. By the way, Lord, what should go through your mind right now?

Lord, kurios. New Testament word. This is the translation of the Old Testament word where we get Yahweh. Jehovah, as some people say. The way you would translate, if you're, if you're quoting a verse from the Old Testament in the New, from Hebrew to Greek, and you see the word Yahweh, L-O-R-D, all caps, the way you translate Yahweh is kurios, L-O-R-D.

Who can say Jesus is Yahweh? Show me a Jew who can say Jesus is Yahweh, and I'll tell you something that's happened to that person. What has happened to that person? The Spirit of God has arrested them and quickened them.

And instead of saying Jesus should be cursed, they say Jesus is the Savior, the substitutionary atonement. It's Christ Jesus the Lord, the priest and the sacrifice, raised from the dead. So the Corinthians were saying, you know what?

We've got tongues. Yes, we do. We've got tongues. How about you? And Paul is saying, if you can say because of the Spirit of God's work in you, Jesus is Lord. That's the most spiritual thing that you could ever say.

This isn't the haves and the have-nots. And by the way, that's what another thing, sadly, that many, many charismatic churches foster, even though it might not be intentionally. We have these gifts, and there are people that don't have those gifts, the haves and the have-nots.

And for Paul, if you're a Christian here today, charismatic or non-charismatic, the highest form of spirituality is Jesus is Lord, the most basic confession. Christ is Lord. It has nothing to do with tongues.

You don't have to say it in a different language. It doesn't have to be in gibberish. It doesn't have to be an impression or intuition. Jesus is Lord, recognizing by the Spirit's work. Paul says, you guys have so many factions.

You had factions because you followed men, chapter 1. I'm of Paulus. I'm of Paul. I'm of Cephas. I'm of the Lord. You had economic factions in chapter 11. We're the poor people. We're the rich people, and the rich eat all the food in communion.

And now you've got another faction. We got the Spirit. Yes, we do, and you've got nothing. Paul's saying that the top of the list, if you ever say to yourself, you know, I'm wanting more in my life. I watch TBN all day.

A, stop it. No wonder you're confused. You watch TBN all day, and it will ruin your mind. I don't know about you, but I don't let my kids have ice cream every day. They could have ice cream sandwiches on my mother's birthday morning, because mom always let them have ice cream sandwiches when they were shipped over to their house.

But I don't give them ice cream sandwiches every morning, because it wouldn't be good for them. You turn on the TV, and you're like, you know, well, I've got it kind of nuanced. Here's what I do. Here's how I watch TBN.

I decide we're gonna have a little game, and how many seconds does it take to listen to heresy? Well, I guess you can do that if you like, but if you're in seminary, and you want to do it, okay. If you're not, you ought to stop watching things that confuse you.

Paul is trying to undermine this elitism. Jesus Christ is confessed by all Christians, male, female, black, white, everything in between. Rich, poor. And by the way, if you have come to Christ Jesus, and say Jesus is Lord, was it your own free will that did it?

I think the look of the text, what's it say? No one can say Jesus is Lord except by his own free will. Nobody else influenced me. I'm not influenced by God at all. I got to make this decision on my own.

I'm not a robot. I'm not a puppet. By the way, let me just refresh your mind, and just give you a glorious truth. No free will in heaven. Will you be a robot? You couldn't sin in heaven if you wanted to.

Will you be a puppet? This whole thing, if you don't have free will, then we're not human. Then you're not human in heaven, because you can't sin even if you wanted to. You won't even think of sin. Unbelievers are slaves to their own sin, Romans 6.

Unbelievers are slaves to the world, Ephesians 2. Unbelievers are slaves to do Satan's will, 2nd Timothy chapter 2. How can you extract yourself from that? As I said before, we are so influenced as a people, you can't even watch a commercial without getting hungry.

When you see a commercial for a Wendy's Frosty, you want a Wendy's Frosty. You are influenced, how much more, by sin and Satan. But when God comes along, and he regenerates you, and he quickens you, and he makes you alive by his free will, what do you do?

Jesus is Lord. How do you come to faith? By your own bootstraps? By your own determination? God's like, I'm not going to force you to do anything. I'm Jesus the gentleman. Well, you need to reread this verse again.

No one can say Jesus is Lord, except by the Holy Spirit. He gives you new life, and you freely say, Jesus is Lord. By the way, on a side note, if you've got an unbelieving friend, you can't coerce them.

You can't bribe them. Oh, you could beg them. You could encourage them, and you could preach to them. But if you want your spouse saved, you want your kids saved, then you better ask God, the God of the universe, who can say, I will open these people's hearts when I please.

And when he opens them, they will respond with what? I believe for my mom's sake. No, they'll say, Jesus is Lord. And by the way, you all pray that way. For those of you thinking, I don't believe in the sovereignty of God in salvation.

Yes, you do, because you pray what way? Dear Lord, please arrange things in such a way that they are not going to be puppets, or they're not going to be robots. Their own free will, they can come to know you.

You don't pray that way. Unless you're weird, I guess. I don't know. You pray this way. God, save my dad. Save my mom. Save my kids. And the way you can know they're saved is because then they'll say, instead of just believing all this going along with you, I believe, I trust that Jesus is Lord.

I die by the grace of God for that truth. In context, Paul is saying everyone is equal. That's why I get so bothered by the charismatic stripe that says, we have the full gospel, and you don't. Really?

So what you mean by that, I think, is Mark 16, at the end of that. But they are not careful when they say, we believe the full gospel. Then I guess that means we don't, and that's exactly what Paul was after, because the Corinthians were doing the same thing.

I guess preaching Christ Jesus and Him crucified isn't enough. Just giving you half the gospel. You say, well, this church isn't very spirit-filled. We've had people who've come to Bethlehem Bible Church, and when the singing was almost over, leave the church.

And one of the one of you brave souls would run out to the car to say to the people, are you okay? You know, do you need a defibrillator? Is everything fine? We don't like the worship. Not Holy Spirit filled.

Okay, I guess if you mean it's a drumbeat and a bass guitar that you feel to experience. But if you mean we're not singing songs about the Lordship of Christ, if we aren't, then I don't think we're spirit-filled.

But show me a spirit-filled church, and I'll show you a church that says, Jesus is my all-in-all. On Christ a solid rock I stand, all of the ground is sinking sand. Immortal, invisible, God only wise, Jesus is the full God Yahweh.

That is a spirit-filled church. I don't care if all the songs are chants, or all the songs are peppy. Well, you know what? You guys need to have a second blessing there. Can you tell me one thing I need that's not found in Christ Jesus?

Is there one thing that I can't find in Christ Jesus that the Spirit of God has for you, but He doesn't have for me? He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also give us freely all things?

That's exactly what Paul would tell the church of Corinth. You think you're in because you've got these special gifts? Everybody's in no matter what gifts you have, and we'll learn soon enough in these chapters that everyone has at least one spiritual gift.