Sunday Sermon: The Spiritual Gifts of Service and Teaching (Romans 12:7)

You're listening to the preaching ministry of Gabriel Hughes, pastor of Providence Reformed Baptist Church in Casa Grande, Arizona. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday on this podcast, we feature teaching through a New Testament book, an Old Testament book on Thursday, and our Q &A on Friday.

Each Sunday we are pleased to present our sermon series. Here is Pastor Gabe.

Spiritual Gifts Build Up the Body of Christ

As we've been studying about these individual gifts, we've been looking to see how God equips his church for the service of his church. The reason why we've been given spiritual gifts is that we may serve and build up one another.

And so we want to read again the section verses three through eight today. We're focusing primarily on verse seven, where we see these categories of service and teaching. And all of this, even as we're reading about these gifts, this is not ambiguous.

It's not something that is subjective, but all of this even falls under the guidance of God's word, even when it comes to the different ways that we may be gifted in service or in teaching. Consider this quote from the Puritan Thomas Watson, who said the following, the scripture is the library of the Holy Spirit, containing the credenda, the things which we are to believe and the agenda, the things which we are to practice.

And all of us have an obligation to believe rightly and practice rightly. And so may that direction be guided according to the word that we read this morning in honor of the word of the King. Would you please stand?

Let's read Romans chapter 12, verses three through eight. I'm reading from the English standard version. Hear the word of the Lord for by the grace given to me, I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.

For as in one body, we have many members and the members do not all have the same function. So we, though many are one body in Christ and individually members of one another. Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them.

If prophecy in proportion to our faith, if service in our serving, the one who teaches in his teaching, the one who exhorts in exhortation, the one who contributes in generosity, the one who leads with zeal, the one who does acts of mercy with cheerfulness.

This is the word of God. You may be seated as we pray. Heavenly father, as we come to our passage again today, we are reminded once again that we are one body. We have been called together to be one body in Christ and is said in Ephesians chapter four, Christ is the head and all the rest of us are built up into the head who is Christ.

But just as we read here, a body has many parts, it has many members and we are many members together in this room. What purpose or what function would you have us do as a member of the body to serve the body and to do so to the glory of God?

Lord, as we go through these things, I pray that many individual persons may read and discern and come to know what their gifting might be to the service of the body. And if there is anybody who does not know, but still inquires how they may be of good service to each other, that they would ask and receive the guidance of many counselors as talked about in the book of Proverbs, that we may help build one another up in love.

As we all hold fast to the faith that has been declared to us through the gospel of Jesus Christ. This gospel has not come to us just merely through information that we may give mental assent, but it has awakened in us that dead man that has been brought to life through faith in Jesus Christ and not just life here on this earth, but life everlasting that we may have with you in your glorious kingdom.

As we read back in Romans chapter eight, the spirit gives us life to live according to the words that we have heard. So how may we live in this world in obedience to your will guide us in those things.

As we continue to read here about the gifts that you have apportioned to us by your spirit, it is in the name of Jesus that we pray and all God's people said, amen. It is in first Corinthians 14, one that the apostle said, pursue love.

Prophecy and the Authority of Scripture

We considered that exhortation last week and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially Paul says that you may prophesy as we studied about spiritual gifts here in Romans 12. The first one on this list is the gift of prophecy.

That was the subject of our lesson last week among the spiritual gifts listed here and in Ephesians four and first Corinthians 12. The only gift that is the same on those three lists is the gift of prophecy.

Why? Well, because as Paul goes on to say in verse four, the one who prophesies builds up the church. Prophecy is imperative for the life of the church. Not that we are looking for new revelation, as I said to you last week, but we hear and study and conform ourselves to that which has already been prophetically revealed in the word of God and compiled for us here in the Bible.

In our own confession of faith, the very first chapter and the very first paragraph is a statement concerning what we believe about the Bible, which according to chapter one, paragraph one is the only sufficient, certain and infallible rule of all saving knowledge, faith and obedience, unquote.

And as we have read in Romans, it is this word that brought us to salvation. Romans 10, 17, faith comes by hearing and hearing through the word of Christ. As we continue to read in Romans, it is this word that guides us in this salvation that we have been given.

What we believe about the Bible and what it says presides over everything else that we believe and do as a church and as Christians who are living in this world. Now some traditions such as the Roman Catholics and the Eastern Orthodox believe that the church actually presides over the scriptures, though they may say that scripture in the church are equal in authority, one of them eventually wins out.

In practice, the church has the authority over the scripture to tell you exactly what it means. You can't, you can't know what it means, which is why you need the church to tell you, they will say. As a pastor friend of mine said recently, the most popular Roman Catholic apologetic argument is an insistence that Roman Catholics don't know how to read and understand the Bible.

I cannot tell you how many times I've been told by a Roman Catholic or an Eastern Orthodox, we gave you the Bible. No, my friends, the church doesn't produce scripture. The scripture produces the church.

Scripture did not originate with the church. It originates with God. As we read about in second Peter 121, no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

The church is not equal in authority with the scriptures or over the scriptures. We are under the scriptures and formed by them. We are made by scripture, which again is the very word of God. So we've just looked at the gift of prophecy.

That was the focus of the message last week, the revealing of God's will through his word, which presides over everything else that we do. And now we go on to these next two spiritual gifts as we look at them today, which are really two categories, service and teaching.

Service and Teaching as Gifts for the Church

Consider again, verses six and seven together, having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them. If prophecy in proportion to our faith, if service in our serving, the one who teaches in his teaching.

Now there are lots of things that could fit in these two categories of service and teaching. And I'm going to mention even some of these to you as we go. So as we consider these two gifts this morning, let us first consider them together.

So teaching and service together and why Paul puts them together. And does Paul have a reason for that? And after that, we'll consider them individually, service first, and then teaching. So our outline is this, we look at them together, service and teaching, then service, then teaching.

So looking at these two gifts together in verse seven. And I want to bring you back to a quote that I gave to you last week from John Gill, who was Charles Spurgeon's predecessor. Now, sometimes I will mention these pastors to you and I will quote them.

And I don't always introduce you to the person that I am quoting. Gill pastored at Goat Yard Chapel, Goat Yard Chapel. What a name for a church. The church later relocated to Carter Lane, which would eventually become the famed Metropolitan Tabernacle that Charles Spurgeon pastored.

But John Gill was there for 51 years, from 1719 to 1771. He was also friends with George Whitefield during the first Great Awakening or before Whitefield came over to the United States and was one of those two main voices in the Great Awakening, the other being Jonathan Edwards.

After Gill was John Ripon, who pastored for 63 years. Then a couple of pastors who served for about 10 years each, followed by Charles Spurgeon, who was pastored there for 38 years, followed by his son, Thomas Spurgeon.

Does anybody know what famous author preceded John Gill at this church? It was Benjamin Keech, who was the author of the Baptist Catechism that we use and quote from before our service begins. From the church's founding in 1650 to Spurgeon's death in 1892, the church had only nine pastors in 242 years.

That is a fantastic track record. And especially when you look at men like Benjamin Keech, John Gill, Charles Spurgeon, who were among the men that pastored at this church. But anyway, back to Gill's commentary note that I mentioned to you last week regarding prophecy and then on to service and teaching, Gill said the following, quote, the offices here and hereafter mentioned are not of an extraordinary but ordinary kind, such as are lasting and will continue in the church until the end of time and are divided into two parts, which are after subdivided into other branches.

The division is into prophesying and ministering, or as we may also understand it as teaching and service. So Gill's view was that prophecy presides over everything since that's the revealed will of God in his word, the Bible.

And then after that, and according to scripture, you have offices that specialize in either teaching or in service, gifts that specialize in teaching and in service. Now, there was something that I did not mention to you last week when we were talking about prophecy.

I don't know why I didn't say this, just kind of overlooked it, I suppose. But back to verse six again, having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them. Notice what Paul mentions first.

If prophecy in proportion to, and in the English Standard Version, it says our faith, there's actually a definite article there, the definite article being the, and only a few translations. I think I found maybe two actually translated as the faith.

Most others will say our faith or your faith or his faith, but it is the definite article, the faith. So if prophecy in proportion to the faith, in other words, everything that would be prophesied must be according to the faith that we hold to in Christ Jesus.

Everything that has been quantified in the word of God that we have in the Bible. We test all things according to scripture. So it's not just any sort of like subjective feeling that a person would have, as I had said to you last week, but it is according to the faith, as said in Jude, that was once for all proclaimed to the saints.

Any prophecy must come from that which has already been proclaimed and presided over by those prophets and apostles who came before us. And then out of that, we have gifts of service and gifts of teaching that are mentioned here.

In fact, the Greek word for service in some translations, if you have the new King James, for example, you probably have the word ministry there, but the Greek word is diakonia, which is another variation of the word deacon.

And the Greek word for teaching is didaskon from which we get the word doctrine. So we have service and teaching, which is qualified in the church by the offices of deacon and elder. The qualifications for overseers or elders or pastors and the qualifications for deacons we see given to us in 1 Timothy 3, which we had studied a couple of years ago.

And as I summarize those two offices back then, if you remember this, and some of you may not have even been with us then, but as I summarize those offices, I said that the pastors oversee the function of the church, especially in the teaching.

And they care most for the spiritual needs of the church in that they oversee what is taught in the church, whereas the deacons look after the physical needs of the church. When you go to Acts chapter six, and we read about the appointing of the first deacons in the church at the time that the apostles were preaching there at Jerusalem, the apostles recognized that there were certain people who were not being cared for, namely those Hellenistic widows that were not receiving food when the food was being distributed among the church.

So the apostles said to the church, it's not right that we should give up preaching in order to serve tables. Therefore brothers pick out among you seven men of good repute, full of the spirit and of wisdom whom we will appoint to this duty.

But we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word. That's in Acts six verses two through four. So we see there from the very first days of the early church, there's been a division of emphasis on teaching and serving.

It's not that teachers are exclusively teachers and they never serve and servants are exclusively servants and they never teach. In fact, we even read of two of the men there, Stephen and Philip, who were appointed to that service.

They were also great teachers, Philip, even a tremendous evangelist. Even here in Romans 12, Paul is showing how there is a ministry to spiritual needs and there is a ministry to physical needs in the church and different people will be gifted in different ways to help meet those needs.

And I don't believe here that Paul is limiting verse seven regarding service and teaching to just deacons and elders. But those are two offices of the church that certainly demonstrate the service and the teaching.

These two things here, as we read about service and teaching in verse seven, these are two categories. And there are many things that fall in the category of service and there are many other gifts that fall in the category of teaching.

We see this also in first Peter four verses 10 through 11, a little bit we quoted from this morning in our congregational reading. Peter doesn't give a long list of gifts there in first Peter four, but he does mention the two categories of service and teaching.

Here's what we read there in those two verses, as each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as stewards of God's varied grace. That sounds familiar, doesn't it? It's exactly the same approach that Paul has taken here in Romans chapter 12, verse 11, whoever speaks as one who speaks the oracles of God, there's teaching, whoever serves as one who serves by the strength that God supplies, their service in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, excuse me.

Now as Paul words this here in Romans 12, seven, he doesn't do much to expound upon these giftings. You'll notice how short the phrase here is in verse seven, if service in our serving, the one who teaches in his teaching, and I read that and I'm like, well, thanks a lot, Paul.

I think I can figure out that if I'm supposed to serve, then I serve, and if I'm supposed to teach, then I teach. But the point is here that if you are gifted in service, then serve. If you are gifted in service, but you don't serve, then what good is the gift?

If you are gifted in teaching, then teach. And if you are gifted in teaching, but you don't teach, then I mean, what good was that gift? How does that build up the church if the teaching isn't taught?

Now that doesn't mean that everyone who can serve should be made a deacon, nor does it mean that everyone who can teach should be made a pastor. Look for the gifts and look for the needs, and how can the person gifted help to meet those needs?

There are much smaller areas in which these gifts can be exercised than filling those particular offices in the church. If the gift is there and it isn't used, then how can it benefit the need? And remember that the metaphor we're looking at here, the metaphor that we're building off of is that we are a body, and just as a member of the body has a function, so does every member in the church.

Is there ever a part of yourself that you look at and you go, what is the point of you? I do. I actually have parts of me that I look at. Why do I have that? Last night, I was reminded why I have toes.

It's to find stuff in the dark and wake my wife up while I'm stumbling around in the room. She even said to me this morning, it didn't sound like you slept very well last night. My toes were the alert that then came to my mouth and made me go, ow, and wake up my wife in the bedroom.

But every part of us does have a point. Every part of the body does have a purpose that serves the rest of the body. And so it is as we flesh this metaphor out, no pun intended, but as we flesh this out, so it would be the case with everybody in the church, you are a part of the church and so therefore are to be a benefit to the body of Christ.

So we've considered these two gifts together as Paul lists them, service and teaching. Now let's break them up and start looking at them individually. So first of all, let's look at serving. You may have a translation that says ministry, as I mentioned, but again, this comes from the Greek word that means to serve.

That's literally how it translates. As Matthew Poole says, this speaks of any ministry in the church that is distinct from that of teaching. So it's like we can divide everything in the church into two categories, service and teaching.

Serving Through Material Needs

And whatever is not teaching, Poole says, is therefore service. The spiritual gifts in Romans 12 appear to alternate back and forth between teaching gifts and serving gifts. So if we were to keep reading into verse eight, which we'll look at next week, we read one who contributes in generosity and the one who does acts of mercy with cheerfulness.

Those are two more examples of gifts of service. But what else might we understand are gifts of service? And there are many other places in scripture where we may draw some of these examples. So let me give you five examples from scripture, and I'll tie this to even some people that serve in these capacities within our own body.

And the first is an example that I've already given you. So number one, an example of service that we have in scripture that we also see practiced among us is serving through material needs. As we see in Acts 6, 1 through 6, men like Stephen and Philip and five others who were chosen to handle the daily distribution of food to the widows.

And the purpose of this wasn't just so that the widow's needs would be met, although that was certainly the main objective. These women are not receiving food in the daily distribution, so we want to show love and care to these women.

But there was also the added layer of allowing the apostles to continue their focus on prayer and the ministry of the word. So because there were those who were designated to care for the material needs of those who had need, this allowed for those who care for spiritual needs to continue on with teaching and building up the church in that way.

Here in the church, in this church, in this body, we have widows who are looked after. And we also have those who have been sick, or perhaps they have had a recent operation, or maybe one of our moms has just had a new baby.

And there are those in this body who will organize meals for them that they would be cared for, or maybe they go over to the house and help to clean. Some meet needs in other ways, not just with food, but with clothing or letting someone borrow their car, or paying a bill, or just being there to lend an ear and talk with one another.

Serving Through Hospitality at Home

So that's one way that we serve, and that we've seen that service happen in our church, serving through material needs. A second way is serving through the home, and maybe even serving through your own home.

In Luke 10, 38 -42, we read of a woman named Martha, who prepared meals and hosted Jesus and his disciples, showing practical hospitality and service. Or there was that occasion in Matthew 8 -14 when Peter's mother-in-law was sick, and when Jesus healed her, she immediately got up and served them.

What a great way to show appreciation to the Savior who had just healed her, that she would then get up and serve the guests that were in her house. And here in this church, we have those who have been incredibly hospitable, to open up their homes to others.

I think just about everyone at one time or another, unless you're brand new here or have never been here before, but you've probably been over to the DeSentos house, or you've been to the Shanickers house.

Both of these households seem blessed above most with that gift of hospitality. The Lopez's and the Davis's, they've been so kind as to lend their homes for small groups. The Timmer's have hosted such great get-togethers and backyard cookouts.

The Lee's host a regular potluck that everybody is welcome to. There are those that I think you can identify within our own body who just have that desire to want to serve and be hospitable with what God has given them, even in their own home.

When my family and I first came to Casa Grande to visit, this would have been three years ago now, this coming September, when we came over that Labor Day weekend in view of a call, the first family to welcome us, with the exception of Dusty and Josh, who came and picked us up at the airport, but the first family who welcomed us were the Whites.

They came right over as soon as we were in. Josh gave us his Durango so that we would have a way to get around. I've eaten at several other families' homes here. Even while we were here in our first visit, I was identifying immediately the spirit of hospitality that existed in Providence Church before we ever even came.

And I'm sure many of you can also think of other families here in this body whose hospitality you've benefited from. But many are specifically blessed with that desire to want to serve and open the home up and offer that kind of hospitality.

Serving Through Craftsmanship and Practical Skills

So that's a second way you may observe that kind of service in our church. A third is through craftsmanship, serving through craftsmanship. When we were going through Exodus, we read of Aholia ben Bezalel, whom God said he had gifted for the construction of the tabernacle.

At the beginning of our study on spiritual gifts, I had said to you that whenever we find these lists of spiritual gifts in the New Testament, they're not exhaustive. None of them are ever exhaustive or comprehensive.

They don't list there every single spiritual gift that we may have. There are other parts of Scripture where we may draw from an example of a gifting that God has given to somebody. And Aholia ben Bezalel was one of those examples that I gave.

God had gifted them in the service of constructing the tabernacle. Later on, there were men who were gifted in the construction of the temple. Exodus 36 .1 says that in addition to Aholia ben Bezalel, there was every craftsman in whom the Lord had put skill and intelligence, and they would know how to do any work in the construction of the sanctuary.

We have had people here who have built things for the benefit of the church. Some of the renovations that we did to the building on Woodruff Road, John has helped, Dawson, Justin, Sal, excuse me, even helping to plug in sound equipment and run it all.

I mean, there's a certain craftsmanship to being able to do all of that. The work of those of you who help with audiovisual, photography, some of the slides that we use, that's an excellent artistic ability.

Serving Through Music and Worship

Building a website, making videos, there are different forms of craftsmanship that contribute to the work of the body. Number four, a fourth way that you may observe service in the church is serving through music.

In 2 Chronicles 30 verse 22, King Hezekiah spoke encouragingly to all the Levites who showed good skill in the service of the Lord. And when you read that in context, you realize some of them were skilled in making the food for the feast, and some of them were skilled in music, in leading the congregation in singing.

It says that they praise the Lord day to day, singing with all of their might to the Lord. The Psalms tell us to sing and play our instruments skillfully. Psalm 33 says, give thanks to the Lord on the harp, sing to him a new song, play skillfully on the strings with loud shouts.

We know that David appointed skilled musicians in the service of the temple for leading the people in worship in song. And we are blessed here with many skilled musicians to accompany our singing. Josh, for example, is an actual band leader who helps with leading the music.

Abigail can play just about any song on piano, and she's 15. RJ knows how to play classical pieces on guitar. Phineas plays violin with little to no prep. He can just pick it up and play. All I have to do is tell him what key we're in, and he's ready to go.

We've just recently begun to benefit from the Franklin couple and the skills that Jeremy and Madeline bring to us. We've heard a little bit from Gabe Huddleston, but he needs to become a member, and then we'll love to hear from him even more and the musical gifts that he can contribute.

Same with the Noggles, as I understand that they're gifted musicians too. And, you know, on that note, yeah, no pun intended there, there are others of you who are gifted musically, and not all of you will get to accompany the music or be up here on stage, and that's okay.

Your gift of music may go as far as serving your family, and that's still unto the glory of God. Family worship and singing may not be as seen, it may not be as visible as what the musicians do up here, but that is a gift.

It is a gift to your own household, and it can be a gift to other saints in smaller settings as well. That is certainly a gift that God has given to you for the service of his saints. And finally, number five, as I'm laying out these examples here, a fifth example is serving through, you guys are going to love this one, serving through cleanliness, taking out the trash.

Serving Through Unnoticed Work

Now, that's certainly not as popular or as exotic as some of these other things that I've listed here. Who wants to take the trash out? Who enjoys mopping floors or stacking chairs? I remember the Christian comedian Tim Hawkins joked about this and saying that, you know, whenever somebody comes up to, oh, Tim, you have such a servant's heart, you have a servant's heart.

He said, I hate hearing that because that means, oh, you want me to stack chairs. That's what you want me to do. But even as we read about service here in Romans chapter 12, it is said that we do this service with cheerfulness.

So even these kinds of service that may not be seen by others can be done in service to the body and to the glory of God. And remember that Jesus said that what is done in secret, God will reward. So maybe nobody sees that you do this, but the Lord sees.

And it is accruing unto that congratulations that we will hear from the master on that day when Jesus says to us, well done, good and faithful servant. He'll say, well done because you serve the church taking the trash out.

You know, there may be those occasions. I've certainly done this, so I'm speaking as much to myself as anybody. But there may be occasions where you stand over the trash and you're looking, why can't somebody take this trash out?

Anybody had that? Like I think that phrase is uttered in our own home probably every day. Why can't somebody take out this trash? Well, guess what? You've just volunteered and do it with cheerfulness.

And these are just a few examples. As I've talked about or given these five examples of service, and I hope that you're not offended if you've contributed to the work of the church somehow and I haven't mentioned your gift or your name, the Father knows it and that should be enough for you.

But I've wanted to cite these examples just to give you an idea. So we're putting names and faces on the ways that we see service done here all the time and every week. When I first came to Providence and the elders that were already here, Alan and Chris, they had asked me what I can do or what I wanted to do, what kind of workload was satisfactory, what was too much.

One of the things that I said to them was I could do everything because I have in some capacity done that before. Just wherever the need is there, I'm willing to jump in and do it. But I said I don't want to do everything because I'm certain you don't want your pasture to be stretched too thin.

But it also means if I'm doing the job, it may be that I'm taking that job away from somebody else. And I don't want to do that. I want to give opportunity there for people to serve. Yes, I'm the guy that gets paid and I want you to feel like that you're getting what you have paid for, certainly.

Of everybody that is here today volunteering and helping out, whether it was setting out pews or setting up sound or setting out the hospitality table or greeting people as they came in, only one person is getting paid for that work and that's me.

And I understand that. And I want to be a faithful servant and be worthy of the salary that the church has determined for me and provided for me and for my family. I want to work hard for you, certainly.

But at the same time, I want there to be places where everybody has an opportunity to serve. And we all have the chance to do that, again, for the benefit of each other. And for the glory, doing so to the glory of God.

It's kind of like the way that the apostle Paul talks in the book of Philippians, where he accepts the money offering from the Philippians who gave it to him. He said, I don't need this. I am perfectly content with everything that I have, but I'm accepting it from you for your benefit.

Because now you have become a participant in the ministry that I'm doing here in Rome. And I want that to be to your benefit as you are storing up for yourself sanctification for the day of glory. When we hear the master say, well done.

And so we all serve in these ways, maybe not receiving congratulations on earth, but doing so in worship to our God in heaven. Remember as we started Romans 12 reading by the mercies of God, present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God.

And this is your spiritual act of worship. What we do, everything that we do, even outside of church on Sunday morning is worship to God. So here we've looked at examples of service. Let's go on now to teaching.

Teaching Through Expository Preaching

So now we've looked at service. We go to the category of teaching, and I don't know why teaching is listed after service. I don't know that there's any necessary reason for that, but we do see that Paul kind of alternates back and forth between service and teaching as he goes through these gifts.

What the church teaches guides everything else that the church does. As Charles Spurgeon has said about the pulpit, it is both the bow of the ship and its rudder. Wherever the preacher goes in the pulpit, the rest of the church goes too.

As goes the pulpit, so goes the church. Of course, the pastor is not the only teacher, and I'm not even the only pastor. So whoever stands up here in this pulpit and teaches will guide the direction of the church.

Just as there are different kinds of service, we also have different kinds of teachers. And as I gave you some examples of different kinds of service, let me also give you examples of different kinds of teaching.