Spiritual Gifts, part 2

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Pastor John uses his spiritual gift to teach on the spiritual gifts

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All right, we want to welcome you back and for our new visitors here today.
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We are in a journey, I guess that's the best phrase for it, through Isaiah, of taking our time seeing what it has to say, but every now and then there's a topic of, we think of significant import, and so we take a break, we're calling it a university class.
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You're not going to get credits for it. But it's where we dive deeper into it, and we're kind of alternating between a significant theological topic or a practice topic, if you would.
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Jeff did one on evangelism. Actually, I taught most of that class because you were there.
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That's true. But you prepared it. We're doing spiritual gifts. In the future, we're looking at things like the
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Trinity. Okay, so then we go into some good theology and maybe prayer life as a practice.
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But we started spiritual gifts last week. I knew we weren't going to do the whole thing.
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We're going to finish it today with an anticipation of having time at the end that we can ask questions.
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Typically, what we've done is we've taught right up until quarter of, give or take a couple of minutes, cut the camera, and then there's questions.
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Some of the feedback I've gotten, I don't know if you've gotten it. Man, we wish that the questions were captured on the video because some of the great discussions happened after the camera's off.
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We're going to leave the camera running until quarter of. Questions. I feel very, very confident in any question that you might ask because Jeff is here to answer them.
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We're going to finish our discussion. I want to open up,
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Jeff, if you would get to 1 Corinthians 12 .1. We're just going to open up with that verse and then you can open us with a prayer.
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All right. 1 Corinthians 12 .1. Now concerning spiritual gifts, brothers,
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I do not want you to be uninformed. One of the powerful things we just had at our preaching camp a week ago,
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Dr. Tim Warren was here and he gave us a lot of helps preparing and delivering sermons, but I believe a lot of what he had to say, it applies directly to teaching as well as preaching.
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Have that one thing that you want. Don't just have a buckshot of information.
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This is, I think, the one thing of our lesson on spiritual gifts.
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I don't want you to be unaware or ignorant. Spiritual gifts are given by God for a purpose, and if the one thing is that we're not ignorant, we are aware of them.
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The motive is so that we can fan into flames everybody's desire to not only to know them, but to obediently use them.
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That's the target. That's the goal. We did get started last week. We'll finish up what we got, but Pastor Jeff, could you give us a prayer?
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Yes, Father. We think of Paul's exhortation to Timothy to fan into flame the gift that is in you through the laying on of hands.
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Lord, we are calling on you right now to fan into flame the gifts that are in us since we were baptized into the spirit when we became part of the church.
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1 Corinthians 12, 13, that we were included in the church, baptized into one body.
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So we have these spiritual gifts. We pray that you would then fan these into flame as we're not uninformed, but we're aware of your work in us to do exceedingly abundantly beyond all that we could ask, think, or imagine.
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So we pray, Lord, that you would fan gifts into flame through this teaching in Jesus name.
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Amen. Quick review, some of the highlights. Definition of a spiritual gift, we did talk about and we looked at 1
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Corinthians 7, Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 12, that a spiritual gift is a gift from God.
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It's given by His grace according to His will.
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And then we worked off of that, how would we define a spiritual gift?
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We came down to the thought that it is an ability given to us by the
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Holy Spirit and it's for the ministry of the church.
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That being said, ultimately, spiritual gifts are for the glory of God, not for me.
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They're for the glory of God. So those were some of the concepts that we talked about and you have to have those concepts if we're going to be talking about it.
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I then went into a discussion that I believe scripturally there is a quiver full of gifts that are given to every believer in common and these aren't the unique spiritual gifts.
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They're a quiver full of gifts that are given and that we receive them at the point of salvation.
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We receive the Holy Spirit at the point of salvation and some of the things that He does for us,
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Romans 8, John 6, we're transformed into a new creation. The old has passed away, all has become new.
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And it's that Spirit that gives us this life. In Galatians it tells us that the Spirit helps us to call
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God Abba, Father. Whether you're coming from a religious background or whether you're coming from a totally secular background, having this ability and this desire to just instinctively turn to God, Abba, Father.
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That's a gift that is given to us. And I want to say as I go on to this that when you receive this quiver full, it's evidence that you are different than the rest of the world because the rest of the world doesn't have these gifts.
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It says that the things of God are not known by flesh because flesh can't understand it.
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It's given to us by the Holy Spirit and so that's in 1 Corinthians 2. We get the opportunity to understand things of God.
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I firmly believe that we talked about the golden chain and I think it starts out with regeneration and justification.
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They basically happen. It's hard to separate them in time because unless God gives you the grace, you're not even going to respond because we are totally unregenerate man.
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So God gives us the grace so that we can't even perceive and when we perceive, then by faith we become justified.
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At the end we become glorified and there's a massive period of time between the sanctification.
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But we are given the opportunity to understand the things of God as we're on this journey that the rest of the world is never going to understand.
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And so oh by the way, if you're talking to your neighbor about a truth of the gospel and they're not believing it, they're not getting it, don't be surprised because without the
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Holy Spirit, things of God are just not going to be there. We get that and also the
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Holy Spirit teaches us how to pray and it says even when we don't know how to pray, the Holy Spirit intercedes for us.
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We get this. This isn't just given to some uniquely, this is given to all of us.
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It also says in Galatians 5 .16, walk in the Spirit and you will not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. We have the gift of the
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Holy Spirit within us. By following the Holy Spirit, these things that are of the flesh, we're no longer slaves to them.
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We are endowed with this power that we can deny. Walk in the
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Spirit and you'll not fulfill. Galatians 5 .22 gives us a list of nine fruit.
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That's for all of us, all nine. I love, depending on which version you've memorized it in, love, joy, peace, love, suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance.
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Against such there is no love. We get all of that. It also equips us to proclaim the gospel of God.
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Jeff, last Sunday, was it last Sunday you gave us the million dollar packets? Yep. Okay. There's still many out there.
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I encourage you to grab them. What they are, it's the gospel of John inside with some helps at the end of it. We have an individual in our church who
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I believe has the gift of evangelism. I do believe he has that gift. He was coming into the building earlier this week and there was a 16 year old young man sitting on the rock and he went up to him and shared the gospel of God and the young man accepted it.
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You can tell who that was. It was Stan.
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Can't I tell? It's too late now. Stan is sharing the gospel anywhere and everywhere.
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It just happened yesterday. God gives him the words to speak at that time and I think he's given him the gift of evangelism.
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No fear. This man has the gift of evangelism as well as witnessed by Tim and by Kyle and by the whole group of young guys.
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That's the fruit of his evangelism to God's grace. It also says that he actually gives us the words to say.
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We get that. These are not the unique gifts and if you're sitting here today and you've accepted
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Christ and you are John 112, you are called the sons of God. You've got the Holy Spirit and all of these are yours.
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All of these are yours. You just have to claim them and use them. I had an opportunity to do a youth camp devotional and I took a large pan if you would and in the middle of it
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I had an empty two liter soda bottle and I had a two quart pan with a handle half filled with water.
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I took out a five dollar bill and I said if anybody can pour this water into that without dropping a drop
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I give you the five dollars. Nobody could do it and I said I'm sorry guys.
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I pulled out from underneath a wide mouth funnel that fit right into the bottom. I said
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I forgot to tell you I got a gift for you. Can anybody do it now? And don't you know some kid came running up and took the pan and tried to pour it into the bottle without the funnel.
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I couldn't have taught that lesson any better if I tried. The gifts that we have are there for reality but you've got to use them.
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You've got to use them. God gives you the grace but you've got to use them. From that we now go into what
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I call the unique gifts. If you pick up on the back of the papers there are two of them.
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One of them is a two sided and the other is a one sided. It's just a list. This takes the four major passages that talk about spiritual gifts and it lists the gifts that are in them and you can see the verse where they show up.
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Now this is uninspired. This is just John's feet.
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I see that there are categories of the different gifts. There are position gifts.
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Ephesians is particularly strong. He gives unto the church some to be apostles, some to be prophets, evangelists, some to be pastors, some to be teachers.
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These are the positions and these are individuals that are placed and called within the church to sing amazing grace.
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That happened exactly this time last week. These are the individuals that God calls and puts them in their position for a purpose.
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We went through these last week. We believe here at Cornerstone that teacher is a position that is relevant and exists.
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If an individual has been gifted for that position and is not stepping forward there is a void within the church because God plans those that he places.
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There is the gift of pastor and I firmly believe that we're talking about the senior pastor.
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God has called that senior pastor for the position and evangelist.
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I believe he's also called as an evangelist. I think Stan is called as an evangelist.
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It's more than just a trait. It's I think a calling. So now we get to the other two that are tougher.
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Prophet is either foretelling, we talked about this last week, or forth telling.
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What's the difference between foretelling and forth telling? Foretelling is telling the future.
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Foretelling is speaking the word of God. Give me an example. Well, so and so is going to have a million dollars by next week.
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So that's foretelling. Foretelling is just telling the word of God. And Jesus is coming soon.
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There is prophets like Isaiah, Jeremiah. I think
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Nathan approaching David is both foretelling and forth telling.
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He's doing both. Proclaiming God's truth for a situation is forth telling.
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Whether there are foretelling prophets today becomes a discussion of cessation versus continuation.
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We'll get into that discussion a little bit later. But we definitely have the position of prophet who is a forth teller.
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Somebody who proclaims truth. Often that's the senior pastor. It could be somebody who has the ability to exegete
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God's word. Because you're taking God's word and proclaim it, apply it for a situation.
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Apostle we do not believe exists today. What was an apostle? Someone who saw
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Christ in his ministry and witnessed him resurrected from the dead. Why were there apostles?
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Oh, I put you on the spot. Well, there's a lot of reasons, but to witness to the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ.
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And to inscripturate his word in the new covenant. So overseeing the new testament.
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Absolutely. And I think encapsulating all of that around it is so that what takes place in Acts takes place.
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The church is established. Whether it's the inscripturating.
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I turned it into a verse. Yes, you did. Ephesians 2 .20. Go ahead.
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The church is built on the foundation of the apostle. Yes. These are the positional gifts.
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We read them last week in Ephesians 4 .11. What I'd like us to do right now is to read the other three major passages.
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We're going to highlight what they are. Let me just say this. I believe, and again this is not inspired and I'm willing for discussion on it.
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The service gifts are capabilities that are given to individuals.
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Uniquely given to believers to benefit the whole. And then there are these unique abilities.
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And that's just me speaking. Because there are things in there that are common gifts to everybody.
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But they seem to be given in unique quality and quantity. To some.
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For a reason. Then there's the sign gifts. The sign gifts are perhaps to validate the church.
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They validated the church back in the day. And whether they're existing today or not is the question of cessation.
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But if you have missionaries that are somewhere where the church is being introduced.
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Sign gifts may be actually given to validate the establishment of that church.
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So I think there's an argument that these sign gifts exist today in God's purpose.
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In God's purpose. And then there's tongues. And that's another topic all unto itself.
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What? As far as sign gifts, I've heard reports in Africa. You know, people who grew up with witch doctors and stuff like that.
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The sign gifts have been manifested to verify that Jesus Christ is God. Not, you know, what these witch doctors proclaim.
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Yeah, and that's the argument from experience. As opposed to the argument from where it stands in Britain.
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That's the argument of experience. It's doing what it did in the book of Acts. In a setting where it's needed.
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So I totally agree with you. 1 Corinthians 12, 4 to 11. We're going to read these passages so we have them.
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Then I can speak off of it. So Bob, I'm going to ask if you would get 1 Corinthians 12, 4 to 11.
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And then I'm going to tag on verse 28 at the end of it. It's on my page there. And Romans 12.
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Sue, if you would get Romans 12, 6 to 8. Sandy, you got 1 Peter 4. 10 and 11.
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So if you could read those passages, I would appreciate it. Sorry, 1 Corinthians. 1 Corinthians 12, 4 to 11.
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And then after that, verse 28. 1
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Corinthians 12, 4 to 11. There are different kinds of gifts.
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But the same spirit. There are different kinds of service. For the same Lord. There are different kinds of working.
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But the same God works all of them in all men. Now to each one the manifestation of the spirit is given for the common good.
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To one there is given through the spirit the message of wisdom. To another the message of knowledge.
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And I apologize. I do this so rudely, I interrupt readers. While he's reading, you can actually look on this.
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And the little numbers in the parentheses are the verse where they show up. So he just got done reading in verse 8.
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To some are given the gift of wisdom. And to some the gift of knowledge. So you can see in 8. And if you look now, you're going to see in verse 9,
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I'm going to hear the word healing. You can actually follow along on here. Verify, be a
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Berean. Verify that what I got here is what the text says. I apologize to continue. I didn't finish 8.
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Yeah, go ahead. To one there is given through the spirit the message of wisdom. To another the message of knowledge by means of the same spirit.
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To another faith by the same spirit. To another gifts of healing by that one spirit.
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To another miraculous powers. To another prophecy. To another the ability to distinguish between spirits.
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To another ability to speak in different kinds of tongues. And to still another the interpretation of tongues.
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All these are the work of one and the same spirit. And he gives them to each one just as he determines.
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Verse 28. And in the church God has appointed first of all apostles.
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Second prophets. Third teachers. Then workers of miracles. Also those having gifts of healing.
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Those able to help others. And those with gifts of administration. And those speaking in different kinds of tongues.
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That passage out of Corinthians gives us some of the positional gifts.
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A lot of the service gifts. And it starts out with that unique ability.
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And that just gets me interested. He gives the gift of wisdom. Well, everybody gets the
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Holy Spirit. So that we can understand scripture. But there appears to be an exceptional gift of wisdom.
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That some within the church may have. And wisdom is taking knowledge and applying it according to God's will.
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So somebody who has this gift of wisdom. Perhaps if we're in a congregational meeting.
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Or maybe there's a class where there's a difficult passage of something.
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I was with friends yesterday. We were looking at John 17, 22.
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Where Jesus says, Father, as you have given me glory.
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So I have given them glory. That they may be as one. And it's like having the wisdom to understand.
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Well, what is this glory that the Father gave to the Son? Because then they always have glory. And how do we get that glory?
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And then that message really says. Somebody who has the gift of wisdom can take that truth.
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And exegete it and let us understand what it is. And so it is with these gifts. He also talks about the signed gifts.
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And then he introduces tongues. That interesting discussion. Romans 12.
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Sue? Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us.
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Let us use them. If prophesied, then let us prophesy in proportion to our faith.
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For ministry, let us use it in our ministry.
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He who teaches in teaching. He who exhorts in exhortation.
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He who gives us with liberality. He who gives with liberality.
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He who leads with diligence. He who shows mercy with cheerfulness. There are things in here like.
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Aren't we all supposed to have mercy? Well, yeah. But again, within the body there is those individuals.
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Who have this super amount of mercy. That maybe can remind us.
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You know, an individual is caught in a situation. And there is a desire to exact some sort of.
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And somebody who's got the mercy may remind us. Let's go back to the cross. Let's go back. Somebody has that kind of a gift.
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What a gift of giving. That is a unique gift. Now we're all to give.
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And we're all to give abundantly. And according to the heart. But some are given this unique gift.
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There's a church in the area. That has an individual who has been blessed by God.
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And he gave this church a lake camp. For one dollar. Just to make it legal.
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Some people are. Some people have that unique gift.
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And again, these listings are here. The reason I put them on that page. We're going to eventually ask the question.
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How do you know which one is yours? Because I think in the authority of scripture. I can write everybody's name on this page.
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On at least one line. And the question is, do you know what your line is? Sandy, you've got 1
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Peter 4? Mm -hmm. As each one has received a special gift.
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Employed in serving one another. As good stewards of the manifold grace of God.
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Whoever speaks is to do so. As one who is speaking the utterances of God.
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Whoever serves is to do so. As one who is serving. By the strength which
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God supplies. So that in all things. God may be glorified. Through Jesus Christ.
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To whom belongs the glory. And dominion forever. And ever, amen. If you go through these lists of gifts.
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Sometimes they match up with each other. Sometimes there's lists in one. That's not in the other.
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Peter's got one that I found to be intriguing. They're all intriguing. But within this list.
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We have things like teaching. And we have things like exhortation. We have the pastor.
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The teacher. We have these kinds of things. And it says he who has the gift of speaking.
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And I see that to be even outside of the realm. Of being a preacher or a teacher.
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Or somebody who has the gift of speaking. And this to me is an indication that God endows individuals.
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To be in an interaction with somebody else. And to be able to speak the truth of God. With his love.
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In a way that that person needs to hear. These are gifts that are given.
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There are physician gifts. There are service gifts. Unique abilities. You may all be called to give.
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Or you may all be called to show mercy. But there are those who have that extra measure. The signed gifts.
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Here in our situation. I don't know that the signed gifts would be active. They're to establish and to affirm.
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But here's a question. If you really believe that you have one of these signed gifts. For some reason.
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Should you be out in the field? That's just a separate question. Tongues are its own issue.
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And we can talk about that. I want to go to the back page of my notes. Talk about the question of sensation versus continuation.
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And the question is. And it's raised. Are the signed gifts still active? Or were they uniquely for the first century church?
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And I think part of it comes down. To the word teleos. In the
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Greek. First Corinthians 13. 9 to 12.
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Just for time. I'm going to highlight it. For now we know in part. But when perfection comes.
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The partial will be done away. Now I know that that talks about what we see. What we perceive.
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But there has been the application. That these things that are being done. For the church. They're done in part.
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When the perfection comes. We no longer need the part. Those who are doing miracles. And those who are doing healing.
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Are a pattern. Of the better that's in heaven. But they're revealing.
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And they're validating. That the church is there. And it says when the perfection comes. What is this perfection?
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And there are three options that I've found. In researching. One of this is. Eventually at Christ's parousia.
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The second coming. And so then all of these. Are going to remain applicable. Until the parousia.
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When Jesus is actually going to reign on earth. Another one is. That the establishment of his church.
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Once the church has been established. We have the book of Acts. And the churches are established. That's the definition of perfection.
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So the sign gifts are needed. Because they are there. And so now the word of God. Can be proclaimed.
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And can be applied. Using these other gifts. And the third is. Well once the canon is complete.
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We've got everything. That God needs for us to know. By reading the canon of scripture.
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Yes. Now the church has been established.
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And it is built on the foundation. That is built. It's not it is being built.
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It is built. So Ephesians 2. Might lead you to think. That we already have the foundation.
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We have Christ as the cornerstone. We have the apostles and prophets. As the foundation. And so now the church is being built.
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That might lead you towards the concept. That the church has been established. Tetelios has been achieved.
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So cessation might be perceived. At that point in time. Then 1st
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Corinthians 14 .5. It talks about. Thumbs and prophecies continue. That the church may be edified.
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And the realization is that the church. Is still in need of edification. Absolutely.
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And so that perfection has not yet been achieved. And so Tetelios has not yet occurred.
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And so the sign gifts are still valid. In their application.
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And taking these scriptures. And going into the testimony. Like Rich was talking about.
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Where there are testimonies. In tribal locations. Where there are witch doctors.
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And so these sign gifts. Are actually miracles and healings. Validating that this church.
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That Jesus is. Jesus is who he is. And witch doctors. I mean
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Moses and Aaron. Were confronted. By false.
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You know. They throw the staff down. And it turns into a snake. And so these false guys throw a staff down.
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And it turns into a snake. Well what happened? Aaron eats the other snake. If you want to look at the scriptures.
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I am not going to tell you. And I'll let you speak if you want. Dogmatically.
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But it appears. If I look at these scriptures. We're looking when does perfection occur?
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Is it going to be when the church is established? I believe the church is still being established.
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On the strength of 1 Corinthians 14. Is it when the canon is established? You can argue that.
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Because we're told don't add anything to this. And that what is in here. Has been established as complete.
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You could argue that one scripturally. When Christ's return comes. Clearly you can say because.
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What we are to be. We don't even know. That's a very loose paraphrase. That we are continually growing.
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Into his image and likeness. I believe that our position. Is that we would accept.
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Continuation in circumstances. Yeah I would say. We're going to go by what the scripture.
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Clearly teaches. And that's what we hold dogmatically. But there's room for difference. On this particular point.
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Because if you are reading this. Completion of the canon. And you think you're handling that faithfully.
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Then you have biblical reason. To be a cessationist. Now when I look at 1 Corinthians 13.
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Eight through 13. I think there's a number of clues. In the text. That this is referring to the return of Christ.
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So when I see him. I'll be like him and I'll know fully. As opposed to looking through a dark glass.
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It looks to me. That this is the return of Christ. The parousia not the completion of the canon. But the burden of proof.
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If the scripture is teaching. These spiritual gifts. And someone were to come and say.
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No they've ceased. Well now that burden of proof. Is on the person making that claim. So I'm going to sit back and say.
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I think I'm open to this. That the Lord is doing these things. Especially on the mission field. Establishing the church etc.
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Because I don't think I can fulfill. The burden of proof from this text. So that's where I'm at with it.
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Because the argument then goes to experience. And from my experience. I don't see the kind of apostolic miracles.
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Happening in America today. That we saw in the first century. Right that are recorded.
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Obviously Benny Hinn. Kenneth Copeland. All these people who claim to be validated. By their supernatural signs.
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There it's laughable. How far removed what they're doing. You know the leg lengthening trick.
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Or something like that over against. Acts chapter 3. Where the man crippled from birth.
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Is just in the sight of everybody. Undeniably walking and leaping. And praising God. So I think qualitatively.
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You didn't have the special water either. Didn't have special water. Or the coat to knock him over.
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There you are. I think it's a far cry. From what was happening there.
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So but now we're talking. At the level of experience. I wasn't in Thailand. Francis Chan says you know recently.
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He saw a bunch of blind eyes open. And that's his experience. But he didn't get it on video. So it doesn't move me much right.
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So when you get down to that level of. Experience it's really hard. To make a judgment.
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So we sit in the text. This is what we know for certain. And then I'm not going to say beyond. What is written.
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So we're just living in America. Yeah you're familiar. Yes. Right.
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Right. He's claiming are still seeing miracles. Right. OK OK.
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Glad you brought that up. There is a difference between God. Performing miracles. And somebody having the gift.
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Of miracles. There is a difference between God. Miraculously healing. And somebody having the gift.
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Of healing. Yes Bob. You saw it on video.
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Yeah. That's a great point. I've actually watched a Daniel Colinda. Reinhard Bonnke video about resurrection from the dead.
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And they interview all these people. They have some video footage of it. A guy who had been dead for two days.
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But there's also people that say. That he could have been in a deep swoon. Because of this drug that was administered.
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Not to mention that nowadays. AI you can fake anything on video. So. Yeah. I have never.
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Had an experience. Of being. I believe in a satanic.
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Presence. And by the grace of God. I was motivated to say. In the name of Jesus Christ go away.
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And that satanic presence ended right away. Do I have a gift? No. Did God perform a miracle?
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Yes. Somebody who has been relieved.
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Completely relieved of cancer. And the doctors say. We got no idea how that one happened.
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Well I do. But it wasn't somebody going in. With the gift of healing. God still performs miracles.
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At his will power. Sue has seen it. She's seen a dead person.
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And seen him resurrected from the dead. Come back to life. And remember himself.
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That's you right? That's me. Yeah. I got it.
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I found him dead anyway. Wow. But he had a lot of medical intervention too.
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Yeah. So how did the. How did the healing.
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Occur? There was. I only remember.
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Falling into. Just going to bed. I was exhausted. And going to bed. That's for sleep apnea.
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And it's a dangerous thing to do. If you're sleep apnea. The next thing I remember.
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I woke up at the rules. For Sue. I was snoring so loudly.
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That she went down the stairs. And came back upstairs. And was relieved for a moment.
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To see that the snoring had stopped. But that goes along with breathing. Yeah. And. There was no resuscitating me.
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In bed or home. Or anywhere. They got the emergency people there.
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But there were. There were a lot of things. That came together. Did truly miraculous.
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What was the. Process. Where I'm going next. I'll just ask with a yes no question.
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Clearly God performs miracles. Clearly he does. And this is an evidence of a miracle.
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Was this a situation. Where a. Healer came. And said
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I'm. Okay. So this is evidence of a miracle. Which God does do.
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Which God does do. Well we know for sure there was one person. Praying very hard. Oh prayer. Yes. Yes.
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One of my EMS partners. Was only several blocks away. I was an
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EMT. Retired now. Was just a few blocks away. He was first on scene. And then just everything.
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That needed to fall into place. Fell into place. To get me to the hospital.
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But so far as I know. There was no. There was no shock. There were no injections.
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No. But a policeman was actually first on scene. And he had something. That he had used for years.
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Called a front. And all it does is push oxygen. And that's what he needed.
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If they had done CPR. Which is today's protocols. Just CPR.
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Just chest compression. It wouldn't have done any good. Because he had used all the oxygen in his body.
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And this man came along. With the wrong equipment. And put it on him. And that put the oxygen back in his body.
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And then they. His partner. From way back. He came along.
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And dropped lines. And got medications. The frog she talks about.
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Is non -intubation. Forced air. Into the system. And opens things up.
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And getting oxygen. Into the lungs. Getting the heart to push the oxygen.
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Into the body. Into the brain. And that's a great testimony.
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What I want us to do. At this point in time. There is no doubt miracles exist.
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But there's also no doubt. That the spiritual gifts are here. How do you know.
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How do you know. What your spiritual gift is. That's a question that I get often.
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I want to start off by saying. In verse 15. 7. 7. That everybody has a gift.
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According to God's sovereign will. Alright, I guess the question is why do you need to know what your spiritual gift is?
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You don't need to know, but it's nice to know. And usually it's when a number of people tell you, you got this gift.
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You know, usually you won't, sometimes you don't know yourself, but other people will tell you what they think you have.
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Rich, that's the sign. Yep. That's actually what you're saying. That's exactly right. If you don't have a phone. Yeah. If you don't have a phone, then you don't use it.
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That's exactly right. There are approaches that people have advocated, and Sandy and I have experienced them.
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These personality questionnaires, and you answer these 75 questions, and you score them at the end, and you have the gift of discernment.
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I don't advocate that. And can I just interject? Do not do the Enneagram. The Enneagram has a cultic root, and it's built on the occult, and it's popular in evangelicalism nowadays.
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To give you all of these personality assessments. It's a step beyond Myers -Briggs and all that personality assessment.
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That's not biblical. It's not the way to discover your spiritual gift. So steer clear of it. What is that?
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Because I've been hearing about it. The Enneagram, it's… It's like a chart. Yeah, it's a chart. It looks like a pentagram for a reason, and it has different points on it.
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And you're either an encourager or a challenger or a blah, blah, blah. But what it does is it boxes you in to how they're telling you you are, rather than letting the word of God conform you to who
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Christ has made you to be. And it becomes a justification for people doing unbiblical things and treating people differently based on their assessment of who you are.
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I've seen it used very damagingly, and that's not spiritual gifts. Because it is evil. Yeah, and the roots of it are evil.
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So, yeah. Stay away from Enneagram. How does the New Agers use it a lot? I don't know.
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People love the facts. You know, if it's popular… New Age paganism coming in.
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Paganism. It's a lot of spiritual… Yeah. …ex -spiritual push behind that.
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Say, well, do anything you can to push you to something that looks beautiful. Right. Absolutely. Absolutely. It comes as an angel of light.
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I'm going to give you four scriptural foundations. And how can you find out what your spiritual gift is?
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The first one is surrender to His will. That's the first thing. Don't be looking for a spiritual gift that you desire that you would have because you're excited about that.
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The first thing it's got to do, 1 Corinthians 12, 11, surrender to His will. The second is that, and this one speaks specifically about preaching itself, but I believe that scripturally
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God puts within you a desire according to His will to be used for His purposes.
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So be ready to listen and respond where God puts this burden, this desire in your heart.
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But then in Romans 12, be willing to serve sacrificially. Not for any other ulterior motive, but be willing to serve sacrificially.
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And then in 12, 9 through 30, be ready and be used in service. It's the service, it's not the gift that matters.
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If He's giving you a gift, it's the service that matters, not the fact that you have the gift.
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Where would you put 1 Corinthians 14, 1 where it says, pursue the spiritual gifts, especially the prophets?
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So now we're going to get into how do we pursue them. That's a great question. Here's some questions to ask yourself.
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I want to know what my spiritual gift is. I want to pursue it. First question is, how has God prepared you?
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God is not a God of mistake. If He's trained you up in certain ways, He has established you and put within you the framework that He wants.
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How has God actually been at work in your life? And then ask the question, given that, what has
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God put in within me, within abilities and within passions? If I am prone to be answering somebody's question before they ever ask it,
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I'm probably not going to be one to be really good to be an encourager. How has
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God equipped you? How has He think of it? Then there's a good question, what interests you?
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If God has given you a gift, He's going to give you a leaning towards a type of ministry.
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Maybe you don't feel at all comfortable being up front, but you would absolutely love to be meeting with somebody one -on -one.
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Maybe you have the gift of exhortation. And then quite frankly, what are the needs within your church?
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If God has brought you here, it's for a fill of a need. What are the needs within your church?
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And so here's the four actions I ask you to do. Pray about it, first of all. Consider these things surrendering to His will.
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Pray about it. And having done that, have your eyes open for opportunities. Don't sit back and wait for somebody else to nudge you.
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Be proactive and be involved. Always be prepared to do a reason for the hope of life.
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I really do have the gift of leadership and administration. Maybe the church needs a new financial secretary.
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Who knows? Who knows? Yeah? Can you speak to the difference between in our weakness,
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He becomes strong? Sometimes in ministry, I feel like a fish out of water here.
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But sometimes then that's when you're in a position where God can use you to do something really amazing that you know is beyond you.
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That's also a really uncomfortable position to be in. You want to try that? No, you got that.
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You're good at that one. He loves to do that to me. I would start off by saying if you feel inadequate, you're exactly where God wants you to be.
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Exactly. Because if you're feeling inadequate and you have a job to do in a spiritual realm, the only place you can turn is to God.
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If you feel I got this one locked, maybe that's not where you actually belong.
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Does that make sense? Yeah. You're agreeing with me energetically.
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Do you want to take that? The steps that you were talking about, the starting point with your weakness is to become an open vessel.
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Because the Holy Spirit will use an open vessel more accurately than not. My personal experience is that things
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I have done with the Holy Spirit guiding me, I don't remember how I got from A to B.
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I don't remember. I've been inspired to write things, do things, and do that.
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And then when it's over, I just look and I say, my word, thank you, Lord. I don't even know how
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I did that. Exactly. And that's part of there. It's an issue in the
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U .S. where we've been brought up to be success is measured by our own control.
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And being endowed with the Holy Spirit is just the opposite. It's to give up control. And so you're always battling these two forces there where you innately want to have success, and then you try to profit off of that saying it's towards the
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Lord. But in yourself, you're finding your own control in this. When you let that go, you put it in the
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Lord's hands, you pray about it. For me, I don't remember. Even in conversations, sometimes
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I don't recall the conversations I have with people. And I'm sure everybody's had that experience where people have come up and said, thank you so much for the exhortation you did.
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And I say, when did I do that? What did I do? And I don't remember.
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And it's not to be forgetful. It's just that I allow the Holy Spirit to do what he's going to do with whatever gifts he's given me or whatever abilities
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I have. Or sometimes the Holy Spirit will do something, you don't even know you're saying something. And you're like, okay.
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That's wonderful. Christian, I would add, think categorically with reference to the particular passage.
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So when Paul has a thorn in his flesh, that's not how he's determining ministry in the church.
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The point there is that even in his weakness, God's strength will supply everything he needs for life and godliness.
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And that's always true about Christians. Now, we're not to look out at the church and say, who is the least gifted communicator in this building?
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And it's a little child. Okay, little baby Aubrey, come up here and give the Sunday sermon.
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Because in your weakness, he will be strong. So we'll get the best possible result out of the weakest vessel.
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Therefore, no, that's poor thinking, right? When it comes to ministry equipment and where you're called to serve, you are to look for what fits with your gifts, not where you're weakest.
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So, Aubrey, do you have a speaking gift? Do you have a serving, an exhorting ministry? Whatever these different gifts are, look to serve and to actively, proactively go after those areas.
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And that's how the church should function so that the body is healthy. So the other issue is kind of a categorically different issue.
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It's in your weaknesses of life, of being afflicted with a thorn in the flesh. Understand that God is going to use even those weaknesses to show his strength in you.
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But that doesn't mean that that's where you pursue ministry. So think categorically with reference to those two different things.
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We have gone a little long, so we're not, I mean, we can keep the tape running if we'd like. I want to close with one thought, and it's the very last question
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I have on the page. It says, what are the risks if we ignore these truths?
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These truths are God's endowment, God's provision of spiritual gifts. What are the risks if we ignore it?
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I think that the answer becomes very simply. The church is missing something
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God intends. And if you're the one that God intends and you're not there, we really want to fan into flames your desire to use your spiritual gifts the way
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God desires it. We're going to close in prayer. We're going to leave questions going.
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So do you want to close in prayer? Yeah, I see that. So Father, thank you so much for your word to us today. Thank you that we could just soak in so many scriptures today.
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From 1 Corinthians 12 and Ephesians 4, 1 Peter 4, from Romans 12.
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All of these passages. 1 Corinthians 7, 7. We pray that we would store these up in our heart and be transformed by them.
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Lord, we pray that you would fan into flame the gifts that are in us. And that each one would be active in serving the body for the building up of the church on earth.
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In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. All right. I'm going to have to run, guys.
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I've got to do the pickup from school. So I don't answer all your questions. And he will be back with Isaiah 12 next week.
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Isaiah 53. Yes. That's right. Isaiah 53. Isaiah 53, the big one.