Spiritual Gifts

This morning…we are going to be studying Gifts…more specifically…Spiritual gifts…

Hope for Everyday Life has been our theme this year…and we just finished studying 2 Pe. 1:5­-7 which was our anchor passage in the summer series hope for fruitful service, we have just finished studying seven different kinds of fruit that the apostle Peter said followers of Jesus Christ need to be diligent to grow in.

Peter gives us two reasons to be diligent in growing in these various qualities. [Read 2 Pe. 1:9-10]

• He says we will be fruitful if we grow in these qualities.
  
  

• He says that if we are not growing, then we will be so nearsighted that we will be blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins.

Reason one is the main emphasis of our recent sermons….We want to be fruitful!!

We want to continue this series of being a Faithful Servant who is growing in hope…but we are now going to pivot to studying Spiritual Gifts….because the Gifts that are given to the church will help be fruitful servants of God….

For our main passage, we are going to be spending time in Romans 12:6-8 [READ]

However, since we are going to be doing that…instead of trying to unpack the entire concept of spiritual gifts in the next few sermons…we are going to do an introductory sermon today on the entire topic.

This message aims to set up and frame the next five sermons about specific spiritual gifts that the New Testament mentions.

Understanding Spiritual Gifts in the Bible

• What is a spiritual gift?

• Who gets spiritual gifts?

• When does a person receive spiritual gifts?

• What is the purpose of spiritual gifts?

• Are all the spiritual gifts mentioned in the New Testament still active today?

Instead of having one key passage that we are going to look at…what we are going to do is jump around the Bible…. rarely at Faith do we do a true topical sermon…and for good reason.

[talk about normal preaching at Faith]

But we are going to do that today so that we can make sure we are all on the same page going forward.

I. What is a spiritual gift?

Now, there are a lot of places that we could turn to study what the gifts are…but I think that this passage from one of the longer sections on Spiritual Gifts is a good place for us to start…

1 Cor. 12:1,4-7,11 — Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I do not want you to be unaware...4 Now, there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit. 5 And there are varieties of ministries and the same Lord. 6 There are varieties of effects, but the same God works all things in all persons. 7 But each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good...11 But the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually just as He wills.

Now…if you are still struggling with the question of what a Spiritual Gift is…then let me provide a definition that comes from a few scholars that will help us answer that question…

ANSWER: Gifts of grace, for God’s glory, granted by the Holy Spirit that are designed for the church’s edification.

Let’s start by breaking that down a bit. First, Gifts are Gifts….

When something is a gift… that means it is not something that you earned…and it is not something that you worked hard to get.

When you received those Christmas presents…your parents might have said things like, “If you are good…then you will get XYZ.”

At your workplace, if you do some sort of task…perhaps not take a sick day in five years…you might receive some sort of gift from you company…but in those situations…you did something.

….

If that is the case…then it may not always be best to call it a gift.

True gifts are not earned because of work…they are given out of love.

When you read and see that persons have Gifted in the Bible…you should see that it is by God’s Good Grace…not something that the person did.

That is important to remember since so many of us see a gifting…and we automatically assume it had something to do with how amazing that person is.

Do you guys know who Zach Edey is?? He is that incredibly tall center for Purdue. He is 7’4” …there is only one reason folks care about his basketball skills…. he is super tall.

If he were 5’6” …he would not be on Purdue’s team.

But because of the gift that he was given of being one of the Anakim… (a bit of a Bible joke there) he has a basketball career.

Can Zack Edey go around and boast about his gift?

Sure, he can…but he ought not to.

Paul would put it this way in 1 Cor. 4:7 —"What do you have that you did not receive? If then you received it, why do you boast as if you did not receive it?”

So, when it comes to gifts…they are gifts…

Next…they come from God and are primarily for his Glorification.

We skipped over vv.2–3 of 1 Cor. 12. But if you’re there you can see what Paul wrote right after he said I don’t want you to be unaware about spiritual gifts...

1 Corinthians 12:2–3 You know that when you were pagans, you were led astray to the mute idols, however you were led. 3 Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God says, “Jesus is accursed”; and no one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit.

The point is that the gifts are about the glory of God and Jesus, and operate under the Lordship of Jesus. That goes right along with the point we just made about them being gifts. But the gifts that the Spirit gives are not about our glory or boasting. They are all about the Lord, and the benefit and edification of others.

This is part of the main reason that Paul is writing to the Corinthian church...they are using spiritual gifts in a self-centered, self-exalting way! But to use what the Spirit gives for your own exaltation is to miss the whole point of Spiritual gifts.

• That’s why there are people in the Corinthian church that are exalting themselves over one another because of their gifts.

• That kind of spiritual competition goes against the glory of God, it tears down the church rather than edifies, and it treats “gifts” as things that are earned or deserved.

If that’s how we understand spiritual gifts, then there is no hope for fruitful service...

So, what is a Spiritual Gift?
Gifts of grace, for God’s glory, granted by the Holy Spirit that are designed for the church’s edification.

Then, then next question for us is…

II. Who gets spiritual gifts?

Rom. 12:6a — Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, we are to exercise them accordingly...

Eph 4:7 — But to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ’s gift.

1 Pe 4:10 — As each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.

The clear implication from these verses is that every single believer gets spiritual gifts. What isn’t clear is how many. We may, with confidence, say that each believer receives at least one spiritual gift.

ANSWER: Every believer.

Perhaps you here the answer, “every believer” and you think, “That can’t be true, because God skipped over me.”

According to God’s Word, that’s not true…if you’re a Christian, then you’ve received the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit has given you at least one spiritual gift.

But when God gives you a spiritual gift it’s not like he sends you personalized note card saying what it is and how to use it. And yet at the same time, when we read Scripture it seems clear that he expects his people to know their gifts and then to diligently use them! So how do we know what our gifts are?

You may be familiar with “spiritual gift tests” that you can take. They are kind of like personality tests. Those tests aren’t given to us in Scripture...their not sinful to use but I would certainly take them with a grain of salt...

At Faith, we don’t encourage the use of those tests to try and find out what your gifts are...instead we encourage people seek out their gifting by:

• First, jumping into serving and trying things out.

And as you get involved in serving, there will be a couple of things to confirm that you are indeed gifted in that way.

• One you’ll probably find a level of enjoyment in that area.

• But further than enjoyment and probably even more important is that other in the body will confirm what your gift is.

Let me walk through how this may practically play out to illustrate.

• When you are starting to consider what your gifting from the Spirit is…some of it will be trial and error. For example, I had a desire to teach from a very young age, and I jumped into any and every teaching opportunity I could from middle school pretty much to present day.
  
  

• Part of how I realized I had the gift of teaching was 1 – I desired to do it, and as I did it, I wanted to continue teaching. But more than just the desire and the continued desire, others also kept listening to my teaching and encouraged me in my teaching saying that had been helped and edified by it.

Now, just imagine instead of being encouraged in teaching, people were saying to me, “Greg, we appreciate your willingness, but every time you teach people walk away more confused than at the start.”

• That probably would have had 2 effects.

• First I probably wouldn’t have kept pursing growing in teaching, and would have found other 11areas to serve.

• And secondly, there probably wouldn’t have been anyone continuing to listen to me teach because it wasn’t helpful.

So desire is part of the confirmation but it’s not the only part of it.

One more comment on this...many people in our church can certainly give testimony to the fact that their gifting is in an area that they were first resistant to getting involved in...the point being they didn’t desire to serve or have the gift first. Instead, someone asked them to serve and they chose to serve and over time they found out they really were gifted in that way.

• So if you don’t know what your spiritual gifts are, then jump in and serve somewhere. And one of the best ways to jump in, is to say, “Yes” to the person that asks you to serve.

• Then be diligent in that area of service, and see what the Lord does in your heart and listen to other people in the church.

One more application...And I realize I said that already...but if other members recognizing the gifting of others is part of how we know our spiritual gifts, I hope you are looking for ways to encourage members in the body that are edifying to you and others.

So we’ve addressed what a spiritual gift is, and who gets spiritual gifts. The next question is, when does a person receive their spiritual gift(s)?

III. When does a person receive their spiritual gift?

Is a spiritual gift more like a driver’s license …or is it more like your DNA?

Meaning, you only get your driver’s license after you are old enough and mature enough…when God doesn’t think you are going to use that gift to hurt someone.

Consider the following passages...

1 Pe 4:10 — As each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.

1 Co 12:11 — But the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually just as He wills.

It would seem, that with the gift of the indwelling Holy Spirit, that the Spirit will also gift a person spiritually.

ANSWER: At the moment a person trusts in Jesus Christ and receives the Holy Spirit.

Perhaps you’re here this morning and you would say you haven’t trusted in Jesus Christ as your Lord and savior or you’re not sure what that means.

• If that’s the case, we are very glad that you are here this morning.

We want you to understand that before a person can receive spiritual gifts, a person must receive the Holy Spirit and the only way to receive the Holy Spirit is to repent of your sins and trust in Jesus Christ’s death burial and resurrection for the forgiveness of your sins.

• To trust in Jesus means that you’re trusting that apart from Christ’s death, burial and resurrection you are destined for hell and under the just wrath of God for your sin, but that through God’s love for you on the cross he bore the wrath of God for you so that you could die to your sins and live to please Christ.

Apart from the forgiveness of sins in Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit inside of you, it’s impossible to truly put off your sin and love God and love others the way God has commanded.

Now…there is an important caveat that we just don’t have time to consider much this morning…and quite frankly, I’m not sure that scripture addresses.

While we know that everyone has some gift…and that you get that particular gift at your conversion…does that mean that more gifts might come later…or what you get is what you got.

I think the Scripture is silent on this…and there is no convincing argument that silences the other side…we just don’t know.

But what we do know is that if you trusted in the D/B/R of Christ…then you have received at least one gift…and you received that at the moment of new Birth.

I hope that as you consider the truth that each and every Christian in this room has a gift…I hope that would give us moment to pause and praise God.

• The truth is that God did not have to do this for us. God did not have to gift his Church anything more than he already did.

• I think if God said…look, I gave you Jesus…you figure out the rest…I think we would all agree…yeah…that is a fair deal for sure.

But, just pause and consider how loving, how kind…how awesome your Heavenly Father is…not only did he ensure that you have salvation…but he wanted you to have gifts…

I hope and pray that we just marvel at the love of our Lord in giving us spiritual gifts.

Let’s turn our attention to one of the more important questions about spiritual gifts...

IV. What is the purpose of spiritual gifts?

I would like to put forward two primary purposes that God has given gifts to his church.

The first is this…

Building up the Body

Ephesians 4 is a significant passage of Scripture that deals with spiritual gifts, and v.12 indicates among other places, that gifts are for...
Eph 4:12a — for the equipping of the saints for the work of service

One of the common metaphors that is used to describe the church is a building that is continually being built.

We see it, for example, in 1 Cor. 3 where Paul talks about how he laid a foundation as a “wise-builder”

Elsewhere in the Bible we are God’s temple. The building metaphor is a common one to describe not only what we are…but what is happening.

One of the best ways to understand so much of the ministry of the church is to think about it through the lens of building…

So for example, when myself or one of the other pastors up here is preaching… what are we trying to do???

• We are trying to build up the body.

• We are seeking to use our gifts of teaching, to build up the body.

When you are in an Adult Bible Fellowship or small group…and I hope that you are…what is happening in that group…we are trying to build each other up in Christ...through teaching, through serving one another, through encouragement and so forth...

The point is…the building metaphor is common in the Bible…and that is one of the primary reasons that gifts are given to the church…to build it up…to strengthen…to edify it.

One of great encouragements to your pastors is that when we look around the church body…we see so many folks diligently engaged in building up the body. They are using their gifts to build up the body.

They could be using their gifts in so many ways…but they want to use them first and foremost to build up the body.

Praise the Lord for the many that are using their gifts, but that’s a question that we each need to individually ask ourselves…am I diligently, and intentionally seeking to use my gifts to build up the body?

We will, at the end of the sermon, discuss what at least are the gifts that are directly mentioned in the Bible…but just ask yourself for a moment…for the gift that God has given to you…are you using it for the building up of the church?

It would be easy to burry that gift and only use it for yourself…to use it for your own pleasure or to make money.

It would be my hope and prayer that as we consider what the Bible has to say about the gifts…that we all would want to love Jesus and follow the Spirit by using our gifts for building up the church.

A second purpose for spiritual gifts is ….

Bringing unity to the church

We already saw this in 1 Cor. 12 when we were thinking about the definition of a spiritual gift. But we see God’s plan of varied gifts for the purpose of bringing unity.

1 Corinthians 12:4–7 ⁴ Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit. ⁵ And there are varieties of ministries, and the same Lord. ⁶ There are varieties of effects, but the same God who works all things in all persons. ⁷ But to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.

And in Ephesians Paul says gifts are for building up the body...

Eph 4:13 — until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.

One of God’s goals in the gospel is to bring unity in diversity. Paul said earlier in Ephesians...

Ephesians 2:13–14 But now in Christ Jesus you who formerly were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. ¹⁴ For He Himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall

The two groups that have been made one are Jews and Gentiles. So God in the gospel of Jesus Christ has brought unity between all the various ethnicities. People that used to have a wall of hostility are now brought near together as brothers and sisters in the church through Jesus Christ!

Part of the way God designed the unity of the church body is through different members, of different backgrounds and upbringings, with different gifts all serving each other in ONE body through the ONE Spirit.

The diversity of the body, all serving each other and living united in purpose to glorify Jesus is one of the ways the world can tell that the gospel is real! Finding a large group of diverse people in community genuinely loving and serving one another doesn’t make sense to the world.

That’s even why Jesus said in John 13:35 By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”

I hope one of the experiences you regularly have when you are at church, or serving the body in some way, or even being served by someone, is thanking and praising God for others in the body because of their different gifting.

For example, when you see someone in ABF send around a card to be signed for someone who is sick or lost a loved one do you pause and thank God for the way God gifted that person and gifted our church to show mercy and kindness to someone who is suffering?

• Or when someone is setting up meals and cleaning for a family that is going through really deep waters...do you pause and thank God for the diversity of the body and thank God that not everyone is like you?

I’m not saying that we shouldn’t be thankful for how God has gifted us...we should be! But part of the joy in being part of a church is getting to see the diversity of people and diversity of gifts all being used for building up the body until we all attain the unity of the faith!

I hope one of the prayers that you’ll regularly pray for our church, is that God would help all of us be diligent to use our gifts for building up the body and for the unity of the church, rather than for selfish gain and selfish ambition.

Lastly, then...

V. Are all the spiritual gifts mentioned in the NT active today?

First, let me say one word of introduction before we talk about this question and how we are going to answer this.

There are certain truths that are central to the Christian Faith…and you have to hold to those...they are not negotiable or up for debate.

So, practically speaking, there are other things that if you choose to believe…you cannot be a member of this church.

• For example, you can’t believe that you need to pray to Mary, the earthly mother of Christ…for the remission of your sins.

• Or you can’t believe that all religions are equally valid…you just chose to believe in Christianity…but it doesn’t matter if you are a Muslim of Hindu…what matters is you be true to you.

So, in order to be a member of Faith and in order to be a genuine believer in Jesus Christ you have to believe certain things and reject other things.

Those believes will also mean that you also have to live a certain way as well.

• For example, you can’t take the view of sin that says, “as long as I ask for forgiveness, that is OK…what I do doesn’t matter.”

Now…I say all of that as a preface to say….that when it comes to how we are going to answer this question…this is a thing that you can believe differently than how I will answer the question, and to some degree, even act differently…and still be a member here at Faith.

So, if you find yourself disagreeing with me…and the formal position that Faith has…that is OK…you can hold to a different belief as long as you are not divisive about holding that belief.

Here is how we would answer the question….first by saying that there are two categories of gifts generally talked about in the Bible…

Authenticating and Edifying Gifts

Now, what do we mean by authenticating verses edifying?

Go back to the days of Moses for a moment and the Exodus…what was the main way that Moses convinced everyone that he was speaking for God?

Did he sit down and have a logical argument with them?

Did he deliver a piece of paper to them?

No…he worked miracles that were meant to show that he was speaking on behalf of God.

When Elijah was on Mount Carmel, and he was calling the children of Israel to repentance…what did he do? He called down fire from heaven.

The point was…often the prophets who spoke for God had a confirming sign to the message that they were doing.

That sign was meant to authenticate the message that was being delivered.

That is really no different than how Jesus, or the New Testament apostles used miracles. The miracles were not just cool tricks to wow and impress people. They were to authenticate the messenger, so that the message they were giving would also be authenticated as coming from God.

There is another class of gifts…gifts that are used for edification….the building up of the body…

Authenticating Gifts:

Edifying Gifts:

A few things about our chart above.

First, you can see that there are just some references…and that they are in the NT. This is a sermon…not a totally wholistic lecture and book.

Second, this just lists where the verses are talked about as being a gift…not examples of it. If we attempted to list Christ’s healing ministry…we would have quite a large chart.

Third, while this list generally represents what scholars agree on as the gifts…we should generally look at lists like this as being representative….not exhaustive.

If you notice that there are places where certain gifts are talked about and not others…and that is because, generally, when you encounter a list…more often than not…you are looking at an exhaustive list.

I have not said anything too controversial yet…I’ve saved that for the last thing that I am going to say...

Authenticating gifts were necessary until the completion of Scripture, but no longer.

So our answer to the question, “Are all spiritual gifts mentioned in the NT active today?” is no.

ANSWER: Not all spiritual gifts are active today because we have the completed Scriptures.

And the gifts that we do not believe are active today, are the ones that fall under the category of authenticating gifts. The authenticating gifts, as I mentioned were to authenticate a messenger of God so that his message could be authenticated.

• The authenticating of the message was absolutely critical because those messengers were writing down God’s authoritative, inerrant words.

Since the Bible has been completed—meaning that there are no more letters or books or anything being added, we do not believe that authenticating gifts are needed anymore. Because the message of the Bible and writings in the Bible have already been authenticated, so our job today isn’t to get any new revelation or message. Our task today, is to know the Word of God that has been delivered to us in the Bible and to apply that to our lives today.

That’s why, every week we want you to bring your Bible. That’s why we encourage everyone person to be reading their Bible every single day. That’s why all of our sermons, and small groups are looking to the Bible as the sufficient, authoritative source of truth.

Our pastors, do not believe they are the source of truth. We seek to submit ourselves, our leadership, our teaching and everything we do under the Word of God.

That’s about all the time we have to answer that question. That is anything but an exhaustive answer to the question. If you want to understand more why we believe that, then by all means we invite you to ask.

But one of the reasons we wanted to address this question briefly, is so that as spend the next 5 weeks on spiritual gifts, and we look at Romans 12:6–8 you don’t wonder why are they not going to spend a week specifically talking about the gift of prophecy? Why did they just skip it?

• - The reason we are skipping it, is because we don’t believe that gift is active today. So we’re not going to have a sermon in a series on fruitful service saying, “We don’t believe prophecy is still active, so come back next week to find out what is active and what you can do to be fruitfully serving.”

Now everything I just said doesn’t mean that we do not believe that God still does miracles today…rather…what we are saying is that no one person these miraculous authenticating gifts anymore.

So if you hear a story of someone being cured of cancer and there is no medical explanation…that fits with what I’m saying.

What I am saying is…the gift of healing… as we see in the early days of the church…no longer exists. It does not exist because the reason that it was needed is no longer valid with the completion of the Bible.

Last thing to say about that chart…and the gifts…and then we are going to take communion….

We have said it before…but let’s remember that the goal of gifts is the build and to encourage…are you doing that?

If you are not…then I would encourage you to take time to consider…what is my gift…and how do I use that gift in the church.

If you are not using your gifts to serve the church…to serve fellow Christians…then you are living contrary to how God wants you to live.

As we reflect on the Gospel in a particular way this morning….I would encourage you ask God for clarity on how you may need to grow in using your gifts to the glory of his name.