1 Corinthians 12:1-11
Smile! <click> This is a special camera. The
camera before this one got stolen. So I went without a camera for almost a
year. But when I learned that God had opened the door for me to go to the
Dominican Republic, Kathy said, “Greg, I want you to have a new camera so you
can take lots of pictures during your trip. I want that to be my Christmas
present to you.” So that’s what’s special about this camera. It is a gift that
was given to me, specifically to be used for missionary work, and ministry work
after that. That’s what a spiritual gift is like. It is a gift given, for you
to enjoy using in a way that blesses others, much like I enjoyed sharing all my
pictures with you when I got back from the DR.
In today’s culture, some of us may be concerned about what it means when we are going to talk about spiritual gifts. Probably the first thing that comes to mind is “speaking in tongues.” Is that weird? Well guess what? They actually had the same problem back in Corinth! That’s why Paul wrote this. He had to teach them something about spiritual gifts. The Corinthians were into the spiritual gifts the way some extreme Pentecostal Charismatics are today.
In our circles we tend to downplay the importance of spiritual gifts because we don’t want to be weird like those extremists. But the spiritual gifts are real. God gives them. The Holy Spirit administers them and we need to have a clear understanding of what the Bible teaches about all this. We want to be enabled by God’s truth to celebrate the spiritual gifts that God has given each of us, even the more unusual and exotic ones, without sliding into the errors that Paul needed to correct among the Corinthians.
But to really understand the value and beauty of the spiritual gifts, first we have to be truly spiritual people. So I want to take a little time to explain salvation in Christ Jesus because that is what makes us spiritual people. We can’t be spiritual before our salvation. That is why Paul starts out this section saying, “No one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, “Jesus be cursed,” and no one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit.
Now quite literally to just say the words is nothing. Anyone can say those words. So what Paul means is that a spiritual person, a born again person, would never want to insult God by cursing Jesus. I mean that is worst case scenario of biting that hand that feeds you. To say that Jesus is cursed and really mean it, you would have to deny that He is your Savior. If you deny that he is your savior then you are in fact not saved. In the same way, an unspiritual person might say that Jesus is Lord with their mouth, but if they won’t live up to what it really looks like to let Jesus be Lord by obeying Him, then they are not saved and Jesus is not their Lord, no matter what they say.
The fact is that the New Testament message embraces a great deal more than an offer of free pardon. It is a message of pardon, and for that may God be praised; but it is also a message of repentance. Repentance means we stop doing what Gods calls sin and we start doing what God calls good. These changes come as a response to God’s great love for us, not to earn his love, but to thank him for his love. The gospel is a message that inspires us to want to live lives of temperance and righteousness and godliness in this present world. It tells us that we must accept a Savior, but in order to accept a Savior, we must deny ungodliness and worldly lusts. The gospel message includes the idea of life changing decisions, of separation from the world, of cross-carrying and loyalty to the kingdom of God even unto death.
The gospel itself is, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be forgiven of sin, saved from death and hell. And once you believe that then the Holy Spirit enters in to show you the life God wants you to live and to help you to do it by giving you these spiritual gifts. We find that the life God gives us through the gospel is the best possible life to live and it lasts forever!
Let me tell you a story. A man leaves his office carrying a backpack and a briefcase. The briefcase represents his work and productivity, the important things he is trying to accomplish in the world in which he lives. The backpack carries his workout clothes and so it represents his self-care, the activities in which he engages for relaxation and fitness. He arrives home carrying these things, one on each shoulder. As he enters the door of his home, he hears a little voice call out, “Daddy!” And his little daughter is running towards him to leap into his arms. In order to receive her love, he must rid himself of the baggage on his shoulders. He drops everything and opens his arms wide to accept his daughter’s loving welcome home, and also to receive her, to accept her and to love her by embracing her.
When we think of the baggage each of us carries around in our lives and recognize it in negative terms, we think of emotional wounds that we haven’t gotten over. Or it can be secret sins we know are wrong but still enjoy, or it can be destructive sins that everyone knows about and yet we still hold onto that, or else, that hold onto us. But as the story shows, our baggage can also look like what is important, such as career and fitness. Whatever it is, positive or negative, the baggage actually represents our sin, which in all cases can be described as, doing what I want, doing things my way, rather than God’s way.
When we encounter God, the picture turns around a bit. He’s the parent. We’re the child. His arms are spread wide, as on the cross, to welcome us home, that is to our true home in Him. To receive that welcome we really need to drop everything, let go of all our baggage both good and bad and enjoy being baptized in His love. That’s when everything changes.
After the genuine encounter with Jesus we don’t turn around and pick up our baggage again. Jesus, through the Scripture, invites us to take up His burden which is light and easy. Now we take up the cross of Christ. We trust God to lead us into the activities that serve Him and His Kingdom, and that does include career and fitness, but now they are placed in proper perspective. Now we do everything to the glory of God. And, we receive the Holy Spirit, become part of a new creation called the church and the rest of our life is devoted to following Jesus, wherever he may lead.
What motivates people to give their lives to the call of God? A meeting with Jesus. Think of Saul on the Road to Damascus. He was dead set against the church. He would have been among those who would have called Jesus cursed because he died on a cross or a tree and the OT says, “Cursed be anyone who is hung from a tree.” Besides that, he believed that Jesus broke the Sabbath laws. He knew that Jesus opposed the teachings of the Pharisees and called them blind guides. Therefore he believed that Jesus was a dangerous heretic leading the people astray from the Law of Moses. But that was before he met Jesus on that road. Once he met Jesus, everything changed! He received the Holy Spirit and nothing would ever be the same.
Paul came to understand and faithfully preach that the core of the True Gospel is that Jesus died so that we don't have to, even though we deserve the great and terrible wrath of God because of our sinful, rebellious desire to do things our own way. The Good News is that the righteous and Holy God made a way through Christ for us to live forever with him through the reconciliation of the cross.
More good news: God comes to us to express His love and show us this way of salvation. He meets us where we are and speaks to our felt needs first. In this way we fall in love with Him as we discover how much he loves us. Or we could say that once we realize that life as a disciple is the most meaningful and important thing we can do, then we can be fully committed to it with all our might. This can happen in many different ways. A sinner can suffer the consequences of sin and finally be fed up and look for a better life. He will find it in Christ. A wounded victim in need of healing will find it in the Loving Lord Jesus. Or an ordinary person just lonely or empty inside, hungering and thirsting for a more abundant and meaningful existence, can discover that life in Christ Jesus is the most satisfying.
We start out being saved in our "own" way, that is, according to our needs. But God expects us to start to learn how to do things His way, and those who truly love Him WANT to learn how to do things His way. In summary, God meets us where we are. He changes us from sinners to servants of Christ. And he propels us on into a future that is defined by our role in the body of Christ.
That’s where Paul’s teaching about the Spiritual gifts comes in. Now moving on in 1 Corinthian 12, vs. 4-6 say, “There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit distributes them. There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. There are different kinds of working, but in all of them and in everyone it is the same God at work.” Every person who has truly met God as God, the Holy One who is bigger than any church, has also been filled with awe and gratitude. The natural response is, “Oh, my Lord, how can I ever thank you?” And as you prayerfully seek to answer that question, you will find that there are things you are pretty good at and things you really like to do. Paul said it this way, “Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good.”
God has called people throughout time – imperfect people, those who had made mistakes, and those who had no idea what they were getting into. However, through God’s grace we know that God invites us to serve and then shows us the way to follow. We are not perfect, we don’t have all the answers, but we know that we belong to God and that God calls each of us by name. The Bible contains many stories about how God calls people and what God asks those people to do.
Can you relate to Moses meeting God at the burning bush? Would you have resisted obeying God with Moses’ sense of inadequacy? Did God leave Moses there? Can you relate to Gideon, who resisted God’s call out of a sense of humility and weakness? Did God leave Gideon there? In what ways do you excuse yourself from going after God’s own heart?
In 1 Corinthians 12:7 we learn that every Christian is called to some form of ministry. “To each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good.” No one in this room, if you are truly a follower of Christ can say, “Not me.” Every single one of you believers has been given a gift or gifts that is designed to be used by you to bless others, to bless us. That is, you are given this gift or gifts for the common good. This verse strongly suggests that learning what Spiritual gifts have been given to you by God and then faithfully using them is the next most important task in your life after your salvation. In other words, once you’re saved, you have to recognize that God will call you into some form of ministry as a part of the body of Christ. You are called and equipped with a spiritual gift or gifts to serve the Lord and build his kingdom as a part of the community of faith, no one is exempt and we ought to be able to see that operating right here.
Paul gives us a list of some examples of what these spiritual gifts look like. To one there is given through the Spirit a message of wisdom, to another a message of knowledge by means of the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in different kinds of tongues, and to still another the interpretation of tongues. All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, the Holy Spirit of God and he distributes them to each one, just as he determines. There are other lists in Scripture.
Does everybody get all of them? No. Does anybody get all of them? No. Does anybody get nothing? No. Does everybody get something? Yes. If you are a genuine bona fide spirit filled believer you have a spiritual gift. Does it have to be one of the ones in this list? No. There are many more kinds of gifts than what Paul listed here. In fact the Infinite God who can do anything he wants may have an endless list of possible ways that he can gift all his children. What constitutes a spiritual gift is simply this, it comes from God and it’s good for God’s people.
Do you know your spiritual gift? Sometimes we need help to learn what gift God has given us. God has designed each member of the team. In Christ, each of us is truly unique. Each of us has a spiritual blueprint that determines how we function in ministry. Many people just don’t know what that design is. But we can work at clarifying who each player is in Christ. Assessment tools are helpful for this. There are several. One is called Discovering Your Ministry Identity. We can use these tools to identify each person’s spiritual gifts, ministry burden or passion.
Another way you can discover your gift is to look around and find out what opportunities there are to serve. Pick what you think you’d like to do and if no one happens to ask, just offer to do it. You will probably be drawn to those tasks for which you are gifted, but the key is do something! Learn by doing. Try new things. Try things you never tried before. You might be surprised how much you like it. Or you might learn that it is not for you. Back in Maine, I tried prison ministry. Two different ways, but I never got comfortable in that environment and I never really connected with any of the in-mates I got to talk to. So I learned from that experience that I don’t have the gifts for that kind of ministry. But even that doesn’t mean I would never try it again. Perhaps another day I will be ready, and if God needs me in that kind of work, He will make sure I can do it.
Whatever your gift or gifts turn out to be, you can be sure they are in there. If you are using yours you already know. If you don’t know, maybe you’re not busy enough with praying and reading Scripture and asking the other members of this body to help you discover your gift. But maybe you haven’t really met Jesus yet. Maybe you’ve just been religious all your life, sort of like Saul of Tarsus, and you haven’t really had that encounter with Jesus that changed everything.
Think seriously about this. At the end of your life, when someone is reading your obituary what do you want them to find there? Will there just be a list of your hobbies and interests, and a mention of which church you attended, or will they write about how much you loved the Lord and served Him with all your heart? For the greatest satisfaction in your life, after salvation itself, find and use your spiritual gifts for the Kingdom of God. It will mean a lot to everyone you know and love. And that includes God himself, who longs to see you enjoying the use of the gifts he has given. Which of you parents, when you give your child a gift, likes to see that gift put on a shelf and ignored? In the same way, you bless God when he sees you using your gifts to bless others. Amen.
In today’s culture, some of us may be concerned about what it means when we are going to talk about spiritual gifts. Probably the first thing that comes to mind is “speaking in tongues.” Is that weird? Well guess what? They actually had the same problem back in Corinth! That’s why Paul wrote this. He had to teach them something about spiritual gifts. The Corinthians were into the spiritual gifts the way some extreme Pentecostal Charismatics are today.
In our circles we tend to downplay the importance of spiritual gifts because we don’t want to be weird like those extremists. But the spiritual gifts are real. God gives them. The Holy Spirit administers them and we need to have a clear understanding of what the Bible teaches about all this. We want to be enabled by God’s truth to celebrate the spiritual gifts that God has given each of us, even the more unusual and exotic ones, without sliding into the errors that Paul needed to correct among the Corinthians.
But to really understand the value and beauty of the spiritual gifts, first we have to be truly spiritual people. So I want to take a little time to explain salvation in Christ Jesus because that is what makes us spiritual people. We can’t be spiritual before our salvation. That is why Paul starts out this section saying, “No one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, “Jesus be cursed,” and no one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit.
Now quite literally to just say the words is nothing. Anyone can say those words. So what Paul means is that a spiritual person, a born again person, would never want to insult God by cursing Jesus. I mean that is worst case scenario of biting that hand that feeds you. To say that Jesus is cursed and really mean it, you would have to deny that He is your Savior. If you deny that he is your savior then you are in fact not saved. In the same way, an unspiritual person might say that Jesus is Lord with their mouth, but if they won’t live up to what it really looks like to let Jesus be Lord by obeying Him, then they are not saved and Jesus is not their Lord, no matter what they say.
The fact is that the New Testament message embraces a great deal more than an offer of free pardon. It is a message of pardon, and for that may God be praised; but it is also a message of repentance. Repentance means we stop doing what Gods calls sin and we start doing what God calls good. These changes come as a response to God’s great love for us, not to earn his love, but to thank him for his love. The gospel is a message that inspires us to want to live lives of temperance and righteousness and godliness in this present world. It tells us that we must accept a Savior, but in order to accept a Savior, we must deny ungodliness and worldly lusts. The gospel message includes the idea of life changing decisions, of separation from the world, of cross-carrying and loyalty to the kingdom of God even unto death.
The gospel itself is, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be forgiven of sin, saved from death and hell. And once you believe that then the Holy Spirit enters in to show you the life God wants you to live and to help you to do it by giving you these spiritual gifts. We find that the life God gives us through the gospel is the best possible life to live and it lasts forever!
Let me tell you a story. A man leaves his office carrying a backpack and a briefcase. The briefcase represents his work and productivity, the important things he is trying to accomplish in the world in which he lives. The backpack carries his workout clothes and so it represents his self-care, the activities in which he engages for relaxation and fitness. He arrives home carrying these things, one on each shoulder. As he enters the door of his home, he hears a little voice call out, “Daddy!” And his little daughter is running towards him to leap into his arms. In order to receive her love, he must rid himself of the baggage on his shoulders. He drops everything and opens his arms wide to accept his daughter’s loving welcome home, and also to receive her, to accept her and to love her by embracing her.
When we think of the baggage each of us carries around in our lives and recognize it in negative terms, we think of emotional wounds that we haven’t gotten over. Or it can be secret sins we know are wrong but still enjoy, or it can be destructive sins that everyone knows about and yet we still hold onto that, or else, that hold onto us. But as the story shows, our baggage can also look like what is important, such as career and fitness. Whatever it is, positive or negative, the baggage actually represents our sin, which in all cases can be described as, doing what I want, doing things my way, rather than God’s way.
When we encounter God, the picture turns around a bit. He’s the parent. We’re the child. His arms are spread wide, as on the cross, to welcome us home, that is to our true home in Him. To receive that welcome we really need to drop everything, let go of all our baggage both good and bad and enjoy being baptized in His love. That’s when everything changes.
After the genuine encounter with Jesus we don’t turn around and pick up our baggage again. Jesus, through the Scripture, invites us to take up His burden which is light and easy. Now we take up the cross of Christ. We trust God to lead us into the activities that serve Him and His Kingdom, and that does include career and fitness, but now they are placed in proper perspective. Now we do everything to the glory of God. And, we receive the Holy Spirit, become part of a new creation called the church and the rest of our life is devoted to following Jesus, wherever he may lead.
What motivates people to give their lives to the call of God? A meeting with Jesus. Think of Saul on the Road to Damascus. He was dead set against the church. He would have been among those who would have called Jesus cursed because he died on a cross or a tree and the OT says, “Cursed be anyone who is hung from a tree.” Besides that, he believed that Jesus broke the Sabbath laws. He knew that Jesus opposed the teachings of the Pharisees and called them blind guides. Therefore he believed that Jesus was a dangerous heretic leading the people astray from the Law of Moses. But that was before he met Jesus on that road. Once he met Jesus, everything changed! He received the Holy Spirit and nothing would ever be the same.
Paul came to understand and faithfully preach that the core of the True Gospel is that Jesus died so that we don't have to, even though we deserve the great and terrible wrath of God because of our sinful, rebellious desire to do things our own way. The Good News is that the righteous and Holy God made a way through Christ for us to live forever with him through the reconciliation of the cross.
More good news: God comes to us to express His love and show us this way of salvation. He meets us where we are and speaks to our felt needs first. In this way we fall in love with Him as we discover how much he loves us. Or we could say that once we realize that life as a disciple is the most meaningful and important thing we can do, then we can be fully committed to it with all our might. This can happen in many different ways. A sinner can suffer the consequences of sin and finally be fed up and look for a better life. He will find it in Christ. A wounded victim in need of healing will find it in the Loving Lord Jesus. Or an ordinary person just lonely or empty inside, hungering and thirsting for a more abundant and meaningful existence, can discover that life in Christ Jesus is the most satisfying.
We start out being saved in our "own" way, that is, according to our needs. But God expects us to start to learn how to do things His way, and those who truly love Him WANT to learn how to do things His way. In summary, God meets us where we are. He changes us from sinners to servants of Christ. And he propels us on into a future that is defined by our role in the body of Christ.
That’s where Paul’s teaching about the Spiritual gifts comes in. Now moving on in 1 Corinthian 12, vs. 4-6 say, “There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit distributes them. There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. There are different kinds of working, but in all of them and in everyone it is the same God at work.” Every person who has truly met God as God, the Holy One who is bigger than any church, has also been filled with awe and gratitude. The natural response is, “Oh, my Lord, how can I ever thank you?” And as you prayerfully seek to answer that question, you will find that there are things you are pretty good at and things you really like to do. Paul said it this way, “Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good.”
God has called people throughout time – imperfect people, those who had made mistakes, and those who had no idea what they were getting into. However, through God’s grace we know that God invites us to serve and then shows us the way to follow. We are not perfect, we don’t have all the answers, but we know that we belong to God and that God calls each of us by name. The Bible contains many stories about how God calls people and what God asks those people to do.
Can you relate to Moses meeting God at the burning bush? Would you have resisted obeying God with Moses’ sense of inadequacy? Did God leave Moses there? Can you relate to Gideon, who resisted God’s call out of a sense of humility and weakness? Did God leave Gideon there? In what ways do you excuse yourself from going after God’s own heart?
In 1 Corinthians 12:7 we learn that every Christian is called to some form of ministry. “To each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good.” No one in this room, if you are truly a follower of Christ can say, “Not me.” Every single one of you believers has been given a gift or gifts that is designed to be used by you to bless others, to bless us. That is, you are given this gift or gifts for the common good. This verse strongly suggests that learning what Spiritual gifts have been given to you by God and then faithfully using them is the next most important task in your life after your salvation. In other words, once you’re saved, you have to recognize that God will call you into some form of ministry as a part of the body of Christ. You are called and equipped with a spiritual gift or gifts to serve the Lord and build his kingdom as a part of the community of faith, no one is exempt and we ought to be able to see that operating right here.
Paul gives us a list of some examples of what these spiritual gifts look like. To one there is given through the Spirit a message of wisdom, to another a message of knowledge by means of the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in different kinds of tongues, and to still another the interpretation of tongues. All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, the Holy Spirit of God and he distributes them to each one, just as he determines. There are other lists in Scripture.
Does everybody get all of them? No. Does anybody get all of them? No. Does anybody get nothing? No. Does everybody get something? Yes. If you are a genuine bona fide spirit filled believer you have a spiritual gift. Does it have to be one of the ones in this list? No. There are many more kinds of gifts than what Paul listed here. In fact the Infinite God who can do anything he wants may have an endless list of possible ways that he can gift all his children. What constitutes a spiritual gift is simply this, it comes from God and it’s good for God’s people.
Do you know your spiritual gift? Sometimes we need help to learn what gift God has given us. God has designed each member of the team. In Christ, each of us is truly unique. Each of us has a spiritual blueprint that determines how we function in ministry. Many people just don’t know what that design is. But we can work at clarifying who each player is in Christ. Assessment tools are helpful for this. There are several. One is called Discovering Your Ministry Identity. We can use these tools to identify each person’s spiritual gifts, ministry burden or passion.
Another way you can discover your gift is to look around and find out what opportunities there are to serve. Pick what you think you’d like to do and if no one happens to ask, just offer to do it. You will probably be drawn to those tasks for which you are gifted, but the key is do something! Learn by doing. Try new things. Try things you never tried before. You might be surprised how much you like it. Or you might learn that it is not for you. Back in Maine, I tried prison ministry. Two different ways, but I never got comfortable in that environment and I never really connected with any of the in-mates I got to talk to. So I learned from that experience that I don’t have the gifts for that kind of ministry. But even that doesn’t mean I would never try it again. Perhaps another day I will be ready, and if God needs me in that kind of work, He will make sure I can do it.
Whatever your gift or gifts turn out to be, you can be sure they are in there. If you are using yours you already know. If you don’t know, maybe you’re not busy enough with praying and reading Scripture and asking the other members of this body to help you discover your gift. But maybe you haven’t really met Jesus yet. Maybe you’ve just been religious all your life, sort of like Saul of Tarsus, and you haven’t really had that encounter with Jesus that changed everything.
Think seriously about this. At the end of your life, when someone is reading your obituary what do you want them to find there? Will there just be a list of your hobbies and interests, and a mention of which church you attended, or will they write about how much you loved the Lord and served Him with all your heart? For the greatest satisfaction in your life, after salvation itself, find and use your spiritual gifts for the Kingdom of God. It will mean a lot to everyone you know and love. And that includes God himself, who longs to see you enjoying the use of the gifts he has given. Which of you parents, when you give your child a gift, likes to see that gift put on a shelf and ignored? In the same way, you bless God when he sees you using your gifts to bless others. Amen.
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