Spiritual Gifts

Transcript

GRM 1189
07/01/2018
Spiritual Gifts
Selected Verses
Gil Rugh

There are some issues that I think it’s important we be aware of--there have been some changes in the Evangelical world that are of great significance and importance that we understand. It’s tied into this whole matter of spiritual gifts, so we’ll have things to say about that as well, but tonight I just want to take some of our time to overview. We’ve done studies of this more in detail and they’re available in Sound Words and online, but we just highlight this issue of spiritual gifts, and remind us of what God has provided for us to be enabled to function in a way that honors Him. Then we’ll consider questions on this subject and others and we’ll pursue it again in our next study, as well. I want to read some passages with you, drawing some matters to your attention in these passages.

Let’s start with the furthest one back in your New Testament, 1 Peter chapter 4. There are several passages that are key as you study the doctrine of spiritual gifts. First Peter 4 is more brief but it brings to our attention, in a concise way, these important matters. You’ll note verse 8, “above all, keep fervent in your love for one another, because love covers a multitude of sins.” You’re going to find consistently there’s an emphasis in the context where he talks about spiritual gifts. He also has been talking about love, because the gifts involve serving one another, as we’ll see, and true biblical love produced by the Spirit in the heart, is a love that puts the other person before yourself. It is a desire to serve them, to do what is good for them.

“Be hospitable to one another without complaint” and then he says, “as each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another, and note some things here that we’re going to see repeated. “As each one has received,” there are no exceptions. Everyone, who is truly a believer, has been gifted by God in a special way to serve in the body of Christ. Each one, it’s individual. It’s not just, well the church has received a pile of gifts, some have them some don’t. Each one, individually, has received this gift of God’s grace. We are to employ it in serving one another. It was given to be used. We’ll see these gifts are for the means of serving. They involve our actions, our doing, serving one another. A gift is not primarily for my benefit, my gift is for your benefit, your gift is for my benefit and that goes on in the body. The picture that we’ll see developed is the physical body. It’s one body with many parts, so here he’s emphasizing we’ve each receive this gift of God’s grace. We use it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.

Now, I had a question that had to do with sins of omission. You know we think sometimes because we don’t commit overt sins that the bible says we are not to do, so we’re not doing anything bad we’re just not doing anything. James tells us, if you know what is required, if you know what it is, to do good and don’t do it, that’s sin. So here, if we’re not using our gift, that would be sin, because he says as each one has received a gift you are to employ it in serving one another as good stewards. We’ve been entrusted with a stewardship, a responsibility to carry out the manifold grace of God. Think about that, everyone of us individually as believers, by God’s grace, have been specially enabled by Him to function in a way that will help this body of believers grow to maturity, and he gives examples. “Whoever speaks, do so as one who is speaking the utterances of God. Whoever serves is to do so as one who is serving by the strength which God supplies.”

He breaks all the gifts down into two basic categories, speaking gifts and serving gifts, in this passage. He’s not going into the details of which might be individual gifts, but speaking gifts, they’re all ways of serving because verse 10 said, “employ your gift in serving one another,” but in practicality for example, my gift in teaching and pastoring would have to do with speaking. I serve the body by teaching as other teachers in the body do for example, and so you could lump it together, speaking gifts and then serving gifts, the variety of gifts there are.

We’ll talk about individual gifts as we get to the other passages. It’s important to do this, at the end of verse 11, so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. You see how important this is. This is a means that God has ordained and established so that He might be glorified. Our serving and the exercising of the gift God has given us is so that we can bring glory to God. You see the importance of functioning as God intended because He’s the One to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever.

Look at Ephesians 4. We’ve been here for other reasons, but it’s key in the gifts. In Ephesians 4, you have the unity of the body in the first six verses. “One body, one Spirit,” verse 4 and following, “one hope of your calling, one Lord one faith, one baptism, one God and Father. But to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ’s gift,” so again, we’re going to see this emphasis on unity and oneness, an emphasis on diversity within and that’s why our physical body becomes such a key example. It is one body with many parts and it functions effectively when every part functions as it’s supposed to function, and when one part of the body is not functioning correctly the body is, to that extent, limited in its effectiveness or hindered. Other parts of the body may pick up, but nonetheless that is a detriment, because one way or another, all the parts serve a key purpose.

Verse seven, “but to each one of us, grace was given,” you note the each one again. This is emphasized, there are no exceptions, each individual believer has received grace and we talk about the gifts, they’re charismatic. The Greek word for grace is charis so we just put an ending on it. We have the charismatic gifts. Gifts given by God’s grace, so each one of us, grace was given to us according to the measure of Christ’s gift. These were measured out as a result of the finished work of Christ. He ascended to heaven. The work of redemption had been accomplished, the power of the devil had been broken and He gives gifts to men. Verse 10 “He who ascended is He who also descended.” We’ll talk about this passage, perhaps, at a future time about where Christ went when He died and so on.

The gifts He gave though in verse 11, “He gave some as apostles,” now note these are special gifts given after His resurrection from the dead and His ascension to heaven, so these gifts pertain particularly to the church, New Testament gifts. I mention that here, “He gave some as apostles some as prophets.” Now there were prophets in the Old Testament. Similarity, there in the gift of prophecy, receiving direct revelation from God. Old Testament prophets did that, New Testament prophets will be those who receive direct revelation from God. For example, Paul writing the New Testament. Apostles and prophets will be those who receive special revelation, “some as evangelists, pastors and teachers” so again you’ll note verse 11 that’s the speaking gifts. All of these involve speaking, apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers. They’re given the communicating of God’s word “for the equipping of the saints for the work of service,” so you know this is God’s way of the body being equipped to function.

You come to trust Christ, probably through the ministry of perhaps an evangelist, for example, someone who carried the gospel to you, and now you sit under the teaching of the word and that equips you for serving with the gift God has given you, “for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ.” We looked at this early in our study because it’s not a complicated pattern. The picture here, this is the body of Christ. At the end of chapter one we had noted verses 22 and 23 of Ephesians. “He put all things in subjection under His feet,” referring to Christ, “gave Him as head over all things to the church, which is His body; the fullness of Him who fills all in all,” so the picture is Christ is the head of the body because He is in control, He has authority. He is the One directing the body, He’s the head then you have all the parts of the body functioning so that the body develops.

We know some of you are into exercising, working out and that. You do that for the developing of the physical body and you do different exercises for different parts of the body. It’s a natural picture and this is to go on “until we all attain to the unity of the faith,” the knowledge of the Son of God, a mature man, and a mature man is one who comes to the measure of the stature, which belongs to the fullness of Christ. We’re to be growing. Remember, we partake of the divine nature, not that we are gods, but His character now being developed and produced in us. As a result, we are to be “no longer children, tossed here and there by waves, carried about by every wind of doctrine, trickery of men, craftiness and deceitful scheming. Speaking the truth in love, we grow up in all aspects to Him, who is the head, from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by that which every joint supplies.” You note every part is important, every piece, every connection. God didn’t put anything in that is not needed.

Now look around and say well there’s a lot of people and well, there are no extra parts in this body. What every part supplies, enables the body to grow, mature, develop stability. There are going to be storms that come, there are going to be attacks that come. What gives the body stability is maturity and again the picture of young children being gullible, being easily led. We watch them, we take care of them. We take them to school for example. In the days in which we lived, my parents didn’t know about the dangers that would beset me when they just sent me out for the long walk to school, but things change, we’re concerned. They did warn me about things, but you get older you expect there’s maturity. We should be discerning so the “whole body fitted and held together” verse 16 “by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body to build itself up in love.” If one part of the body is not functioning as it should, to that extent the body is hindered in its growth and development. That’s a serious matter. It’s not an optional kind of thing.

All right come back to Romans chapter 12 and you’ll note how the chapter starts out. Paul’s laid the doctrinal foundation in the first 11 chapters, so chapter 12, “therefore, I urge you brethren by the mercies of God to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing, the making new of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect, and so through the grace given to me, I say to you.” Now that grace given to him was the grace to be an apostle, that’s where he’s going. He started out this letter in chapter one, the opening verses, by identifying himself as an apostle, one called by Jesus Christ. “I say to you” and that’s part of his ministry, he communicates God’s truth as an apostle to everyone among you, “not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think. To think as to have sound judgment, as God has allotted to each a measure of faith.”

This is another way of talking about your spiritual gift. It is not only a provision of God’s grace, it is a measure of faith. A measure of faith doled out to you for the exercising of that gift that God has given you. Then he says, “for just as we have many members in one body all members do not have the same function, so we who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another.” Again, repeatedly, God uses this analogy because there is no excuse for being confused. I mean we’re all familiar with our body and we all know the individual parts and the role they play. If you would have a stroke and you couldn’t use your left arm, as a result that, would to that extent hinder your body. Now the body goes on and functions, but it is to that extent hindered from doing some of the things it could do or being as effective in doing it. It’s almost such an obvious analogy it doesn’t need any explanation.

There’s the care for the body in each part. You know you push a door closed and you forget to pull your finger out, not that I’ve ever done it, but ouch! You don’t say dumb finger, it serves you right, leave you there. No, it’s part of the body and all the body’s focused on that and fixing it. Looking, what does it need? You know, you need a Band-Aid, is it broken? What do--yeah--because the body is concerned for itself. All the parts are important, but just as we have many members, one body, all the members don’t have the same function, so that’s the body of Christ. God’s brought us together as a group of people, into this place, and the gifts function in the context of the local church. We’ll mention that in a moment.

This is just not the gifts out there. The gifts are given in each local church, which is the manifestation of the body of Christ in this place, so in verse six, “since we have gifts that differ,” note, “according to the grace given to us, and each of us is to exercise them accordingly,” and he goes on to mention some of the gifts. If it’s prophecy, you exercise that gift according to the proportion of your faith. Remember he said at the end of verse three, “God has allotted to each a measure of faith.” That faith is the ability to trust God in the exercising of your gift in that area. Now we recognize, boy, we see people serving in an area and say, you know, I don’t think I could do that. That wouldn’t be me. Well, it may not be what God gives you. He gives you the faith to trust Him and function there, so the prophet and then not every gift is going to be of the same strength. There are people who have a gift then some people have a greater gift.

You know I am a pastor that teaches but there are those who have a gift to a greater degree in this area than me. I don’t have to measure myself against them. I just have to be faithful with the gift God has given me, to the extent He’s given me, and to trust Him to use it to the fullest of the degree I have. No sense in sitting there saying, Lord if You’d have given me a better mind, if I had stronger intellect, if I could do this, if I was better at this. He’s giving me what He would have me be. I want to improve that, I want to reach “my maximum potential” with what God’s given me, but I can’t measure that with someone else. It’s what He has measured out to me according to that proportion.

If serving in serving and when we talk about—eventually as you’ve been a believer for a little while and you begin to function, you realize where God uses you most. We’ll talk about how you recognize your gifts. That’s where you’ll probably spend most of your energy. I tried early on to sort out what my gifts would be and where I would be effective and where not. Some with the gift of pastor and teacher are more effective in one area than another. At seminary in my training and so on, they sort of taught you to be a jack-of-all-trades. I even had to take music courses, and learn how to beat out the music because if you can’t lead singing you won’t be able to pastor a church. Oh really? Well I endured the class but that’s never going to be me, so you learn where you’re going to be strong and you’ll concentrate on that. If you are an exhorter, concentrate on your exhortation, and if your gift is giving, do it with liberality. If you lead, do it with diligence. If your gift is showing mercy, do it with cheerfulness. Not everybody is going to be gifted in the same way, and in the same balance of gifts, in the same areas of strength, so you concentrate on where the Lord is going to use you.

Come back to 1 Corinthians and stop in chapter 1. Paul’s writing to the church, which is at Corinth, verse 2 of chapter 1, he’s writing to the church of God and you note he started out in verse 1, “Paul, called as an apostle.” You know he’s clear, this is my gift, and that gave him authority as God’s representative in a special way, in these days of the founding of the church along with the other apostles, because as yet the fullness of God’s revelation hadn’t been given, so he’s writing now. We’re going to get an inspired letter; the letter to the Corinthians like the Spirit used him to write the letter to the Romans, so he’s writing to the church of God, which is at Corinth, “to those who have been sanctified.” The same basic word as we get the word holy or saints from and he’s going to call them “sanctified in Christ Jesus, saints by calling.”

If you have a little number 1 in front of saints, you’ll note it says in the margin, holy ones, because to be sanctified, hagios and various forms of this word, means to be set apart. You’re sanctified when you’re set apart from sin to God. You are a saint because God has set you apart for Himself. Grace, mercy, and peace. Verse 4, “I thank my God always concerning you, for the grace of God which was given you in Christ Jesus, that in everything you were enriched in Him, in all speech and all knowledge, even as the testimony concerning Christ was confirmed in you,” (note verse 7) “so that you are not lacking in any gift.” So that grace that brought salvation to them was also the grace that brought gifts to them, and this local church at Corinth is not lacking in any gift, and you’re looking for the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, so important to realize the context of the gifts and where they have been exercised.

Come over to chapter 12 and as you’re aware, chapters 12, 13 and 14 are the most extensive development of spiritual gifts we have in the New Testament. Chapter 13 is put in the middle. That’s the love chapter, because this goes together. We are to be a body. You know, we have emphasis that is distorted, self-esteem and learning to love yourself. Nobody has to do that. I have a great grand--he’s a great, great grandson. He’s not a great great grandson, but he’s a grandson who’s great, who is my great grandson, but he doesn’t have to be taught to be selfish. We were at lunch today. He was occupied with the food he wanted, and it was great. But you know, you didn’t have to tell him, oh don’t be giving me your food. You eat it. He just reached out and took whose ever was close. They were built in, you know, they let you know when their hungry, they let you know when they want something. They let you know when their uncomfortable.

So, we are in the body of Christ. We take care of our body, we take care of one another. We look out for one another. You know you don’t find your left hand beating up your right hand. It doesn’t happen in the body. I don’t know how we’ll explain and give an account to Christ, the head of the church, why His body was constantly fighting with itself. He’s not responsible. You certainly are not going to blame Christ. The Spirit of God who indwells us certainly is not fighting against Christ. The picture is so clear, the church at Corinth is racked by divisions. Chapter 11, verse 18, in the first place “when you come together as a church, I hear that divisions exist among you,” so when you come to chapter 12 this is a—he’s answering questions.

Back in chapter 7, verse 1, Paul said, “now concerning the things about which you wrote,” so here, now, beginning in chapter 7 he starts answering questions that they had written him about, the concerns they have, so chapter 12 opens up “now concerning spiritual gifts.” Here he uses the word for spiritual gifts, pneumatikon and pneuma is the word for spirit, so pneumatikon is emphasizing the Spirit as the source of the gifts here but they’re spiritual gifts. “Brethren I don’t want you to be unaware.” You know when you were pagans you were unbelievers. You worshiped the idols and so on, you were led, you were under the control of sin and Satan. “Therefore,” verse three, “I make known to you no one speaking by the Spirit of God says, ‘Jesus is accursed’ anathema. “No one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except by the Spirit.” The true insight of who Jesus Christ is comes from the work of the Spirit in the life. When He opens your eyes, you see Jesus Christ is Lord.

That would fit here. Remember we talked about He is the head of the body. He’s the Lord. That’s not just a word, I jotted down. Let me read you what one person commenting on this said, “The term, Lord also expresses the practical recognition that the speaker belongs to Christ as Christ’s purchased slave.” Paul mentioned that “you’re not your own, you’ve been bought with a price” and therefore Christ has the care of the believer. Paul applies the term kurios (kurios is what we translate as Lord) to Jesus Christ some 220 times. That’s how many times he refers to Christ as Lord. It’s clearly his favorite title for Christ. We “preach Christ Jesus as Lord” he says in 2 Corinthians. On one side, Christ takes responsibility for the believer as his or her kurios. On the other side, the Lord is the authority to whom the believer is responsible, from whom the believer derives his or her lifestyle and ethics, so you see right at the beginning, just like in Ephesians, Christ has been given headship of the body. He is Lord over us. In that sense, He is functioning for our good, to care for us, and He requires our submission and obedience. I mean every part of the body is to be in obedience, just like the analogy of the head. The same thing being driven home. The hand can’t decide what it will do on its own. All instructions are to come from the head, the slave doesn’t—the Lord decides so He’s giving instructions.

Something is wrong when the body is fighting against itself. We read medical things where an immune system breaks down and our own immune system begins to attack the body. Then we say there’s something gone wrong in the body that’s not the way the body is to function. It has a sickness, a disease, somethings breaking down. That’s what spiritually happens when the body is not functioning harmoniously. The spiritual body, I mean we’re to be manifesting for the glory of God what He has done in bringing us all with our diversity together and enabling us to function as a unified body. That’s amazing so he goes on here.

Now I want you to note verses 4 and following he uses the word varieties three times. Once in verse 4, once in verse 5, once in verse 6 to denote the diversity there is. “There are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit” so you note the variety, the difference but the unity is what, there’s only one Spirit, so the gifts given can function harmoniously. “There are varieties of ministries, and the same Lord,” so the same Spirit that is enabling, the same Lord who is directing, “there are varieties of affects,” the outworking’s of our gifts that enables the body to accomplish all that God wants it to, so my hand doesn’t have to do what the ear does and so on. It’s obvious but there is the same God who works all thing in all. I don’t know what we’re going to tell the Lord. Lord it was so complicated I couldn’t understand it, but He communicates to us and it’s brought down to where we are expected and required to understand it.

Varieties of gifts, what have been bestowed upon us by God’s grace. Varieties of ministries, we get the word deacon from this word, variety of ways of serving is what it is. Gifts are ways of serving. There are varieties of affects, outworking’s. You can’t exercise your gift by doing nothing. The same God, so we pick up with verse 7, “but to each one,” again we have this emphasis on no one excluded, to each one. We’ll have this down in verse 11 at the last part of the verse,”to each one individually.” This emphasizes down in verse 18 “God has placed the members, each one,” so again there are no exceptions. If you are not gifted by the Spirit you are an unsaved person; your gift comes at the moment of salvation. Now your recognition of the gift will take place over time. The baby’s born, it’s born with all the parts, but it takes time for each part to learn how it functions. You know they start out, they don’t know how, they don’t quite have control to grab something or you know and then they put stuff everywhere. It’s just not coordinated yet, but God places each part there, over time it develops and so on.

“To each one” verse 7 “is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good,” and note here if you’re a believer you have the Spirit. If you have the Spirit, you’re gifted. Your gift is a manifestation that the Spirit dwells in you. “To each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit.” Functioning as an effective part of the body demonstrates that you are part of the body. It’s a manifestation of the Spirit’s presence in your life, so a person, and people have left or leave from time to time, claim to be believers, but I don’t go to church, but I can read the bible. Well, there may be something that keeps a person home, health physical conditions, other things, but just because I don’t feel like going. Well I don’t like to be part of the body. You know what it is; if you’re a believer, you’d miss that. No, you want to be part of the body and function, so it’s given for the common good. A spiritual gift is not given for your benefit; it’s given for other people’s benefit. Now you’re blessed in using your gift. Of course, you function as part of the body but it’s given for the common good.

“To one the word of wisdom through the Spirit, to another the word of knowledge according to the same Spirit; to another faith by the same Spirit, to another a gift given to him by the same Spirit” and on. “It’s all” verse 11, “but one, and the same Spirit works all these things,” so that gift, whatever it is, it’s the same Spirit working. That why I say when we have conflict with the exercising of gifts, it’s not caused by the Spirit. That’s an attack on the very character of God. There is a breakdown, somewhere along the line, and you’ll note the “same Spirit works all these things.” Note, “distributing to each one individually and now note this, just as He wills. I didn’t get to pick my gift you didn’t get to pick your gift.” The Spirit of God distributed the gifts, and in the sovereign plan of God He provided by the Spirit the gift for you when the Spirit of God took up residence in your life, so He distributes them as He wills.

Oh, Lord I want this gift. You know that’s where, over time, I’ll recognize what my gift is. I’ve shared, I wanted the gift of evangelist, and the gift I didn’t think I would want would be a pastor, speaking to the same group of people week after week after week; boring. I want to go out where the unbelievers are be challenged in bringing them the gospel. Over time it became clear to me what God had gifted me with was not what I first thought I wanted, and that’s true. That doesn’t mean we don’t—we’ll talk about it. We can do other things than our gift, but I want to center where I see God uses me most.

Verse 12 “for even as the body is one, has many members, so also the body of Christ.” Again, he keeps emphasizing it’s just like your physical body, because he knows the Corinthians can be dense and they’re racked by divisions, so just think of your physical body, then think of the spiritual body. “By one Spirit, we were all baptized into one body,” and it doesn’t matter what your nationality is, “Jew or Greek, slave or free, we are all made to partake of one Spirit. For the body is not one member, but many,” so one part of the body can’t say, I don’t need it, “don’t need you,” get proud and elevated about my gift, but my gift would be nothing without the other parts of the body. I don’t care what part of the body you pick out, you cut it off from the body it’s lost its effectiveness. It’s just a body part but it’s not usable. Its effectiveness is when its part of the body, so we were all made to drink of one Spirit.

That’s why I say, if you say I don’t think I’ve been gifted by God, I don’t have anything to contribute, the first question is, have you ever been saved, because the Spirit of God takes up residence. Romans 8 says if you don’t have the Spirit, you don’t belong to Christ. If you do have the Spirit, He’s come, and He’s come not only to identify you with Christ and His death burial resurrection, but then enable you to function in a way—I mean God’s just not throwing parts together. He sovereignly is bringing to salvation and then putting that part where it would be and if He does move you to another church, it ought to be because He’s going to use you in that body and your gift is needed there and so on.

Then you come down to the need of each part, verse 18 “now God has placed the members each one of them in the body just as He desired.” Isn’t that great! I mean think about that God placed me in the body just as He wanted me to be and where He was going to use me, and that’s true of each one of us.

Let me just say something about recognizing your gifts since I’m talking about this, because finding your gift is not a difficult thing. It’s not something you ought to go home and think I’ve got to figure out what my gift is. We know everyone has been gifted, so if you’re a believer you say, Lord, and most of you already know this here and you’re functioning, but recognize every believer has a gift, so there are no extraneous parts, some steps, that’s the first step. Recognize I know I’m gifted because I’m a child of God, I have the Spirit.

Secondly, become aware. Where could I serve in the body? We see things, we put things in the bulletin, our newsletter, to say here are opportunities. Well maybe the Lord could use me here. That’s one thing, there’s a need here. I have the time; I could be used maybe to help fill that. That doesn’t mean that’s where I’m going to be or finally stay, so what are some of the possible ways you might be used?

Thirdly, what are your interests and desires? Do you find an interest in a particular area? Now be careful because it is easy for us to be drawn into things that might be more prominent. I’d like to have Gil’s position. Well, you can’t have it right now. Where is your desire? You know, I would like to do this. Don’t think that the Lord’s going to make you do something you wouldn’t like to do, by the same token it may take time, and you realize I didn’t think I would enjoy serving in that area, but I found out I do. It’s not, oh I’m not going to serve there because I don’t think that’s where my gift is but that doesn’t mean I can’t be used and serve in that area and that helped me find out. Get involved.

A gift is a way of serving. We’ve seen this. It is a way of doing something. That word, there are a variety of effects. That word “effects,” we get the word energy and words like that from this word, energeia is the basic word. We can see we get energy from it. It’s a means of activity, doing something. You don’t wait until you know what your gift is, you find areas you can be used. I mean that doesn’t mean that’s where my gift is, but I can serve in a variety of areas and do things even though my prime gift is going to be for example, pastor teacher. That doesn’t mean there can’t be things I can do at other times. When the church was small, I would come sometimes and vacuum, I would set up a room for a meeting. Now that would be an area of serving the body or doing things other people weren’t available to do. I would go to the hospital even though mercy is not my prime gift. Some of you would say it’s not your gift at all but that’s fine. It doesn’t mean I couldn’t do where there was a need at the time, and then you begin to find out where you are more effective, other places where I am less effective.

Ask other believers after you have functioned awhile. You know we don’t want to be closed. Oh, I know this is my gift. If it’s your gift other people ought to recognize it in time so if you have a doubt or a question, ask. You know if you think your gift is teaching, be open. Do people think that’s your gift? You know an area are you effective in that area, so be open to the input. I want to be open to where I’m drawn and settle in. That’s where your prime energy will be, where your gift is and that’s what enables us as a body to function so well. I mean we have things going on, we have camp ministry that takes things, we’ve just had bible school. We have things going on, we have people in the nursery that have served there so faithfully so that what? So that the Word can be ministered here and you know just things go on.

People come and clean because if this place wasn’t cleaned and you know they’re just so many things going on and everybody praying. Well that doesn’t seem that major. You know for a time I was wearing a boot. I was having a problem with a portion of my foot. It didn’t seem like that part of my foot was major until it wasn’t functioning well, and I finally ended up going to the doctor. I said you know, I can’t put any pressure on that foot and it’s getting worse and it’s more painful when I do. You know you realize that and just take things for granted. That’s why I said we pray for one another because we realize we will maybe not miss those people functioning until they’re not functioning, so that’s just an overview of the gifts. We’re going to get into more specifics, not going through every gift, but I want to divide the gifts, those that are still present, those that are not, and this has become a growing issue.

Things have changed in how we handle the Scripture for this but we’ll have to wait on that, so we have time for questions. Maybe you come with a question. You have anything you came with that you want to ask, it doesn’t have to be on gifts but if you came with something you wanted to bring up, we can address that.

Hey, Gil there have been some questions texted in, so there’s a few questions. I can keep going unless you want to answer questions here but first the good news, a good comment. Thank you, Gil, for faithfully teaching us the Word week after week and year after year, so I second that and I think many here do to. Thank you.

I say first the good news but there really are no bad comments so—the one on spiritual gifts. Do you believe a woman can have the gift of administration and use it with her role? We’ll talk about specific gifts. I think we do have women who are good in administering and they serve in areas consistent with what God intends for them to do and be as a woman, and that would limit them regarding administering men in an overall sense.

For example, we have men that serve in the nursery, but we would have women administering that. That’s not direct in the kind of thing that would be a conflict, as I would see it. I’m the head of the home, for example, but I recognize my wife knows more about the house and things to be done, so I’ll ask, do you want me to do this? She usually tells me why don’t you just go and read a book. It’ll be easier to keep me out of it, but you know those kinds of things, so I think women in that sense do. They play a key role in certain areas that are more tilted toward where their strengths are, so yeah but I say that it has to be consistent with what God made them to be as a woman and try to keep it in that way.

If you have a question in any area raise your hand, and that way they can maybe see it and pick you up. What is your comment on women that are acting as pastors in churches then? Women acting as pastors is a good question because it’s a growing thing and Evangelical seminaries that used to exclude women, like Dallas Seminary, now have many women training. I don’t think that is a biblical role for a woman, but as Paul says that “I do not allow a woman to be in authority or to teach a man,” in 1 Timothy chapter 2, so that would be contrary to the Scripture. Women are not called and gifted to be pastors and teachers in churches, nor are they to be the teachers of the Word of God in the church. “I don’t allow a woman to teach or be in authority over a man,” Paul says and he’s in the context of explaining how we are to conduct ourselves in the church and what women are to do, what men are to do, so it’s just what God created us to be.

I think where women are pastoring in churches, and it is a growing thing because once they train them in our theological schools like Dallas. I use Dallas because many of you are familiar with Dallas, and at one time they held a different position. I’ve kept the article in my office where they made public, we are changing our practice here, and then you send them out. They’ve been the most trained, so they begin to do it. It’s not a question, do they do it well, it’s a question of what God’s will is, and if God says this is what He intends, it’s not, well I know some women who are good speakers, and would be good pastors, and good teachers. That’s not a question, it’s what does God say His will is and plan is. So I think that would be out of the realm for a woman, and teaching men period, I think is out of the realm. Quite frankly, I don’t think women are called to be the teachers of the Word of God. I did this a number of years ago and I said in 1 Timothy 2, since this is an area of growing concern, 1 Timothy chapter 2 verse 12, “I do not allow a woman to teach” and I use that. That is a blanket statement.

There’s another pastor in town who went on to get his Doctors degree and says I could answer every question that’s not a correct way to interpret that, but now the more recent grammatical works are saying, I do not allow a woman to teach. Now that doesn’t mean anything because women can teach other women, in Titus 2. How to “love their husbands” in their realm of the home and so on, but authoritative teaching of the Word is to be handled by men. That’s why we do not encourage women’s studies that are focused on teaching doctrine, because if the women are not getting enough doctrine, the men aren’t, so we tend to have groups that are both men and women. We have a women’s study. They’re geared more toward applying the Word toward their areas of life, like our Tuesday morning Titus Tuesday.

Now that doesn’t mean the women can’t use the Word and apply the Word, but that’s where it’s geared. We emphasize men are responsible for teaching the Word and so that would exclude them from the pastorate as well, and the positions of authority over men. They are not to function, that’s a general principal too, so we have men in the key roles of leadership over the body here. Yeah, it’s a pertinent question.

Gil my question is, is the gospel a call to be a slave of Jesus Christ? I think the gospel is--I mean this gets into what was the debate, more visible, it’s still an issue, the Lordship of Christ. I don’t think God barters with us when it comes to salvation, and there’s a reason. Paul’s favorite title for Christ is Lord. Kurios by its very definition, it means somebody who is sovereign. The major dictionary on the Greek language, it’s not very conservative but it’s like ten volumes on Greek words and on their word kurios, they say well it’s the natural word for God, because any concept of God has to have the idea of sovereignty. I mean does anybody talk about God who is not sovereign, so I think when we are called, or we come to salvation in Christ, we place our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. I think any idea that, well I have accepted Him as my Savior, and this is what I used to hear in the early days of our conversion when we’re in the type of group that taught this. They’d tell us some of you accepted Christ as your Savior but now you need to trust Him as your Lord and submit to Him as your—they’d called you to the altar, now I want to take that second step. First step, trust Him as Savior, second step, now commit to Him as Lord. I don’t find that to be biblical, so He is Lord from day one. You’d think He would say, I could tell Christ, I want You to be my Savior but I don’t want You to rule my life. I won’t submit to You. Can I come to God that way?

Another word that some of you are aware of, the word slave relates to that, doulos. A slave is a slave and that’s a common word used in the New Testament. I don’t remember the count right now; it’s usually translated as a servant or bondservant. There are some books out, Murray Harris has written a book on slaves that I would recommend. MacArthur has written a book on that. It carries the same idea. If He is Lord, you are His slave, you’re not your own you’ve been bought with a price. I mean those kinds of emphasis every time He uses the word Lord, every time He uses the word slave, every time he uses that kind of speech; you are not your own, you’re bought with a price. You know those kinds of things all point to the fact we are to live our lives in complete submission and obedience to Jesus Christ, no ifs ands or buts about it. He is in charge and recognizing that sovereignty that we sang about, we like it when things are going well, but I realize and recognize it and accept it when things aren’t going well.

When, humanly speaking, I don’t like what’s happening, Lord I don’t like being sick. Lord I don’t like that I’ve lost my job. Lord I don’t like that this person has done this to me. I say, Lord You are sovereign. I don’t have to understand why this is happening or been done. Lord, it does not even seem to me to be good, but Lord my life is not my own. I want to submit to You and draw upon Your grace, and that’s all part of it and the challenge is as we grow to live that out. We all struggle with it. If we didn’t, we’d be living perfect lives, in perfect submission, in perfect obedience. I’d be living a perfect life and you’d be living a perfect life and we’d all be living a perfect life and that would mean we’d be living in perfect harmony with one another as we talked about, and the body would be just functioning perfectly, and my life would be a testimony. Gil never sins, he never says a wrong word; he always does just what he should do. He never has a negative bad thought. We all acknowledge we’re still growing but the Lordship of Christ is there any time, there’s no excuse for it. There are no believers who have not been brought into a relationship with Christ as their Lord. We are enslaved to Him. We were slaves of sin, now we are slaves of God and of righteousness.

The Scripture’s clear on it. It doesn’t matter what I think. This is a constant battle. We’re going to talk about this when I talk about some other things next time.

People say, well I’ve believed this for a long time. It doesn’t matter. What does the Scripture say? That’s why the Scripture’s so important and we’re in a situation. This is what I want to draw to your attention when I talk about the difference in the gifts. There’s a change going on in the Evangelical world, in those areas that have been sound, that are saying we have made too much of Scripture and its authority. Now can you believe it? I have a book here and it is written, basically, by men who were either professors or graduates of Dallas Seminary, and what they’ve come to realize is they had too much authority placed on the bible. What do you mean? Where is the Church going? I’ve got my notes here, the name of three professors at Dallas Seminary who were removed from being professors, because they were teaching the very thing that now all these professors at Dallas Seminary are teaching. What has changed? There’s a change going on in the Evangelical world that we need to be aware of and it has to do with this authority, the authority of Scripture.

The man who opens up with this, if I mention his name you may know him, and by next week I’ll have lost my reserve and tell you, because he put it in print, it’s out there but he says I came to a point I found out the bible was not enough. Well there are arguments presented in here that we have become too rational in our thinking. We just come to the propositional truth of the book. That’s not where we need to be. We need this other realm, and we really move to a realm of feeling and emotion and we have dual authority. What is happening? It’s a matter of who’s in charge. My feelings can now begin to drive me, move me. I don’t make decisions just on that rationalism that came out of Scottish common sense and the Enlightenment. It had nothing to do with anything.

You know you let men who—read another book I like. It’s called the Academic Captivity of Theology, written by a professor, but he’s an old professor. He’s my age, they’re good ones. I don’t agree with him a lot. He’s covenantal, but he says we have brought theology and the Word of God into captivity to scholars. What happens with scholars, they have to complicate the simple, and this is where we’re going, so the Evangelical church is being swept away with this, and it’s all around us and feelings have replaced objective truth and you see where the world is. Look at the world, turn on the news. There are debates being held. You know people are stirred up emotionally and they’re on fire for this and that. Is there any rational orderly consideration of the facts? This is where we’re moving now. We don’t do that with the Word of God. That’s those who make an idol out of the bible, it’s bibliolatry.

I studied under 11 Dallas men in Bible College. They hammered away, and I’ll tell you why, because we’ve developed a system of interpretation called narrative theology, and I don’t have time to do that, I’ll talk about that next time. You know, a new way of interrupting the bible. This is coming out of the Evangelical schools and men who claim to believe the inspiration of Scripture, but if you claim to believe the inspiration of Scripture and you twist it in the interpretation what do you have, you have error. It is the battle going on and it’s where churches are going because that’s where the world’s gone. Is the world interested in objective truth, and facts and considering it? No this is how I feel. They even do interviews on news programs. They don’t say what do you think, they say what? How do you feel about this? It doesn’t matter how I feel. What are the facts about this? I mean that’s just gone and our young people are being raised in that environment, they’re being taught this in school, and they don’t have to be rational and it comes into the church.

We expect this from the world but what goes on in the world now? The objective truth of the Word, the propositional truth of the Word, that’s just one thing but if that’s all you have, it’s not enough. What is going to be left? You know when the foundation of the truth of the Word of God--oh they’re saying, we still go to the Word but it is to be interpreted through their own subjective approach and so these are challenging days. It’s coming out in this area, so this book’s entitled, Who’s Afraid of the Holy Spirit?

We can now move to be more charismatic, Pentecostal, because with this new way of interpreting the bible, we can see, we can do theology this way. We’ll talk about the error of that, so all of that ties me back to Lordship. If you don’t have His Word as the absolute final authority, how do you submit to Christ? Well my feelings, the Holy Spirit moves directly in my life, not indirectly through the Word. Now we’re out here floating in a whole sea of uncertainty. Now it’s your feelings? Well yeah, the Holy Spirit dwells in you so He directly communicates to you. How do men with Doctor of Theology degrees come to such nuttiness and we’ll talk about the new way of interpreting Scripture that is being promoted these days.

All right let’s have a word of prayer together. Thank you, Lord, for Your truth. Thank you, Lord, that we do not live in uncertainty. We have Your unchanging Word. A word that is from You. We have the Holy Spirit who is the Holy Spirit of truth, who was used to inspire the Word, to move men to write the very words from You, a Word that is true, will be true, and will be fulfilled. Lord we want to be faithful to this truth. We want to be diligent in the study of it. We want to be careful that we are not carried away by every wind of doctrine, every new thing that comes. We want to be alert and discerning so that we are not deluded and deceived by the subtle errors that are infiltrated into the church. Pray that we might have lives that are conformed to this Word and we might honor You, that we might be a testimony for You. Use us through the days of this week, wherever we are, whatever we’re doing, as lights in the midst of darkness, we pray in Christ’s name. Amen