Concerning Spiritual Gifts

Alright, you guys can have a seat.

Good morning.

How's it going?

Good?

My name is Justin.

I'm one of the pastors here at Mystio.

It's my privilege to be able to bring you God's word.

We're kicking off a new sermon series called For the Church, where we're looking at the gifts of the Spirit.

And I'm excited about this sermon series.

But this topic itself is a challenging topic if we're honest, right?

A lot of the time when we talk about the gifts of the Spirit, it produces more heat than it does light.

Because there's broad fractions upon what the Bible actually says, what are the gifts, how are they supposed to be used.

There's all this kind of difference of thought and opinion among the church.

And so I realize that coming to a topic like this, right, is kind of like rolling the dice, right?

We are going to try to humbly approach the scriptures.

That's one thing we're going to do.

Not submit to our own authority, but to the authority of God's word.

And we're going to try and see all that possibly God would have for us.

And I think that my hope and prayer has been that we would be open, that we would be humble, and that we would have a posture that says, God, whatever you have for me, I want.

And so when we look at this, there's all kinds of things that we'll have to navigate, we'll have to define, we'll have to talk about, right?

And so, but but but we before we really get diving into this, I just want to kind of share my testimony.

And this is something that you guys, uh, if you're new to Mystio, you've probably never heard before, but I think that this will help set the stage uh for this uh sermon series.

And my goal today is not to exhaust all the points of view, all the different uh theological issues that are happening in this sermon today.

My job this morning is just to kind of set up this series and allow as we exposite the text and we go through each verse of these next three chapters in 1 Corinthians that we will see and wrestle with uh what the scriptures say.

So, first off, I was saved as a junior in high school.

Uh I had gotten trouble uh at school for showing up high, and uh I was suspended, and uh my great-step-aunt invited me out to church.

I was uh grounded uh beyond belief, and I thought, hey, you know what?

If I could show my parents that maybe I'm trying to turn over a new leaf, they chill out a little bit and go easy on me.

So my great-step-aunt called, invited me out to church.

Uh this was a family church that I've had many experiences in because this was the home church of my stepmom.

And so every other weekend as I was visiting my dad, we would go to church there.

And then when I was in ninth grade, I actually moved in with my dad and stepmom, and uh, we had seasons of of really strong continuity of going to church, and we had seasons of not going to church for a while.

We kind of were in and out, and so in this particular season, we were not in church.

So my step great aunt, aunt, great step aunt, she invited me out and I went.

And I remember this at the end of the service, there was no altar call, there was nothing of uh uh of that kind of fashion.

I just simply was sitting in the back, I got up, I walked to the front to the pastor, and I said, I don't want to sin anymore.

That was it.

And in true Pentecostal form, they worshiped for like another hour and a half after that, right?

They prayed for me.

I was crying, they were crying, uh, they had known kind of my story and the struggles that I had had as a teenager, and so uh we just worshiped, and that began this uh strong um zeal for God instantly.

It was like a night and day experience, a light switch flipped on, and my life was changed.

Um, and so I was a part of this uh Pentecostal church uh that was small up in Lebanon, it was my family church.

Now, like I said, I had a lot of experiences in this church though before.

In fact, uh, what this church kind of started to do was in around the mid-90s, they started really pursuing this kind of new revival movement that was happening in America.

And one of the biggest uh kind of uh kickstarters to this new revival movement was the Pensacola outpouring or the Brownsville revival that happened in Pensacola, Florida, and it started in 1995.

So I was there, I was not saved yet, but I was there.

And I remember waiting like over three hours in line before a church service would start just to get into the building.

You're talking about this place was flooded with tens of thousands of people to see God move, to experience God move.

And in that, we quickly got a taste for this revival movement.

Uh, we got a taste for this moving of the Spirit of God, and it caused us to seek more and more encounters with the Spirit, desiring that the next one would always be greater than the last one.

So I've seen, I've experienced, I've participated in just about everything under the sun when it comes to the charismatic movement.

I will tell you with full confidence, there is nothing you can say that will surprise me.

Where I'll be like, what?

That's happening in the church?

Uh I've because I've I've seen it, I've experienced it firsthand, I've participated in it in some measure.

And I remember even like kind of as I was kind of reminiscing this week about some of my experiences in this charismatic movement, there's three that will always stand out to me.

Right?

There's three moments that I'll just won't ever be able to shake from my memory.

One of them, uh, they're all kind of funny, but uh the one of them was at the Brownsville Revival.

They were doing these uh baptism service during the revival meeting, and it was up top.

It was a cool baptismal, above the pulpit, up high, and this girl was just uh what they would call under the power of the spirit, and she was shaking hard.

And uh they were trying to get her down, but she was white knuckling the edge of the baptismal.

And so as they were trying to get her down, another deacon comes in to try and help.

And when she goes down, this foot comes up and dropped the deacon.

Both of them went into the water hard.

They just both got baptized right there, one on purpose, one on accident.

I remember that very vividly.

Another time is when I thought God literally slayed a woman by his spirit, right?

So there's this thing called being slain in the spirit in the charismatic movement, and what that typically is is somebody would be prayed for and the person would fall out under the power of God, and they would call that being slain in the spirit.

And I remember this one time we were having a service at our church, and they were getting prayed for, and the woman, like three down from me, got prayed for, and she went down, and there was a wooden pew, and the back of her head cracked that pew.

No one went over to check on her.

I thought she was dead.

I got out of line, I went somewhere else, and I was just like, Lord, don't let her die, let her be healed.

They put a little prayer cloth over her so that her skirt wasn't immodest, and she got up.

She was fine.

The Lord protected her in that moment, but I just thought for sure she was done.

And then there's always this uh infamous uh story of an Australian prophet blowing into my belly button.

And so uh we won't share that today because I've been challenged how many times I would share that during this, but uh I've seen it, I've experienced it, I've been in it, I've sat under and experienced firsthand the ministry of some of the power figures of the charismatic movement.

And as I've been taking some time to reflect on my experiences, I've been taking time to reflect on that that that vein of Christianity that I was in, I really would draw two primary conclusions.

The first one is that the further we went into experientialism, the less tethered we stayed to the gospel and God's word.

The next experience of the Spirit was the main focus, and it definitely became the goal of each service.

And I would say that this is an example of like unhealth that we talked about in the last sermon series.

When the pursuit of this next great experience of the Spirit of God became the end goal, we were manipulating other aspects of the church and the historical church to obtain it.

And so when that became the goal, we dismissed, rejected, or even manipulated foundational truths of the scriptures to obtain it.

This led inevitably to fabricated experiences and unbiblical expressions of spirit gifting and moving.

But here's the second conclusion that I drew.

I cannot reject every experience I encountered as counterfeit.

I can't do it.

I cannot look back on those formative years of my Christian faith and say all of that was fake.

You see, taking time to reflect back on all my experiences, there, what I'm really trying to see is that while there were several examples of experience that I can reflect on and conclude were fabricated, I can't do that to every experience I ever had.

I saw God move in miraculous ways.

I was uh you could tangibly feel his glory and presence as it manifested itself into a particular space and time.

People being healed, people being delivered, people uh uh receiving and demonstrating true expressions of the gifts of the Spirit.

And one of those experiences that I cannot claim is counterfeit is my own story of receiving the gift of tongues and my ongoing use of it.

So, as one of your pastors, who I hope if you've sat under my ministry long enough, know that I do not take this Bible lightly.

And so some of you have two options to have this reality, that I pray in tongues almost daily in my private prayer life as a dismissal to my seriousness to submit to this scripture, and he's just foolish, or that it's fake, or that maybe it really is God.

We're gonna have to throughout this sermon series conclude one of those truths about me, about the scriptures, and about Missio Day as a church.

You see, ten years ago I was truly awakened to the glory and beauty of the gospel through Reformed theology.

I was at a church and uh my pastor that I had been under for several years decided to invite a reformed theologian into our Thursday night Bible study.

Now, again, when I say I've been and sat under every expression of charismatic movement you can think of, I'm talking about my pastor was one of those pastors who had his own jet, rolled with Kenneth Copeland, all those fun stuff, right?

If these things don't mean anything to you, you are really lucky.

Uh but uh nonetheless, uh I I've seen it, I've sent her some so the group that I was in at the time was very much more in the prosperity, health and wealth camp than they were the revival camp.

Uh, though there were great similarities between the two as well.

And so, anyway, my pastor brought in a reformed theologian for a Thursday night Bible study, and he taught on unconditional election and limited atonement.

Still to this day, not really sure what he was thinking would happen from that.

However, I became reformed about two, three weeks later when I was first off in that meeting, verbally arguing with this man who my pastor brought to lead a Bible study, so much so that my pastor came to my house the next day and set me straight.

You cannot disrespect a guest I bring into this church like that ever again.

Came to my door.

Two, three weeks later, I was reading Ephesians and my mind was open.

My heart was opened to the depth of my sin and the depth of God's grace.

I started to love and cherish the scriptures and the theology that actually resided within them.

Simultaneously, I became what I call, though, a functioning cessationist.

And due to the error of teaching I have sat under for so long, and the realization of the false moves of the spirit I have been involved with, I drastically over-corrected.

And I believe that there's actually balance in the middle.

Most people see these two sides of Christianity, spirit gifts and theological sharpness, as warring sides that can never know harmony with one another.

But I've come to a place in my faith where I could not disagree more with that conclusion.

And so before we start diving into the text, I want to at least talk about three positions that the church has on the gifts of the spirit and where Mystiode officially resides.

So you have what we call cessationists.

I used that term just a minute ago, where I became a functioning cessationist.

What they believe is that the gifts of the spirits have ceased.

Specifically, what they would call the revelatory gifts.

Those are gifts where there is new knowledge or new revelation given through specific gifts such as prophecy, word of knowledge, word of wisdom, the gift of tongues, and the interpretation of tongues.

And we're gonna dissect all of that in the coming weeks, okay?

They believe that those gifts have ceased because the apostolic age is over, and fundamentally the hinge point is that the canon has been closed.

So we affirm the canon has been closed.

We affirm that there is no new universal church revelation given through people and men in the office of prophet or apostle that has ceased.

We affirm that the canon is closed.

And we love the sufficiency and the efficiency of the scriptures.

Um, and so there's a part where we agree with the cessationists.

What we disagree with them on is that the gifts have ceased because the canon is closed.

Because there's this, as we're gonna navigate through this series, this little part in 1 Corinthians where Paul declares these gifts will cease, cessationists, when the perfect comes.

They interpret the perfect as the closing of the canon of Scripture.

We interpret the perfect as the second coming of Jesus.

And I hope to unpack that more and more throughout this sermon series.

That the perfect is actually the consummation of the church and the second coming of Jesus Christ rather than the perfect being the closing of the scripture.

So that's mainly where we disagree with cessationists.

They believe the gifts have ceased because of the canon has been closed.

Then there's the charismatics.

The charismatics would agree with us that the gifts of the Spirit are still moving in the church today and that they still are alive and well.

However, where we would disagree with the charismatics is that the scriptures are closed, there's no new revelation, and the Bible is efficient and sufficient in what the gifts' purpose are, use for, order, time, and place within the body of Christ.

They would not agree with us that the Bible is efficient and sufficient for how these gifts should be used, where, when, why they should be used, and so forth.

So you tend to have the charismatics going kind of off the rails a little bit on the use of these things because they pursue experience.

And like I said before, I believe that they draft, they they they progressively become untethered to the authority of the scriptures.

Then you have continuationists.

That's us.

So what we believe is that the gifts still exist and are alive and active in the church today.

We believe that the perfect is yet to come, and we believe that the scriptures are efficient and sufficient for the use of those gifts within the church.

Okay, so those are your three primary views.

We'll kind of unpack that more and more throughout the series, but let's dive into 12, 1.

So I'll read it again.

It's kind of a short passage, but it says, now concerning spiritual gifts, brothers, I do not want you to be uninformed.

And so here's my summary of verse 1.

The scriptures, again, are efficient and sufficient in regards to spirit gifts.

So this first half of the sentence, he says, now concerning spiritual gifts.

Paul's writing to the church at Corinth to address particular beliefs, misconceptions, and questions that they had.

So all in all, it's about uh uh, oh man, I think it's 16 chapters, 1 Corinthians.

And uh and up until this point, he has labored through 11 chapters over such topics as division in the church, stemming from who discipled who, uh, issues of sexual immorality, lawsuits against Christians, marriage and relationships, food and drink sacrifice to idols, head coverings for men and women, communion, so forth and so forth.

So he spent the first 11 chapters really wrestling through misbeliefs, misconceptions, questions that the church had, and he's addressing them constantly, very clearly, very strategically, he's addressing each point in this letter.

And now he's coming to the critical issue of spirit gifts, which he actually uses three of these whole chapters of these 16 just to address.

You see, the people of Corinth, they actually believe themselves to be very spiritual people.

And they actually believe that they had no real need for the physical world.

See, they had an overrealized sense of spirituality.

They would even make statements like, we don't need this fleshly body.

In fact, we're not in the flesh any longer.

We don't need for physical things.

And so as we look at Paul kind of addressing certain things, he's addressing, well, you you do need intimacy, you do need marriage, you do need relationships, you do need these things.

And they have this over-realized view of what the gift of speaking in tongues specifically was for and why it existed.

They believe that it actually established and affirmed their over-realized sense of spirituality.

And so they elevated the gift to a place that it never should have been.

And some people lorded that gift over others, saying that they were not as spiritual as they were because they did not have or practice this gift.

And so Paul's about to lay it plain.

I love the way that Paul is just so direct, but so pastoral.

He puts them in their place by helping them see if they truly were as spiritual as they declared themselves to be, their lives would actually look a lot different.

In 1 Corinthians 3 1, he kind of starts to set the scene.

But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ.

So Paul very quickly, right there at the top of the third chapter, says, You think you're spiritual, but when I'm writing this letter, I can't even address you as spiritual people.

You're so far removed from what it means to be spiritual that I actually have to address you in the flesh and keep on feeding you milk as though you were infants in Christ.

And he says, he talks about his frustration.

I wish I could move on to meat.

I wish I could move on to deeper and more theologically robust uh issues, but I can't.

You see, it sets the tone for the letter in a very direct way that impacts even the topic that we approach here in the 12th chapter.

You see, a perceived evidence of this hyper-spiritual state, they believe themselves, was the function of the gift of tongues.

The use of this gift led them to believe that they were otherworldly and even created some division within the church of who were or who was not spiritual.

This is why Paul addresses the gift so specifically and repetitively over these next three chapters.

So if you look at every time Paul actually lays out a list of the gift of the Spirit, he ends with speaking in tongues and the interpretation of it every single time.

Why is he doing that?

Because he's trying to point them out something that they're not seeing, something that they're missing when it comes to the health of the church and what it really means to be spiritual.

The second half of that first verse, he says, I do not want you to be uninformed.

What Paul will labor to do here in this letter is multifaceted.

First off, he's going to work to bring proper thinking in regards to the purpose and use of the gifts.

Why have we been given these gifts?

How are they to be used in the life of the believer and in the church?

So we need to adjust our thinking properly in regards to the purpose and use.

Second, he will work to expand the scope of view for what all our spirit gifts.

Now, Paul labors in this point.

He's like, look, you want to elevate this one gift above all others, but I'm going to try and open your mind and expand your perspective to what all our spirit gifts, because at the end of the day, everything that we have is a gift from the Father.

Everything that we have is a grace gift given to us.

And so nothing, nothing you have is yours.

Are you hospitable?

It's a gift of the spirit.

Are you good with the ministration?

It's a gift of the spirit.

Are you a good leader?

It's a gift of the spirit.

Are you a humble servant?

It's a gift of the spirit.

Can you prophesy?

It's a gift of the spirit.

Can you heal?

That's a gift of the spirit.

Paul's gonna open our perspective of what all are true spiritual gifts.

Now, we believe that throughout the scriptures, there was never a time where Paul was working to actually produce an exhaustive list of spiritual gifts.

He's not exhausting what all are spiritual gifts.

He's just simply trying to make his point through listing the variety and diversity of spiritual gifts within the church.

We believe that the actually that the broader the context, the more spirit gifting can be applied.

In today's day and age, back then they didn't have A V, but hey, skilled, A V, tech, talent, that's a gift.

And guess what?

It's not a gift of yourself, but it's a gift given to you by God's grace through his spirit.

And so we believe that even the gifts are expansive and continue on today.

And so we need to broaden our scope of what the gifts are, just the way that Paul is trying to get the Corinthian church to.

Thirdly, he'll work to build value and felt need into the spirit gifts.

Value and felt need.

We have been given these gifts, church, all of them, for a reason.

Lastly, he'll encourage them to press into and pursue even more the spirit gifts.

He'll encourage them to press into and pursue even more the spirit gifts.

Even in the midst of misunderstanding, even in the midst of abuse of these spirit gifts, Paul never calls them to do away with these things.

In fact, he calls them to press in and pursue even more.

1 Corinthians 14, 5.

Now I want you all to speak in tongues, but even more to prophesy.

The one who prophesies is greater than the one who speaks in tongues, unless someone interprets, so that the church may be built up.

And so this is what we have a tendency to do in the church.

We see an abuse of something.

We see a misrepresentation of something.

And we want to get rid of it.

We did it with alcohol.

We do it with male headship.

We do it constantly.

We've done it with sex.

All of these things which God has given us as good gifts, because we've witnessed and experienced the abuse of them, we just want to get away with them.

And so we fabricate and twist the scripture to find reasoning and logic to dismiss them.

Ultimately, all of us, to some measure, are under the authority of our experience rather than of the word of God.

And I love what Paul does.

He never does that.

If it's a good gift from God, Paul labors and toils to see that gift presented, demonstrated, experienced, interacted with more deeply, richly, and beautifully within the church.

Even in the same letter, when they were getting drunk on communion wine, he doesn't say, get rid of alcohol, you can't handle it.

You babies.

He says, no, no, no.

Renew your mind.

Renew your mind.

Let that change your heart and let that inform your actions.

And so even with this gift, he does us the exact same thing.

So our main idea this morning is this that the Spirit has given us gracious gifts for our good and has equipped us with the knowledge to use them.

The Spirit has given us gracious gifts for our good and has equipped us with the knowledge to use them.

Let's break this down.

The Spirit has given.

Church, for a moment, recognize the weight of that statement.

God, the Holy Spirit, has given us something.

Man, that's miraculous.

That is cosmic love and affection.

A God who had to do nothing for us, a God who owed us nothing.

He had no obligation to us.

In fact, if anything, he had an obligation to himself to see his justice and wrath executed in light of our sin and rebellion.

But no, that's not the heart, the full heart of God.

God is also merciful and gracious and loving and good.

And so he chose out of his own free will to bestow upon us gifts.

See, God himself has made it purpose to give gifts to his people for their good and his glory, even though we might not understand them.

Even though these gifts might make us uncomfortable, we need to posture our heart so that it yearns for everything that God has for us.

I mean, think about it.

It's not just with these spirit gifts.

What other gifts in your life that God has so graciously given you do you pretty much just say, hey, thanks, but no thanks, God?

Is this the gift you gave me in my spouse?

Is this the gift you gave me in my children?

Is this the gift you gave me in my work?

Is this the gift you gave me in some lame pastor who can't exegete a text?

Is this the gift you gave me?

Isn't that more the propensity of our heart posture?

And you don't think that it affects these spirit gifts of which we find in the Corinthian letter?

These are the gifts you gave us?

What hearts of ungratitude, of entitlement do we communicate to our Father?

Gracious gifts for our good.

Now, see, our inability to see them as good does not equate to them not being good, useless, or unimportant for the work that they were intended for.

These gifts are God's grace to us and a beautiful example of God not holding back from his children.

Like I said before, too often our posture communicates a severe unappreciation for the gifts that he has given to us.

And then has equipped us with the knowledge to use them.

Church, the Bible is efficient and sufficient for us to be able to discern if what is being expressed as a gift is authentic, and if the authentic gifts are being used in divine order and instruction.

The scriptures should give us confidence.

The scriptures should give us assurance to pursue the gifts and see them demonstrated in the body.

When we are afraid to pursue the expression of the Spirit gifts, we are communicating a heart posture that the scriptures are not sufficient.

Amen.

Most of us in this room are Father, Son, and Holy Bible, more than Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

And this is our story.

As we approach these gifts, this is kind of the two ways that it typically plays out.

First off, we abuse the gifts.

We abuse the gifts.

Many of us are led by the pursuit of experience into spaces of unbiblical expression.

It's just true.

We have experienced spirit gifts, or so desire to experience the spirit as authentic and real that this becomes our end goal, and biblical wisdom seems to be a roadblock to our pursuits.

So we want to experience the spirit so badly.

We want to have this next encounter with the Spirit of God so desperately that biblical wisdom becomes, at some point in time, if that's your end goal, a roadblock to the destination.

People who tend to abuse spirit gifts speak of theological clarity as getting in the way of the spirit.

This is language used very often in the charismatic movement.

I would disagree.

I think it actually makes the gifts more beautiful.

I think theological clarity actually makes the gifts more fruitful.

They don't prop up the efficiency and sufficiency of the scriptures in their use of the gifts.

They ignore or reject where the Bible gives clear instruction to purpose and order.

Ultimately, when experience becomes the end goal, we'll push back anything that gets in our way.

And a lot of you have probably witnessed this.

Maybe some of you have experienced it.

Maybe some of you are kind of have a foot in that camp even now.

And I want to tell you something that the Bible is clear on how these gifts should be used, where they should be used, why they should be used, and it's submission to that authority and of the scriptures that makes the gifts truly what they should be.

You see, when we abuse the gifts, we make them into something they were never intended to be.

In fact, we often then end up fabricating gifts that aren't gifts at all.

But some of us, some of us, we reject spirit gifts.

We reject spirit gifts.

And I think there's two primary reasons that's really due to experience that we've done this.

This is just what I'm gonna submit to you this morning.

We've seen an abuse or even experienced an abuse of spirit gifts.

And we've allowed that experience to become authoritative in our understanding.

You see, the problem with cessationists and charismatics, they're just different sides of the same coin.

A lot of them, when you really press hard and boil it down, their experiences are authoritative in their understanding.

So charismatics will say, Well, my experience becomes my authority, and I'm gonna go further out.

And then cessationists, my experience became my authority, I'm gonna pull farther back.

You see, while we judge the other side due to being led by experiences, we ourselves are actually led by them.

We simply discredit all possible expressions of spirit gifts because of the negative experiences we have been a part of or witnessed from a distance.

So I think that's the first reason.

The second fold of this is I believe that we see a gap between what is told to us in the New Testament and what we see and experience in today.

There's a gap.

When we read the scriptures, when we see the works of the apostles and the disciples, when we see all the miracles and signs and wonders, and then we look at the world today, if we're honest, there's a gap.

And out of this perspective, we've really just constructed a safe theology.

I would submit that a cessationist perspective of theology is really, and this is humble submission, I want to first, before I say this, say that faithful, good, holy, righteous brothers and sisters in the Lord are cessationists who will be with us in glory.

Faithful, holy, righteous brothers and sisters are charismatic and will be with us in glory.

I'm not trying to foster a perception of judgment and division.

I'm just trying to bring clarity and where I believe that the Lord's taking us.

But this is what I would submit.

We've built and constructed a safe theology that's built primarily on isegesis and a narrow church history perspective.

So this is what I mean by that.

When we read into the scriptures what is not there, that's called eisegesis.

Our responsibility as Christians is to practice exegesis.

What does that mean?

To take out of the text what truly is there, not read into the text what isn't.

And when we look at the perfect coming as being the closing of the canon, I think we're practicing eegesis.

I don't think you can find it in the text.

I don't think you can make a biblical argument for it.

I really don't.

And then when I say a narrow view of church history, we act like these things didn't carry on into and past the apostolic age.

But we can find from Justin the Martyr, uh Arrhenius, we can find all the way through church history, even in the Reformation, sects of Christianity and people who we hold up as heroes of the faith who demonstrated and practiced these gifts among the congregation.

They're there.

And I can't wait to share them with you.

But when we say that this wasn't in church history, that it died with the Apostolic Age, we're not being thorough or exhaustive or broad enough in our understanding of church history.

We're nitpicking what we want to to affirm our in conclusion.

Also, when we aren't okay, and this is the biggest one, when we're not okay having a space where people can get it wrong and fail, that's the safe theology we're going to create.

And in our camp, the reformed world, we're the worst at this.

We are the theology police.

There's no room for error, there's no room for failure, there's no room to get it wrong.

And so we create this space that's just not joyful.

Like, like, sweet Lord, I was talking to somebody the other day.

When your child gets up and starts walking for the first time in their life, and they take one step and fall, you don't go, you idiot told you you were gonna fail.

Get this kid out of my sight.

We don't do that.

We say, you almost did it, buddy.

Come on, I'm gonna put you back up.

Like we have to create a space where people can get it wrong, where people can fail, and where the gracious kindness of the people of God can swarm around that individual and champion them to keep going instead of beat them down to where they can't get back up again.

That's insanity that we act that way, church.

If the purpose of the gifts of the Spirit are for the maturing and building of the church, so this is our this is what we believe, this is what we believe the Bible teaches very clearly that the purpose of the gifts of the Spirit are for the maturing and building of the church, then we have to ask what happens when the church, Jesus' bride, is built up and matured.

Jesus is glorified.

Isn't he?

Isn't as the bride becomes more and more beautiful in line to what he has made her by the cleansing and washing of his very own blood, as they as the church, as his bride conforms more and more to that truth and that reality, is Christ not greatly glorified?

And secondarily, does not the church love and adore Jesus all the more?

What if a rejection of all the gifts of the Spirit was a passive and ill-affirmed declaration?

We really don't want these outcomes.

God, I know you gave us these gifts.

I know your word says why they exist, to mature your bride, to build her up, to strengthen her, to encourage her, to see her faith grow more strongly.

I know why you gave them to us.

Your scripture's clear, sufficient, efficient.

But you know what?

I think we're good without them.

Passively and ill-informed, you're declaring we don't really want Jesus glorified greatly.

And we really don't want to cultivate a space where the church loves and adores Jesus more.

Because if that's why the gifts exist, then those are the outcomes that we should expect.

You see, everything that the Spirit does is pointing toward the person and work of Jesus.

That's one of the primary reasons that Jesus said that the Spirit would come, that He would make known to you my finished work.

He would declare my majesty and my glory.

And so all of the work of the Holy Spirit is to illuminate the person and work of Christ the Son, even through the gifts.

And the beauty of the gospel for us this morning is that Jesus ascended into heaven so that we could have the fullness of the Spirit.

This is the truth of the gospel, that Jesus ascended into heaven so that we could actually have the fullness of the Spirit.

John 16 7, Jesus' teaching declares this nonetheless, I tell you the truth.

It is to your advantage that I go away.

For if I do not go away, the helper will not come to you.

But if I go, I will send him to you.

Jesus out of his own mouth says, It's better for me to go away.

We can't fathom that.

We can't fathom an ecclesiology, an eschatology that would affirm that as being true.

Jesus, it's better that you go away.

Why?

So we can get the Holy Spirit?

No thanks.

We'd rather just have you.

And Jesus says, You don't understand.

You don't understand.

I'm gonna give you something amazing.

Something you can't comprehend, something you can't fathom the benefit of.

And it's better that I go away so that I can send him to you.

Now I understand that the context of this teaching of Jesus singles out the spirit's role in convicting the world of sin.

You think I didn't do my contextual study?

However, if we work to survey all the benefits of the Spirit, being with us, we can start to see how Jesus spoke in such a way as it would be better for us that the Spirit come than that Jesus remain with us.

And it's challenging for us to imagine that at times.

Especially in this season of the church, absent of Jesus but present with the Spirit could actually be better for us.

You see, we have to labor to see the whole wisdom and will of God in the scriptures.

Yes, Jesus lived a perfect life of obedience.

Yes, Jesus died in our place on the cross at Calvary, bearing sin and shame.

Yes, he was buried and rose again on the third day, conquering death, hell, and the grave.

All of this for his glory and our good, but the narrative of the gospel doesn't.

Stop there.

He ascended into heaven and was seated at the right hand of the Father and sent us his spirit for his glory and our good also.

You see, we think that the gospel stops at Calvary.

And a lot of you still act like there's a dead God in a tomb somewhere.

But the gospel goes beyond Calvary, it goes beyond the resurrection, and it meets us here and now, tangibly in this place that He has ascended and has sent for us the helper.

The gospel is ongoing and ever-living.

And so, what would it look for us if we actually had this heart posture about the gifts of the Spirit in this church?

I believe it would be like this.

We'd be a people who pursue the Spirit gifts with informed minds and thankful hearts.

With informed minds and thankful hearts.

Church, what would it look like if we lived a life that declared honestly and humbly, full of zeal, God, I want everything you have for me.

Everything.

I love this about Paul writing to the Corinthians.

We're going to preach this in a few weeks, but in 1 Corinthians 14, 1, he says, pursue love and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy.

Earnestly desire.

He's talking to a bunch of babies.

Remember?

You're infants.

He's not talking to a conference of apostles.

He's not talking to disciples of Jesus, as far as those who are with him in his physical ministry.

He's talking to a church who's constantly screwing things up, failing, getting it wrong, has horrible theology, is practicing some weird kind of incest within the church and celebrating it, getting drunk on communion, who is lording their gifts over one another, who's creating class divisions among the rich and the poor, who is suing one another for what they're doing inside of the church.

And what is Paul's instructions?

Press in more to what the Spirit has for you.

Earnestly desire the gifts.

He wasn't speaking to the apostles, he was speaking to the everyday saints of the jacked-up church at Corinth.

And if we really investigate our life, if we really took an inventory of our life, what kind of God do we really believe in?

I mean, authentically, and I've been wrestling with this for the last two weeks, and it's wrecked me.

If we took an inventory of our life, what kind of God do we really believe in?

Because if I'm honest, most of us act not as just the gifts have ceased, but God Himself has ceased.

Most of us act like not just the gifts have ceased, but that God Himself has.

That's garbage theology.

What if we actually believed that when we prayed, God heard us?

What would our prayer life look like?

If we believed God heard us, was a loving father who desired to hear us, to shepherd our hearts, to care for us, to see us in our misery, to see us in our pain and in our oppression.

What kind of and he and he would do something about it?

Man, what would our prayer life look like?

You have you you some of you call your dad when you when you need more money.

Like you're you're more dependent on your earthly father.

Like, hey dad, I'm kind of in a bind.

Can you help me out?

And we have the God of the universe who spoke all things into existence, where all things in heaven and on earth are at his disposal.

The cattle on the thousand hills is his, and we don't want to bother him with what's going on in our life?

Or do we just not believe that he's actually able to do anything about it?

What if when we actually exercised our faith, God moved?

That's a wild thought.

Some of us in this room are not submitting to the sovereignty of God.

We're submitting to a theology of fatalism.

I mean, God can move.

And then he says, watch me move when you do.

It's throughout the entire narrative of the scriptures that there is a demand, there is a responsibility on us as God's people to exercise faith and that God is who he says he is.

I love the story of uh the battle of Canaan and Joshua.

The Lord told them, the battle is yours.

I've already won it.

But guess what?

Joshua still had to pick up a sword and swing it.

We have to exercise faith that God is truly victorious, that God has truly overcome, that he is conquering, that his kingdom is actually expanding in this earth, that his light is actually pushing back the darkness, that the gates of hell actually cannot succeed against us.

We don't exercise that kind of faith.

We sit back and we take it.

Many of you are parents.

If your child was desperately sick, what would you do to heal them?

Anything.

You would pray to God, you would cry out to him, you'd even be willing to give your own life for them.

I know you would.

I know the kind of parents that you are.

You don't think the father's heart's greater than ours for his own children?

That's foolishness.

Now listen, I understand that God sovereignly can and does not heal.

And I'm okay with that.

But I'm not okay with pleading for him to move to heal us.

I'm not okay watching the people in our lives who are sick and toiling with chronic anxiety and chronic depression and sicknesses and diseases, and we just sit back and say, Hey, good luck.

I'll pray for you.

Will you?

Will your faith really be exercised in pleading and believing that God can heal?

And can our hearts be content if he chooses not to?

See, that's the whole thing with Shadrach, Meshach, and Abendigo.

I love this story.

And this really shapes the framework of how we understand the sovereignty of God in our lives.

As they were getting ready to be thrown into the fiery furnace, they declare to the king this statement.

Our God will deliver us.

But even if he doesn't, our hearts will not bow to any other.

Man, that's the posture we need to have.

Can God heal you?

Yes, he can.

Will God heal you?

Yes, he will.

But if he chooses not to, his name will still be praised.

He will still be glorified.

He will still be magnified amongst his people as sovereign, as good, as loving, as holy, as righteous.

Church, what if we actually lived lives under the assumption God was who he actually revealed himself to be?

I mean, think about the ways God's revealed himself to be: all-powerful, all-knowing, all-present, gracious, good, loving kindness, merciful, ever-present, mighty hand, outstretched arm, deliverer, conqueror.

What if we actually assumed God was who he's revealed himself to be?

And what if the scriptures were really trying to show us God is a good God who gives gracious gifts to his people for his glory and our good.

That would revolutionize the way we live our lives.

I want to close with a story about my daughter, Addison.

So Addy got baptized when she was eight.

She's 11 now.

And you know, man, one thing I miss about the charismatic movement, those people had insane faith.

They just believed anything.

Like, but in good ways.

Can God do this?

Why can't He?

God can give me this money to do this thing I feel like he's called me to do.

God can overthrow throw government authorities to get us favor to see his kingdom expand.

God can do anything.

Why would you ever take a posture like God can't do that?

I miss that.

I miss that boldness.

Is God gonna reach this city through you and I?

Yes.

Right?

I almost threw out a bad word.

Yes, he can.

Why in the world would you sit back and act like he doesn't want to save people in this world around us?

We gotta exercise faith.

And the other thing I miss is just the childlike posture of approaching God.

God, I don't know what to do.

Will you tell me what to do?

God, I don't I don't know where I should be going.

Will you tell me where I should be going?

Are we people who are actually led by the Spirit?

Because let me tell you something.

While the scriptures are sufficient and efficient for all things according to our Christian faith, what they won't do is to tell you what job to get, where to go to college, who to marry.

They don't tell you those things.

Now, they build guidelines and principles and structure and understanding.

But we need the spirit.

I mean, look through all the acts like the spirit didn't let them go there, the spirit called them to go here, the spirit wouldn't let them talk to these people, the spirit told them to talk to these people.

The spirit, the spirit, the spirit led them in every aspect of their Christian faith.

So this week, my uh daughter Addison had to sign up for classes for junior high.

Like, what the mess?

So um she really wanted to take this art class, and we were talking about where her gift sets is, where her passions are, and trying to have a picture that's up here and broader, more than just right here in front of her.

And I said, hey, this is what we're gonna do.

We're not gonna make a decision.

I spoke what I would like, and I heard what you would like, and I want you to know either decision, I'll support.

I said, but this is what we're gonna do.

We're gonna pray, and we're gonna ask God that He would reveal it to us of what we should do.

I've been I've been reading all these charismatic books, right?

So I'm just like, yeah, he's gonna show us.

And I'm not lying.

My daughter was awakened at 3.45 in the morning, and uh we heard this story uh at about 7.30 around the breakfast table.

She was awoken at 3.45 in the morning, and she said she heard God told her to pick this computer science class over art.

Isn't that wonderful?

Childlike faith.

That your father loves you, that he'll guide you by his spirit into his will, that he'll show you what he wants you to do with your life.

Childlike faith.

I just broke down because I don't have that.

I've lost it.

And church, I want to gain it back together.