A Christian Spiritual Culture, part I

Text: 1 Corinthians 12:1-11

Focus: The Holy Spirit

Function: To help people discern the working of God’s Spirit in their lives.

Form: Bible Study

Intro:

So, this is now the third installment in a short series about the Holy Spirit in the life of the Church.

The first Sunday of the month we saw that the Holy Spirit is in us to seal us, protect us, and guarantee us our place in God’s family.

(SHOW) The Holy Spirit guarantees our place in God’s family.

Then the week before last we saw how the Holy Spirit works inside of us to give us power, grace, love and forgiveness beyond human ability.

(SHOW -add) The Holy Spirit gives us power beyond human ability.

Today we will look at specifics of the Spiritual gifts, how they work and whether or not they are for today.

(SHOW -add) The Holy Spirit creates a Christian culture inside of us.

This will be done in two parts, this week and next.

We are looking today at the specifics of gifts and how to tell if they are genuine.

The first 3 verses deal with the subject of being led by false spirituality.

• Genuine spirituality focuses on the Lordship of Christ and will always honor Him.
• It will never dishonor him.
• But Peterson, in the message says something important: “Use your heads, it is obvious that when the Holy Spirit is speaking the person will never curse Christ and it is His Spirit that gives people the power to proclaim Him as Master and Savior.
• 1 John 4:1-3 relate to this problem.
• (show) Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God; and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; and this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world.
• The Holy Spirit leads people to proclaim His Lordship.
• The spirits that do not acknowledge Jesus are not from God’s Holy Spirit.

So what is the point?

Is it the mere confessing, or reciting a certain statement, or creed that proves a person is from God?

Does every idea, every thought in our head come from God?

Are there other things that have an emotional impact on us, that move us in our spirits that are not the Holy Spirit?

Does the criteria: “It feels good,” “or, it is easier to believe,” or “it seems this way to me” proof that the thought or idea is from God?

Here is the problem, both here and the Church that the Apostle John is writing to were having a problem with false doctrine that was taking away from Christ.

Christianity was being mixed with other religion.

Now those here on Christmas eve may remember the message: “The Wise Men Were a Long Way Off” about how God left a witness to Christ in whatever other religion these wise men practiced and they came to see the Lord’s Messiah, the deliverer of all the nations.

And the point is not a type of faith where all religions really are one, but a faith where God calls people to Christ from every race, religion, and place on the entire planet.

So again, what is the point? (SHOW) The Holy Spirit points people to Jesus Christ.

The people in Corinth were confusing emotion, and other spiritual forces with the moving of the Holy Spirit.

When the Holy Spirit moves, I always have an emotional, as well as spiritual and sometimes physical response.

But that doesn’t mean that every time I have an emotional, physical or spiritual feeling it is the Holy Spirit leading.

Paul is telling us to use our heads, check things out with scripture, and exercise caution, especially when the preacher is merely using emotion, or satire, or criticism or anger to gain a following.

I said: (SHOW): Not every emotional, physical or spiritual feeling comes from the Holy Spirit.

• Our physical health can certainly effect our demeanor and our ability to have faith, a sense of well-being and our perspective.
• A friend of mine cried every time he stood up to give a testimony, he finally asked his doctor who told him that it was a side effect of one of his heart medicines.
• Initially, he thought it was God.
• It was an emotional reaction to a physical problem, but it was so intense he thought it was God.
• I really don’t have to explain the emotional part, everyone knows that we cannot base our faith solely on our feelings.
• But the warning from the scripture is to be careful about being led away by false teachers.
• Brothers and sisters, we live in culture of fear and anger.
• And the fear rhetoric is not from God. But it is certainly emotional, and it is intense. It is intense enough to confuse it with the moving of the Holy Spirit.
• When my son John starred as captain of his High School basketball team, we had some real high times.
• One time, behind by one point, with 7 seconds to go in the game, he stole the ball, ran it back for a lay-up and the extra point. It was exciting.
• And then this man tried to shame me. He said: “I wish people would get this excited for Jesus.”
• I found that statement shaming.
• That reduces Jesus to the level of human emotion.
• Jesus isn’t merely a basketball contest, He is much more. And He is holy, deserving much more that the hype and hysteria of the adrenalin where feel when watching or participating in an athletic and competitive event.
• It is a physical and emotional reaction to the circumstances around us.
• Fear, shame and anger are emotions that can be confused with the genuine work of God.
• Remember, we feel emotions, spirituality and sometimes physical sensation when the Holy Spirit moves, but that doesn’t mean those feelings are the Holy Spirit.
• Anger and fear especially are used by false preachers today to simulate the moving of God. If the preacher is passionate about something he can get you angry about, or afraid of, then he can control you.
• We are in a culture of fear.
• Just look at the political climate and see how so many people are resorting to scare tactics and anger and calling it truth.
• A death squad will show up at your door and decide if your life is worth living if there is universal healthcare. –Be afraid!
• Or, if you are not for it, then you don’t care about the poor, or justice.
• Anger, fear and rhetoric are not the ways of God.
• If you are a deer, and you see Eric, Tim or Gary show up with camouflage, a bright orange cap and some sort of weapon, then be afraid, run away. The fear/flight response in nature is a healthy defense.
• So, protect yourselves, and your pocketbooks from those who merely use those tricks under the guise of Christianity.
• Remember, Brother Paul and Brother John, wrote these words to Christians to help them see how the Holy Spirit works.
• Above all, use your head and compare things to scripture.

(SHOW) The Holy Spirit points people to Jesus Christ.

Now onto verses 4-11, a list of some of the gifts given by the Holy Spirit.

This list is called the Charismatic gifts. It is a list of gifts that is different from the next list that he gives at the end of the chapter and the list in Ephesians 4 and Romans 12. It is not a comprehensive list.

But it is called Charismatic gifts, not after the movement of the 70’s, but from the Greek word Charis which means “Grace.”

(SHOW) Charis = Grace

The Charismatic movement took its name from this word and it went like this.

This specific list is the list of the “grace gifts.” If you have received grace, then the proof of it will be that you have the ability to demonstrate one of these gifts.

That was really unfortunate, because there were a lot of people who knew that they were saved and did not experience these specific gifts.

It led to a lot of fighting. Many churches split; I saw families torn about by this doctrine.

If that was the move of God, then either the Devil is more powerful that God and turned it into something bad, or believers didn’t comprehend this passage.

Brother Paul writes this list because this specific list was causing problems in the church. The church was separating into the group of “haves” and “have nots.”

And he tells them, if these gifts cause division, then you have the wrong idea about them. Remember: (SHOW) The Holy Spirit points people to Jesus.

So what about these gifts? Are they bad? Are they real?

The ensuing argument that divided many churches rallied together with more and more ammunition to prove the other side wrong.

Those who disagreed with their reality say that this specific list of gifts was given only in the time of the apostles, and was used mainly by the apostles, to establish their authority because the New Testament was not yet finished. And, they say, the NT has silenced these gifts, they aren’t genuine, they may even be demonic.

Well, they aren’t reading this passage correctly either. It is obvious that Paul is talking about the believers there in Corinth, and not just the apostles. And although at the end of Chapter 13 he says, prophecies and tongues will someday cease, he never says when.

These gifts are great, when used in the right context and for the right purpose.

These gifts by the Holy Spirit are given to point people to Jesus Christ.

If a person uses the gift to point to himself/herself, then it isn’t at all what God intended.

But they are real, and they are not to be feared.

I was newly back to Christ in 1978. And I was trying to figure out just how much of the Bible was true. I came to this passage, and others like it and thought to myself, “If the bible is true, then this is ought to be real.”

I asked my dad, a pastor, about it and he said that he had seen times when people broke into ecstatic utterances and God did some miraculous things, but he was concerned that people were more interested in the power the gifts give than in bringing glory to Christ.

His first pastorate was in a small town with one other preacher, a Pentecostal preacher. One morning, early, my dad was on the roof repairing it when he slipped, went over the side and started to head for the ground, really fast.

He grabbed the rain gutter and luckily, or miraculously, the gutter broke off slowly as each nail, at 4 foot intervals came loose and it broke his fall.

The Pentecostal minister saw it, came running up to dad to see if he was okay and when he found out that my dad was okay, he exclaimed, “Glory be, I heard you calling out in tongues as you were falling.”

My dad told me, it wasn’t tongues he was saying!

He went to a revival service at his friends church, and half-way through the preaching, this lady ran forward screaming: “I want it, I want it!”

The evangelist had the woman start to say: “praise Jesus Christ” faster and faster until she stumbled over the words and then pronounced that she was now filled with the Holy Spirit.

My dad experienced the abuse and misuse of this gift: the same misuse and abuse that Brother Paul is writing about.

And that was a real problem for me. Because I knew that God had given me this gift, but I was afraid that it wasn’t genuine, afraid that it might even be demonic.

But every time I read the scripture, I would come to a passage like: (SHOW) Luke 11:11-13: "You men who are fathers--if your boy asks for bread, do you give him a stone? If he asks for fish, do you give him a snake? If he asks for an egg, do you give him a scorpion? Of course not! "And if even sinful persons like yourselves give children what they need, don't you realize that your heavenly Father will do at least as much, and give the Holy Spirit to those who ask for him?"

So, I was afraid, but the Holy Spirit was showing me the reality that the Holy Spirit does indeed dwell within believers.

So, I prayed and allowed my tongue to be taken over by God and this spiritual language came out. I doubted at first, so I went to a Full Gospel Business men’s meeting and prayed out loud before this guy who seemed very spiritual. I prayed in my language, and just as soon as I started praying, he started praying in my language. I recognized it. And he started hollerin’ “I just got a new language!”

(SHOW) The Holy Spirit to EACH ONE is given to each one for the common good (of all).

It doesn’t have to be from this list. But listen, because we are saved, God is in us. He dwells right here inside of us. He does this to bring glory to Jesus Christ.