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Location:
6425 Jefferson Rd. For
directions, click here.
Jerry
Varnado,
pastor July 7,
2002 Rather
than focus today on the gift of
exhortation as I had planned to
do, I've decided that I need to
go back and talk a little bit
more about avoiding some of the
negative aspects of spiritual
gifts. And they can have negative
aspects, or side effects. 1-Introduction
to
Spiritual
Gifts 2-The
Enabling
Gifts
of the
Holy
Spirit 4-The
Gifts
of
Tongues
and
Interpretation
of
Tongues 8-The
Gifts
of
Knowledge,
Wisdom,
and
Faith This
is why, in the middle of a long
dissertation on spiritual gifts
in 1 Corinthians, the Apostle
Paul goes to great lengths to
teach that all the gifts of the
Spirit are to be exercised in the
context of love -- the kind of
love that reflects the character
of Christ Himself. We
find this teaching in 1
Corinthians 13, often called "the
love chapter." This passage is
read at many weddings. In fact, I
read it at a wedding just a
couple of weeks ago. But
let me put the chapter in context
by starting a few verses back, at
1 Corinthians 12:27. Remember,
Paul is writing about the use of
spiritual gifts in the
church. And
now I will show you the most
excellent way. If
I speak in the tongues of men
and of angels, but have not
love, I am only a resounding
gong or a clanging cymbal. If
I have the gift of prophecy
and can fathom all mysteries
and all knowledge, and if I
have a faith that can move
mountains, but have not love,
I am nothing. If I give all I
possess to the poor and
surrender my body to the
flames but have not love, I
gain nothing. Love
is patient, love is kind. It
does not envy, it does not
boast, it is not proud. It is
not rude, it is not
self-seeking, it is not easily
angered, it keeps no record of
wrongs. Love does not delight
in evil but rejoices with the
truth. It always protects,
always trusts, always hopes,
always perseveres.
Love
never fails. But where there
are prophecies, they will
cease; where there are
tongues, they will be stilled;
where there is knowledge, it
will pass away. For
we know in part and we
prophesy in part, but when
perfection comes, the
imperfect disappears. When I
was a child, I talked like a
child, I thought like a child,
I reasoned like a child. When
I became a man, I put childish
ways behind me. Now we see but
a poor reflection as in a
mirror; then we shall see face
to face. Now I know in part;
then I shall know fully, even
as I am fully known.
And
now these three remain: faith,
hope and love. But the
greatest of these is love.
Follow
the way of love and eagerly
desire spiritual gifts,
especially the gift of
prophecy. When
I talked with you in past weeks
about the gifts of teaching and
prophecy, I specified a number of
personal tendencies or
characteristics that are usually
seen in people who, on a regular
basis, manifest these particular
gifts. I
said that it's helpful if other
people in the church understand
these tendencies so they're not
offended by the prophet's
boldness, for example, or the
teacher's attention to minute
detail. But
what I didn't cover well enough
is this: it is absoutely
essential
that persons who are exercising
these gifts be aware of these
tendencies, so they can guard
against the possible negative
side effects. For
example, we don't want people who
manifest prophetic gifts to have
the attitude of, "Well, I'm
supposed to obnoxious and
confronting and offending. That's
just the way prophets
are!" Yes,
the prophetic gift will help you
see people's faults, it will help
you see things in stark terms, it
will give you a prophetic edge.
But what Paul is saying in 1
Corinthians 13 is that the
prophetic gift and every other
gift must be exercised in
love. Now,
I understand that sometimes love
needs to be tough. Sometimes we
need to speak a word that's hard.
But that doesn't have to be the
case all the time. You can
exercise prophetic gifts without
being obnoxious. Grady
Wigley, one of my mentor's in the
pastoral ministry, told me he
knew lots preachers who changed
churches about every four years,
because it would take them just
that long to offend every person
in the church. And the people
would rise up and ask the
District Superintendent for a new
pastor. Inevitably, Grady said,
the outgoing pastor would say
something like, "Well, I must be
prophet! They're stoning
me!" Friends,
you don't have to be obnoxious to
be bold. And we, as people who
receive spiritual gifts from God,
need to understand what these
gifts do do us, so that we can be
careful to exercise them in love
and not end up inflicting harm on
people or offending them
unnecessarily. God's
desire is for spiritual gifts to
build up the church. He doesn't
intend for gifts to cause
divisiveness. Let
me give you a few practical
examples of some of the things
that people who manifest the gift
of teaching need to be aware of,
so that they can use their gifts
appropriately and in ways that
build up the body. I
going to put back up on the video
screens a list I used a few weeks
ago in the sermon
that covered the teaching
gift. But
real life isn't always systematic
and sequential. Sometimes
teachers have trouble
understanding the problems people
are facing because they're trying
to get everything to fit in a
neat little box. Secondly,
teachers have a keen interest in
the meaning words. Again, that's
a good thing. But too much
emphasis on shades of meaning can
be boring and fruitless. We can
get lost in minutiae and not
really help anybody. At
times, I have prepared sermons
that went into great detail about
original languages and the shades
of meaning of certain words. But
in the end I tossed out a lot of
that because most people don't
really care about that stuff. It
doesn't help them where they
are. Teachers
tend to report as many facts as
possible, but too many facts can
produce overload in minds of
others and frustrate the learning
process. If God is using you to
teach, you need pray over the
facts that you have at your
disposal and ask God, "Just what
is it out of all this that will
be pertinent to these people and
their lives?" A
good teacher knows his or her
material, but the downside is
that sometimes we can come across
as arrogant toward people who
don't understand or who see
something from a different angle.
We need to guard against that, so
that we don't end up hindering
relationships with others in the
church. Teachers
like to dig up facts and truth.
Again that's good. But be careful
that you don't end up locked in
our ivory tower and become a
loner. Don't get holed up with
your books or your computer and
neglect people. Let's
talk now about the possible
downside of the prophetic gift.
Here is list of characteristics
we looked at in the
sermon
on
prophecy
a few weeks ago. Friends,
we need people who call us live
out the social principles of God.
But that, too, can get out of
balance. You may have heard of
the "social gospel." It was a
movement in the church in the
20th century that was all about
the social implications of the
gospel. What got lost along the
way was evangelism. We helped the
poor, but didn't tell them about
Jesus. Social
application is good, but it is
not the totality of the
gospel. But
the prophet must guard against an
approach to repentance that comes
across as berating people with
gloom and doom, because that's
out of balance. The gospel is
about repentance, yes, but it is
also about victory in Jesus. In
Him we're to know joy unspeakable
and full of glory. That's where
God wants to take us. Number
three: "Prophets can seem
dogmatic, stern and intolerant."
And they can seem that way
because, frankly, they often are
that way. But sometimes it's just
not necessary to be so dogmatic,
stern and intolerant. Don't
hear me wrong. There are times
when we have to be dogmatic.
There are issues upon which no
other opinions are acceptable.
There are biblical absolutes --
about sin, about the inspiration
of Scripture, about the deity of
Christ -- from which we should
never move. But
the Bible also says there are
"disputable
matters."
Look
with me at Romans 14, starting at
verse one. The Apostle Paul is
giving instructions about how to
deal with one another in the
church regarding things that are
not central to the
gospel. Who
are you to judge someone
else's servant? To his own
master he stands or falls. And
he will stand, for the Lord is
able to make him stand.
One
man considers one day more
sacred than another; another
man considers every day alike.
Each one should be fully
convinced in his own mind. He
who regards one day as
special, does so to the Lord.
He who eats meat, eats to the
Lord, for he gives thanks to
God; and he who abstains, does
so to the Lord and gives
thanks to God. Down
to verse 13: So
if we're going to be dogmatic,
let's make sure we're not being
dogmatic about something that's
really a disputable matter.
Another
item on our list is that
"prophets are often bold to the
point of hindering intimate
relationships." The problem with
that is this: God designed us for
intimacy with other people.
Anything that works against the
way God intended us to function
relationally are things we need
to work to overcome, even if
those tendencies are the result
of the manifestation of spiritual
gifts in our lives. Remember
what Paul said: Even if we have
all these wonderful gifts, if
we're not exercising them in love
then we've missed what God
wants. The
last one on our list is that
prophets want "immediate results
and are not willing for people to
be in process." That can be a
problem -- because life is made
up of a series of
processes. All
of us are in varying stages of
various process through which God
is healing us and taking us to
spiritual maturity and human
wholeness. It is rare that anyone
achieve immediate results in the
process of growth. So
we need to learn to be patient
with others, even though we want
results and want them now. We
need to patient with our
children, our friends, ourselves
-- even with God. His timetable
is almost never our
timetable. I've
talked about the negative aspects
of only two gifts today --
teaching and prophecy. But the
point is the same with
all
the spiritual gifts God has given
into the church. We
must receive them in great
humility, exercise them in love,
and guard ourselves against
imbalance and personal tendencies
that often accompany the gifts
and may impede their
effectiveness. There's
also a major temptation we must
avoid with regard to all
spiritual gifts. Here it is on
the video screens: Pride,
more than anything else, is also
the thing that causes division in
the church. That was the case in
the church at Corinth and it has
been the case in other church
situations I have been familiar
with. When spiritual gifts begin
to be made manifest in the
church, pride gets in the way.
People start wearing gifts like
spiritual merit badges. Some
people get arrogant, some get
defensive, and lots of people get
their feelings hurt. I
have one more slide -- I call
these spiritual gifts "do
nots." Spiritual
gifts could be erupting all
around us, but that is not a sign
of our spiritual maturity. Paul
told
the Corinthians that they
"[didn't] lack any
spiritual gift." And yet there
were immature. Also,
demonstrating a spiritual gift
doesn't make you better than
someone else. You cannot say,
"I'm better than you because I
speak in tongues and you don't"
-- anymore than you can say, "I'm
better than you because I have
brown hair and you have
blond." Exercising
a spiritual gift does not make
you a "better" Christian, in the
sense of some sort of hierarchy.
A gift may make you more
effective in what God has called
you to do, indeed it should when
used properly, but it doesn't
make you intrinsically better
than other people. Third
point: Spiritual gifts do not
reside in you and me but in the
Holy Spirit. They are His gifts.
We simply deliver them to the
church. I
want to see the regular and
consistent manifestation of
spiritual gifts in our worship
services. They make God alive to
us, they help us experience God's
presence. They are essential to
any church knowing the fullness
of what it means to be a New
Testament church. But
I certainly do not want the
division that can accompany the
gifts at times. I repeat: it is
not the spiritual gifts
themselves that are divisive.
People are divisive. The
reason I have preached this
sermon today is so we can
understand the gifts more fully,
and work to avoid the negative
side effects that can come when
they're used improperly.
Listen
again to what John Wesley wrote
concerning spiritual gifts. I
quoted this in my
sermon
on Pentecost
Sunday,
and I repeat it today because
it's relevant to the pride issue.
In his journal entry for August
15, 1750, he wrote
this: What
he is saying is that pride,
spiritual pride, killed the
activity of the Holy Spirit in
the church. Bottom
line: we avoid the divisions by
rejecting the temptation to
pride, by receiving the spiritual
gifts with great humility, by
being careful to avoid the
negative side effects -- and by
using the gifts, in love, to
build one another up in the
faith.
Gateway
Church gathers
for worship
Sundays
at 10:30 a.m.
(Hwy. 129) in Athens,
Georgia.
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Avoiding
the
negatives
(Sixth
in the series,
Spiritual Gifts in Corporate
Worship)
Gateway
Church,
Athens GA
As I said a couple of weeks ago,
the gifts themselves aren't
divisive, but people often are.
In fact, this was just what was
happening in the church at
Corinth. People were using their
gifts in a prideful way, and it
was causing harm and division in
the church.
Sermons
in
this
series
Now
you are the body of Christ,
and each one of you is a part
of it. And in the church God
has appointed first of all
apostles, second prophets,
third teachers, then workers
of miracles, also those having
gifts of healing, those able
to help others, those with
gifts of administration, and
those speaking in different
kinds of tongues.
Are all apostles? Are all
prophets? Are all teachers? Do
all work miracles? Do all have
gifts of healing? Do all speak
in tongues? Do all interpret?
But eagerly desire the greater
gifts.
Be
on guard
Teachers
First
of all, teachers have a desire to
present truth accurately,
systematically, and sequentially.
They have a plan. They have a
direction. They know what they
want to cover and how. And that's
good.
Prophets
The
first thing: "Prophets are
concerned about the social
implications of God's Word."
Remember John the Baptist? What
did he say? "The man with two
tunics should share with him who
has none, and the one who has
food should do the
same."
The second characteristic: "The
prophet's primary objective is
repentance." Repentance is good.
It is biblical. It is necessary.
John Wesley said, and I agree,
that in a sense we need to live
lives of continual repentance,
turning from ourselves and
turning toward God.
Accept
him whose faith is weak,
without passing judgment on
disputable matters. One man's
faith allows him to eat
everything, but another man,
whose faith is weak, eats only
vegetables. The man who eats
everything must not look down
on him who does not, and the
man who does not eat
everything must not condemn
the man who does, for God has
accepted him.
Therefore
let us stop passing judgment
on one another. Instead, make
up your mind not to put any
stumbling block or obstacle in
your brother's way.
A
big temptation
Pride.
Over the past 17 years that I
have been a pastor, I have become
convinced that pride, more than
anything else, is what keeps
people from receiving what God
has for them. It's true in
conversion, and it's true in the
area of our spiritual
growth.
'Do
nots'
Some
people have the idea that if a
person manifests a spiritual gift
that's a sign of spiritual
maturity. That's not necessarily
so. You have only to read Paul's
letters to see that.
Not
divisiveBy
reflecting on an odd book...,
The General Delusion of
Christians With Regard to
Prophesy, I was fully
convinced of what I had long
suspected:
1.
That the Montanists"
[-- they were
essentially the
charismatics of the 2nd and
3rd centuries --] "
that the Montanists... were
real, scriptural
Christians; and,
2. that the grand reason
why the miraculous gifts
were so soon withdrawn, was
not only that faith and
holiness were well nigh
lost; but that dry, formal,
orthodox men began even
then to ridicule whatever
gifts they had not
themselves, and to decry
them all as either madness
or imposture.
An
audio tape of this sermon is
available
free of charge (U.S. requests
only).
Request
a tape by calling
or writing the Gateway Church
office.
Please specify tape number
020707a: Spiritual Gifts in
Corporate Worship, part
6.
©
2002 Gerald R.
Varnado