Thinking the spiritual gifts | Feat. Stephen Bartley

What do we mean by the spiritual gifts? When it comes to this topic we are more inclined to lean towards controversy as opposed to wonder, debate as opposed to collective pursuit and disunity over unity! In this podcast we talk about what the spiritual gifts are, cessationism, continuitionism and how we can pursue the gifts as God has commanded!

Minute 57:07 | *Edification in Christ* Not edification of Christ.

Time Codes:

0:00 - Intro
2:19 - What do we mean by the gifts?
5:22 - Why does there exist a dichotomy between charismatic gifts and other spiritual gifts?
17:29 - Cessationism?
28:06 - Continuationism?
40:08 - How do we pursue the gifts?
50:01 - Spiritual gifts at the expense of Gods word?
53:15 - G.I.F.T
56:22 - Summary
59:03 - Stephen's closing thought
59:59 - Conclusion

Music by
Over the limits
Vernacolmusic

Transcript

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Wildfire Podcast is an extension of Wildfire, which has a focus of igniting men and women of God into a deeper discipleship with Christ, instilling people with a passion to radically and relentlessly pursue Christ wherever that leads, that God's truth will spread like a wildfire. Hello. Boom. We're straight into it. Exactly. Stephen Bartley is your name. That's right. For those who do not know who you are, may you tell us? Yeah, I'm Stephen. I'm married to Hazel and we live outside Dungamon and involved in a couple of new church works at the moment. And yeah, that's maybe about the height of our exciting description. Yeah. The topic that we're discussing today is thinking through the spiritual gifts. And I remember reading just like it was a short blog. It was a via WhatsApp message that I seen it. So I don't really know what it was from, but it was almost like a devotion where you were talking about these things. And I immediately, I knew it was like a hundred percent you'd be fantastic for talking about this and especially in my generation, the spiritual gifts can actually become oddly controversial, as it has been for the longest time. But you almost think that there needs to come a point where that's got to break. Because it's been a debate for so long. So yeah, I'm excited for this and I actually was a little bit upset there because I just kicked my milkshake. So it's now on the carpet floor. So I've got my milkshake, you're here present and we're going to talk about the spiritual gifts. So it really can't get much better for me personally. You're in the hot seat so maybe... milkshake besides. So the first question I want to ask you is what do we mean by the gifts? Yeah well... A lot of people when they talk about spiritual gifts, there's a bit of confusion. What's fascinating when Paul begins his discussion of gifts in 1 Corinthians 12, 13, 14, the first thing he says is, I don't want you to be ignorant or unlearned or even agnostic about the term. So a lot of Christians I find are either ignorant, not in a derogatory sort of sense, but they don't really know what gifts are. They don't know how they work. Or maybe more Christians that are open, they're more agnostic about it, says, well, I don't quite know, it could be God, could be not. be quite opposed to what they feel are modern manifestations of these things. But the confusion I find on the basic level on gifts is a lot of Christians confuse gifts with talents for example. So people say oh God has given you an amazing gift well what are they referring to you know if someone's able to play the piano or if somebody's able to learn languages really well or somebody's really athletic. So don't you've got such gifts from God. But those are talents. And the way I would sort of put a difference between those two things is that a talent is something you're born with, whereas spiritual gifts are things you're born again with. So there's something that the spirit has brought into your life. Your gifts naturally, or sorry, your talents rather, really come from your mum or your dad. What you were born with and certain capabilities go down families. But what you're born again with is what God's family offers. And when Paul describes gifts, in fact, he uses five terms for it in that wee passage in 1 Corinthians 12. So, for example, he calls them spirituals. So the idea of being from the spirit, he describes them as graces or grace gifts, Charismas where we get the word charismatic. He uses words like ministries. He uses words like operations, idea of activities or effective ministries. Or he can use the word even manifestations. So within maybe seven or so verses, he uses five terms for gifts. And so when you sort of put that all together, you realize this is something the Holy Spirit does. It's by His grace. It's not by our works, but it is manifest. and it is effective to help other people. So in terms of gifts, they are supernatural, they're from God and he's the one who distributes them to whoever he wants and they are something that any believer, I believe anyway, we're going to talk about that obviously, but what I believe, any believer can operate in at least one spiritual gift because the Holy Spirit wants to have everybody involved, I think that's what his heart is on that. Mmm, so... You highlighted differentiation between talents and gifts. So those are different things. And talents are that which you're born with and gifts come of being born again. That's so good. That's brilliant. I've never heard it described that way before. Why does there exist a dichotomy between what are considered charismatic gifts and other spiritual gifts? So why does there exist this... the spiritual gifts that are listed in 1st Corinthians 12. And they seem to be just together, the gifts. But so often we hear today, it's like there's the gifts of spirit and then there's healing and prophecy in tongues. Healing, prophecy in tongues always seem to be separated. And they're considered the charismatic gifts. And then you've got other spiritual gifts, like wisdom or administration. Yeah, sort of talk a lot. Okay. There's really three passages in the New Testament that give us a list of gifts. So 1 Corinthians 12 lists nine of the gifts, which are probably the big core of them. So you have, for example, words of knowledge, words of wisdom, discerning of spirits, gifts of faith, working of miracles, gifts of healings. That's as always people always misquote. It's gifts, plural, of healings, plural. So it's not a gift of healing. You have tongues, interpretation of tongues. And then I always get the last one. Is it tongues, interpretation of tongues? and there's one other, yes, and prophecy. There was a big one, obviously. But those are the nine big ones that Paul talks about. And those things, in a sense, were never actually told what they are. in detail so it seems as though when Paul wrote that to the Corinthians they knew what that was, they knew what a word of knowledge was, they knew what a gift of faith or you know was or a working of miracles, they understood what those were. It is an interesting thing somebody once said to me that if you take a dove, a dove has two wings and they say on one wing of a dove there are nine feathers and on the other wing there's nine feathers. And somebody brought out the point there are nine supernatural gifts of the spirit and nine fruit of the spirit. So if you have a dove with only one wing on, it's going to nose dive into the ground and you need balance. You need both wings to fly. And so I would a lot of Christians I find are like, well. I'm all into the fruit of the Spirit. I just want to live a holy life. I want to live a set apart life. That's a good disciplined life. Well that's okay but it's a life lacking spiritual power. Whereas other Christians are all about power and gifts but they're not with the character. And so the bird is hit in the ground pretty quick. So if we want a balanced life of purity and power we need fruit and gifts. To follow on what it was saying there, there are two other passages where Paul does talk about gifts. In the latter of 1 Corinthians 12, he talks about ministries, administrations and then the other one is Romans 12, he mentions a couple of gifts. So some people have the idea that there's nine supernatural gifts of the Spirit and I've listed those there but other scholars would nearly say there's 18 gifts of the Spirit listed in the New Testament. One of which is quite amusing because people say the gifts have ceased. One of them is the gift of celibacy in 1 Corinthians 7 verse 7. Paul said he wished he had it. Everyone had the gift that he had, which was celibacy. He could live a single life in purity without needing to be married or have sexual relations. He was complete in that way. That was a gift of the Spirit. So if somebody hypothetically was to say, I don't believe any of the gifts exist today. Well, you said that they have to create dichotomy, a separation of ideas to say, well celibacy and administration and ministries of mercy and ministries of kindness and all that, oh that exists but these other supernatural more manifested stuff, well maybe not so. So you're really stretching it I would feel to use that argument. I'm not attacking a person or a group of people but in terms of the idea I don't think it's a very convincing argument. That's the only thing I would say about that one. categorical differentiation you would say is not a biblical one? No, because in a sense there's not a there's not in a sense in the New Testament Paul says here are all the gifts. You know, here we are. The fact is he was responding to practical needs that were there. So when he writes to the Romans, he was saying, these are some gifts, for example. It wasn't an extensive, exhaustive list. He says, use your gift. When he was writing to the Corinthians, he says, these are examples of nine gifts. you know, fill your boots. Peter does the same in 1 Peter 4, I think it is. He writes them and says, right, if anybody has a gift, go and use it. When Paul writes to Timothy, he says, don't neglect your gift. So it was never something to say, right, this is the theology, now just go and deal with that. The fact was he was dealing with a pastoral practical issue to say, these are some examples, go ahead, fill your boots. That was really his approach. So sometimes we're trying to make the Bible into like a theological manual, was written really as a missional book, widely on the move, you're doing ministry on the move, we need to start incorporating gifts and you need to use them. So in a sense, you know, people are trying to find this perfect theology. And it is perfect theology. But the fact is, it is very much based on the gospel commission, using it on the march, really what I'm trying to bring out. So we need to use them to fulfill the great commission, as I argue. So it's not to say that we have this exhaustive list, would you say? Do we have an exhaustive list in scripture of every gift of the Spirit? I think we have to be careful that we, Paul writes the Corinthians, we don't go beyond what is written. Okay. So yes, potentially, for example, a word of knowledge, how do we define that? It's not just saying, oh, you have knowledge. For example, a lot of Christians misinterpret that phrase. They say, oh, I have knowledge. But no, it refers to the word of knowledge, which is where God allows a Christian a specific piece of knowledge about a person they wouldn't otherwise know. And they use that to speak to a person. Maybe they're not a Christian. And they share that word of knowledge and get awakened. They get saved. Or to encourage a Christian, maybe, that says, oh, God really knows about your life. So how does that word of knowledge come about? It could be, you know, as literal, as simple as you're praying and a thought comes into your head. That's not your natural thought. It could be a dream. It could be a picture. It could be a vision. It could even be a scripture. So, you know, recently we were in a healing meeting and in the prayer meeting, two thoughts just came into my head. One was a skin condition, psoriasis, which is not what I'm thinking about every day. And the other was a wee verse in Acts 13 and 3. separate to me now, Paul and Barnabas to work, I've called them, got up in the meeting and I said, look this is maybe a bit random, test it, see what you think, psoriasis, if anybody here has psoriasis come for healing, anybody feel there's a call of God on their life, end of the night there's a man came up and says I'm your man, I have psoriasis, I would like to get healed and on top of that there I have a call of God on my life. So there was an instance, it was a word of knowledge But it was a series of thoughts. Whereas my wife, for example, would get pictures now and again, not always, but frequently, just wee pictures or dreams even. And those are different, you know what I mean? Those are different manifestations of the same gift. It's a word of knowledge. But there's different ways those gifts will work themselves out. Yes, so the gifts are led out for us. And we shouldn't go beyond scripture, but how they are expressed. is of course you mean this is what you're saying it's not theological manual where you can go in oh yeah that's page 1000 and the psoriasis and no like again it's sort of so often it removes the practical application of like the Commission and like we're actually you know living creatures who have these needs yeah and there's other living creatures who have needs and we're born to go and tell the nations and we have been transformed by the spirit, equipped by the spirit for this work. And so whatever you yourself are teaching or in that healing meeting, again that gift is highlighted, a gift of knowledge, but the expression of that such as the thought of psoriasis, that's not what you find in scripture. So people need to know like you're not going to find every single expression. With the gifts, what I have discovered, and it's limited, but I mean I'm learning, you have to take steps of faith, you have to take risks. And the risk is you're going to look stupid, or the risk is it's not going to work. and you have to take a risk. And I find that Christians really just, they almost feel safe with the Bible under their arm to say, I've got all this knowledge and treat the Bible like a theological textbook because you feel you're in control with knowledge. Whereas what God often calls us to do is not to live by our knowledge, but to live by faith. And of course, faith's based on knowledge. You can't just have a blind faith. But sometimes what God says, take what I've written and apply it by faith, take a step. and you know whether for example that's somebody opening their mouth to pray in a prayer making where they feel I'm going to use the wrong words or something but they're taking a step of faith potentially looking stupid and trusting God to undertake for them it's the same with the gifts if we're always sheltered and really looking after ourselves wanting to protect ourselves all the time and don't take risk and be risk-aversive you're not going to see the gifts manifest in that way. You're going to have to, as Joan Wimber says, you spell faith as R-I-S-K. You have to take risk and you may well get things wrong, but the only way a child learns to walk... is by taking one step, falling right on their face, getting up again, walking towards dad or mum. And that's the only way we learn is through error sometimes and getting it wrong. And if we do make mistakes in the gifts, it's good to be in a healthy, loving environment where somebody can pull us aside and say, look, no, I don't think that was God, but good, good attempt. And let's try to help you with that. And to love people into maturity, I think that's of the Spirit, we're regenerated and we're in the family of God and we're indwelled by His Spirit and being indwelled by His Spirit and being full of the Spirit, we're also filled with the Spirit and we have, as followers of Christ, you're indwelled with the Spirit, we see manifestations of that. So the Spirit that is within us, we see the fruits of the Spirit, so love and joy, so if you want to see is this person filled with the Spirit, you can see the fruit of their lives. But if you also want to see somebody as a follower of Christ, you can see the manifestations of the Spirit. And manifestations of the Spirit are led out for us in 1 Corinthians 12 and Romans 12, then Ephesians 4 as well, or those texts where it sort of lets out, here's manifestations of the gifts. But those letters again are not exhaustive, like the likes of the letter to Corinth. Paul is writing to Corinth, and as you said, He is giving them a list of gifts to equip them for their mission. And so it is with church and Ephesus and vice versa. And then the expression of those gifts, how they actually play out, isn't recorded for us in scripture. Because that's where, again, it's the living out of faith is where you see how these giftings and how these manifestations actually play out. Okay, perfect. So what about this idea of cessationism. Say it again. Cessationism. Yeah as you can tell I'm not the best person for describing this. No. What is that? I can barely even say it. So dear help anybody else who's maybe never heard of this before. What is that? Cessationism is a belief that the gifts of the spirit have ceased in modern times or that the gifts of the spirit have frequency in modern times. Now the verses that are used for that is 1 Corinthians 13. So for example Paul says this in 1 Corinthians 13 and verse 8 he talks about you know if there are prophecies they will fail or cease whether there are tongues they will cease whether there is knowledge it will vanish away that's interesting there in verse 8 he doesn't say word of knowledge he says knowledge in general right so he says there's going to be an end of the spiritual gifts right and he says what will be the marker of that happening is verse 10 when that which is perfect is come then that which is in part will be done away. So there's a clear indication Paul says the gifts will cease, they will come to an end. Now what happens if someone believes in the belief of cessationism? They believe that the gifts of the Spirit ceased either on two events. They say the gifts of the Spirit were given to the early church to help them get set up, to help them get on their feet. Like an immature child, they use this imagery of Paul. like a child, when I was a child I spoke like a child, so on and so forth. And what they'll say is that the gifts of the Spirit have ceased when the perfect has come. And they say the perfect is the completed canon of scripture. And so they say because there wasn't a Bible you had these gifts but now that the early church got its Bible together the gifts then stopped, right? So they say, some of them will say, gifts ceased whenever you got the There are other Christians, for example, and they will use 2 Corinthians 12. I think it is verse 12. Could be wrong on that one. But Paul says that the works of an apostle were done among you with signs and wonders. And so the argument goes, well, whenever the apostles, yeah, 2 Corinthians 12 and 12, truly the signs of an apostle were accomplished among you. So they say, whenever the apostles died, when John, the last apostle, passed away, the signs of the apostles died with them. So those are the two sort of texts they'll use. When that which is perfect has come, then the gifts cease. Or when the apostles died out, then the gifts ceased, right? The problem, I could take a number of reasons why this is a problem. But the most obvious reason is when you read Church history, the gifts of the Spirit have continued for 2,000 years. So if you were to read some of the early Church fathers, which just simply means the early writers of the Church after the Book of Acts and after the apostles, Justin Martyr talks about prophetic gifts among them. Eusebius, who writes Church history, the gifts are in operation. Augustine, who in the early parts of his ministry questioned whether the gifts had ended. By the end of his ministry, he had seen 70 healings within two years and had concluded the gifts hadn't ceased. If you go into the Reformation, which is normally the time when people got back to the Bible, if anybody's Presbyterian, if you study the early Presbyterians, they were all prophetic men, like John Knox, John Welch, Prophet Peter. And there was a site, I can't remember exactly, but I know pictures and all the rest of it. But the guy was preaching the gospel in this forest and the guys were heckling him. And he said, because I'm telling the truth of God, he says the grass under my feet will never grow again. And his footprints are still in the forest ground. So you talk about guys that were highly And even someone like Spurgeon, who's often vetted as the great man of God who didn't believe in the gifts and he didn't believe in what I'm trying to say here. In 1894, there was a book published about Spurgeon, about all the healings that Spurgeon saw. And someone has actually said Spurgeon was the most prolific healing evangelist of the 19th century. and yet today that's not spoken about. There are people Spurgeon prayed for who were in insane asylums, and they were prayed for in the morning and released in the evening. He was a man that went to deathbeds, prayed with people, they rose again, and a man who operated in the unusual gifts himself. So church history sort of discounts the cessationist view very quickly, but to answer those two wee scriptures, when they said that which is perfect has come. The question I ask is how do you know the perfect in that verse, 1 Corinthians 13, 8 and 10, how do you know if that perfect is the completed canon of scripture? Because it doesn't say that explicitly. What you're doing is reading your interpretation into that verse. Whenever Paul uses that term perfect, which is the teleon or teleos, he always refers to the second coming of Jesus. So for example, if I was to go to 1 Corinthians, again, you read scripture in the context of scripture, particularly an epistle, read a difficult passage in an epistle in the light of other scriptures in that same epistle. So like in 1 Corinthians 1, you know, chapter 1, verse 4, this is what Paul writes to these same people. He says, I thank my God always concerning you for the grace of God which was given to you by Christ Jesus, that you're enriched in everything by him in all utterance and all knowledge. So he says, I'm really thankful that you're operating in all of the gifts, in prophecy and tongues and things like that, and knowledge gifts like, you know, wisdom and knowledge and that. And he says this in verse seven, so that you come short in no gift. So he says, I'm really thankful for that. Well, if you were taking the cessationist position and said, well, Paul, come on, why is all this stuff going to vanish away in 50 years? Why should you be thankful for this happening? Just keep praying for the Bible to come, which he doesn't do. But this is what's crucial. In verse seven, he says, so that you come short and no gift eagerly waiting for the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ, who will also come to you in the end, which is the same term Paul uses for the perfect. So the gifts of the Holy Spirit will cease whenever Jesus returns. So I am a cessationist but my date for cessation is whenever Jesus returns, not 2000 years ago. The other scripture that says, you know, the signs of an apostle were done when the apostles therefore die out and the gifts cease. The problem with that idea is when the Bible speaks about apostles, we immediately think of the 12. But if you study the New Testament, there's 25 people who are called apostles. And so you go, well, what does that mean? How does that leave us? I believe the New Testament teaches there's apostles with the capital A, the B12, the definitive number. And their role was to see the resurrected Jesus, to prove that he was alive. As a historical, never to be repeated again, fact, he was alive again, was to prove the gospel. And also to write the New Testament, they are apostles in the capital A sense. That's where the book of Revelation says there's 12 gates. each of them are the apostles you know this but I believe that there are apostolic people. today like missionaries, pioneers, people that press into the spirit in unusual ways. So for in history like a John Wesley I would count as apostolic, a Smith Wigglesworth, any missionary that presses into new territory and brings God's kingdom. So to use the argument to say oh when the apostles died out the gifts died out with them. No because there are more than the 12 so that doesn't work. The other problem that you have is that in the New using gifts who are not apostles. So Stephen is an example in Acts 7, he uses gifts, he's a deacon. So it doesn't say when the works of a deacon were done. The fact is there are people who are not apostles, another example is Agabus, the prophet in Acts 21, or Philip's daughters who are prophetesses. They are not apostles, but the works, apostolic works follow them. So the apostles, the 12 guys, we need to just say the scripture is complete. You don't add the scripture. gifts and even prophecy. And so we have to be balanced, we have to be consistent. And so I appreciate to be a secessionist is nice and easy because all you just do is read your Bible and a man says praying blow your nose at me. That's being derogatory on him. Whereas what I'm saying is what the biblical position is, scripture says gifts are available and it's not always straightforward. But that's what God says we have to do. The complication is not the gift. The complication isn't God. The complication is we have a fallen nature who make mistakes and can get wrong motives and wrong attitudes with things and can get things wrong. So we have to be correctable. And any time Paul teaches on the gifts. It is always with the caveat of test it, prove it, have godly life, be biblical, hold to the truth of the gospel. It's always in that balance. So wherever you see, you know, today the greatest argument for cessationism and the belief the gifts have ceased today is pure charismatic practice. So when you see somebody, you know, claiming to be the prophet of the hour, but their prophecies don't come true, or someone that says they live a great or somebody that's just doing immoral and godly stuff, that's the greatest proof a cessationist needs to say, oh, this is fake. Whereas they never deal with really godly people. They've throughout history and in the modern time who have used their gifts with a godly heart to advance the gospel, which is what the New Testament I believe teaches. So what would you say then about continuationism then? Yeah. So that's obviously the antithesis. Yeah, yeah, it's the opposite of that. of a cessationist. Yeah, there are folk today and they say that they're continuationists and they believe the gifts do continue to today. Now they may say it may not be exactly the same as the book of Acts, it may not be as frequent for example, some of them will say that. But the idea is that the gifts have continued. Now the only sort of wee quibble I would raise with continuationism is that a lot of guys are happy. to be sort of in their theological sofa and they're saying, I believe in the gifts, you know, today. But the Bible doesn't ask us to believe in the gifts, it asks us to seek the gifts, to pursue them. And so it's much like if I interviewed someone on the street and said, do you believe in the gospel? And someone says, oh, I believe that Jesus is real. But ask, are you a Christian? Oh, no, I'm not a Christian, but I do believe that that's a true thing to believe in. And you'd sort of say, well, no, you need to put faith into the truth. You need to actually believe. And the sign that you believe is that you act on it, you start to show obedience. That's why Paul says you need to obey the gospel as opposed to just, you know, give intellectual head service to it or give an assent. So that's, that's the only thing that I would have as a quibble on the idea of being a continuationist. A lot of guys are happy just to do it in their head, to do the theological gymnastics, but they're not actually willing to take a step of faith and to say, look, I'm going to pursue this. Even if I look stupid, don't understand me, even if people may call me this that or the other, it doesn't matter. If God wants me to have them, I want to have them. And furthermore, if I want to help people and I want to really effectively love people, gifts are really integral. So like 1 Corinthians 13, the love passage. is right in the middle of a discussion on gifts. So it's not saying you can't love people, you know, without gifts, I'm not saying that, but Paul's thinking love and gifts are very closely linked. And it is possible, unfortunately, for people to use gifts without love. And at the same time, there's amazing Christians who don't believe in the gifts, and they're very loving. So why should it be either or why can't we help both is what I would think. So We've differentiated between talents and gifts, and you've got the fruits of the Spirit, which is evidence of the Spirit that indwells a follower of Christ. And then you've got the gifts of the Spirit, or manifestations of the Spirit that indwells a follower of Christ. Now we have said that the totality of the gifts are presented to us in texts that we have mentioned. But we reject that there's a dichotomy. So that means that, well, if we were a cessationist, that would bring us the cessation of all. Yeah, you have to be consistent. Yeah. That's the problem. Yeah, so which means, yeah, it just wouldn't work, which is why you need, which is why they need to have that dichotomy. where it's like, well, like they themselves, the cessationists will themselves say, not all of the gifts have ceased. We are indwelled by the Spirit and there is manifestations of the Spirit. And then they will select those said gifts, whereas we're saying to them, no, we don't get that sort of dichotomy in scripture. We just have the gifts of the Spirit, those manifestations presented to us. And so we can't reject them. No, in actual fact somebody said the gifts of the Spirit and the Spirit of the gifts are indivisible. Very simply meaning we're in the era of the Holy Spirit and whenever Peter got up at Pentecost and preached what was happening, which was tongues and people hearing languages in their own, you know, in their own languages, he said This is the fulfillment of what Joel says, in the last days I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh. And then it says, whosoever shall call in the name of the Lord shall be saved. If you were to interview most evangelical Christians, they'll say, is this the era where people can call on the name of the Lord and be saved? They said, yeah. But Peter, when he interprets Joel 2, says, this is also the time where God is pouring out his Spirit. And it says, your sons and your daughters will prophesy. You'll dream dreams. You'll have visions. I pour my spirits on male and female, upon maidservants and masters and the whole spectrum of society and all its diversity. God says, I want to. indwell Christians, I want to fill Christians, I want to equip Christians and empower them to do my work to advance this gospel. So yeah, we're in the era where God is simultaneously pouring out his Spirit and also saving the lost. So a lot of Christians say, well we like the saving of the lost part, we're comfortable with that part, but this whole pouring out of the Spirit and God's Spirit working in this way, But I argue it's the same spirit who does both work. He's the spirit of the word, I would say as well, as much as the spirit of the gifts. So as much as the spirit who can lead a good Bible study, it's also the spirit who can give accurate prophetic words and heal cancers and even raise the dead, if he wills to. So the fact is we need to. The Bible says don't quench the spirit which means put the fire out, 1 Corinthians 5. We're not to put the fire out and a lot of times we have put the fire out by despising the gifts and sort of thinking of them as, oh they're just immature things, they're not important. So we would recognise gifts of the spirit as manifestations of the spirit and that which is perfect. has not yet come. So it then logically follows. And so the gifts have then not ceased. Whereas a counter view would be the manifestations of the spirit are present, but the perfect has come. And so then the gifts have ceased. But as we've seen exegetically, the perfect there. is talking about the return of Lord Jesus Christ, which makes sense, because if you look at the completion of the canon, which is perfect, that doesn't seem to be in view of all things are perfect because we live in still that fallen world. So it's like whenever the canon closes, you just read, or we just experience in this world today, sin, sin. So all of us are still longing for that, which is perfect. And... Yes, so that which is perfect is yet to come in the Lord Jesus Christ when he returns. And so the manifestations of the Spirit are still going to be present. And if they're still present, then they should still actively be pursued. Yeah. Oh, definitely. I mean, what is so fascinating that you take 1 Corinthians 13, and if you take that idea, the cessationist idea, oh, they're going to cease, right? And love is the most important thing. Let's forget about gifts. Just love each other, right? You've got a massive problem when you come to 1 Corinthians 14 and 1 where Paul says pursue love and desire spiritual gifts especially that you would prophesy. So you know is Paul contradicting himself within two verses to sort of say oh gifts are going to end guys you know which is what he is saying to them. You're praising this sort of gifts and all but you have to realize they are going to come to an end but the thing that will last forever is you know faith, love and faith, hope and love. Those are your character and that will last into eternity. But he says, 1 Corinthians 14.1, he says, desire them, which means to fervently, you know, not be passive. I find Christians sometimes will say, oh, well, if God wants me to have it, He'll give it to me. Well. You never did that when you were a kid and you wanted a toy at a shop. You went to your mum and dad and you nagged them really until you got it. But the fact is we are to come before God. And Jesus said, have you been evil? Know how to give good gifts to your children? How much more you have any father give Holy Spirit to those who ask? So whenever we're hungry and even desperate, I would say to know God's presence, to experience God, to use the gifts, to help others, he will start to give those gifts. But I find unfortunately it's not common to find hunger among spiritual Christians. It's not normal sometimes to find this hunger. It's like we've just settled for, you know, Sunday to Sunday. And as long as we get through 52 Sundays in a year, we're doing all right. Whereas you say, no, there's a pursuit of God that's pressed into the Lord and see what he has for us. What are some of the key texts or examples from Scripture you think are important addressing the spiritual gifts. Yeah. Well, I think where you really start is you go through the gospels because what's really is unusual to say to folk is that Jesus operated in spiritual gifts. So for example, when he went to the woman at the well and he sat down with her and says, where's your husband? And she says, I don't have a husband. I've had, and says, yeah, you're right. You've had six husbands in the man you're living with now. That's a word of knowledge. So as Jesus was a man, yes, he was always the son of God, always God incarnate, but he lived as a man dependent on the Spirit. So when you think about, that was a word of knowledge, because Jesus says in John 5, I can do nothing of myself. It's the Spirit who does the work. So Jesus, for instance, cast out demons. That's what we call a working of miracles. people, different types of conditions and illnesses. I mean when you think of the gospel, every condition that you could have from the top of your head to the sole of your feet, every organ of the body Jesus ministered to in some way, he brought healing there and those are gifts. You go into the book of Acts then you see Paul you know operating in the gift of faith. So many times to speak to someone who was dead to rise up like the young fellow that fell off the roof and died in a sermon, you know or that or Paul says himself he says I speak in tongues more than you all. And he says, I sing in tongues even. So the fact is, the New Testament in the gospels, in the book of Acts, in the epistles, you will have constant references to the use of gifts. And so many of those passages is concerned with the responsible use of those gifts, that they're not abused, they're not used to hurt people or harm people. Because unfortunately, when you go to some charismatic spaces, Gifts have been used to hurt people rather than help them. So people will use prophecy to embarrass people or shame people or control people. That's completely immoral. That's completely against the Spirit of God. And we have to realize, well, you can operate in a gift, but not the anointing. That's something to say as well, because the gifts of God are, without repentance, are irrevocable. Paul says in Romans 11, those gifts will never taken away. So a person could arguably use a gifting but be living an ungodly life, could get accurate prophetic words and yet be living an ungodly life. As much as somebody could be a brilliant Bible teacher and be doing a lot of ungodly things in his congregation. So we want to be people that are using the gifts under the anointing of God's Spirit. We're not grieving or fighting against the Holy Ghost but we're walking in agreement with them. So they're so important to do that. So you've mentioned this already. So we have concluded that the spiritual gifts are manifestations of the spirit and are to be pursued until that which is perfect has come, that which is perfect has not yet come. So we are to then pursue the spiritual gifts. How do we pursue the spiritual gifts? You have mentioned it already. but there has been widespread abuse. Yeah. Not so much because the spiritual gifts can't be abused as such, like, healing is healing, prophecy is prophecy, tongues are tongues, faith is faith. But rather there is abusive people. Correct, yeah. Who then take a gift. Yes. And yeah, and then all of a sudden people are like, yeah, the gifts are being abused and... and then nobody actually starts to pursue them because they've never actually seen it done well. Yeah that's true. And again I think as we've already we've refuted that we do not accept the dichotomy of like you've got the totality of spiritual gifts as a whole just the spiritual gifts not the spiritual gifts and then within the spiritual gifts this separate category of healing prophecy and tongues which I think is where people automatically go to when it comes to the abuse of the gifts. But whenever we talk about the totality of the gifts and manifestations of the Spirit, how do we pursue them? Not just tongues, prophecy, healing. I'm talking about all spiritual gifts. How do we pursue them and avoid this exploitation that has existed? When you read the New Testament, really, there's two ways people received gifts. One is directly from the Holy Spirit. So for example Acts 10 and Cornelius' house, they're meeting together. They actually aren't saved yet but they simultaneously are born again and then filled with the spirit and it says they began these gentiles... newly being saved, now filled with Spirit began to prophesy and speak in tongues like the Book of Acts 2 talks about with Pentecost. So there was an instance where people experienced the Holy Spirit directly without anybody being involved, Peter or anybody praying for them. And so whenever I find it is possible for someone who's just newly saved to operate in gifts, right, because the Spirit of God is indwelling them. But the way that we often have to pursue gifts is to ask God to constantly fill us with the Holy Ghost. So for instance, Paul says in 1 Corinthians 12, we've been baptized into Christ, which is whenever we receive, we become part of the body of Christ, but we have to drink, it says, of the Spirit. And so in the same way that, you know, you don't drink every three days, you drink every day and you drink multiple times a day, we have to constantly be asking God to fill us with the Holy Ghost, keep the channel clean is the way I'd say. If you're like a pipe and the Spirit flows through you, you want to keep the blockages out as best you can and the Holy Spirit, if you're seeking His fullness, He will manifest gifts. So I can think of my own experience where I was really hungry for God and I would just get along with God every day. I'd just say, Lord, I want to meet you, I want to know you, I want to be full of your Spirit and I had encounters with the Holy Spirit in my own there was the presence of God. And then in turn, in a couple of years, gifts started to manifest like tongues, like interpretation of tongues, like other wee tongues, other gifts rather. And they're like tools, you know, the tools that you pick up to fulfill a job. So I don't walk about every day and say, I've got a hammer, look at the hammer I've got here. You just say, like, there's a nail needs put into that wall, would you take a hammer or not? Or you need a screwdriver for whatever else. You pick up the gifts, you need them. So sometimes we will experience the gifts by just encountering God and being full of the Spirit. But the other way in the New Testament that people are operating gifts is by the laying on of hands. So I could give you a couple of examples of Paul says to the Romans, Romans one, he says, I want to come to you that I would impart a spiritual gift to you all. So Paul says, I want to come to the Roman church. I'm going to pray for people to receive gifts. And sometimes if you go to a trusted, godly, anointed figure, a pastor or an elder or somebody that you know, believes in the true gospel, there's no whiffiness about, you know, sex or money or anything like that. They have a pure anointing, they're not controlling, you sense the Holy Spirit is on them and they're not controlling your bossing you about. I wouldn't be adverse to go to that person and say, would you mind letting hands on me to pray that I would receive what God wants me to have. So for instance if I was to turn to like 1st Timothy, Paul talks about this with Timothy which was interesting, 1st Timothy 4. He says that first Timothy four and verse 14, he says to Timothy, do not neglect the gift that is in you, which was given to you by prophecy with the laying on of hands of the eldership. So presumably what happened was that elders were praying on a teenager, Timothy, and one guy got a prophecy to say, I feel God is giving Timothy a gift tonight, so they prayed for the release of the gift. In this case, it was the gift of teaching. So he was given the gift of teaching and may well have been a gift of faith according to 2nd Timothy 1 because it talks about the faith that was in your mother and grandmother is also in you. So it could have been a gift of faith but the fact was they let hands on him and the gift was imparted. So I can think of occasions where you can lay hands upon a person and it's not the person, it's not them being magic or something like that but the spirit that's in you imparts the gift to that person. It could be tongues, it could be prophecy, it could be, as I say, teaching, even administration or different ministries, all those 18 potential ministries could be imparted if God wants that to happen. So those are the two ways the gifts are transferred to somebody, typically by directly by the Holy Spirit or by the line on of hands. However, this is not the easy bit. The harder bit sometimes is what Paul says to Timothy there, don't neglect the gift. So I've met Christians, for example, and they said to me, who I used to speak in tongues years ago. And you said, well, what happened? I didn't use it, didn't use it. I saw that they lose the gift, but they lose their efficiency and effectiveness in the gift. So what do you find, you know, when Paul said that in 1 Timothy 4 and verse 15 then, in this translation says meditate on these things, give yourself entirely to them and your progress may be evident at all. The word there for meditate in the original means to practice fully. So Paul was saying to Timothy, don't neglect the gift, but use the gifts, keep using them with regularity. And excuse me a second. If you're in a meeting and you have a prophetic gift, the more time you use the prophetic gift, you're going to get better. Same with teaching, same with ministries of mercy. Any gift you're going to improve the more and more you use the gift. But if we neglect it, well, we're not going to see it as much. The other thing to say is be part of a community of hungry, spiritually sensitive and loving people. And you find when you're in that gathering of a group, the gifts will come out of you and people will notice the gifts that are in you. It's important to say that because there's a lot of Christians, I'm gonna clean my throat a second. There's a lot of Christians and they are onto gifts. And then they say, oh, the gifts aren't practiced in my church. So I'm gonna leave my church and gonna, me, God on the sofa is really gonna be the future. It's me and God alone. And to be honest, I find those Christians become very susceptible to false ideas, conspiracy theories, they go off on wacky trains. Whereas when you're in community using the gifts, you're building each other up and you're being built up and you're kept safe. from doing dumb things really. So you're not getting up and prophesying. The second coming's coming next Tuesday afternoon. Everybody build a bunker. You know, whereas somebody would come along and say, brother, you got that wrong. You know, or this is what the Bible says about all that. Don't be afraid, don't be panicking. So we have to operate in community. It's really important with it. And... You know, we're open to each other where we can be vulnerable to be corrected and we can be vulnerable to make mistakes. So there's so many times I can think of where I got things wrong in the Christian journey. And I had very sympathetic, patient people around me that are able to sort of say, no, I don't think that was right. They weren't down the throat. But I think we need to seek the gifts, seek the fullness of God's Spirit. Maybe. Maybe spend time with people that you know operating gifts and ask them to lay hands on you. And on top of that, you know, use the gifts you have, be part of community, and you'll find that your efficiency and effectiveness in those gifts will get stronger as the time goes on. And often what people think is that the pursuit of the gifts comes at the expense. of God's word. So people, you can either be experiential and pursue said gifts, but that is the detriment of then God's word being lost. So you get local bodies and churches and people who are dedicated to God's word, but there is this absence of spiritual manifestation, again, possibly because of security and comfort and yeah, a lack of risk and faith. But then you've got on the other side those who pursue the spiritual at the expense of God's word too. You would find that they don't actually underpin any of their experience in God's word. It's what R.T. Kendall talks about, there's been a silent divorce between word and spirit. And that shouldn't be because when you think of the man who wrote Romans, who wrote all these epistles. was the same man who spoke in tongues more than anybody else, who saw the dead race, who cast out demons, who did all this extraordinary stuff. And we need to see those two camps of word and spirit being together. Because if it's all gifts, there's a shallowness in word sometimes, and there's a liability to fall into false teaching. That's a given. But at the same time, if you're all word and you're all expositional preaching and you but there's dry as a rock. You know, that's not what God intended for us either. You look at Jesus, Jesus was a man who was mighty indeed and in word. So I mean, that's what even his enemies would say about him. He was mighty, he was powerful in the word and he was powerful in the miraculous. And I just say, well, aren't we supposed to be Christ like? Aren't we supposed to be like him who knew, who could quote scripture like nobody ordinary, but at the same time raises the dead, casts out demons, You know, as a man of intense prayer, a man who has revelation and insights into God's kingdom, why shouldn't we want both, I would argue? And there's going to be people, obviously, you know, prophets are going to be into their prophetic stuff, teachers are going to be in their teaching stuff, pastors are going to be into caring for people, and evangelists are just hungry to lead anybody to the Lord. Let them do it, let them at it. But this is the diversity, it's the same spirit who's working all in all. and we shouldn't discriminate to say, oh there's nothing of the Holy Ghost in that because they're all Bible studies and oh well there's nothing of truth in that because they're all into tongues. The fact is the Spirit will work as we allow him to work, he's not going to force himself and everything with the gifts is with cooperation. We have to give the Spirit our permission to say, well use my tongue to prophesy, use my tongue to speak in tongues, sick and they would recover and so we have to put our bodies on the line and allow him to use us but if we play it safe unfortunately we're not going to see the same results. I find what is helpful for me when pursuing the gifts is turning the word gift into an acronym so G means gift so the gift itself, I is that which is imparted the gift which is imparted, F is the gift which is imparted for others. And then tae, the gift which is imparted for others needs to be tested in scripture. I think that is often what gets lost and that we're called not to hold every prophecy with contempt, which is often what you say. Everyone's like, as soon as you hear a prophetic word or healing or tongues or spiritual manifestations or words of wisdom or knowledge, insert whatever spiritual gift, we immediately hold them with contempt. And then on the other side of the spectrum is, do not trust all the spirits, but instead test them. So you've got people on both camps where they're holding everything with contempt as it relates to the spiritual, and they just prefer the word, the word, the word. And then you've got other people who are like, they just leave themselves open to everything and anything, and they don't test anything. When we're clearly given, that's in 1 Thessalonians and in 1 John, we're clearly given scripture where, We're called to test. And we're not called hold everything with contempt. And another helpful phrase that a lady said to me was the word alone, you'll dry up. The spirit alone, you'll blow up. But the spirit and the word, you'll grow up. Yeah. And so pursue the word and when you pursue the word correctly you'll end up pursuing the spiritual gifts and if you pursue the spiritual gifts correctly then you'll end up pursuing the word. Yeah. So there can't be this divorce when it's done correctly and whenever you see that divorce taking place you can assume that there is the individual is abusing one of the two. Yeah, yeah absolutely and it's so important to say they're gifts. They're not wages. You don't earn them. You don't deserve them. And so when Paul wrote to the Galatians in Galatians 3, he says, did you receive the spirit by the works of the law, by the hearing of faith? Did they receive the spirit's fullness? And the answer is, well, no, it wasn't by any good works. We did, but didn't jump through several hoops. We believe what the promise of scripture says, we'd be full of the spirit. And then he says, but he that works miracles among you as in gifts, does he do it by the works of the law, but here in faith? So it's all by faith. It's by simply taking the promises of scripture and just saying, I believe God is good enough that even he can give a gift to a person like me and he'll do that. He'll do that as you described there, if it's for the benefit of others and you're wanting to test it and you're wanting to look after it, well, I mean, of course not withhold one good thing if you ask him for it. So the last thing I'm going to get you to do is what one thing would you want people to take away from listening to this podcast? I'm going to give you some breathing space to think about that. But while you're thinking about that, I'll sort of summarise what we've talked about. So you think of a cessation in the sense that canonical prophecy has ceased that there is no need and no possibility of adding to the closed canon of scripture and that the apostles capital line no longer exists as this refers to those witnesses who had experienced of the manifest, the tangible and risen Jesus, but you already highlighted about small apostles and how they find themselves in that Ephesians four gifting category among evangelist teachers prophets and continuationist in the sense that the gifts modeled by Jesus. that are practising the early Church and reaffirmed in the Epistles are still for today and for the edification of Christ and His Word to advance His Kingdom and that the inspirited Church that exploded in Acts was a result of the receptiveness of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and obedience to the person of the Spirit's calling in their lives. And we have differentiated between what are talents and what are actually spiritual gifts, spiritual manifestations. and we have rejected the dichotomy that is often created. We would just view the spiritual gifts as the spiritual gifts. And we exhort people, as scripture does, to then pursue those gifts in their totality. And that includes tongues and prophecy and healing and words of wisdom and words of knowledge. All of these gifts were called to pursue them. and we're called to pursue them in community. We're called to recognise that these are gifts which are imparted and these are gifts that are to be tested but are for others. There is a real missional sense to the gifts that we have and it's to encourage one another and to lift one another up. And so it's about time that this topic shouldn't be a one of debate or of controversy, but one where we gather as family. and pursue the spiritual gifts which is given by God and do so in all being like I don't even deserve to be saved but I am and it's not only am I saved I'm saved to serve and God hasn't just given me a commission with no gifting but rather he's saying I am a father who wants to give you good things and these giftings so it's about time you I've gone long enough without pursuing them like now is the time today is the day where you start pursuing the gifts and do it every day and yeah that would just be amazing. I'm going to ask you to say one thing you would want people to leave with in this podcast. Yeah hunger for God is the key thing and you know when you're younger you're more liable to be hungry because you don't know maybe what something's like. The problem is as you get older you become less hungry. become more satisfied with what you see and the trick to the Christian life is to remain hungry and it's not always out of emptiness or desperation but sometimes you've tasted and seen the Lord is good and you're saying, well I would like more of that, thank you, that would be really great if I could have more of God. And so if you're hungry, if you seek God as the giver you will find the gift and I find if Christians are hungry. the gifts will operate quite easily, quite seamlessly among them. Amazing. So to finish off, I'm just going to read 1 Corinthians 12 from verse seven, but these are God's words. It was written to the church in Corinth, but is written for us today. So it says this, "'To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit, for the common good. For to one is given through the spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge, according to the same spirit, to another faith by the same spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the ability to distinguish between spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. All these are empowered by one and the same spirit. who apporsens to each one individually as he, that is the spirit, wills. Stephen, thank you very much.