SPEAKER_03: Have a question for you as we begin.
SPEAKER_03: Seems like a simple question, but I want us to ponder it for a moment.
SPEAKER_03: That question is, What is a church?
SPEAKER_03: What is a church?
SPEAKER_03: We're continuing our series Gifted, looking at the person of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_03: We've understood that the Holy Spirit is not a force we wield or a power that we grow into, but a person we can know.
SPEAKER_03: We also learned that the promise of the Holy Spirit was a new day in the new covenant where God would send his spirit to indwell his people.
SPEAKER_03: We don't see that indwelling language used in the Old Testament except for the temple in the innermost part of the temple.
SPEAKER_03: Well, in the New Testament, God sends his spirit who dwells within us, and we are the temple of the living young.
SPEAKER_03: This is unique and beautiful.
SPEAKER_03: Moses longed for it, David praying for it.
SPEAKER_03: We are in that day where God's Spirit dwells in us, empowering us for ministry, enabling us to obey God in gladness, gladness, and sealing us until Jesus returns.
SPEAKER_03: We looked at the day of Pentecost where that actually took place, and we learned that God's Spirit not only convicts our hearts so that we would turn to Christ and trust Him, but also convicts us to love our neighbor.
SPEAKER_03: If the Holy Spirit formed the church, we not only have a love for God, we'll love for one another.
SPEAKER_03: And then we looked at how the Holy Spirit transforms our inner man to serve the Lord and produce fruit.
SPEAKER_03: We looked at the fruit of the Spirit last week.
SPEAKER_03: Well, today we're looking at the gifts of the Spirit of God in 1 Corinthians chapter 12.
SPEAKER_03: And I asked again, because we're in the book of 1 Corinthians, what is a church?
SPEAKER_03: 1 Corinthians chapter 1 begins here.
SPEAKER_03: We'll get to chapter 4.
SPEAKER_03: To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, call to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, both of their Lord and ours.
SPEAKER_03: What is a church?
SPEAKER_03: I mean with this, right?
SPEAKER_03: What were the apostles like Paul when he wrote 1 Corinthians chapter 1 to the church of God that's in Corinth or all the other New Testaments that are written to churches or a church?
SPEAKER_03: What do they mean to communicate?
SPEAKER_03: What are they intending to communicate by using the word church?
SPEAKER_03: Well, the word they used in the Greek, which was the common language of the day, was the word ecclesia.
SPEAKER_03: Ecclesia.
SPEAKER_03: That word is how we say church in English.
SPEAKER_03: And that word ecclesia had cultural and historical roots.
SPEAKER_03: It did not come out of nowhere.
SPEAKER_03: In fact, the common language about the day during the like and the apostles was Greek, and so uh not many Jewish people, all Jewish people, could read or speak Hebrew, and so it had an Old Testament, like we see, the 39 books of your Old Testament, in Greek, it was called the Septuagint.
SPEAKER_03: Taking a history lesson for just a moment.
SPEAKER_03: Well, in the Septuagint, 65 times the word ecclesia is used before we would say the church like came to be in Acts chapter 2.
SPEAKER_03: Well, in those 65 times, you see it in Joshua, you see it in Deuteronomy.
SPEAKER_03: In those 65 times, it referred to a group or the people of Israel when they were gathered together, embodied, assembly.
SPEAKER_03: A church, a gatherment, a group of people, committed to one another, committed to be there, the church.
SPEAKER_03: A church, ecclesia.
SPEAKER_03: It was used in the New Testament as well, even for a gathering of unbelievers.
SPEAKER_03: In uh the book of Acts, we have a riot forming an Ephesus and an Ephesus.
SPEAKER_03: That word Ecclesia is used for the orang of people that were gathered to accuse Hoth.
SPEAKER_03: Ecclesia.
SPEAKER_03: So when the New Testament writers were writing Ecclesiah, they intended to communicate something they knew.
SPEAKER_03: A word that meant an in-person, local, embodied gathering of people.
SPEAKER_03: Not something online, not something you just go to every once in a while.
SPEAKER_03: It was a group of people who knew one another who were gathered together for a purpose in person.
SPEAKER_03: Well, how does 1 Corinthians and the rest of the New Testament describe who those gathered people are in the church as we would know it, the body of believers?
SPEAKER_03: Well, the local church is composed of saints.
SPEAKER_03: Saints.
SPEAKER_03: We don't use the word saints too often.
SPEAKER_03: We often use the word Christians.
SPEAKER_03: Christians was used, uh, where Christians were used for believers of the Lord Jesus Christ in Antioch, but saints is the most common New Testament term.
SPEAKER_03: It's over 60 times the New Testament, the word saints referring to believers, not a special class of believers, not a certain group of believers that have deceased that were closer to Jesus, but all believers, saints, people who have been sanctified, don't the Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_03: So the local church is an assembled gathering composed of saints, Ephesians 1, to the saints who are at Ephesus, 1 Corinthians chapter 1, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus.
SPEAKER_03: And why the why is the church so important?
SPEAKER_03: Well, the church is God's, according to the New Testament, chosen way to display and declare both his grace and his wisdom before a watching world.
SPEAKER_03: I'll read Ephesians 3.
SPEAKER_03: Paul says, Of this gospel I was made a minister according to the gift of God's grace, which was given me by the working of his power to me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all fans.
SPEAKER_03: Good.
SPEAKER_03: So that through his church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in heavenly places.
SPEAKER_03: This gathering is a testimony of God's grace to heavenly authorities that look down and say, Why then?
SPEAKER_03: And all we can say is God's scripts, we don't deserve what we've been doing.
SPEAKER_03: In fact, in Ephesians chapter 2, uh we learn that we were saved, though we were dead in our trespasses and sins, so that we might put on display the immeasurable riches of his grace and kindness towards in Christ Jesus.
SPEAKER_03: You have been saved to show everyone in the physical world, in the spiritual world, the high and the low, everyone how gracious God has been.
SPEAKER_03: This is his wisdom that he would save people for himself and show how gracious he is.
SPEAKER_03: Paul wrote to a local church in Ephesus in 1 Timothy, nearing his death, he wrote to the church in Ephesus through Timothy himself, I hope to come to you soon, but I am writing these things to you, so that if I delay, you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the Lynagon, a pillar and a buttress of the truth.
SPEAKER_03: He says the church is God's house, it's a gathering place, it's comprised of people who know one another.
SPEAKER_03: Now, of course, we have a church global, all believers in all places, but only look at the New Testament.
SPEAKER_03: More joy of times, that word for church global is saints.
SPEAKER_03: The word for church mobile is church.
SPEAKER_03: Gathering peak, gathering, peak, gathering of people.
SPEAKER_03: In 1 Timothy, he's saying that gathering of people is this gathering of people is a pillar and buttress of the truth.
SPEAKER_03: Well, in Ephesus, there was a beautiful building that had multiple pillars that held up marble ceiling, the temple of Diana, the temple of Arnas.
SPEAKER_03: And those pillars held that marble roof up high, and it's beautiful.
SPEAKER_03: As you interviewed Ephesus, you could see it.
SPEAKER_03: And so what Paul is saying here is hey, the church is the place where the gospel is yelled high, so that anyone who comes near can see, oh, that's what God's dying.
SPEAKER_03: Oh, that's what God has done.
SPEAKER_03: He also says the room buttress of the truth.
SPEAKER_03: I doubt we've used the word buttress this week, maybe ever in your life.
SPEAKER_03: But buttress is the support bees that hold up a big building.
SPEAKER_03: They hold it from storms, from falling in storms.
SPEAKER_03: So we not only hold high the truth of the gospel, but we hold fast in the truth of the gospel.
SPEAKER_03: The gospel is carried down through the ages by the power of God's Spirit through his church.
SPEAKER_03: So this is a church defined.
SPEAKER_03: If I can give you a definition, it'll be on the screen.
SPEAKER_03: The church is a regular gathering, it's a place.
SPEAKER_03: Church is a regular gathering of Christians who agree to declare, display, and even defend the gospel.
SPEAKER_03: So Redeemer City at Oakwood is a local expression of a universal church, of the universal church.
SPEAKER_03: It's a spiritual reality.
SPEAKER_03: Local church membership is a spiritual reality.
SPEAKER_03: You're believers here if you've trusted the Lord Jesus Christ, expressed in a physical community.
SPEAKER_03: The local church is one body, but many parts.
SPEAKER_03: We're one body, many courts.
SPEAKER_03: New Testament has more than 51 and other commands, many of which are talking to believers of the local church.
SPEAKER_03: Love one another, care for one another, serve one another, keep one another, encourage one another.
SPEAKER_03: So the local church membership must exist.
SPEAKER_03: Hebrews chapter 13, verse 70.
SPEAKER_03: You know who your pastors are.
SPEAKER_03: Submit yourselves to them so it's not grumbling for them and that it's good for you.
SPEAKER_03: They'll give an account for how they live.
SPEAKER_03: No one say Hebrews 13 said.
SPEAKER_03: In order to be excommunicated, which happens seldom, but it does happen in the New Testament, one has to be formally recognized to be excommunicated.
SPEAKER_03: So local church membership must be implicitly true in the New Testament.
SPEAKER_03: In fact, there are reasons to join a local church.
SPEAKER_03: I'll give you a few around the screen as well.
SPEAKER_03: We join a part of the local church to obey God.
SPEAKER_03: Hebrews 10 24 and 25.
SPEAKER_03: Don't neglect the gathering, as is the habit of some, but draw near together and gather as the day of the Lord draws near, encouraging one another in building one another up.
SPEAKER_03: Hebrews 12 15, another passage, says, See to it that no one, he saw come to the church, fails to obtain the grace of God.
SPEAKER_03: To obey God, to be careful by God.
SPEAKER_03: Jesus is the Great Shepherd, while he has ascended to the right hand of his Father, he has sent his spirit and has established pastors or elders to care for your soul in the meantime until he returns.
SPEAKER_03: So to be careful by God, submit yourself in the local church to obey young, to make it safely home.
SPEAKER_03: I think that's point four on the stream, but I'm gonna go to point three in a minute so you wouldn't put point three on there, to make it safely home.
SPEAKER_03: You know, local church discipleship in its essence is doing all we can as members to make sure that our fellow member, our brother or sister in Christ, makes it safely home.
SPEAKER_03: That they cross the finish line of your life, crossing heaven's threshold.
SPEAKER_03: We answer the question of am I my brother's deeper with saying yes toward one another, helping each other arrive safely home.
SPEAKER_03: The fourth reasons, number three, I think I'm a screen to join a church, is to encourage and be encouraged, to build up and be built up.
SPEAKER_03: And this is the point of this morning's message.
SPEAKER_03: 1 Corinthians chapter 12 through chapter 14 is all about building one another up in a local church.
SPEAKER_03: And 1 Corinthians 12 through 1 Corinthians 14 tells us that we have been giving God's spirit enabling us to do so, supernatural.
SPEAKER_03: We learn from 1 Corinthians 12 through 14 that we have spiritual gifts not for us but for our fellow church mothers.
SPEAKER_03: I want to give you an ophabude of 1 Corinthians 12 through 14.
SPEAKER_03: Each chapel a different part of the sentence.
SPEAKER_03: Here it is.
SPEAKER_03: You can kind of foam your way through chapter 12, 13, and 14 and see this.
SPEAKER_03: In chapter 12, we learn that God has given particular gifts by his spirit to the members of the local church.
SPEAKER_03: In chapter 13, you learn that there to be exercised in love.
SPEAKER_03: And in chapter 14, you learn there to be exercised in love for the purpose of building one another up.
SPEAKER_03: There's my three chapter.
SPEAKER_03: I have four main points this morning.
SPEAKER_03: That was just my introduction.
SPEAKER_03: We're in my three full points.
SPEAKER_03: Are you ready?
SPEAKER_03: Here it is.
SPEAKER_03: Point number one from chapter 12.
SPEAKER_03: You have yes.
SPEAKER_03: Church, you have dips.
SPEAKER_03: If you're a believer in this room, you have been gifted by God's Spirit to empower you for service in your book, church.
SPEAKER_03: I believe the Bible teaches that you received that gift at word conversion.
SPEAKER_03: That is when you placed your faith and trust in Christ and were transformed by God's Spirit.
SPEAKER_03: The spiritual gift defined behind me on the screen.
SPEAKER_03: Spiritual gift is a supernatural gift given by the Holy Spirit to born-again believers, empowering them for effective gospel proclamation andor church edification, church encouraging, church building.
SPEAKER_03: These gifts are not natural or given at birth.
SPEAKER_03: It's not your outgoing personality.
SPEAKER_03: You may have that one personality, that's great.
SPEAKER_03: But that doesn't mean you have a greater outcorring in doubt spirit.
SPEAKER_03: It's not a talent gained in life like dumping the basketball.
SPEAKER_03: Unbelievers can dump the basketball, right?
SPEAKER_03: We all have many talents we can do.
SPEAKER_03: Not a talent.
SPEAKER_03: It's a supernatural gift of grace from God.
SPEAKER_03: From God to his people for this people, to his people, to individual believers, for his people, their open church.
SPEAKER_01: Moral.
SPEAKER_03: Okay.
SPEAKER_03: A diversity of gifts are given, Paul says.
SPEAKER_03: Look at verse 8.
SPEAKER_03: For to one is given through the spirit, the utterance wisdom, and another the utterance of knowledge, to another faith, to another gifts of healing, to another working emeritus, to another prophecy, to another the ability to distinguish between spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues.
SPEAKER_03: While we could go on for some time distinguishing what it means to be Baptist and not Pentecostal, that we love our Pentecostal brothers and sisters, what it means to be Baptist and not Presbyterian, do we love our Presbyterian brothers and sisters in Christ?
SPEAKER_03: We could talk about the different interpretations we might have of the sign gifts, as they're sometimes called, continuations with cessations.
SPEAKER_03: That is not the main point of this text.
SPEAKER_03: And so it will not be the main point of my draw.
SPEAKER_03: The point seems to be not to explain the function of each gift, rather to list some of the different gifts that God has given his church to show they are from the Holy Spirit for the mutual benefit of the local church.
SPEAKER_03: In fact, most likely these are not this is not an exhaustive list because there are more gifts talked about in Romans chapter 12 that aren't in this list.
SPEAKER_03: You see, wisdom, speaking truth to someone's life in particular situations, knowledge, teaching, faith, not the gift of faith and salvation, the gift of faith exercise that might help someone else in difficult days.
SPEAKER_03: Healings, miracles, tones, the interpretation of tones, discernment, prophecy.
SPEAKER_03: God gives these gifts as his church has need.
SPEAKER_03: That's what number one.
SPEAKER_03: You had gifts.
SPEAKER_03: And a two you don't get to choose them.
SPEAKER_03: You don't choose your gift.
SPEAKER_03: The Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_03: Verse 11, you and the dead with me.
SPEAKER_03: All of these are empowered by one and the same spirit who apportions to each individually as he wills.
SPEAKER_03: In other words, you don't get to pick up your spiritual gift like an item on a the fae table.
SPEAKER_03: I like more of that one.
SPEAKER_03: I like some of that.
SPEAKER_03: The spirit knows what each local church needs, and empowers different parts of that local body to serve the whole.
SPEAKER_03: That's very important.
SPEAKER_03: I hope you see that.
SPEAKER_03: Thank you so much.
SPEAKER_03: The Spirit God knows what each local church needs and empowers different parts of the body, different individuals to fill in the Gauss, to be a functioning body, to work together, different persons to serve different functions, different Christians to care in different ways, so no one is left out and nothing is lacking.
SPEAKER_03: This is what Chris read this morning.
SPEAKER_03: There are varieties of gifts.
SPEAKER_03: The same scare.
SPEAKER_03: There are varieties of service for those gifts, but the same Lord.
SPEAKER_03: There are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone.
SPEAKER_03: The many gifts, same giver, unique in gifting, unified in giver.
SPEAKER_03: You gotta ask a question because he seems like he's saying the same thing many times in different ways.
SPEAKER_03: Oftentimes, when Paul's writing a letter or Peter is writing a letter, they're respong to something that is happening.
SPEAKER_03: And if you were to read, sit down and read chapter 12, 13, 14, especially chapter 14, you know there's a problem.
SPEAKER_03: Which happened a lot in Corinth.
SPEAKER_03: There's a problem.
SPEAKER_03: It seems like people were taking pride in the gift they were given, a few of them, as if it was the most important of all of the gifts they had.
SPEAKER_03: All the gifts there were.
SPEAKER_03: And some felt less than because of that gift they were given and the gift they didn't have.
SPEAKER_03: If you read 1 Corinthians 14, it seems like a pretty good assumption that that gift that some really wanted that didn't have was the gift of tongues.
SPEAKER_00: Speaking a language that was not their language.
SPEAKER_03: And those who didn't have the gift desired it above the one they were given.
SPEAKER_03: For one who speaks in the tongue speaks not to men but to God, for none who understands him, but he utters mysteries in the spirit.
SPEAKER_03: On the other hand, the one who prophesies speaks to people for their upbuilding of encouragement and consolation.
SPEAKER_03: The one who speaks in a tongue builds up himself, the one who prophesies builds up the church.
SPEAKER_03: Now I want you to all speak in tongues, but even more a prophesy.
SPEAKER_03: The one who prophesies is greater than the one who speaks in tongues, unless some interprets so that the church may be built up.
SPEAKER_03: So why was there such a unique fascination with the gift of tongues, as Paul seems to imply?
SPEAKER_03: Can you imagine why?
SPEAKER_03: Well, imagine for a moment your gift is a hospitality.
SPEAKER_03: Your gift, like it's reported in Romans chapter 12 as one of the different gifts, is receiving people you don't know well into your home.
SPEAKER_03: Does that just look supernatural?
SPEAKER_03: I mean, it's always might, like, because not everyone does that, but that guy can speak in that language.
SPEAKER_03: I don't think he came from there.
SPEAKER_03: I don't know how he's doing that.
SPEAKER_03: I don't know how the Spirit of God's doing it.
SPEAKER_03: That seems more spiritual.
SPEAKER_03: Seems supernatural.
SPEAKER_03: And so what did you have in court?
SPEAKER_03: Well, I'll show you 1 Corinthians 14, verse 23.
SPEAKER_03: If therefore the whole church comes together and all speak in tongues, and outsiders or unbelievers enter, will they not say you are out of your minds?
SPEAKER_03: So in Corinth, most likely you've had tails.
SPEAKER_03: People were speaking out of turn.
SPEAKER_03: Some was likely trying to replicate it if they didn't have.
SPEAKER_03: And most of that trip.
SPEAKER_03: That's why he limits select thricket corinth at the end of chapter 14.
SPEAKER_03: It may have in the church of Corinth been the embodiment of Jesus' warning in Matthew chapter 6, where he warns against praying with mindless repetition, not thinking about what we're saying.
SPEAKER_03: So Paul's comments to a defined church are these back in chapter 12.
SPEAKER_03: For the body does not consist of one member, but many.
SPEAKER_03: This is verse 14.
SPEAKER_03: If the foot should say, Because I am a foot, I have I do not belong to the body, that would not make it any less part of the body.
SPEAKER_03: The ear should say to an eye, I don't belong, or an eye to an ear, I don't need you.
SPEAKER_03: Or a nose, to a forehead, or toes, to arms, I don't need you.
SPEAKER_03: Or I'm not a part of the body.
SPEAKER_03: No, we need all parts of the body functioning together to form one proper body.
SPEAKER_03: God is giving it some of you gifts that I don't have.
SPEAKER_03: I have this minute that you don't have.
SPEAKER_03: Maybe you had a gifts that you don't have.
SPEAKER_03: It's all to make one functioning bite that serves one another well so that when an arm is hurt, the other walk the gun.
SPEAKER_03: When you need to get somewhere, in an emergency situation, you have two feet.
SPEAKER_03: You have eyes that can see, oh this is dangerous, ears that can hear, oh I need to flee from this false teaching.
SPEAKER_03: A head to think.
SPEAKER_03: No.
SPEAKER_03: Since we're nearing college football season, it's like a football team.
SPEAKER_03: On a football team, you have a quarterback, a running back, a wide receiver, lun, and so on and so forth.
SPEAKER_03: Each planning individual roles comprising one team serving the same bowl.
SPEAKER_03: That is the gist of 1 Corinthians chapter 12.
SPEAKER_03: You are on the same team, but your assignments might be unique to help behold.
SPEAKER_03: Don't try to copy the gifts and practices of another person, making a formula for success for you to try to figure out their gift to become like them.
SPEAKER_03: That doesn't belong you to be them.
SPEAKER_03: He made me.
SPEAKER_03: He gave you the gifts he wants you to use.
SPEAKER_03: Yes, any like other members' faithfulness, but don't idolize their gifts.
SPEAKER_03: Be faithful with what God has chosen to be.
SPEAKER_03: God has placed you or you are, gifted you what you need to serve his church with power.
SPEAKER_03: Some of you, that's the gift of service.
SPEAKER_03: You like to get your hands dirty for the glory of God, and that's how you serve this church.
SPEAKER_03: Some of you have a natural leadership tendency and proclivity, and it's uh hyphened by the Spirit of God to give you a hunger to lead and a gifting to lead, taking others under your wing and leading people toward a goal, teaching, acts of mercy, contribution.
SPEAKER_03: And then again, verse 6 it is the same God who empowers them all in everywhere.
SPEAKER_03: As we exercise the gift, God empowers us for fruitful ministry within a local, faithful church.
SPEAKER_03: Let's be clear, God is not in need.
SPEAKER_03: Us to carry out His mission and chooses to use His use us, and He gifts us so that we can affect Real different gifts given by the same God, different ministries where we serve using the gifts God has given us, and we see different results from the ministries as God makes them effective.
SPEAKER_03: Of course, a question comes up inevitably when we talk about spiritual gifts, and the question is what you're probably thinking, some of you, right now.
SPEAKER_03: What is my spiritual gift?
SPEAKER_03: And it's common to have uh spiritual gift inventories, tests that you take.
SPEAKER_03: And and I think those are good and fine.
SPEAKER_03: Uh they are keeping exhaustive because I think in the New Testament we have every gift listed.
SPEAKER_03: I don't think that's what the New Testament is trying to accomplish.
SPEAKER_03: Trying to show varieties of gifts that God has given a particular church, sure.
SPEAKER_03: But there might be gifts that are not in Romans chapter 12 and 1 Corinthians chapter 12 as well, and that that's okay.
SPEAKER_03: So any assessment that you take is probably the limit.
SPEAKER_03: Oftentimes you fill out those assessments like you want to serve rather than, you know, of course, like you actually need to serve.
SPEAKER_03: They kind of become, in some ways, like um personality tests.
SPEAKER_03: Or you just really want to do something, and so you choose those answers.
SPEAKER_03: So, what is the right way to go about then serving and finding out your spiritual gift?
SPEAKER_03: I have some tips.
SPEAKER_03: Some tips, helpful tips.
SPEAKER_03: I take these from a man named Juan Sanchez from a church in Texas.
SPEAKER_03: Godly, smart, maiden, and pastor.
SPEAKER_03: He says, first, encourage your church to identify.
SPEAKER_03: Identify not what they think their gift is, but what their church beats.
SPEAKER_03: What is lacking?
SPEAKER_03: Is the Holy Spirit not giving gifts to help what is lacking?
SPEAKER_03: Where is their arm missing?
SPEAKER_03: Where are there toes that are about functioning?
SPEAKER_03: Like toes should function.
SPEAKER_03: Identify those needs.
SPEAKER_03: Even go to your pastors and say, hey, where are some needs here?
SPEAKER_03: Maybe there's word minister needs, maybe there's serving needs, widows, orphans, elderly parents, children, single mothers.
SPEAKER_03: Ask the leadership church, what gates is this now?
SPEAKER_03: Identify.
SPEAKER_03: Number two, pray.
SPEAKER_03: Once you identify the needs your church has, pray, Lord, would you fill those needs with you you would like to fill them so that our church might not lack?
SPEAKER_03: And God, if you would have me serve those areas, give me a heart for those areas, a willingness, a desire.
SPEAKER_03: Ask their church leaders and fellow members to pray for that in your life.
SPEAKER_03: Pray.
SPEAKER_03: Number three, ask yourself, what do I enjoy doing?
SPEAKER_03: We should not think that serving the Lord has to be done begrudgingly or has to be like our least favorite thing.
SPEAKER_03: Lord is giving you a new heart, a heart for him, and probably a heart to serve him.
SPEAKER_03: So, what do you enjoy doing for the kingdom of God in your local church?
SPEAKER_03: How can you enjoy so little and his body with particular?
SPEAKER_03: Number four, seek Dazi counsel from pastors, leaders, mentors, small group leaders, fellow members, mature Christians with whom you spend much time who observe you and care for you and know your gifting.
SPEAKER_03: Maybe we validate either confirming or denying the gift you might need pursuit.
SPEAKER_02: And lesson number five, don't just sit, go serve.
SPEAKER_03: The Lord in his sovereign providence might have a place for you when you ask to serve that you learn is how you have been gifted.
SPEAKER_03: And you will benefit this body of yours.
SPEAKER_03: Children's ministry, student ministry, college ministry, preparing for this, preparing for that, prayer ministry, senior adult ministry, uh, you know, outbreach ministry.
SPEAKER_03: Where is the Lord gifted?
SPEAKER_03: Maybe it's just serving their hands.
SPEAKER_03: I say just serving a nickname, it's serpenting your hands for your patient.
SPEAKER_03: If it's hospitality, I want to take it blend my home, I want it and meet people.
SPEAKER_03: The Lord gives from the benefit and blessing of his church.
SPEAKER_03: Number three.
SPEAKER_03: These gifts, and this is important, aren't for ye.
SPEAKER_03: You say, but God gave them to me.
SPEAKER_03: Oh, yeah, they're halfway there.
SPEAKER_03: They're not totally for ye.
SPEAKER_03: First Corinthians chapter 12, verse 7.
SPEAKER_03: To each is given the manifestation of the spirit, means the spirit felt working in someone's life for the common good.
SPEAKER_03: So God gives gifts to you, but not necessarily for you.
SPEAKER_03: How God chooses to bless his church is through someone else.
SPEAKER_03: So that when you come together, someone has been given a gift that blesses you, and you've been given a gift to bless someone else, and vice versa.
SPEAKER_03: So to neglect joining and being found in membership of the local church is to keep your spiritual gift that you've been given by God for that church, and it neglects blessing someone else, and you're neglecting getting the blessing, receiving a blessing from somebody else, for you're given a gift.
SPEAKER_03: To neglect using your gift to the local church is to neglect serving your brother or sister in Christ for whom you were given it.
SPEAKER_03: Your gifts are given to you for others in your local church.
SPEAKER_03: The local church is a necessary blessing.
SPEAKER_03: A necessary blessing.
SPEAKER_03: And if you neglect it, you neglect giving and receiving a gift for your spiritual nourishment.
SPEAKER_03: These gifts are not to be held back for the local church, they are to be applied in them for others.
SPEAKER_03: We want to be for others with the gifts God's goodness.
SPEAKER_03: We want to see, by the power of God's Spirit, indwelling His church, empowering them for ministry, people using their gifts so that people come to articulate the gospel clearly.
SPEAKER_03: We want to see people using their gifts so that people who are needy are seen, prayed over, and cared for.
SPEAKER_03: We want to see people using their gifts so that others are sent with the gospel to foreign nations.
SPEAKER_03: We want to see people using their gifts so that the church is mutually stronger to reach the world.
SPEAKER_03: We want to see people using their gifts so that the church is encouraged, challenged, equipped, and convicted.
SPEAKER_03: And lastly, we want to see people using their gifts so that the church is a bold witness to an onlooking world.
SPEAKER_03: Church, for this place, we must be for others with the gift or gifts God has given us.
SPEAKER_03: Main point number four.
SPEAKER_03: Gifts used without love are meaningless.
SPEAKER_03: Meaningless.
SPEAKER_03: If you look at verse 31, after he says that you've been given these different gifts, he ends verse 31 and ends chapter 12, transitioning chapter 13 by saying, Next, you see it?
SPEAKER_03: I will show you a more excellent way.
SPEAKER_01: You see that?
SPEAKER_01: I will show you a more excellent way.
SPEAKER_03: That is the way of love.
SPEAKER_03: Well, we've heard this passage of scripture, I'm sure, read in many ways.
SPEAKER_03: I don't think Paul has a relationship between a husband and a wife, and mine he wrote this.
SPEAKER_03: But a church that was divided because they did not love Lennifola.
SPEAKER_03: So here's what he says in chapter 13.
SPEAKER_03: Are you ready?
SPEAKER_03: If I speak in the tongues of men and angels, but I have none love, I am in voicing thong or a clinging symbol.
SPEAKER_03: And if I am prophetic powers and understand all mysteries, and have all knowledge and have all faith, so as to remove melons, but I have not love, I am nothing.
SPEAKER_03: If I give away all that I had, I deliver up my body to burn, but I have not love, I gain nothing.
SPEAKER_03: Essential in the Christian life is the love that we're all have on them.
SPEAKER_03: The motivation, he says, for the use of gifts should be love, and the goal should be the common good.
SPEAKER_03: See this would be.
SPEAKER_03: Verse 1, without love, it doesn't matter what you say.
SPEAKER_03: Doesn't matter what you say.
SPEAKER_03: An individual can speak any language he wants with as much eloquence as humanly possible, but without love it is whiteness.
SPEAKER_03: Verse 2, without love, it doesn't matter what you know.
SPEAKER_03: The Corinthians, oh Ragum, if you know the church point, they were boasting in their wisdom.
SPEAKER_03: And he says, Is there not anyone wise among you to settle the dispute that was had between two Christians in chapter 5, chapter 6?
SPEAKER_03: He's saying, Knowledge without love is pride, it doesn't help it her.
SPEAKER_03: Or verse, right on top of someone else, and he doesn't have both.
SPEAKER_03: So that love isn't there what you say, verse one, that love isn't there what you know, verse two, without love doesn't matter what you do.
SPEAKER_03: Verse 3.
SPEAKER_03: This passage of verse 3 says that someone could sell all they have for God and be persecuted for God and be killed for God, but if they do not have the love that comes from God for others, none of those things they do matter in luxury.
SPEAKER_03: None.
SPEAKER_03: It's crazy to think someone goes so far as being a water for God and be doing so for a legacy rather than love for God.
SPEAKER_03: And love for following.
SPEAKER_03: Come look at me, everybody.
SPEAKER_03: I'm more spiritual than you.
SPEAKER_03: I'll get martyred and show you how great I am, how weak you are, God says to the apostle called Minimus, wordful, wasted time.
SPEAKER_03: So it doesn't matter what you say.
SPEAKER_03: It doesn't matter what you know, it doesn't matter what you do.
SPEAKER_03: You don't have love, me.
SPEAKER_03: The motivation for the use of our guests should be love, and the goal should be God's glory and others being.
SPEAKER_03: So here is the passage you all are familiar with.
SPEAKER_03: Let's go through a slowly before we conclude.
SPEAKER_03: Verse 4 of chapter 13.
SPEAKER_03: Love is patience, and it's kind.
SPEAKER_03: It does not envy your boasts, it is not arrogant or rude, it does not insist on its own way, it's not irritable or resentful, it does not rejoice of wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.
SPEAKER_03: Love bears all fangs, believes all fangs, hopes all fangs, and endures all things.
SPEAKER_03: This is the most excellent web.
SPEAKER_03: Let me just give a quick snip to each one, please.
SPEAKER_03: Love is patience and kind.
SPEAKER_03: Kindness is patience and action, seeking out needs and tenderly meeting those needs without paying it, without not expecting anything in return.
SPEAKER_03: It's not jealous, doesn't envy.
SPEAKER_03: It doesn't selfishly need attention or affection, doesn't brag.
SPEAKER_03: Bragging is attempting to make others jealous of you.
SPEAKER_03: Bragging builds our own self up.
SPEAKER_03: It's not rude.
SPEAKER_03: Ask questions like what do you need?
SPEAKER_03: How can I serve you?
SPEAKER_03: Go in my home, rather than I better read my Bible and here's what you need to hear.
SPEAKER_03: It's not self-seeking.
SPEAKER_03: It serves others, not seek doesn't seek to be served.
SPEAKER_03: It's not easily angry.
SPEAKER_03: You ever been around somebody who's really touchy?
SPEAKER_03: Does it harbor a grudge?
SPEAKER_03: Love forgives.
SPEAKER_03: Does it try to keep an upper hand?
SPEAKER_01: Does it try keep score?
SPEAKER_03: It's not.
SPEAKER_03: It's grieved and wrongdoing.
SPEAKER_03: It's the lad in chief.
SPEAKER_03: Love is a book for the opportunity to say, I told you so.
SPEAKER_03: It bears all fans.
SPEAKER_03: It takes arrows without shooting them back.
SPEAKER_03: Trusting that the person that said those were full things was trying to be helpful.
SPEAKER_03: Church considers Jesus who bore the cross for a people who be him.
SPEAKER_00: Love.
SPEAKER_03: Love believes all fans.
SPEAKER_03: This doesn't mean love is goal all, but rather believes someone is innocent and so prove it guilty.
SPEAKER_03: It doesn't assume the worst of another believer.
SPEAKER_03: Love hopes all things, it doesn't ignore reality, but rests at the promises of God and believes that God is able to do things, yes, even through them.
SPEAKER_03: It endures all things, it sticks it out.
SPEAKER_03: It's there in the bad, the broken, and the beautiful.
SPEAKER_03: It's there in the easy and the difficult because it's not built in circumstances, it withstands them.
SPEAKER_03: So let me ask you your question, Church.
SPEAKER_03: With the gifts that you've been given to serve this church for the glory of God and for the good of everyone you sit beside, how's her muff?
SPEAKER_03: Last week the question was, how's your joy?
SPEAKER_03: This week the question is, how is your love for your family?
SPEAKER_03: Maybe you could put your name in these verses.
SPEAKER_03: Am I case?
SPEAKER_01: Am I kind?
SPEAKER_01: Am I rude?
SPEAKER_01: Am I jealous?
SPEAKER_01: Am I self-seeking?
SPEAKER_01: Am I easily angered?
SPEAKER_03: You know, Jesus really cares about our love as we serve Him.
SPEAKER_00: And he really cares because our love directs attention away from us and to the one who loved us at utterance.
SPEAKER_03: By this we know love that Christ laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lines for our raiders.
SPEAKER_03: Even our ambitions, even what we want to do, think it's mean.
SPEAKER_03: Even our own desires.
SPEAKER_03: If anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in lead, yet closes his part against them, how does God love by it?
SPEAKER_03: Then I hold God's love as a mess.
SPEAKER_03: Hash love.