Spiritual Gifts: Definitions

as you know we've been talking about God's plan for changing the world and our role in it let's just remind ourselves how does God intend to change the world

Through the church, by the transforming power of the Holy Spirit, using our spirit gifts. And we've given us a definition in the class for this spirit gift as follows. A specific, special ability given to a Christian by God, most directly by his spirit, and that the Christian is to employ in order to strengthen and build up the church for the glory of God. I want to emphasize right now again, given to a Christian by God. These gifts are not a basis for pride because at root we had nothing to do with it.

It was given to us by God. And that's going to be particularly important as we really begin to focus on what our gifts are. You are special in the sense that God has given you an ability, a skill, a gift to use in his kingdom. but let's be humble recognizing that it came from him. So here we go.

Got your sheets? I need to get you to correct one thing on your sheets. I divided the gifts up and I'm going to review in alphabetical order first. The gifts that in our class were listed at least by one person as being the number one gift that they had. Okay?

So the gifts we're going to review initially, somebody in this class said this gift was their number one gift based on the test. The only mistake, I left off one, the gift of healing. We had a person who had as their number one gift the gift of healing. So you see I left that out in the list that were identified as the number one gift by at least one class member, but you can add that in to that section. So here are the definitions.

What I'm going to do is give you the definition, and then I'm going to give you a warning. If you have this gift, something you need to watch out for or be careful about. Because sometimes when we have gifts in a certain direction, we may have problems in another direction or be short-sighted in another direction because we're so focused in one direction.

So here we go.

The special ability to steer the body toward the accomplishment of God-given goals and directives by planning, organizing, and supervising others. For each of these gifts, I've given you the Greek word and its definition just so you'll have that. And you will see that those Greek words help us understand the gift. But this is the person who's the organizer, who sees a goal and can figure out how to plug people and resources into the planning, the organizing, and doing in order to accomplish the goal. What do these people have to be careful about?

They have to be careful that they don't get so focused on the mission that they forget the people. so important on getting the task done that they can run roughshod over people and uh and not be as kind and generous as they should be sometimes so be careful in that regard but this is an important gift we need people who can help organize in order to get things done in the kingdom of God. The second, discernment. The special ability to clearly distinguish truth from error and right from wrong by judging whether a certain teaching, behavior, or proposal is godly or ungodly.

the danger for these folks is a spirit that is overly critical they see so clearly what is right and wrong what is truth and what is error that they have kind of a you can develop if you have this gift a harshness a spirit of negative criticism toward those who don't as quickly recognize truth from error. These folks are real black and white folks.

And we need that in the church, don't we? We need folks who can help us know what is the truth and what is error. What is right and what is wrong. But these folks too need to have a measure of grace in their discernment. If I go through these, I know this is a big class and we hesitate to ask questions, but if I'm not clear about something, if you have a question, stop me and I'll be glad to try to answer the question.

Thirdly, evangelism. The gift of evangelism. It is a gift.

It is the special ability to share the gospel clearly and winsomely with unbelievers. The evangelist will often get positive responses to his or her presentation of the gospel. The fact that some have the gift of evangelism. Billy Graham. Got to have the gift of evangelism.

I mean, how is it? I mean, do you listen to him? I listen to him present the gospel sometimes. I'm saying, I mean, that wasn't all that special. I mean, he just said it real plainly, real directly, and then thousands come to faith in Christ.

I'm going, wow. But he's just got that ability to just say it straight out, plainly. but in a very winsome, attractive way.

Now, the fact that you don't have the gift of evangelism doesn't mean you shouldn't be able to tell about your faith. Even though we may not have one of these gifts, it doesn't mean there are not times when we're right there and we have to be the one that steps in and is able to share the gospel and tell about the gospel. But sometimes as Baptists, we've tried to, My view. We have sometimes tried to press square pegs into round holes and make people evangelists who were not evangelists.

Now, do we not want to make disciples for Jesus Christ? You bet. And part of that is evangelism. That's not all of it, but that's part of it. And we want to get across the goal of having people come to faith in Christ.

but I think we do that best if we all exercise our gifts appropriately and let the evangelists, those who have the gift of evangelism, be those who take the lead in evangelism while we do our gifts and we can thus support evangelistic efforts. Let me give you an example. I think Joy Holland helps promote evangelism. When she goes back there and prepares a meal and cooks a meal so that people can come and gather and hear the shared word of God, He's helping evangelize the world. Hubert, who's got that gift of being able to run our sound system, when he sits up there and runs the sound system so that the pastor can preach and teach, I think he's helping evangelize the world, but he's not the evangelist.

He's not the one with the gift of evangelism, but he does something to support that. You don't get the football team doesn't get the ball across the goal by everybody being a quarterback. You need a right tackle, a left tackle, somebody to be the pulling guard. And I think the Church of Jesus Christ needs for all of us to be doing our gifts, and we will then accomplish what God wants us to accomplish. We didn't have enough evangelists in this class, though.

I told somebody we're going to go to some other churches and start recruiting. We need more people with this gift. we only had a handful that indicated as their first or second gift evangelism and we need that, we need more evangelists evangelists be careful there can be pride in this gift and you can get real focused on numbers how many count, how many profess faith in Christ you can get so focused on numbers that you can really build up pride and be an inappropriate focus. Third, or excuse me, fourth, exhortation. Exhortation is a special ability to come alongside of someone with words of encouragement, guidance, motivation, comfort, and wise counsel to help him or her be all God wants them to be.

This is the person who will say to somebody, you can do this, and will sometimes say, you ought to be doing this this is somebody who can encourage but then exhort and exhort has this sort of telling somebody what they ought to be doing don't we need people who sometimes come to us and say look you know you need to be doing this you're not doing it you should be now start and sometimes we need people because we don't sometimes we think more lowly of ourselves maybe people who say, you've got the ability. God has given it to you. You can do it. And they can motivate us.

These people, I think one warning is, the person who's an encourager can be so focused on people that they can forget the mission. They can be so focused on wanting to help individuals, they can sometimes forget the big picture goal of the church. So you've got to keep the big picture in mind encouraging individuals next faith the special ability to confidently and unshakably trust in God's power and wisdom to accomplish his will and purposes despite obstacles circumstances apparent failure and persecution now all Christians have exercised faith by coming to Christ you had to exercise faith. You put your faith in Christ. But when we're talking about the gift of faith, we're talking about that person who in the midst of what looks like hopeless circumstances, looks like nothing can happen the way it's supposed to, can stand there and say, I know, I know, I know that my Lord will do it. And this is the person who can be the real prayer warrior who in faith can go to God and trust that God will make things happen. We need people like this because often, particularly for the church, the course can appear fearsome and difficult.

We walk through a minefield in a sense as Christians because there's so many obstacles that are raised by the culture against the Christian faith. And we need people of faith who have this gift who can trust that God will do it and will go to him in prayer. The difficulty these folks have is they get tired of the mundane and the ordinary. You know, the everyday little things of life we have to do with. These people want to see the big things happen, the great things happen, and sometimes don't like to deal with the nitty-gritty of life that we have to deal with in the church.

Next, giving. the special ability to see needs and to meet those needs by liberally and cheerfully sharing of material resources without thought of return. These folks give and keep on giving and they don't really think much about it. It's just what they do. And they love to give.

They love to see needs and bring financial resources and material resources to bear to help with those needs.

But these folks will be tend to be a little critical of folks who are miserly. Who are so concerned about hanging on to the dollar. They want to say let it go. God can use it a lot more in his kingdom than you can just keeping it for your own self. They don't like selfishness.

Next, helps. ability to render support or assistance to others in the body so as to free them up from ministry. This is related to service, but I think the distinction of helps from service is helps is particularly supporting someone else or doing something or taking a task so that the other person can then be freed up to do what God has gifted them to do. So this is the person that's a real supporting role for someone else now those of you who have the gift of helps you got to be careful that you don't fall into the trap of feeling used you know when you're always helping someone else you can sometimes develop this attitude that I'm being taken advantage of but you're there to help so to free them up for ministry if you've got the gift of helps don't try to be a leader in terms of being out front you're going to get real frustrated and not do that good a job at it you're more of a behind-the-scenes person to come along and take something off of someone else to free them up to use their gift knowledge the special ability to gain deep insight into biblical truth through careful research thoughtful analysis and serious study it may also include the special ability to have insights about people or situations imparted by the

you probably know there are some of these gifts, and we're going to talk about some more in a minute, where you get into some theological discussions and people get a little afraid that the Spirit of God might really reveal something new to somebody. That can be, from a theological perspective, that can scare people.

I think the thing to keep in mind If God imparts to someone through some mechanism, some special insight into a situation or a circumstance, that's not something that's just revealed in Scripture. This is an insight that is revealed in some other way by God to this person. It will never be an insight that is contrary to Scripture or teaches or leads to do something contrary to Scripture. So if somebody comes to you and says, I've got the gift of knowledge and God has imparted to me that you in this situation should really leave your wife and go live with this other person, this other man. Leave your wife and go live with this other woman.

Or this other man.

Either one, that person has not imparted to you a spirit of knowledge that they learned from God. It's from somewhere else because it's contrary to the scriptures. So I think that's the real balance to keep in line. what you're told against scripture. Watch against pride, you folks who have the spirit of knowledge.

You tend to have deeper knowledge than others. And you can easily get bored with teaching and preaching because it seems so simplistic sometimes. And you just, can't they ever give us anything with a little meat? So you have to guard against that attitude. Though we want meat, don't we?

Next, leadership. to stand before, motivate, and lead people with care and skill in order to accomplish certain goals or objectives.

These are the out front people who can motivate. Leaders, be careful. It's easy as a leader to be manipulative. You see something, you've got a goal or an objective, and you begin to manipulate people. Don't manipulate.

and don't get frustrated with people who want to deal with the details. The leader usually sees the goal and wants to get to the goal. And when people say, well, have you thought about this, this, this, this? Have you got the money lined up? Who are you going to use?

The leader says, I don't want to worry about that. Let's just go do it. You know, let's go. Don't worry about all these details. Well, you got to deal with the details to some degree.

So if you're a leader, try not to get frustrated with that. mercy the special ability to be sensitive toward others who are suffering whether physically, mentally spiritually or emotionally the person with this gift feels genuine concern and sympathy for those who are suffering and expresses that concern and sympathy verbally and through acts of love and kindness designed to alleviate the suffering these people give the church a good name because they're out there just loving on people and taking This is the Mother Teresa type person. And boy, they make the church look good.

Now, you've got to be careful, you mercy folks. You don't want to hold people accountable sometimes. You don't like to draw straight lines and tell people that this is right or this is wrong because you're so merciful. But you need to help people even as you're being merciful to them to see what is right and what is wrong, what is truth and what is error. but boy you make us look good keep doing it pastor the special ability to shepherd protect care for feed and guide christian believers particularly with respect to their spiritual needs we had a number of women who had this gift of pastoring now this is not talking necessarily about the office of pastor and that's a whole different theological discussion but it's talking about this gift of being able to shepherd people.

So critical. The pastor, the shepherd, you know the shepherd who took care of the sheep? Not only did he care for or feed the flock, tend to the flock but the shepherd was the one who fought off the wolves. This is the one who will lay down his or her life for the sheep. And if the sheep are being attacked, the shepherd will go right between and do whatever is necessary to save the sheep.

This is the one who, when one of the sheep strays, will climb whatever mountain, go whatever journey, no matter how hard it is, to find the sheep and bring the sheep home. Because the shepherd loves the sheep. Boy, we need people like that. Because we've got a lot of straying sheep in the church, don't we? and we need people who will go get them and bring them back.

You shepherds, you pastors, boy, you can get weighed down with the problems that people are dealing with because people tell you their problems and you want to care for them and you can really get weighed down with what you're dealing with. So you've got to be able to let the Lord take care of those things, those situations that you really can't control and trust Him to do that. But go save the sheep. Prophecy. The special ability to communicate God's word with clarity, power, and conviction.

I think clearly preaching falls into this category. The person who can take scripture and communicate it. The question is, does God ever directly give some illumination or revelation to people apart from just what is in scripture? think we may be limiting God if we say that can't happen, but again, there will be no prophecy that is communicated from God that is contrary to what's already been given in the written word. So always weigh what you are told against the word.

The prophet can be a harsh, critical person, or at least can come across that way. You remember the prophets of the Old Testament. People didn't like to hear from the prophet because the prophet would come and point out what God's truth was and where the people were wrong and in error. So you have to be careful if you're the prophet that while you speak the truth from God that you do it with the spirit of love. Speak the truth in love.

Service. The special ability to identify undone tasks in God's work, however menial, and to use available resources to get the job done.

However menial. The servant will do whatever. This is the person that will go clean the toilets when they need to be cleaned.

This is a behind-the-scenes person.

And you really have to be someone who can live without glory. because you're not going to get much of it as a servant

until you get to heaven. Boy, then you're going to get a lot. These folks in the day when we stand before our Lord are going to get, I think, a lot of pats on the back from our Lord because they did things that people never saw, some things that would seem very small but were very meaningful in the long run. Now, you servants, you've got to be willing to receive service too. time having others do something for him or her so sometimes you servants when somebody wants to do something for you let them let them

teaching the special ability to understand the bible and the christian faith and to clearly communicate and instruct others so that they may grow and mature in the faith teachers are so important to be sure that people are maturing in the faith and to be sure that people don't get rocked every time a new philosophy comes along or a new way of thinking it's the teachers that can help be sure we know what is from god what is right and what is wrong and can help us stay on a straight course, not being tossed by every wind of doctrine as the book of Ephesians says. Teachers have to be careful that they make teaching practical. They get so caught up in the knowledge and the understanding of the subject, they can get a little esoteric sometimes and forget that teaching has to meet real life, everyday life. Skip down, and I'm going to talk about healing since we had a class member who mentioned healing as a number one gift. The special ability given by God to serve as the means through which God makes people whole, either physically, emotionally, mentally, or spiritually.

This healing is often the result of fervent, trusting prayer to God. Now I want to say something about the gift of healing. I don't think this gift necessarily is supernatural. It can be. can be that somebody for whatever reason God through their prayers and petitions God just seems to supernaturally heal I think we see this more quite frankly in some other countries in Ethiopia there's some folks who have the gift of healing and maybe it's when there are no doctors or nurses hospitals available maybe God in those situations raises up some people that he uses to impart this healing.

But healing can be, this can be the nurse, this can be the doctor, someone who God has specially gifted to be able to see bodily ailments or bodily problems. Or it can be somebody who has the ability to be a psychologist, to see into mental or psychological problems that people have, and can, through their special skills and abilities,

means but in a way that others can't typically do it. So you doctors and nurses, some of you probably have this gift of healing. All right, now let me talk, these gifts are gifts that I'm going to talk about now except for healing are gifts that nobody listed as number one in our class. So we didn't list anybody that said wisdom was number one. Now we had some folks who said said wisdom was number one. Wisdom is the special ability to perceive clearly a situation and to make proper practical decisions by applying biblical truths to that situation.

The gift of apostle is the gift, the special ability to be sent forth to new frontiers with the gospel, providing leadership over church bodies and maintaining authority over spiritual matters Essentially, those with this gift are missionaries and church planters. In a sense, we don't have apostles anymore. In a very strict sense, that word means someone who got his commission to take the gospel straight from Jesus Christ, somebody like a Peter or a Paul. But that word apostle literally means one who is sent forth. And so I think that gift of being an apostle is the gift that people have of being missionaries or being church planters.

There are just some people who want to go to new cultures, to new places, to take the gospel where it's not been heard and plant churches. Those are our apostles of today. We talked about the gift of healing, the gift of making people whole, the gift of miracles, the special ability given by God to serve as the means through which great and mighty things are brought about through the supernatural power of God. These miracles are often the result of fervent, trusting prayer to God. Unlike the gift of healing, which is not necessarily a supernatural event, we're now talking the supernatural folks.

When we're talking about miracles, we're talking supernatural stuff. And there are some, I think the scripture teaches, that God gifts or honors in a certain way by bringing about mighty acts. And I think often today this is done through prayer. Somebody who is a fervent, faithful prayer warrior.

It's one of the sign gifts. It's a powerful demonstration of God's working and God's presence. The gift of tongues. a special ability to speak in a language not previously learned so unbelievers can hear God's message in their own language Acts 2, Pentecost is a good example it may also include the ability to speak in a heavenly language a language that is not known, that is not a known human language you don't have to be around long to know that this gift is a controversial gift There are some who argue that you must speak in tongues as a sign that you're saved and that everyone who's a true Christian believer will speak in tongues. There are some who say, while that's not true, that the gift of tongues is available to every believer who wants to exercise that gift.

There are some who say that the gift of tongues is a gift for some, but not for all. and then there are some who say the gift of tongues no longer exists that it was only a first century phenomenon and it no longer exists without spending a long time in theology I think the proper biblical view is that it is a gift that some have but not all and you need not speak in tongues in order to be saved or to show you've been saved there are some Paul says who have this gift but not all And then lastly, interpretation Yes, wave

No

Where they talk about the ceasing Where people say they've ceased Is they go particularly to 1 Corinthians 13 Where it says When the perfect comes imperfect will pass away and some have argued that the perfect came when we got god's word finally canonized and that was the perfect and therefore we no longer needed needed this these sign gifts like tongues or interpretation of tongues or miracles or so forth but i think if you read first corinthians 13 i think it's teaching that when the perfect comes that's when Christ returns. That's when the perfect is going to come. And then those gifts will cease. We don't, all gifts will cease. We don't need them anymore at that point in time.

Oh, you're talking about specifically right at the very end time. You're not talking about, you're not talking, some people use the word the last day saying we're already in the last

days there are if you go during the during the time of the tribulation there it seems to be some evidence that the witnesses for christ will certainly diminish i don't remember if isaiah explicitly says that there will no longer be the gift of tongues but there certainly seems to be that time of tribulation, that there may be, in a sense, a silencing of some of the witness for Christ. And that may be what you're talking about. But for our day and time, before we get right before Christ returns, I think it would be pretty hard to say that these signed gifts don't exist. I don't think Scripture gives us a good basis for saying the signed gifts have ceased already. And the reality is, folks, that we have Christian believers say and who have spoken in tongues.

So it seems to be that among Christian believers this gift still exists. Again, that can be a long discussion. And then interpretation, translation of what has been said. The folks who speak in tongues, Paul in 1 Corinthians 14 has pretty clear teaching that if you're speaking in tongues in the public assembly, it must be interpreted.

And the gift of tongues is you're speaking a language you didn't previously know, whether it's a known human language or not. And the gift of interpretation seems to be you're able to interpret a tongue you didn't previously know. But if you're going to do it in the public body, there's supposed to be interpretation. Paul says if you don't do that, people are going to just think you're crazy. He says this in 1 Corinthians 14.

He's going to say if unbelievers show up and you're just in there speaking in tongues and nobody explains it, unbelievers are just going to think you're crazy. and disorder. And Paul dealt with this with the Corinthian church. And he said, folks, tongues isn't the most important gift. You'd a lot rather have prophecy than tongues. But that is not to say the gift of tongues no longer exists. Go read 1 Corinthians 14 if you're interested in that.

Let me say a word about other gifts. It is pretty clear, I think, and most commentators agree that the gifts explicitly listed in scripture are not all the gifts necessarily there may be some other gifts that are special abilities given to advance God's kingdom I think there are at least maybe three others that are explicitly stated in scripture that we haven't mentioned and I'm going to mention those to you here music go read first Corinthians 14 26 where Paul talks about when you come together some of you have a hymn. Some of you have a word of instruction. He seems to be talking about people coming together who have gifts and he says, he talks about music, hymns. And he may be, and this is debated, he may be indicating that some have a special ability or gift of music that is used to advance God's kingdom on earth and to build up the church. Craftsmanship. You go read the book of Exodus. Bezalel, the first person filled with God's spirit was filled with the Spirit to build the tabernacle.

So there may be some who have special gifts of artisanship, craftsmanship, building skills, who that's a gift given by the Spirit for the building up of the church. Revelation, that is mentioned as a separate gift. God-given disclosures that people may get through a variety of means, including visions or dreams. It's explicitly mentioned as a gift. vision or dream that will teach something contrary to scripture but I think music craftsmanship and revelation there's a good argument these are biblical gifts if you take these spiritual gifts tests or you do much research you will see that people will list some other gifts they will list celibacy first corinthians 7 7 they will mention voluntary poverty they will mention martyrdom as gifts.

Those are gifts in a sense, but I don't think in the same sense of the gifts we're talking about. Being celibate, Paul does say it's a gift in 1 Corinthians 7, 7, because you're freed up from some responsibilities to go advance the cause of Christ. But being celibate alone doesn't advance the kingdom. So I've left celibacy, voluntary poverty. Being poor by itself doesn't advance God's kingdom.

to give up all their possessions to go serve God. Martyrdom, the willingness to do great sacrifice, can be important in advancing the kingdom, but I think it's different than the gift of service or teaching. So I've left those out of my list, but just so you'll know, you'll see those sometimes. All right, here's my conclusion. Number one, I want you to take that little card right now and write your name and your three top gifts on the card.

If you need to look back at the test from last week, do it. But I'm going to give you a few seconds. I'd really like you to take a stab at this. What you think your number one gift is, your second gift, and your third gift.

I've already got all of you in the spreadsheet from last week, I know, but I'm now wanting you to give me a little more definition here.

The test, I'm asking you, the test is a tool. It's not the final answer. So knowing what the gifts are, the definitions, knowing yourself, knowing your own skills and abilities, taking the information from the test into consideration, but not letting it be the final answer,

are. This is a self-assessment. I don't see all of you writing.

Question?

Yes, if you didn't get the test last week, you can come up after class and I'll give you a copy to take.

Okay.

Pass them in. That side passed to the middle. This side passed toward Phil. This side passed toward John Fowler. Pass and then listen.

I've got just three or four more comments.

Somebody asked me, they said, well, David, you've asked us to tell us our gifts. you tell us yours teaching number one giving number two and third would be probably it's kind of you know you get to this kind of leadership administration

they they're all right there together okay

John, will you take them up down this side? Okay. Now watch. Here's the next point. My question is, are you presently using your gift for God?

He's given you a gift for a purpose. Are you using it for His purpose? If you are not, you've got to find some avenue for using it. If you don't know how, I'll be glad to talk with you. Phil would be glad to talk with you.

But you've got to find a way to express that gift. You cannot, cannot just sit there. Then you've got to find a way to use it with focus and passion. You've got to be able to get things out of the way so you can do the gift. And then you've got to go for it.

You've got to do it. If it's giving, you've got to give with liberality, as Paul says. If it's leading, then get out front and start leading. If it's serving, get down in the trenches and start doing it. Don't sit on the sidelines.

Get out there and go for it. Fifthly, Charles Spurgeon says, Without God's Spirit, we're like ships without wind, branches without sap, and coals without fire. We need God's Spirit to fill us to do what we're called to do. Symbala reminds us how we live is more important than how long we live. So start living today for Jesus.

And every day he gives you, as long as he gives you life and breath, serve him. And lastly, pray regularly. Spirit of the living God, fall fresh on me. Break me, melt me, mold me, fill me.