Well, let's take a look at our passage. Can I have... Let's see. I choose Shane Levites. Can you read verses 1 through 11 for us? Mm-hmm. Oh, wait a second. Great, thank you. So, in thinking about moving into this next big section, there are a lot of questions pertaining to spiritual gifts, you know, and I wrote down some questions and it's really interesting to think about.

And as you guys know in the Christian community, there is a lively debate, people standing on two opposite ends of the camp talking about our, you know, spiritual gifts, stuff that we practice today. Do I have a spiritual gift? And there was a season of the Christian Church where everybody was into, let's do a spiritual gift diagnostic.

What's your spiritual gift? And you go down the list answering all these questions and you find out your spiritual gift and then you go apply for the worship team or something, you know. So, there's a lot of confusion I would say in our day and age and there's a lot of questions to be answered.

Today, obviously, we're only going to be tackling a portion of the text, meaning we're tackling 11 verses, but remember this section goes all the way to the end of chapter 14, okay? And one of the things that's really emphatic about the verses that, you know, our brother Shane read is simply the fact that, if you want to summarize this study, God gives gifts.

Okay, so that much we know is true. God is giving gifts to his children, his church, and there's a sense to which all of us then should have a sense of the fact that we are endowed, we are thoroughly blessed, and we also then have, in many ways, a responsibility.

We have an expectation on our lives to practice those gifts, to exercise those gifts, to use it for the church and whatnot. So, the fact of the matter is the passage is really talking about God is giving you gifts. God has given the church gifts, and that's a good way to summarize it.

But, pertaining to these gifts, Apostle Paul starts to delineate the nature, the source, the purpose, and the various aspects of the gifts that we have in the church. So, this is the stuff that we're going to be studying today, okay? And looking at verse 1 and 2, it says, "Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I don't want you to be unaware.

You know that when you were pagans, you were led astray to the mute idols, however you were laid." Okay? And I sectioned that off because, as I looked at the passage, you notice that in verse 3 it begins with, "Therefore," so you know that there's a transition in thought.

So, I wanted to stop at verses 1 through 2 and just take a look at what he's saying. Well, in the very first, I guess, part of it, he starts talking about, "Hey, I don't want you to be unaware about spiritual gifts, so here I'm going to teach you." But in opening up, he says, "Remember when y'all were pagans?" You know, it's kind of like, "Whoa, okay." It's kind of like if I were to say, "Remember when you were flat-out simple?

You know, remember before Christ, B.C., your life, B.C., how wretched you were?" And he's having them think back, and it's kind of like, "Whoa, dude. My question to you is, what do you think is the point of him doing this and asking them to recall their previous life?" To the church that he has been calling brethren all this time, to the church that he's thankful, he's, you know, convinced that they're saved, why have them think back to their pagan days?

You guys get what I'm asking, right? I know it's like, I'm asking you to dig into what Apostle Paul is trying to aim at. You look at his statement in verse 2, and he's like, "You know, when you were pagans," and then he described them, right? So why would he bring that up?

What, I guess, a simple, easier question. Oh, go ahead. If they were led astray by idols, then they were led astray by, essentially, the passions of their own lusts. So what was fueling them was, like, their own idolatry, their own desire for the end. So he's gonna make a distinction between, like, a God-given gift, which fuels them, and the fuel that they would derive or have when they're pursuing their idol.

So he said it in a good way, like, there's two different spirits about doing something. One is you're fueled by your flesh and, like, selfish desires. The other is more godly, and you're fueled by the motivation of, basically, God and His Spirit, right? So Apostle Paul is definitely gonna attack that.

And throughout the entire book of 1 Corinthians, he's been attacking that, you know? It's like, you're acting fleshly when you compete with each other. You're acting fleshly when, you know, they were saying, like, "I'm of this leader and that leader," and they're acting fleshly in trying to sue each other and all that kind of stuff.

And then even with spiritual gifts, Apostle Paul is definitely getting at them. It's like, what is fueling your exercise of gifts? Is it your flesh? Is it the Spirit? So that's definitely there. The other thing I find that is very interesting is in thinking about their pagan life, yeah, they were really swayed by any and everything.

So he says, "You were led astray by mute idols." And some of your translations will say, "Dumb idols," okay? And then he'll say, "However you were led." So you were just really like what the Bible talks about as, you know, that shifting shaft or whatever, all the stuff that just blows in the air.

Wherever the wind blows, you just go. So he's sitting here first addressing this issue, and you think about the current circumstance a little bit, and you wonder what was happening in their church related to spiritual gifts that Apostle Paul would now embark on this discourse or embark on this teaching segment of, "Hey, I want you to be aware of what's going on with spiritual gifts," you know, concerning spiritual gifts.

Well, I think there was a lot of that. I think there was a lot of this like fleshly, a lot of this like self-ambition. They were always trying to—I feel like there were a lot of people who were always trying to use the church experience to elevate themselves, right?

But there's another thing I feel like was happening is he emphasized the fact in thinking about their pagan life that just as the idol is mute—literally in the Greek it means it has no voice—like it's dumb, as in there's no direction to it. There's no content to it. There's no reality to it.

And you were led astray by that. So you had no idea where you were going. Put it in another way, to you anything was God, even the mute, right? And very often when you have that kind of swaying heart and that kind of swaying mind, you yourself can very well become the most ring kind of idolatry, which is the idolatry of self, right?

And the reason why I talk about that is because I think in that day and age, it's helpful to think about the culture and the time. You know, there was a culture where, remember, the practice of religion was commonplace. The practice of pagan religion was all over. It was just rampant.

Everybody practiced some kind of religion, you know? And when you think about the stuff that they did, it actually mimicked or had resemblance to a lot of the Christian stuff. What do I mean by that? You know, when you think about today's like worship experience and all that kind of stuff, there's a sense in which you can sometimes just simply remove Christ's name from the picture and other religions will practice the same thing.

You know, if you have passionate singing, do you think other religions don't have passionate singing? You know, if you have like kind of a spiritual ecstasy, like an experience of the transcendent, you know that pagan religions have that too. They would like, obviously they would like induce it. They would put stimulus or they would have something where they're trying to induce that kind of experience.

I mean, think of Buddhism and trying to get to that state of nirvana or even related to that. You know, for us as Christians, we want to sacrifice and we want to let go of the world. And, you know, other religions practice the, I forget how to pronounce this, A-C-S-E-T.

There you go. Thank you. It's so hard. They practice that too, depriving yourself, you know. And the reason why I bring this up is because I think you had a mixture of a lot of stuff in the Corinthian church. You had those people who were fleshly motivated, making the church experience really driven by whatever they wanted in their heart.

And then you had a lot of people who continued to like not separate themselves from the worldliness that was around them. You know, and the practice of very pagan worship. And the Apostle Paul says, "Remember when you were pagan and you guys made like anything of God? And you guys were led astray by the thing that could not talk?

You made everything out to be God?" You know, there was confusion in the worship experience. There was lots of confusion in the worship experience. Question, is there confusion today in the worship experience? I think so. I think about my overly fanatical and very superstitious like Korean heritage. And I remember when I went to Chicago to meet up with one of my relatives.

I haven't seen her in most of my life. And she was in Chicago and she was a wife of a pastor. I came from a very charismatic background and she was a very lovely lady. And I'm not mean to like put her down or anything, but she would always connect everything to God.

You know, it's like, "You know, before you came I had a dream and God was telling me." And all of a sudden already it's like, "Oh man, she got to bring in God's name to her dream." Or she would say like, "Oh my friend at church, she was telling me all this stuff and then that was God telling me." Or like everything, like anything and everything.

And it was just like, "And that was God and this was God." And I'm always like hesitant, you know. Like you can't just do that. You can't just make everything, every experience like this. So more practically what we do more so maybe in the non-charismatic. Charismatic as in like, you know, God, supernatural miracles and the worship church experience and all that kind of stuff.

But you know, when people so easily interpret, they had a scenario where things went sour and things went really bad. But it worked out, so that was God. Right? It worked, so it was God. Like it was fruitful, so it was God. You know what I mean? And God is just attached spiritually to everything and anything that happens.

Now, I believe absolutely every good and perfect gift comes from the God above who has no shifting shadows. Everything we have comes from His gracious hand. So accrediting God with all that is good is okay, you know. But there is, there is, again perhaps maybe it's more so my personal experience.

But there is this like bent on connecting everything and anything to God. But I don't think we can so easily do that because that creates what? Confusion. You see what I'm saying? And so for me, as I think about, hmm, what could have been the scenario, I really do feel like, yes, there was a lot of confusion.

There was confusion by the false motive of man. There was also confusion by this kind of pagan influence of religious experience. The kind of mystical experience that happened for them in their pagan lives, they were wanting to see it in the church. And the fact of the matter is, do some churches in our current day try to offer mystical experiences as their church worship?

Yes. It does happen. And it's incredibly dangerous. It's incredibly confusing. And Apostle Paul says, "I don't want you to be like that, unaware." So I guess immature minded, you can't discern what is from God and what is not from God. Okay? So to me, that is how he's introducing the topic here.

That is how he's introducing the topic, okay? So I left a blank there for you guys to summarize all that. Okay? All right. So moving on then, I mean, if he's -- if Apostle Paul is saying, "I want you to be discerning, like carefully discerning and maturing your thinking to be able to say and evaluate, this is from God and this is not from God, how do you test the spirit?" Okay?

How do you test the spirit? Well, let's take a look at verse 3. Can I have just a note? Can you read that for us, please? Thank you. So this is a pretty simple one, but what does Apostle Paul say is a good test to see if something is of the spirit?

It's just like a -- come on, guys. Don't leave me hanging. He just says, "If this and if that." Yes! >> If there is a tally silly, he says, "You can't say Jesus is a curse." >> Right. That's the test. There you go. Sometimes the easy answer is the right answer, okay, guys?

Don't think too hard about it. Don't overthink it, okay? But that's exactly right. On this one side, he says, "If anybody says that Jesus Christ is a curse, then that is obviously not of the spirit of God." Okay? That is obviously not of the spirit of God. So what you have is, on the negative side, you can't say things that are degrading, right?

You can't say things that are degrading and diminishing of Christ's glory and say that this is the spirit of God. So one thing that's kind of interesting, if you think about that, is the test to see if something is of the spirit is theological, is doctrinal. Yeah? The test to see if something is of the spirit is to think, "Does this magnify or degrade my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ?" So you think about that, and again, he's offering a way for the people to ask, "Is this of the spirit?

Is this godly, or is this not?" Because, yes, if you did read from chapters 12 to 14, you guys got the sense that, like, oh man, sometimes the worship service in Corinth, it's disorderly. There is chaos. There's a sense of people chiming in when they're not supposed to, or people trying so hard to manifest their gift.

You know what I mean? And he asks, "Does this magnify the Lord?" So that's a really good question, because as there is a negative side, there is a positive, which is, in verse 3, Jesus is Lord. In one sense, it's one thing to deny him as Lord, but there are those who would not be willing to flat out say, "No, he's not!" But they're not willing to say, "Yes, he is!" You see what I'm saying?

There are those who can, again, who can exist in the circles of Christian faith, who will never flat out deny Christ, you know? Who will never flat out say, "Cursed is Christ!" That word for "cursed," you guys have probably heard it a lot in different contexts, is anathema. You know?

Anathema. I don't think there are people who might be like, "Yeah, you know, cursed is he!" But it's another thing to proclaim him. He is Lord. And to say that is to say Jesus is divine, that Jesus is God's anointed, Jesus is authority, you know what I mean? It's really to exalt Christ.

And so, this is a way to test the spirits. I think this is really important when you think about church worship. I think this is really important when you think about spiritual gifts. If some of you guys are not decided about it, meaning like the miraculous sign gifts of healing, the miracles of being able to speak in tongues, and all that kind of stuff.

If you're undecided about it, there are ways to still test it. Does it magnify Christ? Right? So, you guys all know our vision number one at Berean, right? We desire to glorify God by establishing a church that engages in God-centered worship and not man-centered. And contained in that vision is this question.

When we do this, right? When we have our worship and when we have our studies and when we have our programs, who gets the glory? Okay? There has to be that question. And it's so important. And to the camp that says, "We're all about charismatic gifts and we want to practice tongues." Well, there's still a question.

In you doing that, who gets the glory? And then to those guys who are like, "No, we don't like it. We don't ever practice that kind of stuff. We're all about Bible teaching." Still then, who gets the glory? The preacher? The church? The people? Who gets the glory? Is it the Word of God?

Is it the truth of the Lord? Is it God Himself, the one who is ever enduring? You know? And so there is that question for anything that is happening in the context of spiritual life. Right? Is Christ being exalted or not? And I think that's definitely one good way to test everything that's happening.

So keep that in mind again, that Apostle Paul is giving this criteria, at least this test, to help the church understand how to evaluate things. Okay? Now, I asked a second question. So just from the test that he points out and highlights, does it give you any hint as to what's the condition of the church?

What's happening there? What do you guys think? (Audience member) That means that that was happening there. That people were saying, people were cursing God. Yeah. (Audience member) Because he's pointing it out, it means it was happening. Right. I think, which is pretty astounding, right? It's like, oh shoot. At that church, were there people who were denouncing Christ, even while they were saying, "I am filled with the Holy Spirit, listen to me." Jesus is a curse.

You know what I mean? Like, was that actually happening? Well, just to give you a little bit of a background, a lot of stuff was happening back then. We know that there were people who were agnostic. I mean, the Gnostics, not agnostic. There were the Gnostics, there were the Gnosticists.

There were people who would deny the resurrection of Christ. And to deny the resurrection of Christ would essentially mean you believe Jesus to be dead. Okay? Would that be thinking of Jesus as a curse? Yeah. There were people who would deny Jesus' bodily, like, incarnation into the world. Those are the people that, remember in 1 John, John was battling that.

The people who were saying, like, the dualist, like, there's a spirit and there's a body and everything that's a body is wicked, evil. So, Jesus didn't come in the body. And then John's like, "Okay, if you say that, you have the spirit of the Antichrist." You know? Because that diminishes the glory of what Christ has done.

Now, the reason why I bring that up is because, in my mind, I asked the question, "What would be the spiritual condition of the church to allow that kind of teaching to happen?" You know what I mean? And I'll tell you what. I said the test was theological, and the test was the content of faith.

The content of belief. And if the church ever starts to care more about simply the religious experience on Sundays, rather than the personal faith that you exhibit, that you practice, well, we can get there easily. When the church no longer cares for the content of faith, but they care more for stuff like the flesh, am I accomplishing my fulfillment?

Am I getting the experience that I want? Am I having, you know what I mean? You can just X, Y, Z, whatever you want to fill in there. If you are caring more for the personal experience than the actual content of my belief, then, yeah, this kind of stuff can happen.

Got a guy coming in here, "I'm full of the spirit. I'm going to prophesy. Listen to me." Jesus didn't come in the flesh. Jesus never resurrected. Jesus is not the Son of God. That kind of stuff can happen. Okay? So, again, Apostle Paul saying this stuff really points to how severe the situation at the church was.

Okay? Any questions about that? No? Okay. Then, let's go to verse 4 and 5. Can I have Jane, can you read that for us? Okay. Cool. So, as you read that, he definitely changes gear because he said, "Okay, I'm going to have you think about your pagan days and how led astray you were, how you had no direction when it came to worship.

And then I'm going to teach you a test of how to test if things are of the spirit." And he says, "Now." Okay? So, as he says, "Now," I feel like, okay, he's introducing a thought, a premise. And he says, "There are varieties of gifts." And I had you guys do an exercise where you read various passages that did a list of spiritual gifts.

And later on in your discussion, I'm going to ask the question, "Define spiritual gifts." Now, it could be hard or it can be easy, right? Let's first try to think biblically what is categorized as spiritual gifts in the Bible. So, just at this moment, can you guys just throw them out?

Whatever you guys saw, whatever you guys read, throw out a couple. And I'm going to call on you guys just to highlight some of those. Okay? So, let's see. From that table, John Kim. Cool. Thank you. And then from the table in front of me, Titus. Oh, sorry. What?

Did you come in a little bit? Yeah, of course. Okay. Miracles, prophecy, ability to distinguish between spirits and tongues. Cool. Okay. And then from this table, Christine, did you find any others from the other passages? Interpretation and stuff like that. Okay. So, if you guys read some of those, what's really interesting about that is I feel like, oh dang, like a lot can be categorized into spiritual gifts.

Because some of it's as broad and big as like wisdom, you know? So, you're just a wise dude. Some of it's like knowledge. And then some of it becomes more specific like tongues or healing or prophesying, et cetera. Right? So, you notice that the list kind of is inclusive of a variety of things.

So, just as the passage says, there's a variety of gifts. Now, I want to ask you this question, which is this. As you see that there are varieties of gifts, what is the implication of the truth that there are a variety of gifts? What are some ramifications of that?

Maybe even like applications for the church. Because it's just a principle of reality. God has given lots of different kinds of gifts. What do you guys think? Yes. - If there's lots of gifts, then holy, if you're just really needy people, there's lots of needs, right? - Lots of gifts, lots of needs.

- Lots of needs. - Excellent. Okay. And actually, yeah, I mean, if you look for a moment at that passage again, he kind of talks about the fact that there are lots of gifts. There are lots of, what are the other variety of things? Ministries and effects. So, God is so orchestrated there that, yeah, there are lots of gifts because there are lots of needs.

And there are lots of ways in which ministry happens. And then there are lots of effects, results, and fruits that God bears. Okay? So, absolutely true. What are some other implications? Yes. - How would you describe it as a gift? Like, your ear, eye, or hand. - Good. - Are meant by God.

- Yeah. So, in that being the case, that God has created by design, that though yes, we are one, there is diversity. And there being diversity, it doesn't make sense for one person to be like, "But I really, really, really, really want that one." You know? And I do wonder, again, in the church, because of selfishness, there are those gifts that people all kind of tend to go towards.

You know? The ones that typically get more praise, the ones that typically are held in higher esteem. But if we all did that, then there would be no diversity. You know? We all have this kind of mentality. "Hey, if I'm going to play, you know, what's that game that you play in the winter at Christmas?

Everybody sits around, throw the gift in the middle, and you take turns taking it?" - White Elephant. - Thank you. White Elephant. Dang. My brain is like, okay. So, you know, we sometimes just function like, "Okay, we're going to do the White Elephant gift. Biggest box, mine." You know?

Like, that's typically how I function, you know? But we know that in the big box is just another box. And it doesn't always work like that. That in God's eyes, those gifts does not function the way we deem it to function. Externally, yeah, it's huge. It's wrapped well. You always find that bag in the middle that's like somebody just grabbed one of the church, like, trash bags, and they wrapped it up with a piece of tape.

And like, "Eww," you know? That's the external. But internally, it could be a huge old gift card. I don't know. This analogy is starting to break. But you guys get my point. Yeah. That's absolutely right. What Leah said is that the fact that God has designed that there are many gifts, and He is the one who is giving it, it doesn't make sense we're sitting here, if we do, in our hearts, covet other people's gifts.

What are some others? What are some other implications? Yes? - No one person has all the gifts. - Yeah. No one person has all the gifts. I mean, we can sit and talk about that one for a little bit, too. I'm going to be honest, okay? I think my struggle with pride is wanting to have all the gifts.

I do pride myself over being like a jack of all trades. I'm the master of none, but I know how to do just about everything. I love learning. I love tinkering with stuff. So I know how to cook. I know how to do this and that. I know how to do sports.

I know how to do this. I know how to do that and this and this. And there's a feeling of like, I can do just about everything. Do you know what I mean? And then if that thought, oh, I can do just about everything, is not, oh, I can do anything the church needs, but it's, I can do anything, you know?

Then now that short little skip and a hop over here becomes very hurtful to the church. You know? Somebody wants to, no, I can do it. Somebody wants to, no, I can do it. And I've caught myself doing that. And I'm like, okay, you just need to calm down.

God has blessed the church with various gifts and no man has every gift. What's another implication? You know, another way that I think pride and that kind of flesh comes out is when, because you have a gift, anybody else who has a weakness in that area to which you are gifted, you have no patience.

You know what I'm talking about? Let's say I'm really good at discipline, but then you're not very good at it. What is wrong with you? Discipline is so easy. All you have to do is wake up. All you have to do is set that alarm. It's because you're lazy.

You know, like, that's what I could say. But then someone could look at me and be like, well, what about your purity? I said discipline. You know what I mean? So there are those people who, because they're gifted in one area, they just start pounding that everybody else. They don't realize we are gifted in various things.

And just as that person has another gift and perhaps that person is not as strong as you, you likewise have weakness in other areas. But I've seen people, it's like they're gifted in evangelism. How come you don't evangelize? Don't you know this is the call of God for your life?

He calls you a witness. Go! You know? And like, dang, man, I believe it. I believe in the Great Commission. I'm sorry I have a hard time, you know? But sometimes you get frustrated and you don't have patience with the people who have weakness in the area you think you're strong.

But God has gifted us in various ways. What I found interesting was, you know, listed underneath the spiritual gifts was the gift of faith. Did you find that interesting? Okay? And I try to look up every single commentary. All the commentaries all concur that when it says the gift of faith, it probably doesn't mean like gift of faith as in salvific faith.

Because the whole church, Apostle Paul assumes that you guys are Christian exercising your spiritual gifts, gifts to, you know, serve God. So he's not really talking about like the gift of faith as in I'm God saved, you know? Because everybody has that if you're a Christian, genuine Christian. So what is that referring to, you know?

And one commentator was like, it's weird, but yeah, when you even think about faith, God in his design has allotted us our faith. And there are those of us who really excel in that just like absolute trust in God and no matter what the circumstance, they're just like so keen in on God's sovereignty.

And so when they believe that, it inspires the church. And I think, yeah, that's a gift to the church. So if I think about people who are suffering, you know, and I bring up just right now, you know, Pastor Aaron and Tina and everyone saying like, you guys are encouragement.

There's sinners thinking, you guys don't know, we struggle and we're not doing much. We're just trying to hold on to God. And then other people though, they're getting inspired by their perseverance. To me, that is a gift to the church, right? The church at large. I'm not gonna be like, oh, Pastor Aaron, you have the gift from God, you know?

I don't know if I can say that, but I can honestly say that's a gift to the church to see people trust God in the most dire circumstances, right? Okay. So I don't know if categorically before I used to put those kind of things into the bucket of what I believe to be spiritual gifts.

But according to the Bible, I think it's all there. Okay. So again, those are the implications I think I see. Here's another implication. You notice how God says in that passage, so there are very specific or various gifts. There are various ministries and there are various effects. But then in summarizing that, what does he say?

He says, but the same God who does what? He works. He's the one who is working all things. He is the one who is empowering. Okay. He's the one empowering this stuff. So when I see a guy come into church and he's got the solution, it's like, oh, your college students, they're so, you know, I don't know.

I think our college students are great. I think they're growing and stuff. But yeah, college students struggle with the same stuff. It's like, oh, they're too immature. They're too worldly. They're too fleshly. Here's the solution. You do X, Y, Z. You know what I'm getting at, right? There are those individuals who in maturity think that they have the answer, they have a program, they have the steps one, two, three to produce the work of God.

But that's not true. God has so designed the church in this amazing organic way where there's going to be an empowering of the spirit. And as each person abides by the spirit, exercises their gifts, and practices their faith by their own conviction, the fruit will be born according to God's spirit.

Right? I mean, if it was easy as a guy, a consultant coming in here and being like, dude, step one, two, three, four, five, and then your church is cool. Church would be easy, you know? But I don't know. Like, I've done it. There's a lot of young people who come into the church saying stuff like that.

You got to do this. You got to do that. And what I think about that is they are pursuing uniformity above and beyond spiritual unity. In spiritual unity, God has designed the diversity of our gifts to contribute to the building up of the body, and we are united in spirit.

In uniformity, all of you guys need to do this, this, and this, and we're there. That is not success. That is uniformity. Okay? All right. Any questions about that? Are there thoughts of implications of this truth? There are various gifts, various ministries, various effects. But there is truly one God who is working all things to his end as he wills.

Take a look at the, you know, verse 11. Take a look at verse 11. And he says, "But one and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually just as he wills." I love that. Okay? I love that. I love the fact that there is a sense in which, again, as a pastor of the church, am I tempted to want to control this church?

I am. I am. And, you know, there are times when I just wish, like, okay, I do wish it would just function effectively and efficiently, you know? But we are not a machine. And we're the household of God. We are God's, we are Christ's body, you know? And what I believe is amazing is that God is so orchestrating, designing, distributing, equipping, and empowering this body to do what he wills.

And I think everybody has to just, this passage to me isn't one of these, like, and so what do we do with that? It's just, I need to acknowledge that. You know what I mean? Yeah? Okay. Thoughts, questions? All right. Let's move to verse 7 through 10, our last section in our study today.

And KJ, can you please read that for us? "For each one is given an explanation of the Spirit of the common good. First, one is given a word of wisdom to the Spirit, and to another the word of power, and to the Word of the Holy Spirit, and to another the faith of the same Spirit, and to another the gifts of the human heart of the Spirit, and to another the finding of miracles, and to another prophecy, and to another the distinguishing of spirits, and to another the various kinds of tongues, and to another the interpretation of tongues.

The one and the same Spirit works all these things, contributing equally to the good just as it was." Excellent. So here is a toss-up, easy question for you guys. What is the purpose of spiritual gifts? Ink, ink. I don't know why I did that. What is the purpose of spiritual gifts?

Common good. Okay. Common good. So, so far we've studied a lot about the spiritual gifts. I think we could, if I were to ask you for a definition, you guys could probably give quite a bit. You know about the purpose, what it should not be used for, where it's from, who gives it, what kind there is.

You know what I mean? So we're learning about the spiritual gifts, and one of the main emphatic points about this entire passage is the spiritual gifts is given for the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. Right? And I want you to capture both aspects of that. That each one is given, the manifestation of the Spirit helps you to still define even further what a spiritual gift is.

A spiritual gift to me then is the work of the Spirit in you. The manifestation of the reality of His presence, the work in you, that He has caused to show outwardly for the purpose of the common good. For the purpose of the good of the church, edification of the body, for greater witness, for gospel ministry, the common good.

Okay? And so, as I think about that, the true spiritual gifts of God, earlier we said it magnifies Christ, but it also has to have this benefit for the church, benefit for gospel ministry. It empowers, it strengthens others, it unifies, it draws people together, it inspires other people, it meets practical and spiritual needs.

Okay? So now I can see why this is so important to God. And you can say then, how upset, okay I'm just gonna use the word upset for a lack of better words. There's Apostle Paul who is teaching this, who sees what Matthew mentioned earlier. People using their spiritual gifts as a means to satisfy their desires.

People using their spiritual gifts to satisfy their pride and arrogance, their personal ambition. People using their spiritual gifts to say, "Look at me!" Essentially sometimes that's what it is. You know? And so, as you think about that, I mean just think how despicable, you know? What a disdain it would be in God's eyes, where he has designed the spiritual gifts for that he has gifted every single one of us, that he has given us the spirit of God for the purpose of this, but then to come around and use it for ourselves.

Yeah? I think that's what he's getting at really as an emphatic point. Before you guys, you guys were just led astray by everything, everything and anything! Especially your own desires. But I want you to understand what is the purpose of the spiritual gifts? It is for the common good.

And so, we have to remember, because this is such an important part, there are so many counterfeit gifts, just like there are so many counterfeit spiritual experiences. And never, ever should we see the gifts as a means, as a badge. We should never see it as some kind of like prestige or a tool for ourselves.

But we need to think critically and we need to think deeply about the fact that this is for the edification of the church. There is a passage that clearly states it in 1 Peter chapter 4, verse 10 and on. Can I please have Ashley Hamamoto? Can you please read that?

Okay. Thank you. So, we began with a bunch of questions. You know, if you look at the bunch of questions, I just put it down. We started with a bunch of questions about spiritual gifts. You know, what are they? Why are they important? How many are there? Does everybody have a spiritual gift?

How do you know what your gift is? How important is it that individual, how important are the spiritual gifts to individual Christian living? All this kind of stuff. You know? Well, that 1 Peter passage is pretty clear, right? That as each one has received a special gift, he says, "Employ it in serving one another." Right?

As good stewards of the manifold grace of God. And so in my mind, I ask myself this question sometimes too. Like, what's my gift? Because I'm going to be honest with you, sometimes it's easier to find out what's not my gift than what really is my gift. You know what I mean?

So, I tell Pastor Peter all the time, like, "Pastor Peter, you can't leave because I'm not a visionary. You're a visionary." You know? Or something like that. Or like, "You can't, you can't." I tell him, "You can't leave because, you know, X, Y, and Z. Like, I'm not good with this kind of scenario.

I'm an introvert." All this kind of stuff. So, I know all the things that I'm bad at, but sometimes it's hard to know what you're good at. Can you guys relate to me on that? Yeah? Because if I were to ask... Nice. Okay. What's my cotton? Your gift is messing me up.

I lost my train of thought, you know? I'm just kidding. Alright, so, sometimes you just feel that way. It's harder to know what you're bad at than to know what you're good at. Now, is it incredibly vital for your Christian living to know specifically what is your gift? And I think about that for a moment.

And I think about the passage here in 1 Peter. I think you get the general principle. And you get the general aim. You know what I mean? I really do believe that we are very much in a spiritual journey. That we are in a walk of faith. That we are getting progressively sanctified.

And as we simply set our hearts to glorify God in everything, as we simply desire and commit to proclaiming Christ as Lord, the various giftings are going to emerge really dynamically. You know? And the thing about it is, not only is it going to emerge, but it's going to be encouraged in the life of the church.

And people are going to see it probably first before you ever do on your own. And I want to encourage you guys, just seek that. Just seek the broader goals. If I'm speaking, if I get an opportunity to speak, let me do so by exalting the Lord as I'm speaking the words of God.

If I'm serving, let me do so with a heart of servanthood like that of Christ, with all that I have. Edifying the church. Right? If I'm leading, let me lead with excellence. If I'm, you get the point. Right? You get the point. And so, I just want to make it clear that, in conclusion, there are still a lot of questions about spiritual gifts.

And notice how I didn't really even get into any debate about do I believe in like sign gifts and all that kind of stuff. If you guys have questions, we can talk about it later. But that wasn't even his point necessarily in this moment. What Apostle Paul made very clear is that every single gift that the church has and that you have as a person, there by our God, who is the same spirit, same Lord, same God.

The triune God is gifting his church and they are given for the common good and they are to be used for the building up and edification of his body. Amen? Okay. Any questions at this time about what we covered today? Yes. So, I just want to understand a little bit better in terms of spiritual gifts.

For example, like speaking tongues. So, I know that it still happens, you know, you see, you hear about people who are overseas and they are praying, they are filled by the Holy Spirit and they are filled with the Holy Spirit and they speak in tongues. The language that the other person is using.

Right. But then, but once they stop praying, they can't speak in tongues. People have that ability to just speak in tongues on their own. So, I just want to understand a little bit better at the time, you know, when in first coming hands, when they could exercise that gift, is it something that they could do on their own or how does it feel when you are filled by the Holy Spirit?

Okay. Okay, I'm going to just try to specifically answer that question. She was asking kind of like, in that time, in that time, sorry, in that time in the early church, when people had the gift, could they exercise it literally as a gift that they have, they can pull it out of their belt any time or do they have to be like filled with the Spirit, have an experience and then they did that?

In my mind, it seemed to me that in those, in that early church time, that if they had the gift, they were capable of exercising it. Because if they had the gift of healing, they knew what they were doing when they laid hands on people to heal them. Okay.

So, that again, then begs the question of like, then what are the people practicing now and et cetera, and that I guess we can go into a deeper discussion about. But to answer your more specific question about that, it definitely seemed to me that the spiritual gifts that they practiced in the early church was quite different from what a lot of the people practice now, where if they had the gift, that was something that they knew they had and they were exercising as they were going.

Yeah. Okay. Cool. Any other questions? And, and I do want to say, do I want to get into this? Maybe I will. Okay. You know, like, I'm just going to say this for the sake of just like really, because it's one of those bigger parameter thinking. You guys all kind of know like my position and you guys know church's position.

We're like open and like very, very, very, very cautious. That's our position at church. And I hope you guys realize that we are not anti-miracle, you know, the supernatural. We actually believe it. Like we pray that God would perform miracles on the lives of the people we love. We pray for God to intervene.

You know what I mean? And God actually, I believe God does that in our day. He does. He's a divine God. He can and he does, you know? And so the spiritual gifts, again, like I just, as we're talking about it, I don't want to have a parameter of thinking where we're trying to piece and place these spiritual gifts in a place that it's not supposed to be, which is that was then, this is now, that kind of stuff.

As I'm saying that, you know, I just wanted to clear that up and do realize too, first for me, when I think of spiritual gifts, I am thinking about truly spiritual gifts that are actually, yeah, they are supernatural. I think of it, you know, if I want to use the word miracle, yeah, miraculous too.

What do I mean by that is, you know, like being able to play the guitar, to me, that's a spiritual gift. But to be able to inspire people to worship God with passion, that's a spiritual gift. The difference is, a pagan can play the guitar, but only one who is saved and has a spirit of God is going to say, God is God, Jesus is Lord, let's worship.

You see what I'm saying? And to me, that second one, supernatural. Okay? All right, any other questions? Okay, let's take a moment to pray and you guys can do your discussion time. Father God, I want to thank you because as we study this passage, we realize Lord, that you are so intricately involved with your church.

You indwell us, you are ever present, you gift us, you provide for us, you create the ministries, you cause the effect. Lord, we just realize, God, you are completely involved and Lord, we want to just acknowledge you. Through this time of study, we want to acknowledge God that, yes, all the results, all the fruit on your hands and God, we just need to be more spirit filled.

There are those of us, myself highly included, that sometimes thinks I just need more education, I just need to speak better, I just need more of this and that, know how, business skills, whatever it may be. But I pray, Father God, I would never buy into the worldly philosophy of success accomplished by the will of man.

I pray, Father God, that I would wholeheartedly surrender to the Spirit of God who works in us and through us for your great purposes. Father, I do pray that each one of us will be spirit filled through the week, God, just acknowledging your presence, abiding by your word and God, desiring truly to magnify you in our lives.

We thank you in Christ's name, amen. Okay, thanks everybody. Okay, thanks everybody.