I believe in the Gifts of the Spirit. I believe they are for the church today. I believe God gives different gifts to different members of the Body. The same Spirit giving the Gifts to the Body for the common good.
I believe a lot of what is seen in Pentecostal circles is a caricature of what the Bible reveals. I don't think the use of the Gifts should be sensational, hyped, overly emotional or spooky. God doesn't need us to "gin" things up to prophecy, to utter a word of wisdom, to work a miracle or healing.
I am especially concerned about performances of so-called prophets or those that "operate" in the Gifts of the Spirit that are celebrities, have to have a microphone, a platform, an ad campaign to come into a city in order to have God use them in this way.
Jesus is the ultimate example. He walked in the Spirit, He discerned spirits, He healed, He gave people a word of knowledge, a word of wisdom and oftentimes it was private, never was it a performance. Jesus didn't get all showy with it, He spoke words and laid hands on people and kept the glory flowing to God.
I have people in my life that I trust that walk with God and they have been granted spiritual gifts. If I said their names you wouldn't know them. Yet when they speak what they say is spot on. And it might be 4 times a year. There's nothing sensational about it, hyped or self promoting.
To the outsider the "spooky" ways many spirit-filled churches act causes them to be frightened, confused or jaded toward the reality of God's gifts. I am trying in my life to balance the reality of the gifts while defusing the ways we allow those gifts to be used, especially in public worship gatherings. There is so much misinformation and very little teaching in these areas in churches.
I preached a message several years ago going verse by verse through
I Corinthians 14 explaining how we were going to bring order to our worship gatherings and not allow an "anything goes" attitude to them. An 80 year old, life long Pentecostal member of our church told me afterwards that in all of her years of being a Pentecostal she had never heard a message or a lesson on the subject. It helped clear up a lot of confusion about the subject for her.
I am not against emotion per se. I am not against people speaking in tongues. I am not against God using someone to heal, to perform a miracle, to utter words of wisdom or knowledge that can help someone. We are trying to strike the balance at our church.
We can be blessed by God with these gifts that are for the common good. But we must make sure everyone is benefitting from them and it's not at the expense of an unbeliever, an outsider, a sinner who doesn't understand these things. And I want people to be careful that they aren't tempted to put on a show, to self promote, to bring attention to themselves.
I Corinthians 14:18-19 I thank God that I speak in tongues more than all of you. But in the church I would rather speak five intelligible words to instruct others than ten thousand words in a tongue.
I Corinthians 14:23 So if the whole church comes together and everyone speaks in tongues, and inquirers or unbelievers come in, will they not say that you are out of your mind?
I Corinthians 14:25 What then shall we say, brothers and sisters? When you come together, each of you has a hymn, or a word of instruction, a revelation, a tongue or an interpretation. Everything must be done so that the church may be built up.
I Corinthians 14:33 For God is not a God of disorder but of peace—as in all the congregations of the Lord’s people.
Let's work to take the "spooky" out of our gatherings and the use of spiritual gifts and let us strive to lead people to Christ, to build people up, encourage and bring healing and wholeness to them.
Let's demystify the things of God and make them real and practical all the while He is getting all the glory!
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