What the Bible Says About the Holy Spirit (Part 4)

In the fourth of our series on the Holy Spirit we will be looking again at spiritual gifts. In the first article we looked at the work and the ministries of the Holy Spirit in a general sense—what kind of work does He do in the world—before we got into this broad issue of spiritual gifts. This is an important component. What does it mean to live a life that is imbued and empowered by the Holy Spirit? What does it mean for us to walk in the power of the Spirit in our meetings together and when we relate to one another on one-on-one levels?

As I stressed in the last article, all of us who know Christ have been given one or more spiritual gifts, some kind of unique gift mix that perfectly suits you and equips you for God’s intention. You will be investing your life in the power of God’s Spirit, reproducing spiritual fruit rather than merely human works. It is this fruit that is alive and the fruit of the Spirit—love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control—is the fruit of Christ-like character. All these qualities, these spiritual virtues, are things that are alive because they are things created in God’s image, and we are also designed to invest our lives into people.

It is my conviction that all of us will give our lives in exchange for something and it would be prudent for us to be sure that what we give our lives in exchange for won’t let us down in the end. If we give our lives in exchange for just material acquisitions and earthly accomplishments and achievements, we will look back and wonder what it was all about. All those things are destined to perish but the Scriptures invite us to see that the one who does the will of God abides forever and those things will endure. We are called to pursue those things that are invisible, those things that are not yet palpable and seen, and let those very things that are invisible animate and energize the visible in our lives. All that we do ought to be related to the indwelling of the Spirit of God, who mediates Christ’s presence in us. That is why when Jesus ascended, He didn’t leave us as orphans, but He sent a “comforter” who would be alongside us, and because the Spirit is in us it is as though we have a river of living water that springs from within our inner-most being. That can have an impact on your home life as well as your work and other areas of your life. All those aspects of your life ought to be somehow tied together and integrated and made coherent.

We will be talking tonight about the gifts of miracles, prophesy, healings, the gift of tongues and interpretations, and what is called the word of wisdom and knowledge. The reason why we are focusing on those particular gifts is because there is a good deal of controversy surrounding them, and, I fear, a good deal of misunderstanding as to their use. We have noted before the importance of the whole Charismatic movement. The first wave of the Spirit was called the Pentecostal movement, while the second wave is the Charismatic; and the third wave is often associated with a different understanding of the role of baptism in the Spirit. I argued before, that in the transitional time since Pentecost in the book of Acts, people were baptized in the Spirit, but it would be better to call this the ‘filling’ of the Spirit, a term that is compatible with New Testament usage, both in Acts and the epistles as well. In fact, we are commanded to be filled with the Spirit of God, and this filling of the Spirit can involve either the mature filling or a sovereign filling. In Stephen’s case there was a mature filling that characterized his life. In fact, all the deacons were supposed to be men who were filled with the Holy Spirit. There can also be special times, sovereign moments, where God, in His grace, would descend upon them in power and they would speak the word of God with power or they would have great boldness to teach or preach.

My view here is that there can be many fillings. Also, your experience will be unique to you, in terms of its pattern. It may be that one person has a particularly profound experience at one point in their journey, whereas another person shows more steady progress. We must understand that God works in a wide variety of ways with His people and that what occurs for one is not normative for another. For example, when I was in seminary, I had the belief that if you didn’t know the day and hour you came to Christ, then you probably weren’t a Christian. That was the crazy idea I was led to have, and so I struggled with folks who would say that they couldn’t remember, because that experience didn’t fit my own experience. The key is to always test our experiences by the standard of the word of God, an authority that doesn’t change with the culture or the times. The way for us to always be relevant is to stick with the truth of Scripture. Many times, people will modify their beliefs to fit their culture. The word of God, which flows from generation to generation, is perpetually relevant because it is, indeed, what it claims to be—the word of God.

Having reviewed this, I want to move on into Paul’s description of the gift of prophecy and the gift of tongues in 1 Corinthians 14 because of the overwhelming controversies that surround both of them. So, we will take them both square-on.