The Church and spiritual gifts

Spiritual Gifts

Every human being has certain passions and things that they are good at. Many times the world calls these gifts. I find that each human created by God, both believing and unbelieving have natural gifts or talents, which are things they are good at. These gifts can be things like, athletics, music, arts and crafts, cooking, design, and landscaping. When God’s children accept Him as Savior, Father, and Lord, they are given a spiritual gift from the Holy Spirit who enters and starts to grow in His control of their lives. The spiritual gift can amplify the already natural gift or it can be a spiritual gift that is separate and useful for the Lord in other ways. The Holy Spirit gives His gifts to the believer in the church for the use in the church to glorify God in His church and further the church’s mission. Spiritual gifts are for use in the ministry of the church and are designed by God to grow the believer and be used in service of one another in the faith community.  Spiritual gifts can break down into 2 separate but equal categories; speaking and serving gifts (1 Peter 4:11). 1 Corinthians 12:8-10, 28-30, Romans 12:6-8, and Ephesians 4:11 seem to give a good list for spiritual gifts but not having a complete and full list of gifts, these verses are only a good starting place. Here from these verses is a good starting place in understanding spiritual gifts.

Wisdom

Knowledge

Faith

Healing

Miracles

Prophecy

Distinguishing between spirit

Tongues

Interpretation of tongues

Apostles

Teaching

Administrating

Serving

Exhortation

Generosity

Mercy

Evangelist

Shepherd

This list from Scripture cannot and should not be exhaustive and complete. A believer in Jesus and child of God living under the power of the Holy Spirit should seek to steward their gift from Him. Stewarding a spiritual gift is first doing something for the Holy Spirit and through service learning what gift the Spirit has given. Next, in service for the church, the believer finds ways to cultivate, grow, and strengthen their gift for service in the life of the church. Finally the believer using their gift in ministry must be willing to follow the Spirit and go out of their comfort zone and let the Spirit lead with their spirit gift no matter what direction the Spirit wishes to use this gift for His glory. Ultimately Spiritual gifts are about worship of God and [praising the gift Giver.

*I have a few thoughts concerning the “sign” gifts of the Holy Spirit. The sign gifts are considered to be the miraculous gifts like; miracles, healing, tongues, and the interpretation of tongues. These gifts were common in the early church when the new believers in Jesus were reaching out to the lost world and the gifts were used to compliment the good news of Jesus and touch peoples’ lives. I believe these gifts can be used by the Spirit today in the same way. The sign gifts can and have been used in new places that the gospel is reaching out to in the lost world, especially in the third world places. But these sign gifts are not as common and are not found in places where the gospel is already planted. The sign gifts were used mainly in evangelistic places and not used much in the edification of the church. That still applies today so we should not expect or be ready for any sign gifts today in the places where the church already is and is in need of edification not evangelistic outreach.*