4-30-23 Kasey Campbell: Examining Pneumatika

Today, I want to start a new series; we’re going to walk through 1 Corinthians 12, 13, and 14. And there are a few reasons for it; one is that these chapters are unique in their descriptions of the gifts of the Spirit. Once we come to Christ and are baptized in the Holy Spirit (so that God can empower us to move by His Spirit), we need to have our spiritual senses awakened and we need to learn how to allow the Holy Spirit to minister through us. God wants to minister through you. And it’s a growth process. Just like the rest of the Christian life, we need to grow in maturity, discernment, and the disciplines of mind and body. So we want to learn from Paul about how God will minister through us. The gifts of the Spirit are also quite controversial. Do they still exist, can we move in them, what does that look like interpersonally, and how do we do that in a church service? How do we differ from other Pentecostal and charismatic churches in how we receive and minister the gifts to one another? And because of these questions and the controversy surrounding the gifts of the Spirit, it’s important to have clarity about them. It’s also important that we allow the apostle Paul to teach us how the Holy Spirit desires to minister when we gather. And I do want to take this series verse by verse because Paul lays this stuff out in a very helpful way. How many of us would say we want Paul to be our apostle? In these chapters, he’ll start with some warnings for us, then He’ll talk about how there are a variety of gifts, then how love is preeminent, then how self-control is necessary. The presence of the Holy Spirit in power and in gifts makes it easy for us to think that the evidence that God is in something is the power and gifts themselves. In other words, we sometimes think that when people move in the gifts, that means that everything being done is of or from God. But that isn’t how Paul thought. Paul says that the ultimate criterion of the Holy Spirit’s presence is the exaltation of Jesus as our Lord, King, Master, and Savior - and that attitude expresses itself in loving concern for other people. Whatever takes away from loving people the way God does, even if it is a real, legitimate gift from the Holy Spirit, starts to move away from God’s purposes and into a fascination with spiritual activities as an end in themselves.1 In other words, the gifts are amazing, helpful, and needed. We want them and we want to minister them. They build us up and help us in many ways, but we can’t forget the reason why 1 Fee, Gordon D. The First Epistle to the Corinthians, Revised Edition, P645. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2014. Examining Pneumatika | 1 God gives them to us. 1 Corinthians calls us to open to the gifts of the Spirit in the Spirit of the gifts. And the spirit of gifts, or the attitude we need to have when we operate in the gifts, is love. God calls us to balance passion and zeal for His Spirit and His gifts with discipline, wisdom, and love. We’re called to follow Paul’s mandate - which is to operate in, move in, distribute, or manifest the gifts in a way that displays the loving heart of God toward people. So let’s pray before we take a look at what Paul has to say on this topic. He’s going to start by giving us a warning or a caution about spiritual gifts and how we need to think about them when we move in them or receive them. PRAY. We’ll start in 1 Corinthians 12:1-3 NASB Now concerning spiritual gifts, brothers and sisters, I do not want you to be unaware. 2 You know that when you were pagans, you were led astray to the mute idols, however you were led. 3 Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God says, “Jesus is accursed”; and no one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit. I want to start with a little vocabulary. When Paul says he wants us to know about spiritual gifts, the word he uses there is pneumatikos, which literally means ‘spirituals,’ or ‘things of the Spirit.’ Say ‘things of the Spirit!’ Paul wants us to be aware of the ways the Holy Spirit works. Paul is responding to questions about the supernatural manifestations of the Holy Spirit, and through the next three chapters, he’s going to explain how the ‘things of the Spirit’ are supposed to function when believers come together for worship. These people have a lot of passion, zeal, and energy for the gifts but not much knowledge about them or God’s goal for them. Have you ever heard the phrase ‘a little knowledge is a dangerous thing?’ That’s what’s going on here. And Paul pastors the gifts in them. Did you know that the gifts can be pastored? Paul gives direction and guidance about how people should move in the gifts in a service. This is a few chapters later: 1 Corinthians 14:40 NIV But everything should be done in a fitting and orderly way. Some people think that if the gifts of the Holy Spirit are pastored, or if there is guidance, an order to how they’re walked out, or correction, the gifts will be quenched. And that’s certainly a possibility. If a person doesn't have Paul's heart (and Paul truly loved the gifts of the Spirit, by Examining Pneumatika | 2 the way), then the principles of guidance in the gifts can be used in a harsh way to smother them. Some churches shut them down altogether. Paul’s teaching about the gifts was not intended to stop the Corinthians from moving freely in them. That’s important. His goal was to protect the people from making certain mistakes that, over time, would cause the church and community to despise them. Without guidelines, human flesh always takes over and ruins what God intended to be beautiful. This happened to the church in Thessalonica. Apparently, they shut down the gifts. Paul felt the need to say to them, 1 Thessalonians 5:19-21 NKJV Do not quench the Spirit. 20 Do not despise prophecies. 21 Test all things; hold fast what is good. Paul was pastoring the gifts in Corinth and giving guidance on how to walk them out; not to stop them but in order to preserve them. If done wrongly, they would stop eventually anyway because they’d be ‘despised;’ if done properly, they would continue to be a blessing to everyone. And that is still true today. How many of you know that when someone brings a prophecy, a word of wisdom, a word of knowledge, or some other spiritual gift, and it’s right on, it’s powerful and helpful and comforts us and encourages us?! It’s great when it’s on and truly coming from the Lord. My point here is that the people in Corinth were very excited about the gifts; they loved moving in them and they had a lot of passion, but they also had a lot of problems. And Paul doesn’t want them to be ignorant about how these pneumatika or spiritual things work - he wants them to have the wisdom that comes from both the Lord and from experience when functioning in a spirit-filled ministry capacity. In other words, he wants them to know how to minister in a way that builds people up, not in a way that causes more problems and causes people to despise prophecy. The Corinthians had a lot of problems. You might not think that they would, considering Paul planted this church and pastored it for the first year and a half, but it did. Acts 18:1 NKJV After these events Paul left Athens and went to Corinth. [...] Acts 18:11 NKJV And he settled there for a year and six months, teaching the word of God among them. So Paul is addressing these problems in the church in 1 Corinthians; that’s one of the main points of the letter. It is a corrective letter. He wants to stop some behaviors and start others. Examining Pneumatika | 3 It’s helpful to remember the problems that this church was having because these same wrong attitudes affected the way they ministered in the Spirit or moved in the gifts. Our heart attitudes towards the Lord, towards the body of Christ, towards authority, and towards the gifts affect how we minister them. And we have to learn the right ways to do things by hearing Paul correct the wrong ways the Corinthians were doing them. But we also have to be very careful because we can’t assume that just because the Corinthians did something wrong as far as spiritual gifts, Paul condemns the use of spiritual gifts altogether. He doesn’t. He is pastoring, he’s correcting, he’s counseling, he’s guiding, he is stopping some behaviors and starting others. And he’s doing it because he wants these people to move freely in the Spirit but also be guided by the same selfless love that led Jesus to the cross. Paul wants to strengthen our resolve to allow the Holy Spirit to minister to us when we’re together, but he also wants to caution us and warn us to avoid pride, prioritize the needs of others over ourselves, and not do anything that draws our attention away from Jesus. Let me tell you about some of the problems the Corinthians were having: they had a problem with factions or clicks. People were loyal to their favorite teachers, especially if that person baptized them. They had a problem in the community with clicks and they were arguing over whose leader was better. They had a problem with selfishness - they only wanted to see their own needs met and weren’t concerned at all about new believers or people who might come into the church. They were prideful about the gifts. In other words, they had an attitude of superiority and self-sufficiency that was incompatible with a heart of loving service and humility. They yelled out in tongues in a weird scary way; basically, they were all doing it very loud, all at once and for a very long time to the point where no one knew what was happening or what was being said. Here’s another problem. They would give prophecies that were boring and went on too long, and a of people in a row would do that. They lacked self-control and blamed it on the Holy Spirit. What I mean is that they would just get loud or rowdy or whatever and just say the Holy Spirit took them over and controlled them and forced them to act a certain way. That’s not how the Holy Spirit operates, by the way. There was a lack of beauty and order to the service. It was Examining Pneumatika | 4 chaos. They had even more problems, too, including tolerating sexual immorality and getting drunk on communion wine. Lots of issues in this church. They had all kinds of problems, but they were still trying to move in the gifts of the Spirit. So Paul starts off by reminding the Corinthians that not all spiritual manifestations are from God. 1 Corinthians 12:1-2 NASB Now concerning spiritual gifts, brothers and sisters, I do not want you to be unaware. 2 You know that when you were pagans, you were led astray to the mute idols, however you were led. Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God says, “Jesus is accursed”; and no one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit. Paul wants us to know that the flesh and the devil can also ‘inspire’ prophecies and do wonders. Oracles, divinations, and even healings were, and still are, a part of other religions, but the guidance and power people get in those don’t lead them toward freedom and salvation; it leads them toward deception and bondage to demons. Prophecy, or hearing from God, was big business back then. Remember the Oracle of Delphi? Paul doesn’t want people gullible, naive, or untaught when it comes to the real, true operation of the gifts of the Spirit. He reminds them of what happened in the past when they didn’t know the difference between a true and false prophecy; he says you were led away by other spirits; you were lured into things that weren’t of God because you didn’t know how to recognize the voice of the Holy Spirit. I want to pause here and say that one of the main problems with false prophecy is that it’s supposed to be God who is speaking it. After all, if God says something, who are we to argue with it? The problem comes in because just because someone says they’re speaking for God doesn’t mean they are. We might be listening to something that is just a person’s thoughts expressed in prophetic language, or worse, it might be motivated by the enemy. To make things even more complicated and difficult, sometimes, part of what is said is from God, and another part is just from the person. So the result is a mixture of inspiration and flesh that leaves us having to discern which is which. And, to add one more layer, we have to be discerning about what we are thinking and saying as well as what other people are saying. Are Examining Pneumatika | 5 we aware when we stop speaking God’s word and start speaking our own? Are we humble enough to stop if that’s the case? The Holy Spirit lives in each of us, so each one of us who has been baptized with Him is capable of prophesying as the Spirit leads. The giver of all gifts lives inside you and me. Say, ‘The giver of all gifts lives in me.’ God wants to use us to minister for Him. But what separates an effective prophecy from a mixed or false one is not the ability to move in it; it’s the integrity of heart with which we do it. The integrity of the heart is very, very important here. Here’s what I mean; will we monitor our own heart attitudes and make sure we don’t let anger, pride, fear, or insecurity affect what we say or the way we say it? Will we stop when God tells us to? Will we police ourselves and check our hearts as well as our words? Our integrity of heart, our humility, our submission to the Lord, to the body, and to leadership, and a deep love for people are the real factors that determine our effectiveness in ministering spiritual gifts or moving in them in a way that builds others up. Anyone who wants to move in the gifts or speak on God’s behalf but lacks these qualities makes more trouble than anything. They mislead, confuse, or condemn, and cause others just to get annoyed by the gifts and their operation. Some people, sadly, just don’t have the right heart motivation to be able to minister the gifts in power and in grace. Some people simply desire attention or affirmation. In other words, some people just want to be the center of attention all the time, and if they don’t get their share of it, then it wasn’t a good church service. Some people want control over a gathering or group of people. They want to dominate the way things go. Some are looking for pain relief. That sounds strange, but what they say or do comes from a place where they’re hurting and want to make sure that that pain point they have is taken care of. This often goes hand in hand with the next one, which is that some people want to try to force God to do something or move in a certain way. Still, others have learned patterns of delivery - they say the same thing over and over again no matter when or where they get a microphone. So the need in all of us for discernment is great, but in spite of the danger, when prophecy or other gifts are accurate, they powerfully edify, exhort, or comfort us. We’re all able to hear God speak, and it brings us to life spiritually. There are problems because people are immature, but the benefits demand that we grow in our capacity to hear God’s voice, not throw away His Examining Pneumatika | 6 gifts. Paul doesn’t want the fact that people mess things up to stop us from longing for and desiring true prophecy and gifts from God. And He says the answer is not to shy away or withdraw, but to become more discerning, to test the spirits and test the prophecies. He says to test, confront, and even discipline if necessary. And when we do these things, it needs to be in kindness because there needs to be room for mistakes as we learn and grow. So how can we figure out what’s what? How can we tell whether something is coming from the flesh, the enemy, or from God? Paul gives us some simple criteria. 1 Corinthians 12:3-4 NKJV Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God calls Jesus accursed, and no one can say that Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit. So the first way we recognize the true is if Jesus is glorified, focused on, and lifted up by what is said or done. In the days of Corinth, there were priests and prophets who pronounced curses on Jesus; they wouldn’t acknowledge Him as Lord, and they would go so far as to say that God was against Jesus. None of the pagan prophets would acknowledge Jesus as Lord because the spirit in those false prophets hated Him. True prophecy always exalts Jesus Christ as King of Kings, Lord of Lords, the Messiah, and Savior of the world. Paul tells the Corinthians that they need to discern the spiritual source of a word and also examine its content so they won’t be led astray again. So one check we have is this: Is Jesus glorified and magnified by what is said or done? Second, is the Lord’s body edified? 1 Corinthians 12:7 NKJV But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all: I want to talk more about unity and the edification of the body next week, but if everyone in the body of Christ isn’t built up in the faith, then the manifestation isn’t from God. Third, is our flesh crucified? This is a big one. It speaks to humility and laying down our pride when we minister to others. Paul didn’t become an apostle because he was puffed up, prideful, and speaking in a way that sounded great to everyone. It was the opposite. He had to crucify his flesh and die to himself over and over and over again. The Corinthians actually used it against him - they said, ‘You’re not an apostle because you don’t take money from us for the ministry. Crazy! But Paul says 1 Corinthians 2:1-5 NKJV And I, brethren, when I came to you, did not come with excellence of speech or of wisdom declaring to you the testimony of God. 2 For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. 3 I was Examining Pneumatika | 7 with you in weakness, in fear, and in much trembling. 4 And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, 5 that your faith should not be in the wisdom of men but in the power of God. He said, ‘Look - when I talked to you, I wasn’t trying to convince you with human wisdom, fancy speech, or anything else. You can trust me because I’m committed to crucifying my flesh with Jesus on the Cross. And you can see it by the way I talk and by the way I live. You can see how weak and unimpressive I am as a person, and you can see that as I humble myself before you how powerfully the Holy Spirit moves on my preaching!’ The Corinthian people were used to hearing wisdom come in the form of eloquent speeches which involved careful reasoning and logic. Greek teachers would develop schools of thought based on philosophical presuppositions about life. Most of these intended to show people the most successful way to live. When Paul arrived in Corinth, he came as a messenger announcing that God had miraculously broken into human history by sending His Son, who had been crucified and resurrected for the salvation of all who would believe in Him. Paul didn't develop a philosophy; he simply came and told them what God had done and called them to repent and believe. This was a radical approach to these philosophical minds, but God had done miracles through Paul to confirm that his message was true. In fact, Paul says that he himself was in a weak condition when he arrived in Corinth, and there was nothing impressive in the way he delivered God's message. He reminds them that he was fearful to the point of physically trembling on some occasions when he ministered there. The reason Paul brings this out is because he is continuing to show how God's ways of working seem foolish to us. He has already shown that the gospel itself seems foolish, and then he helped the Corinthians realize that the make-up of their own church was very unimpressive by most social standards. His final point here is to show that he himself is an expression of this foolishness of God. God sent the gospel to them through a man who was weak and unimpressive in his delivery, and yet a great church had been formed in that city. So, once again, God had accomplished great things in spite of human weakness, and when the final assessment was in, no one could say it was Paul's eloquence that had brought them to faith. Examining Pneumatika | 8 My ultimate point here, though, is about our own responsibility to grow stronger in recognizing the voice of God. That’s what the Mary Model is all about. If we’re going to grow in ministering the spiritual gifts God has for us, both to our church family and out in the world, we have to learn to recognize what God sounds like and grow in hearing Him. There will always be mistakes because we’re human and we’re learning, but we have to learn how to separate the wheat from the chaff. Paul wrote to the Corinthians about how to move in the gifts, but he didn’t tell them to stop. He told them to grow. That’s always the question to us: will we grow? Are we willing to do the hard work on ourselves; are we willing to evaluate ourselves, what we say, how others respond; where do our flesh and attitudes and desires get in the way of our ministries? The Bible is always our final authority in matters of faith and practice. No prophetic word from a person will ever be compared in value or authority to God’s written word. Everything that is said or done will be tested by scripture. Cults get started when what a person says is held higher than what the Bible says. But God still desires to speak through people and to people. He wants to exhort us, he wants to edify us and build us up, and He wants to comfort us, maybe even warn us. So today, the question is; will we accept the responsibility to be discerning? Are will willing to police ourselves? Are we willing to get a little messy and give grace, and are we willing to grow? Are we willing to make integrity of heart, submission to the body, to leadership, and to the Holy Spirit take center stage? Are we willing to make love for people our driving motivator even if it leads us to cross with Jesus? Are we willing to get to know scripture to the point where we know exactly how God’s voice sounds? Let’s pray. Examining Pneumatika | 9