The Gifts of the Spirit

Eric Mann

God - Part III: The Holy Spirit • Sermon • Submitted 3 years ago

Holy Spirit

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Child Dedication

Welcome Today we welcome Brett and Mindy, their sons Kellen, Daniel, Pheonix, and their new daughter, Savannah. We also welcome other family members who are here today for this event. It is wonderful that you can be part of this dedication service.

Introduction

Today Brett and Mindy have come to give thanks for Savannah. We will be dedicating Savannah to the Lord, praying that she would come to know and serve Him. We also dedicate Brett and Mindy to God, asking that He would give them wisdom, understanding, knowledge and ability to raise Savannah in the way of the Lord. As a church we dedicate ourselves to setting a godly example for Savannah so that she might one day come to trust in Jesus as her Lord and Savior.

Deuteronomy 6:4–9 CSB

4 “Listen, Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 5 Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. 6 These words that I am giving you today are to be in your heart. 7 Repeat them to your children. Talk about them when you sit in your house and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. 8 Bind them as a sign on your hand and let them be a symbol on your forehead. 9 Write them on the doorposts of your house and on your city gates.

This passage and other passages in the Scriptures impress upon God’s people the importance of raising our children to know and love God and to know and follow His ways in their lives. This morning I’m going to ask you a series of questions asking you to commit to raising Savannah to love and follow Christ. After each question, you can answer by saying, “We do.”

Parents:

Do you today recognize Savannah as the gift of God and give heartfelt thanks for God’s blessing?

Do you now dedicate her to the Lord who gave her to you, surrendering all worldly claims upon her life in the hope that she will belong wholly to God?

Do you pledge as parents that, with God’s fatherly help, you will bring her up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord, making every reasonable effort, with patience and love, to build the Word of God, the character of Christ and the joy of the Lord into her life?

Do you promise to provide, through God’s blessing, for the physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual needs of Savannah, looking to your own heavenly Father for the wisdom, love and strength to serve her?

Do you promise, God helping you, to make it your regular prayer that, by God’s grace, Savannah will come to trust in Jesus Christ alone for the forgiveness of her sins and for the fulfillment of all his promises to her, even eternal life; and in this faith follow Jesus as Lord and obey his teachings?

To the congregation:

Will you offer your ongoing love, support, prayers and encouragement to Brett and Mindy in their role as Savannah’s parents?

Will you also be faithful in praying for Savannah, and, as much as you are able, help teach and set a godly example for her so that she might one day come to trust in Jesus as her Lord and Savior?

Presentation:

On behalf of the church family, we’d like to present you with a certificate of dedication, as well as a gift to remember today’s dedication.

Prayer of Dedication:

Father God, you have heard Brett and Mindy make their commitment to raise Savannah to love and follow You. You have also heard this church commit to support them and come alongside them in their efforts to raise their children in a way that honors You and leads them to faith in You. Lord we pray that you would help each of us to honor the commitment we have made today, that You would give us wisdom and perseverance in the long journey that is involved in raising children, and that you would grant us the strength and the patience that we require. We dedicate Savannah to You Lord, and ask that she would grow to love and follow you, and that you would give her a life that brings you and her parents joy and pride. We ask these things in Your Son’s Name, in the Name of Jesus… Amen.

20151011 God Part III – The Gifts

Over the past few weeks we’ve been looking at the third member of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit. Last week we saw how walking with the Holy Spirit in a regular and consistent way affects us individually as God helps us to develop the character He wants us to develop. We talked about the fruit of the Holy Spirit and other character traits become more and more of a part of our lives the more we develop our relationship with God through the Holy Spirit. We also saw that we have as much of God and of the Character of Jesus as we choose to have. We can choose to let God work in our lives, which is hard work and requires us to give up the things in our lives that don’t please God, or we can choose to keep certain areas of our lives as “off limits” to God because we’re afraid of letting Him be in full control. The good thing is that even though it is hard to become the people God wants us to become, when we finally decide to allow God to change us, He gives us His strength and power to change, we don’t have to do it all on our own.

Drawing closer to God and letting Him make us more like Jesus is always worth it, and will always bring the best results for our lives in an eternal perspective.

Today we’re going to be looking at how the Holy Spirit works not just in our individual lives, but in the community called the Church to make us into a “body”, or a group of people, that is able to accomplish His plans for the world.

I want to start this morning by talking about (showing you some photos of) a “Sunday Assembly.” If you saw pictures of it, It would probably look a little familiar, especially if you’ve ever been to one of the newer churches that meet in a non-traditional place. There’s a band with music, a speaker that shares an encouraging and sometimes challenging message, they take up a collection to help fund the work they do in the community. There’s just one thing missing in this Sunday Assembly. God. You see, a few years ago a pair of British comedians started the Sunday Assembly as a bit of a joke. It was a place for atheists to gather, sing songs, hear an encouraging message, experience community with others that thought like they do. In their mind, they could have all the benefits that a church brings, but without God.

As wrong as that may seem to many of us, many modern Christian church services around the country seem to rely more on having a great band, a motivational speaker, a good fundraiser, or plenty of whatever they are giving away that week to pull off having church or doing ministry instead of depending completely on God’s Spirit to come and change people’s lives.

The late Dr. A. W. Tozer, author and pastor, said, “If the Holy Spirit was withdrawn from the church today, 95 percent of what we do would go on and no one would know the difference. If the Holy Spirit had been withdrawn from the New Testament church, 95 percent of what they did would stop, and everybody would know the difference.”

The question we need to ask ourselves here at Fist Baptist is if the Holy Spirit were removed from the things we do, would it make a difference? Is the Holy Spirit essential to what happens here every Sunday? Is the Holy Spirit a key component to our Food Mission twice a month? Is the Holy Spirit indispensable to our Thrift Shoppe ministry? Is the Holy Spirit a key requirement to what happens in our Upward Sports ministry, and our Wednesday night ministries? I believe the answer is “Sometimes.” I have no doubt that there are some things that our church does where the Holy Spirit is heavily involved and active. I also believe that there are areas where we may have good intentions and a sincere heart, but where we are relying on our own strength, on our traditions and on our abilities to carry on a work FOR God without relying ON God.

Thankfully, I believe that at the heart, our church and the vast majority of our members are genuinely interested in serving God and reaching out to our community, and when God has pointed out issues to us we have responded in positive ways. One of the things that my wife, Shannon, and I talk about on a pretty regular basis is the way that God is working in the people of our church to change us, grow us, and help us be more and more like who God wants us to be. I have heard some of you share your stories of what God is doing in your lives. I have seen the ways our Church is growing in the past year even in the midst of COVID, how the men and women of the church are walking closer to God now than they were a year ago. These are things that are evidence to me that we are allowing the Holy Spirit to work in us and to shape us more and more to be like Jesus Christ. But even though I think we have a good start when it comes to allowing God to work in us and through us, I want to take this opportunity to encourage each one of you to continue to open yourself up to God more and more; to let Him have a greater amount of control in your life than He does now; to not just let God work in you as an individual, but let Him use you as an important part of a bigger picture of how He wants to show love and compassion to the world through the gifts he gives each one of his children.

God wants each of His followers to play an important part in His bigger picture of how He wants to show love and compassion to the world through the gifts He gives us.

I was reading a book by a pastor named J.D. Greear a while back, and he made a great connection between C.S. Lewis’ book The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe in his Narnia series, and the gifts of the Holy Spirit. He recalls how in the story (and in the movie, if you saw that one), three of the children receive a gift from “Father Christmas.” Later in the story, it turns out that the gifts they receive have a lot to do with the role that each one of them is supposed to play in the battle between good and evil. Pastor J.D. goes on to draw a parallel that each Christian is also given one or more spiritual gifts, and these gifts help us understand what role God wants us to play as a part of the Church, Christ’s body.

The Spiritual Gift God gives you helps determine the role He wants you to play as a part of His bigger plan.

As Americans, we often default to thinking about the individual. We ask questions like, “What is God’s will for MY life?” and look for the answer as an individual rather than as part of a bigger picture. That’s how our individualistic society has trained us to think, but that’s not how the culture of the Bible thought, and I don’t think that’s how God wants us to think either. We need to be aware of the importance of living our Christian faith as part of God’s community - The Church. You see, God’s primary way of working in the world today is through the church.

Here is what Jesus said about the church.

Matthew 16:15–18 NIV

15 “But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?” 16 Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” 17 Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven. 18 And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.

Let me go off on a short tangent here, and then we will get back to our main point. Many people get confused and think Jesus was saying that the Church was going to be built on Peter, but Jesus didn’t build His movement on earth on he shoulders of an imperfect disciple, He built His earthly movement called the Church on the truth that He is the Messiah, the Son of the Living God. Getting back to the main point of today’s sermon, Jesus never planned for His message and His movement to depend on individual people, not even the Apostles. His plan was always to make a difference through a community of people working together. God’s plan to take salvation to the ends of the earth was His Church!

The Church functions as Christ’s voice, His hands, His feet, etc. Christ works THROUGH us to accomplish His purposes. In 1 Corinthians 12, the Bible uses the example of a body with different parts (head, mouth, hands, feet, ears, etc.), each with their own function and importance, and each controlled by the head, Jesus.

Going back to this question that many people ask about how to discover God’s plan for their lives, let’s look at this from the right perspective in the context of being a part of the Church. One of the things that is most helpful is to discover what your Spiritual Gift(s) is or are.

One of the best ways to discover what God wants from your life is to discover your Spiritual Gifts. (The Spiritual Gifts are listed out in 1 Corinthians 12-14, Romans 12, and Ephesians 4)

1 Corinthians 12:4–7 NLT

4 There are different kinds of spiritual gifts, but the same Spirit is the source of them all. 5 There are different kinds of service, but we serve the same Lord. 6 God works in different ways, but it is the same God who does the work in all of us. 7 A spiritual gift is given to each of us so we can help each other.

So, let’s look at...

How you can discover your Spiritual Gifts:

1. A spiritual gift makes you extra effective in a specific area that all believers are supposed to carry out.

Most Spiritual Gifts are duties and tasks the Bible tells all believers that they are supposed to carry out. All believers are commanded to serve others (Service), to tell others about Jesus (Evangelism), to speak about how the truths of the Bible relate to our everyday lives (Prophecy), to pray for the sick to be healed (Healing), to encourage and challenge each other to live godly lives (Exhortation), etc., but some believers are extra good at doing some of these things and seeing results. When this happens, it’s a sign that this person might have a spiritual gift in that area. Just because you DON’T have a spiritual gift in a specific area doesn’t mean God doesn’t ask you to do those things.

2. You discover your spiritual gifts as you actively obey God and do the things He calls you to do.

So as you obey God and serve others, tell them about Jesus, give money to the church and to help others in need, or any of the other things believers are commanded to do, God shows you the things you are best at. Sometimes, other people will also point out areas that you are especially good at.

As you start moving forward and start obeying God in these different areas, God will direct you more and more towards certain things. Most people don’t have some kind of supernatural or extraordinary experience where God suddenly reveals something to them (although that COULD happen). For most people, it’s a process of finding the things that come naturally to you as you obey God in many different areas over time.

3. A spiritual gift sometimes reveals itself at the intersection of what we are passionate about/what we love, what we’re good at, and what others tell us we’re good at.

Romans 12:6–8 NLT

6 In his grace, God has given us different gifts for doing certain things well. So if God has given you the ability to prophesy, speak out with as much faith as God has given you. 7 If your gift is serving others, serve them well. If you are a teacher, teach well. 8 If your gift is to encourage others, be encouraging. If it is giving, give generously. If God has given you leadership ability, take the responsibility seriously. And if you have a gift for showing kindness to others, do it gladly.

Serving well, teaching well, prophesying (speaking God’s word of Truth boldly) with faith, encouraging others, giving generously, leading with integrity, and showing kindness gladly are all things that people do when they are passionate about them. When you are passionate about things, it doesn’t necessarily mean you have a spiritual gift related to it (I can be passionate about football or about horses, but that doesn’t mean that it’s a spiritual gift). However, many passions and natural abilities can give you insights into ways that God has gifted you to serve Him and His people.

So look at the things you are passionate about. Maybe it’s education, maybe it’s helping the poor, maybe it’s justice for the abused, maybe it’s making things organized and helping things run smoothly, or helping people find hope when there seems to be no hope left, or something else.

Then look at the things you’re good at. Maybe you have the ability to explain things to other people so that even things that are hard for most people to understand, when you explain them they understand them. Or maybe you’re really good at taking chaos and giving it order, or maybe you are good at knowing when someone or something is not what they or it claims to be.

Then look at what people tell you you’re good at or effective at. If people are telling you that they are surprised at how you have patience with and compassion for people that most others would give up on, that might be a clue. Or someone comments that you’re really good at helping and serving, it may indicate an area that God has gifted you in. Maybe those things overlap with your passion and the areas you’re good at.

4. The Holy Spirit sometimes takes the specific experiences and events that have shaped who you are and gives you a spiritual gift that is in line with those experiences.

Sometimes God uses the experiences in our lives to teach us something that He will use later in our lives as a part of His plan. Maybe we learn a skill, or we learn how to overcome a hardship, or we learn something we didn’t know about God, and later in life those things will be useful not just to us, but to the others God puts in our path who need to hear about the things we learned through those experiences. Maybe a person grew up knowing what real hunger and poverty is, and understanding what it means to live paycheck to paycheck and just barely get by. And now that they are in a stronger financial circumstance they have a strong desire and drive to be generous with others when they see a need. Maybe another person grew up in a family that always opened their doors to others and where people came to experience true hospitality, and seeing the effect that their parents’ actions had on others has given them a desire to also be a home that practices hospitality. Maybe another person has experienced great loss and deep grief, or they have suffered at the hands of others unjustly, and they are now able to come alongside someone else and comfort them or offer them support in their own time of need.

People have different experiences, and as we relate to each other as a part of the Church, WE get to share with others about the wonderful things we’ve learned about God, and we get to hear FROM OTHERS about different things that THEY have learned about God through their own experiences. Together we get to experience and know much more about God than if we only had our own experience to learn from. This way we get a much fuller picture of Who God is.

5. God’s Spirit works in our every-day jobs and what we do.

Sometimes this area is one we forget about the most. God also wants to use what we do for a living as part of His plan for the world. This is not the same as our spiritual gifts, but it is still an important part of who we are. Our jobs sometimes give us skills that God can also use for His purposes. For example, a doctor, an accountant, a mechanic, or a teacher all have skills that God wants to use as a part of His plan to show His love to the world.

A few years ago someone in the church I was pastoring was having car trouble. So I called another church member who I know loves to tinker with cars and asked him if he would take a look at the car. He said he didn’t know if he had the skills or tools to fix the problem, but he was willing to take a look. He looked at the car, figured out it was something he could fix, and he fixed it. The person whose car was fixed really needed to have their car running. I know God blessed this person through a brother in Christ giving his skills to God and saying, “I’m willing to serve.”

Here is the thing I want to end with. God not only wants to work in us individually to make us more like Jesus and to help us grow spiritually. He also wants to use us together as a team, or as different parts of the body, each person doing their part to accomplish the bigger purposes and plans that He has for our community and for the world. One person alone doesn’t have everything it takes to accomplish God’s plan. That’s why God calls us to be a part of a community of people who are seeking God, growing in their faith, and willing to be changed and used by God to do great things for Him. But in order to reach our highest potential we need to be connected to the Holy Spirit and we need to let Him be in control of our lives more and more each day.

Together we get to see and experience more of God’s goodness, faithfulness, and provision than we would if we tried to live the Christian life alone. So if you want to experience God more deeply, and experience the joy of the Christian life more fully, work to discover your spiritual gifts, and then start using those gifts to serve God’s people and to serve others who still need God.

In the past few weeks you may have heard that we are going to bring back Sunday School the first Sunday of June (June 6). In order to do that, we are going to move the early drive-in service to 9:00 AM (this will also help make it cooler as the summer temperatures arrive); then Sunday School will be at 10:00 AM, and the indoor service will remain at 11:00 AM. After talking with Toni Anne, we’ve decided that at first, Sunday school will be limited to just a few classes (two or three) that will all teach the same thing. Because we’ve been talking about the Holy Spirit these past few weeks, and as we’ve started looking at how the Gifts of the Spirit are important to the church, we will be starting our Sunday School groups with a study on how to discover your Spiritual Gifts. The class will include a Spiritual Gifts assessment tool to help you figure out what gift or gifts you may have, but that’s not enough. You need to learn how to use your gifts to serve God and edify the church.

I hope you will consider attending the Sunday School groups starting June 6th, or if you aren’t able, we will try to make some of these assessments available for you to take on your own. These are just tools to help you get started, they are not the only thing I would use to try to figure out how God wants to use you and what He wants you to do, but it’s a place to start. As you start to discover the spiritual gifts God has given you, pray and ask God how He wants you to get more involved and how to use those gifts to serve the Church.

Let’s Pray...

As you spend time this week seeking God, consider joining one of the Sunday School groups starting in a few weeks.

· Ask God to help you see where your passions, what you’re good at, and what others think you’re good at overlap, and see if this might be an area where God has given you a special gift.

· Ask God to show you how you can use the skills and tools you’ve learned in your job or daily life as a part of His plan for our community and the world.

Hebrews 13:20–21 CSB

20 Now may the God of peace, who brought up from the dead our Lord Jesus—the great Shepherd of the sheep—through the blood of the everlasting covenant, 21 equip you with everything good to do his will, working in us what is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.