Focus on the Giver not on the Gifts.

Focus on the Giver not on the gifts.

“Now if the foot should say, ‘Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,’ it would not for that reason stop being part of the body.16 And if the ear should say, ‘Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,’ it would not for that reason stop being part of the body.17 If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? 18 But in fact God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. 19 If they were all one part, where would the body be? 20 As it is, there are many parts, but one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, ‘I don’t need you!’ And the head cannot say to the feet, ‘I don’t need you!’” (1Corinthians 12:15-21).

For the next few weeks, I would like to write about the way we should interpret the gifts, services, and works of the Holy Spirit in context of the unity of the fellowship of believers. As you are thinking about this, the elephant in the room is whether supporting the practice of the gifts of tongue and prophecy or not. Very briefly, there are two major views on the gifts of tongue and prophecy, based on the interpretation of the verbs, “will be ceased” and “will be stilled” in 1 Corinthians 13:10. On the one hand, a group called, cessationist, interprets them as the permanent cessation of those gifts for all future churches, while another group interprets them as the temporary stillness for the proper practice of the gifts. I will not go into the detail of biblical exegesis and critical analysis, but, I want to confirm first that God still gives us the gifts of the Holy Spirit and second that believers must be wise and humble to practice them in our local congregations, focusing on the Giver not on the gifts