Verse one, first Corinthians
12. Now concerning spiritual gifts,
brethren, I would not have you ignorant. It's never the desire
of a believer for anyone to be ignorant of God's
word, the truth of God. And you may think, here we're
gonna talk about spiritual gifts now for a while. And we're not
gonna talk about Christ, but what an eye-opening few verses
we're gonna look at tonight that I wish everyone could hear in
this religious world. Concerning spiritual gifts, there
was a lot of ignorance about that then, and there's a lot
of ignorance about it now. about spiritual gifts, and so
Paul teaches very clearly on it, very clearly. He said, seeing
we have such hope, we use great plainness of speech, and he did. By the Lord's grace and by the
very inspiration of the Holy Spirit, the scriptures are very,
very clear on this. And notice throughout this discourse,
in this whole chapter and the next one and the one after that, that ignorance concerning what
God does, who he is and what he does, that's what spiritual
gifts are. Just like everything else, it tells us who God is
and what he did, what he does, what he's like. And notice throughout this now
that ignorance concerning that, him and what he does, always
leads to being removed from the simplicity that is in Christ. It takes the eye of the sinner
away from Christ, because the less ignorant you are about what
God says, the more you're gonna look to Christ. The more ignorant
you are, the more Christ gets set aside. And the other thing,
of course, the natural result of that is pride. We're gonna
be puffed up. And you see, that was the problem.
They were ignorant about this. They made it a competition. Christ was completely
forgotten in it. And they became proud, puffed
up. over it, something that was a
gift from God given to Editha. We're gonna see that, that's
what he gave those gifts was to exalt
himself and abase man, the sinner. And when that happens, everybody
wins. When we get in the dust and God
is glorified, everybody wins. Verse two, you know that you
were Gentiles, carry away unto these dumb idols, even as you
were led. Now Paul says this for a couple
of reasons. Concerning these spiritual gifts,
I don't want you to be ignorant about that and I want you to
remember where you came from. I want you to remember who you
are, what you are. and the change that has taken
place from then to now and how it happened, who changed you,
who blessed you thus far and gave you the understanding that
you do have and gave you the gifts that you do have. You were
Gentiles carried away unto these dumb idols. You were carried
away. You were full-fledged sold out
to a bunch of carved rocks and wood. Remember that when you're thinking
about this. If that doesn't bring you down, nothing's going to.
If the gospel doesn't bring you down, put you in your place,
then God is just letting you boast your way to hell. That's
all I can say. God's got to bring us down. You
were dumb enough to worship and bow and put all your hope into
a piece of stone. Remember that. You know that,
he said, you know that. They very much needed a reality
check and Paul's giving it to them here. It's as clear as day.
Let's start out on the right ground. They took pride in which
man they followed. We saw in the beginning of this
letter, they acted like lost people in all of their behavior. They were indulging in fleshly
appetites. They had perverted the ordinance
of the Lord's table so badly that God was killing some of
them for it. And as with all gospel teaching,
every time we gather to learn, let's take our place. If God doesn't turn the light
on, We will laugh and boast our way to hell, trusting in a spider
web. If he doesn't teach us, we're
not gonna know anything, nothing. Without God's grace, we're idolaters. We're no better than a bunch
of natives dancing around a totem pole. You can't heartily say
amen to that and you're not starting in the right place. God's gonna
have to bring us there. And then first things first,
anybody that has the spirit of God is known by this, their knowledge
of, faith in, and bowing to, or not, the son of God. Look at verse three. Wherefore,
I give you to understand that no man speaking by the Spirit
of God calleth Jesus accursed, and that no man can say that
Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost. You see what I mean
by first things first? This is not about people running
around speaking in other tongues. This is not about some kind of
weird magic show that people can get all excited in the flesh
and say hallelujah as loud as they can. It's not about that. The whole thing of spiritual
gifts is about who's on the throne and who ain't. If you can say that Jesus is
the Lord, you have the Holy Ghost. Anything short of that is despising
him and rejecting him. And the Holy Ghost has nothing
to do with that. So who are the ones that the
most boast in religion these days? I don't know if they even
do it anymore. I used to watch some of that stuff just to make
myself sick. Do you ever do that? Just make
yourself sick on purpose just so you can suffer. I used to
do that song. Not proud of it, but I don't
even know. Do they even have these? big revival meetings anymore
where everybody gets up out of their wheelchairs and stuff like
that, I guess they probably do. They were doing that then. And they were despising Christ
then like they do now too. And the ones that brag the most
about the Holy Ghost, the Holy Ghost, we have the Holy Ghost,
we're gonna show you the Holy Ghost, we're gonna show you the
power of the Holy Ghost. They're the ones that don't say a word. If they ever use the name Christ,
it's in blasphemous rebellion against his authority. He's Lord,
he is the Lord. Unless you confess that, the
Holy Ghost has nothing to do with you. The Jews as a whole called Jesus
a cursed. They despised him. made gladly
and with exaltation, nailed him to a cross and spit in his belly.
And the Gentiles too, some were claiming now at this time and
still do, some were claiming to have the spirit of God and
doing religious magic shows like religion still does. They were
going around offering healing and things like that. By the
power of the Holy Spirit, you'll get up out of your wheelchair
and we say these prayers over you and you go home and you'll
start getting better and things like that. And they were making
a lot of money off of it. But at the same time, they were calling
Jesus Christ accursed. And Paul said, they have nothing
to do with the Holy Spirit. It doesn't matter what they say.
Don't believe them. Don't fall for it. promising cures and things for
profit. They're still doing that. Why
do you think people go to these religious institutions that they
call churches? Because they want to get right
with God and live the Christian life so God will bless them.
And they'll go to heaven and have a mansion on a hilltop someday. I think God let me be in that
a little while when I was young so that nobody could question me on that. I know what
I'm talking about. I know what they're in it for. And one of the things that exposed
now the falsely religious Jews as imposters was the fact that
God accompanied the preaching of the gospel with signs and
wonders. You look at Mark 16, 20, following signs and wonders,
followed the preaching and God by that means supported and confirmed
the gospel that they preached. And of course, those who hated
Christ had to imitate that. I expect people were asking questions,
don't you? They're doing miracles, and what
are you guys doing? So of course they imitated that
and still blasphemed the Lord Jesus Christ at the same time.
Paul makes it clear that's not the Holy Spirit. Those who did have the Spirit
called Jesus the Lord. That word thee is there for a
reason. It doesn't have to be there. We'd know what it meant,
wouldn't we? By God's grace, that's what characterized
the ministry. You see, he's using these phrases
to characterize the difference, to show the stark contrast between
Holy Spirit and his gifts, and false religion and made up stuff.
And the difference is Christ, who Christ is. That governs, informs, guides,
and defines everything said after this. Jesus is the Lord. That's what characterizes, that's
the way Paul is describing the ministry. that is accompanied
and blessed and attended by the Spirit of God. That's what you're
gonna get out of it. When the Holy Spirit is there,
what you're gonna get out of it is that Jesus is the Lord. It's time to bow. It's time to
listen like God Almighty was talking to you, because that's
what's happening. This didn't mean that you had
a Jesus is Lord bumper sticker. To confess that Jesus is the
Lord is to acknowledge that he was who he claimed to be. The
son of God, God in human flesh. If you've seen me, you've seen
God the Father. To say that he is the Lord is
to bow to him in all of his work. If he is the Lord, then what
he says goes. It goes. not what you get out of it, not
what your truth might be. What he says goes, if he's the
Lord. What he says concerning God,
what he says concerning you, what he says concerning himself,
what he says concerning how a sinner is saved, goes. To say that Jesus is the Lord
is to acknowledge that he does what he will, when he will, with
whom he will. It's one thing to agree with
that doctrine. It's another thing to live every moment of every
day in the conscious reality of that fact. To bow to him in everything.
to look to Him in everything, to know that whatever happened,
happened exactly the way He ordained it to take place. To say that Jesus is the Lord
is to take your place before Him in the very meaning of the
word Lord here. which if you've heard all three
times in the last couple of weeks I've said this, you probably
think I'm beating you over the head with it. But I'm gonna keep
saying this because the Lord showed me this recently. The
word Lord, the word Lord here. Do you know what it means? Let
me read it to you verbatim from the Greek definition. This is
right at the top. You know how sometimes there's
alternate meanings and stuff? This is three or four of those
from the top down. He to whom a person or thing
belongs. Who are we talking about? The
one that owns you. That's who we're talking about.
He said, I'll do with my own what I will. That's you. All right. He to whom a person or
thing belongs about which he has the power of deciding. Is that not exactly the opposite
of what religion says? It's the opposite. We have the power of deciding.
To hear them and to listen to them, not so. about which the ones that he
owns, about them, he has the power of deciding, master, Lord,
the possessor and disposer of a thing, the owner, one who has
control of a person. Is that clear? Is that who this
religious world is talking about? If they are, I've missed it.
And I've been in the big middle of it. That's not ambiguous,
is it? Who he is, who we're talking
about here? You should be able to listen to a so-called preacher
for about five minutes and tell if that's who he's talking about.
If he's saying that Jesus is the Lord. If you know him, you should be
able to tell. Don't miss the fact that before Paul says a
word about, he's already on the subject of spiritual gifts, is
he not? Concerning spiritual gifts. But
before he ever says a word about gifts of knowledge and teaching
and speaking in tongues, he gets this straight right up front. The presence and blessing of
the Spirit of God in you or in anybody has to do first and foremost
with who Christ is. What think ye of Christ? And it has particularly to do
with his sovereignty. He said, now I'll have mercy
on whom I'll have mercy. So if religion's little Jesus
now had, if he had mercy on you or somebody in response to a
decision you made, then you're yet lost and you need to know
that. You just need to know it. Don't wanna argue about it. You
just need to know. There's nothing to argue about. It's not a competition. It's
not I know more than you. It's who is this Christ? that you're talking about. Is
he the Lord? If not, the Holy Spirit has nothing
to do with you except in condemnation. You have no reason to believe
anything other than that everything works for your evil if your savior is not the Lord. As I'm saying these things, all
these different errors that I hear are popping into my head, but
I'm not gonna get up on that. It doesn't matter what else anybody's
saying. He is the Lord, and there was
nothing unclear about that. Nothing unclear about that. And
if not, don't pretend you're in a church. Don't pretend that you're preaching
the gospel. Somebody said that we must confront the particular
issue of our day from the pulpit, or we're not preaching the gospel.
I get what they're saying, but let me tell you something, there
ain't never been but one issue, and that's who God is and who
ain't. In every age, in every century, in every day, from day
one, there ain't been but one issue, who God is. It ain't you, it ain't me. It's not anybody in religion.
It's not those who claim to have deciding power. You're saying
you're Lord. By definition of the word, you're
saying that you are the Lord when you say that. It's up to
you. That's what Lord means. Don't recommend that. Now we must confront error. We don't want to educate people
on the details of error. I'm not interested in that. I
don't want to study error with greater interest in error than
I have in the gospel. Not interested in that. But we
must combat error and establish the throne rights of the son
of God. To say plainly who he is, which
you can't separate who he is from what he did now. If who
he is is the Lord, then when he died to redeem sinners, he
redeemed sinners. It's not complicated. Far from
it. Confront error. The king of kings
sits on the throne. He decides, not you. Bow, there's
one thing to do. We gather in his name and we
worship him. Why? Well, that's the thing to
do if you're a Christian, no? You know why we do that? You
know why we come here and worship the Lord? Because he said so. He said so. By his grace, we
know who he is. We preach sovereignty. We preach
that he has mercy on whom he will have mercy. He made everything
exactly the way he wanted to. He runs everything exactly the
way he wants to. And he saved everybody he wanted
to. He's suffering. He can't be thwarted. None can stay his hand or say
unto him, what do I stop? You can't stop him. You can't
even question him. He's the Lord. He's the Lord.
He owns you. He has the power of deciding. We preach election. You know
why? Because he said so. It's that
simple. It's that simple. We didn't make
it up. He said, you've not chosen me, I've chosen you. I've chosen
you. Before I formed you in the belly,
I knew you and ordained you to be my prophet. He said to Jeremiah. We thank God, brethren, beloved
of the Lord for you, because God has from the beginning chosen
you to salvation through sanctification of the
spirit and belief of the truth. It means whereby he sets you
apart. That's what sanctification is
there. The Holy Spirit picks you out. that's by grace through faith
in his gospel. We preach predestination because
God said so, because Christ said so. Salvation by free grace, because
that's what he said. I will love them freely. There'll be no reason in them
It won't be a decision they make. It's not of him that willeth
nor of him that runneth, but it's of God that showeth mercy. We despise and we renounce our
own works. Paul to me is such an eloquent
example when he said, everything that I ever was or knew or did,
I cast it behind my back like it was dumb that I may win Christ. And I know that, I know to do
that. I know that about myself and all I am because Christ said
so. And I bow to his word in it.
I know it's true because he's given me faith to believe him. We renounce our own works. We
renounce our own will. We renounce our own ways because
he said so. He said no man can come after
me except he take up his cross, follow me. We hear Christ because God said so. This is
my beloved son. Hear him hear him Don't hear
anybody That preaches any other gospel unto you paul said let
them be accursed If they preach any other gospel unto you than
that which we have preached unto you Let him be accursed We hear him we speak of him because
he said so Everything I've commanded you, you go tell them. Whoever
believes you, I'll save them. What a beautiful thing this is.
What a beautiful, wonderful thing this is. How can we fail if we serve Him? And we come to Christ because
he said so. No man can come except the father
say so. And draw you, look that word
up. It means to take you from where
you are and put you where you're not until now. And where is that? Oh, no man can come unto me. If the father draws you, you're
coming to Christ. That's what's gonna happen. He does that by His Holy Spirit
now. You're not gonna despise Christ.
There's more than one way to deny Him and call Him a curse
now. You come right out and curse
His name like no doubt many of the religious Jews did. They
hated Him personally. Face to face, they hated Him.
Still do. They just can't get at Him now.
They wouldn't have been able to then if He didn't let them.
They had no power over him at all, except it were given to
them of the Father. He's the Lord. Of course they
didn't. He's the Lord. Of course he redeemed
everybody he died in order to redeem. He's the Lord. Of course
he does as he pleases with you and me and everybody else. Of
course he does. Of course he saves whom he will.
His hand's not shortened that he can't save. We're dead to this world, and
this world is dead to us because he said so. We glory in the cross, Paul said,
by whom? We glory in Christ crucified,
by whom this world is crucified unto us, and we unto this world. We cast the net, I thought about
this, when the disciples were fishing all night, We don't know what we're doing,
do we? We don't know. Even in that which we are the
most suited for. The thing that they did the best
was fish. But they fished all night and
caught nothing. And the Lord said, throw the
net over there. Is that what we do? What are we
gonna do? if not what the Lord has told
us to do. What direction do you have beyond that? Are you just
drifting through this life on a whim? Am I? We cast the net where we do because
he said so. Simon said, at thy word, we'll
do it. Is that how we're gonna be? Can
we be like that? Oh, by God's grace, I wanna be
like that. You know, we love each other. Indeed. The Lord has tested that love. The Lord has brought the fire. And we love each other. It's
not just something we say, is it? We love each other indeed, two
words, indeed. That's what love is. And you know why? Because he
said so. a new commandment I'd given to
you, that you love one another. Thank God for that commandment,
because when he gives a commandment, if anybody's gonna ever obey
it in any sense, he's gonna have to give the power to obey it. And bless God, I think he's given
us a little bit of that. Thank God for that. We believe on him. And we used to say, all my eggs
are in one basket. If he's not enough, I'm a goner.
And I'm not afraid. Are you? Not afraid. We trust him. Because he said
so. Can you believe in God? Believe
also in me. I will, I will, I will. And look at what Paul says in
the next three verses in closing. This is so beautiful now. There
are at least two things, and when I see two things in something,
that means there's probably 50. But there's two things here.
Verses four through six, listen to them together. Now there are
diversities of gifts. He's gonna talk about this. Different
things that the Lord enables his people to do for the furtherance
of the ministry. Why? Because he is the Lord. He didn't just wind this clock
up and let it run. He runs us. He made us, he owns us, and he
runs us. And he does so by giving us gifts
of his Holy Spirit to enable us. to obey him, to serve him,
to love him indeed, to worship him. And look, but the same spirit,
don't ever forget what spirit this is. This is the spirit whereby
we say, Jesus is the Lord. Any gift or use of a gift, or
a weird manifestation of some kind of thing in religion that
does not conform to that, that doesn't exalt the Son of God
and reveal Him for who He is, is not of the Holy Spirit. It's
the same spirit we're talking about. There are different administrations
in verse five. That's types of service. There
are different types of service. As he says later, there's pastors,
there's teachers, there's people that are gifted in knowledge,
people that are gifted to speak, different gifts. And there are
some that are many, he could never mention all of them. In
a million years, I've told you before, some people are just
gifted, and you know this is right, just to be an encouragement.
Maybe the pastor knows that better than anybody. Some people have
a gift for that. Everything they say is an encouragement. It just lifts you up. You love
to talk to them. That's a gift. No question in
my mind about that. Others have the gift of generosity.
Many have that in this church. Just whatever it is, just say
it. That's a gift. This world is
not like that. And so there are many gifts,
there are many types of service. There are many roles in which
to serve the Lord. And then look, there are diversities
of operations. That takes it down to each individual's
role in each particular service with the various gifts that qualify
them for that. So he takes it right down to
the specifics here. You see that? It's all different
for everybody. But don't ever forget this. It's
the same spirit. It's the same Lord, the end of
verse five. It's still about him. It's still about him. And there
are diversities of operations, but it is the same God. Isn't this clear? Would you expect
somebody to preach on the gifts of the spirit in religion and
say any of that? That's the spirit speaking. He takes the things of Christ
and reveals them. He always does that. The Lord
said, the Lord Jesus said, he'll guide you into all truth. You
won't be off on a tangent jumping over pews and saying, slapping
people on the heads and things. You'll be exalting the son of
God for who he is and putting sinners in the dust before him.
Bow, bow to his will and salvation. Bow to his word by abandoning
everything you are and have ever done and looking to him for all
your righteousness. Bow to Him, the crucified Son
of God, and the power of His precious blood to redeem. Without
the shedding of blood, not one of your sins can be put away.
I don't care who you are or what you've done. Everything that
you've done that you think is good is evil. And it takes the
blood of Christ to redeem and wash away your best work you
ever did. Bow to Him. as the Lord. And so you see how there's two
things here, diversity. Clearly he's saying this in the interest of unity also. You may have a different, you
may be in a completely different service and in that particular
service, you may have a certain gift that qualifies you for a
particular operation within that service. but it's the same spirit. It's the same spirit by which
I'm able to say what God said with his authority, not mine. And it's God working it. We can't
mess it up. May he never let us mess it up. We will if he purposes it, if
there's a reason for it that we don't know about and the Lord
lets go of you for a second, you'll be a disaster and I will
too. But may that never happen. May
the Lord work in us to accomplish his good purpose for his great
glory. So he reminds them in the spirit
of unity that there's one spirit, one Lord, one God that is over
all and in all and worketh all of this in his people. And that's
why this should never be a matter of pride like it was with them
or contention among them or any such thing because we're one
body, one Lord, one faith, one birth, one spirit. And also just
as important if not more so what we take from this is that all
of these gifts are given for the same reason the spirit teaches
us who Christ is to begin with So that he might be exalted That same spirit that causes
you to say I that Jesus is the Lord. You turn from your idols,
as these Gentiles did, and say, He's the Lord. I bow to Him now. I believe Him now. I submit to
Him now. I serve Him now. By His grace,
I love Him now. The same spirit causes you to
say that. And he also gave these gifts
and for the same reason, to exalt God's son. If any ministration
of the gifts that God gives doesn't exalt Christ and reveal him and
declare him and glorify him on his throne, then it's not the
Holy Spirit. If the gifts are being used or
taken to mean anything other than that, then the result is
pride, contention, malcontent, which is all a result of putting
Christ aside and looking to the flesh. Who's God and who ain't? And this is not a lesson that
only had application when there were gifts of the spirit like
tongues and healing. The most important, I want you
to notice as we go through this study, what Paul calls the most
important or what he says are the best gifts, they are very
much in effect right now in God's church. Preaching the word. He said if
somebody's talking in tongues, he's edifying himself. He gets
something out of that. Somebody preaching the gospel.
He edifies the whole church. He said, seek the best gifts. And those are still very much
in effect. Whatever you're doing in this world, as a believer,
whatever your gifts are, everybody is, we'll see in this now, nobody's
left out. Paul says, everybody's gifted
in one way or another. differently, diverse ways, diverse
uses. Whatever it is you're doing in
this world, if it doesn't exalt Christ, you've got to wonder,
why am I doing it? Now, that doesn't mean that a
secular job in this world can't honor and glorify and exalt Christ,
but does it? Will it? That doesn't mean that
things that you own in this world cannot be used for his glory,
his exaltation, his worship, but are they? Will they? The Lord Jesus Christ sent his
Holy Spirit into this world in a particular way after he physically
departed this earth. Doesn't mean the Holy Spirit
never visited the earth before that. Clearly, in the Old Testament,
he very much did. But he did say, when I leave,
I'm gonna send my spirit. I'll send you the spirit. And he said, he'll take the things
of mine and reveal them to you and he'll guide you into all
truth concerning Christ. Gifts with which every believer
is gifted are also for the glory and honor of God's son That's
it May God give us grace and use
us for his glory