2nd Sunday after Epiphany
January 18, 2004
1 Corinthians 12:1-11

^12:1Now about spiritual gifts, brothers, I do not want you to be ignorant. ²You know that when you were pagans, somehow or other you were influenced and led astray to mute idols. ³Therefore I tell you that no one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, “Jesus be cursed,” and no one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit.

⁴There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit.
⁵There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord.
⁶There are different kinds of working, but the same God works all of them in all men.

⁷Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good. ⁸To one there is given through the Spirit the message of wisdom, to another the message of knowledge by means of the same Spirit, ⁹to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, ¹⁰to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in different kinds of tongues, and to still another the interpretation of tongues. ¹¹All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, and he gives them to each one, just as he determines. (NIV).

The Spirit in You

  When Jesus changed the water to wine at Cana, he revealed his glory, and his disciples put their faith in him. That was a long time ago. However, Jesus has not stopped revealing or showing himself. He now shows himself through his Spirit. Last week we noted that Jesus was baptized with the Holy Spirit so that he could baptize us with the Holy Spirit and that this happens at our Baptism. He joins us to himself and begins to live in us through his Spirit. In this way Jesus now shows himself indirectly, through his Spirit in his people.

  Today we learn something very important about the Holy Spirit in our Epistle lesson. In writing to the Corinthians about spiritual matters, Paul teaches us that it is the Holy Spirit who both enables us to confess “Jesus is Lord,” and who works various gifts of grace among us.

  Some people seem to be more spiritual than others. They may claim to be filled with the Spirit. They may claim special spiritual abilities and even act like God speaks directly to them. “The Lord told me such and such.” Others of us would honestly have to say that we know hardly anything about the Holy Spirit and all that other stuff. It might make us feel inferior. It often causes tension between us. Such was the case in Corinth, much misunderstanding about the Holy Spirit and tension.

  Paul says, Now about spiritual gifts, brothers, I do not want you to be ignorant. You know that when you were pagans, somehow or other you were influenced and led astray to mute idols. Therefore I tell you that no one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, “Jesus be cursed,” and no one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit.

  The translation “spiritual gifts” is unfortunate. It really says “spiritual matters.” In fact, Paul will talk about much more than so-called spiritual gifts. The first of these spiritual matters is very important. You and I cannot believe in Jesus as the Son of God or trust him as our Saviour unless the Holy Spirit creates that faith in us. Oh, we could read a book about Jesus, or take a course on world religions at school, and decide that we would like to be a Christian. He could be our hero and we could follow him like a person follows a celebrity or a guru. But that would be a head thing or a hobby; it would not allow us to trust our life to Christ. To trust our life to Christ, we need something more.

  Paul says that no one speaking by the Holy Spirit can curse Jesus and no one can confess that “Jesus is Lord” except by the power of the Spirit. Perhaps we can best understand what Paul meant from an historical example. A couple generations after Paul, there was a guy named Pliny the Younger. He was the Roman governor of the province of Bithynia, which is now part of modern Turkey. Christianity was illegal and Pliny wasn’t absolutely sure what to do with people accused of being Christians. So he wrote the emperor, told him what he was doing, and asked if that was all right. This is part of what he said in his letter.

“Meantime this is the course I have taken with those who were accused before me as Christians. I asked them whether they were Christians, and if they confessed, I asked them a second and third time with threats of punishment. If they kept to it, I ordered them for execution; for I held no question that whatever it was that they admitted, in any case obstinacy and unbending perversity deserve to be punished. . .
“As for those who said that they neither were nor ever had been Christians, I though it right to let them go, since they recited a prayer to the gods at my dictation, made supplication with incense and wine to your statue, which I had ordered to be brought into court for the purpose together with the images of the gods, and moreover cursed Christ — things which (so it is said) those who are really Christians cannot be made to do.”

  Fortunately, we don’t have a situation like that to test us and show what we really believe. But the point is, that true faith in Christ is a gift of the Spirit. He works that confidence in us so that we are prepared even to suffer and die rather than deny Christ. A person would never say that he believed Jesus was Lord, God and Saviour, and die for that confession if he didn’t really believe it! Of that Pliny was convinced.

  If then you believe in Jesus, if you confess him as Lord, you need to know that it is because the Holy Spirit lives in you and has created that faith. When you were baptized into Christ, you received the Holy Spirit. Do not think of yourself as any less spiritual than another person. Do not think that you are less important to God than some other person. Just as the one Jesus died for all, so by the one Holy Spirit we all believe in Christ. Since the Spirit lives in you, he wants to work in and through you just as he worked through the Corinthians 2000 years ago. He may not do the same things in you, but he will do something!

  Now recognizing that faith itself is the work of the Holy Spirit, we can go on to understand something about spiritual gifts. Follow with me as I read verses 4-11. There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit. There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. There are different kinds of working, but the same God works all of them in all men. Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good. To one there is given through the Spirit the message of wisdom, to another the message of knowledge by means of the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in different kinds of tongues, and to still another the interpretation of tongues. All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, and he gives them to each one, just as he determines.

  Did you notice that Paul is not concerned with explaining the gifts? He mentions several examples: word of wisdom and word of knowledge; faith, no doubt a sort of heroic faith; gifts of healing; workings of miraculous powers, perhaps things like exorcisms; prophecy, i.e., receiving a revelation from God — for example, the Christian prophet Agabus who prophesied that the people of Jerusalem would arrest Paul and tie him up (Acts 21:7-11) — ; discerning of spirits, i.e., the ability to know if something is from God or the devil; various languages, i.e., the ability to speak languages that one doesn’t know; translation or interpretation of languages.

  Yet, Paul’s interest is not in the gifts themselves, but in who gives them. He doesn’t try to explain how they work and what they do. Instead, he wants us to see why there are such gifts. He wants us to recognize that whatever gifts there may be in the Church, All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, and he gives them to each one, just as he determines. They are manifestations of the Spirit!

  Paul calls these gifts “gifts of grace.” Again, “spiritual gifts” is an unfortunate translation. The word itself has nothing to do with spirit but everything to do with grace. The word means something that is freely given rather than earned or merited, gifts of grace. In other words, these gifts are not personal accomplishments! They are not indications that one person is somehow more important or valuable to God than another. These gifts are manifestations of the Spirit, ways in which the Spirit works to enable us to confess Jesus as Lord!

  The Corinthians were split up into competing factions within the church. They boasted about whom they followed, Peter, Paul, Apollos or Christ. They loved philosophy and apparently the gift of speaking other languages. Yet they failed to see that gift as one among others. The failed to see that it wasn’t their ability but the Spirits’ ability. They failed to see why the Holy Spirit was giving them that gift. The result was pride and competition among them. The result was neglect of other gifts, and especially a lack of love.

  All these, Paul says, are the work of one and the same Spirit, and he gives them to each one, just as he determines. That is what we must understand, even more than the gifts themselves. This one Holy Spirit works in us to build us up into the one Body of Christ. Christ is the head of only one body, not billions of bodies. He is my head and your head because we are members of that body. Whatever gift you and I may have, is given for the good of the whole.

  There are no grounds for division among us. We share one and the same Spirit. We cannot split up and judge one another on the basis of what gift we do or don’t have. Yet there are such divisions within the Faith today. The so-called charismatic movement generally believes that the sign of having the Holy Spirit is to speak in tongues, i.e., unknown, ecstatic languages. They consider those who do not speak in such tongues to be immature or even false Christians. Naturally, those who do not speak in tongues get defensive and condemn the so-called charismatics. This creates tension and division in the Church. Whatever this tongues might be, if it is indeed the work of the Holy Spirit, it cannot become a reason for division within the Church.

  So where does this leave us? First and foremost, the Holy Spirit and his gifts of grace bring us to Christ. Jesus gave the Holy Spirit to his people so that he could be with us. The Holy Spirit never operates independently of Jesus. Rather, through his Spirit, Jesus leads us and equip us to be his witnesses.

  It also leaves us a spiritual confidence and joy. If you confess that Jesus is Lord, you can be sure that you have the Holy Spirit in you. You don’t ever have to feel like a second rate Christian because you don’t speak in tongues or whatever. The Spirit is doing something in you for the Body.

  Finally knowing how Jesus operates in us through his Spirit gives us direction for important questions. For example, what about other religions? It follows that since one confesses Jesus as Lord only by the Holy Spirit, that those who do not confess Jesus as Lord have a different spirit. They are not part of the Body of Christ but need to be! Therefore, we should never be satisfied with the popular notion that all roads lead to heaven, that all faiths worship the same God. It’s simply not true!

  Know then that Jesus continues to reveal himself in you through his Spirit. If you confess Jesus is Lord, then know that the Holy Spirit is in you and look for the other ways he shows himself in your life.