Now about the gifts of the Spirit, brothers and sisters, I do not want you to be uninformed (1 Corinthians 12:1 TNIV).
It is hard not to be confronted by the irony of this statement. God, through the Apostle Paul, is making His heart known about something in which He feels we should be informed. Yet, if there is one thing in the Body of Christ that is beyond question a topic of misinformation, it would be this subject of spiritual gifts. We go from the extreme of they don’t exist at all today to the opposite end of the spectrum in some circles of Christianity that look a lot like a three-ring circus. The disparity between the two ends of this chasm begs the question – how did we get so far apart on a topic upon which God unequivocally called us to educate ourselves and gave us very specific information in Scripture to do so.
Well, that is the problem – we have become “informed” by sources other than the Bible and when we have actually used the Bible as our source, we have read into it our own interpretations based upon our biases, fears, expectations, pride, and even personal agendas. How sad that we have missed the very heart of what God intended to be a great blessing and catalyst of unity for the Body of Christ and ended up with some of the greatest divisions in Christ.
It is important when God calls us to be informed on a subject – whether it be spiritual gifts or any other aspect of our Christian experience – that we stick to what is written and not wander into the uncharted territory of someone else’s opinion. While the Bible does say that there is safety in the multitude of counsel, God expects us to seek His counsel first. Then we will have a barometer by which we can verify if the counsel we are getting lines up with what is written or strays into those murky waters of pet doctrines that lead to division.
I will make a personal commitment to always seek answers from the Lord alone first and then run it by trustworthy believers who hold the same convictions about truth that I do.
No comments:
Post a Comment