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How
the Body Works
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Equipping
the Saints How the Body Works - Unity in Diversity How the Body Works - A Look at the Gifts How the Body Works - Love is the Best |
Study
3 - Divine Design 1
Corinthians 12:11-13
Now
that Paul has given us a look at the gifts, he takes us to the next
level. He has already
introduced the topic, but now it's time to go deeper.
God is a great giver, and He has been very generous in what He
has imparted. Now we come
to three wonderful verses that shift our focus to the Holy Spirit.
As we will see as our study develops, God is interested in
pouring out His gifts, but is more interested in our true spiritual
condition. The
Spirit is the Source
At
verse 11, all the gifts that Paul has described are the work of the Holy
Spirit. Paul
begins to masterfully set forth his argument that the gifts are nothing
for us to brag about They are distributed by the will and determination
of the Spirit. In other
words, the Spirit decides who gets what, why, and when!
God is sovereign. So while the ecstatic utterances of the
Christians, for example may have been interesting to the speaker, they
may not have been beneficial to anyone.
In fact they may have been a source of grief for some who may not
have appeared as "enlightened" as the others.
Therefore the utterances glorified the speaker and not the giver
of the utterance. We
can see this clearly chapter 14. We
must come to the point of understanding the rightful place of Christ
as the Head. The
source of all things that have eternal significance is in the Lord.
He is the bread of life, He is the light of the world,
and He is the source of the Rivers of Living Water that
Jesus promised when He spoke to the Woman at the Well.
If we receive our "food, light and water" by focusing
on men, then we will soon become hungry, dry and thirsty!
When we "fix our eyes on Jesus, who is the author and
finisher of our faith," (Hebrews 12:1,2) we will never be
hungry, in darkness or thirsty for the eternal. We will then find the
nourishment, light and drink we need that will satisfy our spirits. Ephesians 2:1-10 All
that we have is from the Lord. It
is by His empowering presence that we have been saved. When we did things our way, we followed the way of the ruler
of the kingdom of the air, which was the path to destruction, futility
and despair. We were headed
for wrath, and there was nothing we could DO to stop it.
But God, who is rich in MERCY (unmerited favor), gave us life
instead. It is GRACE (the
empowering presence of God) that saved us.
We have nothing to boast about, because from the start we are HIS
piece of work! We were made
by Him to do what He made us to do before we were born!
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