Scripture: I Corinthians 12:4-11
Among all the disputations and misconceptions that plagued the prickly Corinthian church, Paul took extreme care with one in particular: the spiritual gifts phenomenon. Part of the difficulty with the Corinthian Christians was their inability to see the substantive differences between living as a Spirit-based Christ-body community and living as part of one of the dozens of other pagan cultic communities which also claimed to give their members a deity-directed existence.
Instead of playing down the diversity of gifts of sign present and possible, Paul happily enumerates them. He seems eager to demonstrate that whether an individual experiences the impressive gift of wisdom, the eye-opening gift of knowledge, the quiet gift of faith, or the more show-stopping gifts of healing, working miracles, uttering prophecy, discerning spirits, or speaking and interpreting tongues — all these are “by the same Spirit.” For Paul, the presence of all the spiritual gifts is equally necessary to create a whole and healthy faith community — a genuine witness to Christ.
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Answers to the blanks in the bulletin:
The gift of Discernment is a special ability to distinguish between truth and error, justice and injustice, what is authentic and genuine and what is phoney.
Are you ready for a Miracle? Those with this Spirit-given power are able to act contrary to natural law or use natural law in extraordinary ways!
Anyone with the gift of Healing allows God to work through them as an instrument for restoration.
The gift of Tongues is understood to be either the ability to speak a language not normally spoken or to utter praise to God not understood by human ear.
If a person has the gift of Interpretation they are gifted with the ability to translate language uttered so that the message can be understood!
