Spiritual gifts part 15: The world tells the unbeliever he's fine. The believer? In trouble.

Pastor-Teacher
John Farley
Thursday,
August 19, 2010

Spiritual gifts part 15: The world tells the unbeliever he’s fine. The believer? In trouble.

Spiritual Gifts Part 15: The world tells the unbeliever he’s fine. The believer? In trouble.

The Doctrine of Spiritual Gifts

Point 1: Setting the scene for Paul’s teaching on the Spiritual Gifts.

The Angelic conflict plays out in the conflict between the principles of the world system and the principles of the cross.

The battlefield right now is the soul of the Church Age believer.

The world is a system of thinking that exalts self and opposes the Lord God.

1. Question God’s word.

2. Remove respect for the authority of the Lord God.

3. Contradict God’s word.

4. Attack God’s character.

“The world” is a system of thinking, based on deception, that opposes the Lord God and exalts self, yet never truly satisfies, and results in death.

Try to satisfy the body, the soul, and the spirit through counterfeit means, rather than according to God’s perfect provision and accurate instructions.

Satan thought he had won a great victory on planet earth when he enticed Adam and the woman to rebel against God.

Our Lord is the Heavyweight Champion of the universe!

The Gospel is first and foremost an adventure. It is the announcement of the greatest victory of all time.

The Lord Jesus Christ comes on the scene and He knocks down the barrier that satan had built to imprison the human race.

He destroys the works of the devil: sin, the penalty of sin, the consequences of sin, the affront to God’s character and nature, death (physical and spiritual), our position in Adam, human good and evil.

That is why the Church Age, coming fast on the heels of the Resurrection and Ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ, is the age of the unique spiritual life.

The Church age is the dispensation when God the Holy Spirit is manifesting the victory of our Lord Jesus Christ on the cross.

One of the most visible and powerful manifestations of this life of the Spirit in the church is the function of spiritual gifts in the local assembly!

The local assembly with its members functioning in their spiritual gifts is a powerful manifestation of what the Trinity is about in loving One Another, working together to achieve a common goal, and one glorifying the Other.

What in the world is “the world”?

Know as a matter of first importance that Christ through His cross has overcome it, JOH 16:33.

You share in that victory by virtue of being a believer and therefore being in union with Him.

At the moment of belief in Christ as your savior,
you are placed in an unbreakable union with Him.

So as Paul tells us in Galatians 6, the power of the work of Christ on the cross has worked for you by destroying the power that this world otherwise would have on you.

I hope you know you’re ALIVE! Check it out..... ROM 6:11, EPH 2:5, 1PE 3:18.

The kingdom of darkness works to convince the unbeliever that he is saved - doing fine! - and convince the believer that he’s not saved!

EPH 2:5
Even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ ( by grace you have been saved),