The Christian's Duty in a Hostile World, Part 3 B

Beloved, there are a lot of issues that are important in the church.

None is more important than this and none is more serious than this. If you disdain to use your gift, you cripple the body of Christ. You cripple it. And if we do not function as the body, then Christ is crippled and the world's perspective of Him is skewed. When you think of the vital parts of your body, the first ones that come to mind probably aren't the tiny bristling cilia in your ears and nose, but you'd sure miss those microscopic barbs if you woke up tomorrow and they were gone.

Cilia, after all, are essential for hearing and smelling. The fact is, a body functions properly only when all its parts, even the hard-to-see ones, are working together in harmony. Certainly that's true for the body of Christ. But how does God expect us and equip us to function in a world that is antagonistic toward the very work the body is trying to accomplish? John MacArthur considers that vital question today on Grace to You as he continues his study, Faith Through the Fire. Now with the lesson, here's John. Let's open our Bibles to 1 Peter chapter 4.

Look at verse 10 and 11. As each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another. First of all, I want to talk about the extent of these special gifts. Peter says, as each one has received, and therein does he describe for us, the extent of special gifts, or as we call them, spiritual gifts. Everybody has one. Everybody has them, and you've got one that nobody else has. So you take that unique gift in a unique ministry with a unique effect, with a measured amount of grace and a measured amount of faith, and then you add your physical capabilities, your training, your background, your opportunities, your environment, and all your influences, and you function like nobody else.

That's why there's nobody to replace you if you don't function. That's the extent of spiritual gifts. Secondly, what about the source of spiritual gifts?

Where do they come from? What about the source? Well, we've already certainly hinted at it. Look again at verse 10. It says as each one has received a special gift. You've received it. Somebody gave it to you. You didn't earn it. You didn't pray for it. You didn't plead for it.

You didn't work it up. You didn't generate it. You received it. Ephesians 4, 7 calls it Christ's gift. The word for gift here is charisma. That's the word from which we get grace. It is a gift of grace. You didn't earn it.

You couldn't earn it. By the way, in Ephesians 4, 7, when it talks about Christ's gift, it uses the word doreah, and that word doreah emphasizes the freeness of the gift. Sometimes spiritual gifts are from the word pneumaticos, which means spiritual. That's talking about the character of the gift. It's a spiritual capacity. Doreah is talking about the freeness of that gift. And so freely we have received our spiritual gift. It is a gift of grace, a spiritual enablement. It is supernaturally given.

It is supernaturally energized. You can't earn it. You can't work it up. You can't pursue it. That's what's so foolish about people pursuing certain spiritual gifts.

You can't do that. They are received, not pursued. So we see the extent of gifts. All believers have them, the source of gifts.

They are given by the Holy Spirit. Thirdly, the nature of gifts. The nature of your spiritual gift is indicated by the word gift, the word gift.

And we've already basically touched on this. The word is charisma. Our spiritual gift is a gift of grace. It is undeserved. It is unearned.

It is free. It is given to us by God's Holy Spirit. As I mentioned, doreah emphasizes in Ephesians 4, 7 the freeness of the gift and this term shows the motive behind that free gift, namely God's grace. The word pneumaticon, also translated spiritual gifts in 1 Corinthians, means spirituals and emphasizes the character of those gifts. That is they're controlled by the Holy Spirit. Now keep listening to me.

I'm going to pull this all together. So what is the nature of our gift? It is motivated by the grace of God, given sovereignly and freely to every believer, and controlled by the Holy Spirit. It is charisma, motivated by grace.

It is doreah, freely given. It is pneumaticas, spiritual in the sense that it is operated by the Holy Spirit. You will find that term pneumaticon used in 1 Corinthians 12, 1, 1 Corinthians 14, 1, and then a number of other places in the 14th chapter as well to refer to spiritual gifts. So then summing it up, what is a spiritual gift? It is a graciously, freely given mode of ministry energized by the Holy Spirit.

Did you get that? It is a graciously given, free and supernatural, spiritual capacity for ministry to the body of Christ. A spiritual gift is a God-given capacity through which the Holy Spirit supernaturally uses you to minister to the body.

That's it. I have a spiritual gift. I use it to minister to you. You have a spiritual gift. You use it to minister to me. It was given you graciously, freely by God. It is energized by the Holy Spirit and through it you minister to the body.

We're not talking about human talent here. We're talking about divine enablement. Your spiritual gift is a unique capacity to minister to the body of Christ as the Spirit of God flows through you. Now, Peter says, first of all, take care of the vertical relationship and be holy in your life.

Secondly, take care of the horizontal relationship, be loving in your relationships. And now thirdly, he says, serve, serve, serve. And the thing by which you serve is this vehicle God has given you called a spiritual gift. Now, let me give you another thought about it, not only the extent of it and the source of it and the inherent nature of it, but let me talk about the obligation of it. Look back to our verse, verse 10. As each one has received a special gift, use it in serving one another. Now, there's the obligation.

Use it. First Corinthians 12, 7 says, you were given a gift for the common good, for the common good. You are to use it to be mutually beneficial to the church, to help, to benefit.

You cannot cease to use it without it having an adverse effect on the church. Go back to first Corinthians 12 for a moment and let me show you this. First Corinthians 12, and I want you to just flow through this so you'll really understand this. First Corinthians 12, 12, and he's comparing you and your spiritual gifts in the body of Christ with a human body as an analogy. So he says, a body is one and has many members. And all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ.

Just look at your human body. You've got one body but a lot of functions and a lot of members. Okay, that's like the body of Christ. Verse 14 says, the body is not one member but many. Now what's going to happen here in verse 15? If the foot should say, because I am not a hand, I am not a part of the body, is it not for this reason any the less a part of the body? Your feet can't go around saying, well, because I'm not a hand, I'm not going to serve. Or if the whole body, verse 17, were an eye, where would the hearing be?

Everybody's got a different function. And if the whole were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? Now God has placed the members, each one of them, in the body as He desired. And if they were all one member, where would the body be?

It would be a freak. But now there are many members but one body. And the eye can't say to the hand, I have no need of you. Or again the head can't say to the feet, I have no need of you. On the contrary, it is much truer that the members of the body, which seem to be weaker, are necessary.

In other words, that you may be proud about your nose and the beauty of your nose, you're better off without your nose than you are without your liver. And what might seem the less comely might be the most important. Sometimes we depreciate some members of the body of Christ in the wrong way.

So, look at verse 23. Those members of the body which we deem less honorable, on these we bestow more abundant honor. And our unseemly members come to have more abundance seemliness, whereas our seemly members have no need of it. But God has so composed the body giving more abundant honor to that member which lacked that there should be no division in the body, but that the members should have the same care for one another.

In other words, you've got to understand that everybody's equally important. Before the time of cosmetic surgery, you didn't do things to make sure your ears were the way you wanted them. You didn't do things to make sure your nose was the way you wanted it.

You didn't do things to make sure your hands were the way you wanted it. You did things to make sure the stuff nobody sees was working. And you had surgery to fix something inside because that was more important to you than on the outside. It's nice to be nice on the outside, but what does it matter what you look like if you're diseased on the inside?

The point is this, those members which are the most visible and the most entertaining and the most prolific are not necessarily the most important. So you can't underestimate anyone's significance. You use your gift. You can't say, well, I'm not going to serve because I'm not a hand. I'm not going to serve because I'm not an eye. I'm not going to serve because I'm not an ear.

You can't do that. You have an obligation to use your spiritual gift. Beloved, if you don't, you're in disobedience to the Word of God and you're running cross grain to regeneration because you are saved to serve. Furthermore, would you notice again into verse 10 that he adds a little strengthening word for us. We are to employ it as good stewards.

There we are to that word, oikonomos again. We are responsible for managing our gift. We are responsible like a steward was.

A steward handled people's land and their funds and their resources, their human resources and their food stuffs, paid wages, took care of the members of the household. They managed all that for the owner and that's what it is with us in the spiritual gifts category. God has given these gifts for us to manage. You don't own your gift. You're under obligation to use your gift.

Now don't get overly technical trying to describe what it is or refine it and define it. I know there have been all kinds of computer studies that'll tell you your gift. You fill out two sheets and they'll send you back a little paper that tells you your gift. No.

No, it cannot be analyzed by a computer. Your gift is what you do when you're filled with the Spirit of God to serve the body of Christ which produces a positive impact. That's your gift. And if you try to get me to totally identify mine, I can't do it.

I just know the Spirit of God uses me when I'm available to be used. Now no gift is for you. Your gift isn't for you. My gift isn't for me.

I don't preach to listen to my own tapes. That's not for me. It's for you. And you don't serve. You don't serve for you. You serve for me. We serve each other for the common good.

Now, another thought. Peter speaks also of the variety of spiritual gifts. The variety of spiritual gifts. Would you please note at the end of verse 10, he says we are to be good stewards of the manifold grace of God. The manifold grace of God.

Well that word means multicolored. And it reminds us again of 1 Corinthians 12, 4 to 6 where in 1 Corinthians 12 he says there are varieties of gifts. There are varieties of ministries. There are varieties of effects.

Literally it means distributions. So God gives these gifts and He gives these ministries and He gives these effects in all kinds of varieties. Manifold multicolored giftedness. And I love that word multicolored because that takes me back to the palette again.

God has these colors and He blends them to paint you a unique color. So you and I may both have the gift of teaching, but mine may be blended with a unique grace, a unique measure of faith. Mine may be blended into a special ministry with a special Holy Spirit energized effect. Great diversity in the body of Christ. I may preach but with an emphasis on showing mercy. I may preach with an emphasis on discerning truth.

It varies from person to person. That is why non-use is so crucial because nobody can take your place. Nobody can take your place. Beloved, there are a lot of issues that are important in the church.

None is more important than this and none is more serious than this. If you disdain to use your gift, you cripple the body of Christ. You cripple it. You turn it into a crippled body which does not rightly represent Christ. I used to call the church body number two. Body number one was Christ incarnate.

Body number two is Christ living in His church. And if we do not function as the body, then Christ is crippled and the world's perspective of Him is skewed. Now, we have these gifts, but there is an assumption in Peter's commands here and that is that we're not all using them properly. We can use them improperly in the flesh, counterfeiting them.

We can let them fall into disuse. And so in either case, we are disobedient. So Peter says, you've received a gift, use it. And then in verse 11, he shows us that our gifts fall into two general categories, two general categories.

Very simple. Whoever speaks, let him speak as it were the utterances of God. Whoever serves, let him do so as by the strength which God supplies.

Stop at that point. Two kinds of gifts, speaking gifts, serving gifts. That's it. You either have been given speaking gift or a serving gift. Some of us have been given a gift which involves speaking, preaching, teaching, giving word of wisdom, giving a word of knowledge, discernment, leadership. Some have been given serving gifts, the gift of service, maybe the gift of administration, the gift of prayer which is a quiet, silent behind the scenes, showing mercy, the gift of helps and all of those beautiful blends.

Those are the serving gifts. If you have a gift of speaking, he says in verse 11, make sure when you speak, you speak the utterances of God. If you have a gift of prophecy or teaching or knowledge or wisdom or exhortation, when you open your mouth, make sure you speak as it were the utterance of God.

Now let me say a word about that. That term is used of Scripture. It refers to the Old Testament.

It is so used in Acts 738 and in Romans 3, 2. Whenever you use a speaking gift, you must speak God's truth, not your own ideas. You must speak the word that God uttered, the utterance of God. Since not all Christians were inspired by God, like the writers of the New Testament, since not all Christians were inspired by God, Peter must be referring here to the revealed word, the written word. And he is simply saying if you have a speaking gift, whenever you speak and you use that gift, it better be the Word of God.

That is a very, very strong statement. Secondly, if you have a serving gift, then you do that by the strength which God supplies. If you have a gift of helps or a gift in the area of administration or giving or mercy, gift of discerning, some function of serving the body of Christ, then you better do that by the strength which God supplies.

You better be energized by the Holy Spirit, walking in the Spirit, Spirit-filled so that you're not doing it in the flesh. So Peter gives us here full instruction on spiritual gifts, the extent everybody's got them, but individually they are unique. The source, they come from God.

They can't be sought. They're given by grace as a free gift from God's sovereignty. The nature of gifts, they are spiritual enablements through which the Spirit uses you to minister to the body. The obligation, you are to use your gift and you are to use it as one who has a stewardship before God to discharge.

The variety, almost as endless as your imagination and beyond because each of us has one unique to ourselves, the multicolored grace of God and the categories, speaking gifts, serving gifts. Now, beloved, those are our instructions. Christian life is fairly simple. Holiness with God, love with men, spiritual service.

That's it. And since you have been transformed by Christ from the kingdom of darkness, translated into the kingdom of God's dear Son, you have a desire then to obey. Finally, we've seen the incentive, the second coming. We've seen the instructions, holiness, love, service. Third and finally, the intention, the intention. What's the goal of this? Verse 11 at the end, so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever.

Amen. What's the intention of all that we do? What's the intention of our holiness, the intention of our love, and the intention of our service that God may be what?

Glorified. That God may be glorified. So that, Peter says, in all things, all the matters of Christian duty, God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. This is, by the way, what we call a doxology, a doxology.

Doxology is simply a word that means a word about praise, a word about glory. And so we are to glorify God. We can only glorify God, notice in verse 11, through Jesus Christ to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever.

And commentators have long discussions about whether to whom refers to God or whether to whom refers to Jesus Christ. And I think it is a blessed, inspired ambiguity because the glory belongs to God in Christ and Christ in God. And so I want to glorify God. Whatever I do, whether I eat or drink, 1 Corinthians 10, verse 31 says, I want to do all to the glory of God. And the way to do that is to live in the light of the second coming of Jesus Christ, is to fulfill the obligation of holiness, love, and service in the power of the Spirit and thus to live to the glory of God. Peter can't resist throwing an amen on the end of this.

So let it be. Let my life be to the glory of God. So we are to live in the disciplines of life.

And as I said when we started all of this, the cost of discipleship is high, but not as high as the cost of rejecting Christ. He expects the best out of us and the goal to give Him all the glory. So in the end, were we perfectly holy, perfectly loving, and perfectly serving, we would take no credit, right?

We would give Him all the glory. Let's pray. Thank you, Father, for these great truths which the Spirit of God has vouched safe to our hearts in the Word. And may we be obedient to be the people you want us to be, not just forgiven, but transformed. And may that impulse that longs to obey attach itself to these commands. And may we continually yield to the duty which you desire to produce in us by your Spirit. In the dear name of our Savior, we pray. Amen. This is grace to you with John MacArthur.

Thanks for being with us. John is chancellor of the Masters University and Seminary in the Los Angeles area, and the lesson you just heard is part of his series from 1 Peter titled, Faith Through the Fire. John, in light of what you said today about Christians using their spiritual gifts, I imagine there are listeners who simply wonder, what are my spiritual gifts? So how would you answer that? Is there a test you can take? And how do you determine what your spiritual gift is?

And is it even important to know? Well, I think it's important to know because you should be responsible for the use of that gift, but I think you can over-define the gift. There are some people who think that a spiritual gift is sort of a one-dimensional thing like the gift of faith or the gift of giving, which are specifically mentioned in the New Testament. I tend to think that your spiritual gift falls into one of two categories, 1 Peter 4.10. As each one has received a spiritual gift, employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. But Peter also says there are speaking gifts and there are serving gifts.

So I don't think those are narrowly defined. You have in 1 Corinthians and also in Romans the list of gifts. They're categorical, but they don't tend to over-define the gift. In fact, I would like to think of it this way, that there are many categories of gifts. If you think of them as colors, the Lord painting you on a palette, he dips into a number of those gifts and paints you. And so you're a combination of things that make your gift unique to you. Maybe a speaking gift primarily, maybe a serving gift categorically, but it's really unique to you. It's designed for your personality. It's refined through your experiences and the work of the Holy Spirit in your heart. Its purpose is to minister to others. And that's why you need to use your gift, to know your gift and use your gift. But don't over-define it. I'll just use myself as an example. Obviously preaching, teaching, giving is a part of what I believe the Holy Spirit prompts me to do. So I'm a blend of those things, as every believer is. You'll know what your gift is because it'll be what you love to do, what you find fulfillment in doing, and what other people are benefited from.

Right. And, friend, if you have more questions about spiritual gifts, if you want to know exactly what Scripture says about them, get John's commentary on 1 Corinthians. It includes teaching not only on spiritual gifts but also on church unity, Christian liberty, and more. To order the commentary on 1 Corinthians, contact us today.

The book is available in hardcover for $19 and shipping is free. The 1 Corinthians commentary, in fact the entire 34-volume MacArthur New Testament commentary series, is ideal not just for pastors but for any student of Scripture. To order the volume on 1 Corinthians or a few additional volumes or the entire set, visit our website, gty.org, or call us toll-free, 855-GRACE.

And that number translates to 800-554-7223. And remember, if you're looking for further study on a particular passage of Scripture, we have thousands of Bible study tools available free of charge at gty.org, including John's entire sermon archive. That's more than 3,500 sermons covering the entire New Testament and much of the Old Testament, all free to download in either MP3 or transcript format. Again, the sermon archive and many other Bible study tools are available at gty.org. Now for John MacArthur and the entire Grace To You staff, I'm Phil Johnson inviting you back tomorrow when John will show you more ways you can experience hope and victory during trials. Faith Through the Fire, that's John's current study. Be here for that when another 30 minutes of unleashing God's truth, one verse at a time, comes your way on Tuesday's Grace To You.