Do They Continue? The Gifts, Pt. 2 (Articles of Faith Series

If you choose to become inactive or to leave the restored Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, where will you go? What will you do?

You're entering outer brightness. But God, being rich in mercy because of the great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, just in case you didn't get it in those few verses, right? Even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. Did I warn myself again?

No. He made me alive together with Christ. Listen, I can no more manufacture the second birth than I manufactured the first one. How can you look upon this inner with such love? Grace overflows my cup. All of my soul and my heart have been revived.

In you I'm satisfied. All right, Fireflies, welcome back to this episode. Today we're going to be discussing, again, the gifts of the Spirit. Last week we covered several questions related to that, and we're going to cover some more topics related to the gifts today.

So let's jump right in. Is there a connection between the Spirit as gift and the Spirit as giver? In other words, were the equipping gifts of the Spirit present in the Old Testament, even though the indwelling gift of the Spirit was not?

Matthew, you want to tackle this one? Yeah, I thought about how to answer this question, and the only example that really came to mind, or that I was thinking about it, is there were times in 1 and 2 Samuel where the Spirit came upon people and spoke through them. And even King Saul, the Spirit even came upon King Saul and he prophesied through him. But I think even then, you can see later in 1 and 2 Samuel that I don't think that King Saul was a believer because he continually tried to murder David.

He was continually trying to throw a spear at him, and it's like after the fourth or fifth time, you think David would get the hint, like, maybe don't trust this guy? But yeah, he just continually tried to kill David, but the Spirit still prophesied through him. So there's a lot of debate amongst people, like, well, was he saved?

Was he not saved? Well, how could the Spirit talk through him if he wasn't saved? And so I think there are a lot of, especially Reformed writers, they'll talk about how the Spirit can temporarily work through somebody and give them gifts and supernatural abilities, or prophesy through them, or give them gifts without them actually being saved. So I think, but we do still recognize that it is the Spirit himself that does operate and does give gifts. So it's not as if we can operate independently of the Holy Spirit and have these gifts. It's the Spirit himself that gives these gifts.

So there is definitely a connection there, but one does not necessarily need to be a saved believer for the Spirit to work through somebody. Michael, you said in the previous discussion that we had, you talked about Abimelech, right, where God gave him a word of prophecy and spoke to him. But we don't really get any kind of indication that Abimelech was a true believer.

I mean, he could have been. It's uncertain that God can speak to people without them necessarily having that indwelling of the Spirit that comes with being a true born again. Yeah. And then, of course, there's the example of Pharaoh in Egypt receiving the vision of the seven healthy cows being eaten up by the seven starving cows. And so he's receiving a vision of what is going to happen in the future.

And this is a pagan king. So I think that goes along with your point as well. But yeah, what I was going to say in answering this question is that, yeah, there may not have been an indwelling of the Spirit, but you would look at some of the miracles performed by righteous people in the Old Testament. And, you know, how is that possible without the Spirit enabling them to do it?

So and I'd be interesting and interested in your take on that, too. But I mean, I'm just thinking about, you know, Joshua having the ability to lead the Israelites into battle and and and then winning these fights and and then being able to cross the Jordan River, you know, and and on dry ground, just like through the Red Sea. And then all the things that Elijah did, you know, calling fire down from heaven. I mean, I know he didn't do that of his own power. So it seems to me like there were gifts being given by the Spirit, even in Old Testament times.

Yeah. Yeah, I wanted to tease this out. So let me read real quick what what my theology professor, Dr. Jack Cottrell, has to say here. He says, there's no connection between the Spirit as gift and the Spirit as giver. Old Testament saints did not receive the gift of the Spirit as an indwelling presence, but the Spirit nonetheless bestowed gifts of service upon some of them. That is, the gifts of the Spirit are not the result of and are not related to the fact that the Spirit dwells within us. So I think it's an important distinction to kind of tease out, especially with with Latter-day Saints, because, you know, Joseph Smith's view, if you if you look especially at the book of Moses, I think it is right where Adam is baptized by the Holy Spirit.

Not not like we not like Christians talk about like the baptism of the Holy Spirit, but actually baptized by the Holy Spirit in water. And so it's his his view was kind of like this this view that that God's work with humanity was the same throughout all time. And, you know, that's not what we actually see within the Bible. What we see within the Bible is successive revelation. And so it's an interesting thing to kind of tease out there because there's there's kind of this, I don't know how I would term it, maybe just consistency view that Latter-day Saint Scripture seems to take versus what we actually see in the Bible. So I think kind of talking about the how the Old Testament Saints, some of them and even as Michael Michael pointed out, Pharaoh, you know, that there was work that the Holy Spirit did in and through people in terms of giving them spiritual gifts that that they used. But it's not the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit that Christ promises to believers in the New Testament.

Yeah. And just to kind of piggyback on that a little bit, Paul, I've definitely come across and I think I used this argument when I was a Latter-day Saint. Well, you know, Saul prophesied so he must have been a Christian. And the fact that he went totally evil and bad means that you must be able to fall from your salvation.

So it kind of leads you down this this theology that isn't true if you take that position and it gets even dicier in the New Testament. And I just had this argument with a Latter-day Saint this week, you know, where he said, well, you know, Judas was an apostle. And I said, yeah, Judas was an apostle, but he wasn't a Christian.

I mean, he betrayed Christ for some pieces of silver. So he may have had that title, but, you know, having a title or having gifts of the Spirit, it does not make you a saved Christian period. Right. And when you said that Judas was not a Christian, you're not saying it in the sense that he was a professing believer.

You know, you're talking about a regenerate, born again, actual, true believer. Correct. Yes. Yeah. Thanks for clarifying that. I mentioned that because a lot of people get confused, you know, between a professing believer and a true believer. Good.

All right. So next question. For what purpose are the spiritual gifts bestowed upon believers?

Michael? Well, OK, so short answer on this one, it seems that they are given to help us strengthen the church. And I would also say, I mean, I think that goes into a bunch of subcategories.

But I mean, it can be, you know, for preaching, for missionary work, anything that the church would be involved in. I would say that the gifts can help with that. I don't know if there was anything specific you were looking besides that. But that's that's what I came up with. That's pretty consistent with I don't know what's happening there. That's pretty consistent with.

Yeah. I mean, with what my theology professor kind of had to say about the saving work of the Spirit meets the needs of the individual. But his equipping work has a different purpose. The Spirit gives ministries and abilities to individuals so that those individuals may use these gifts to meet the needs of God's covenant people as a whole. Matthew, anything to add there? Yeah, I'll just quote from 1 Corinthians 12 that just confirms what you just said. Now, there are varieties of gifts, but the same spirit. And there are varieties of ministries in the same Lord.

There are varieties of effects, but the same God who works all things in all person. But to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. And then he speaks about the various gifts for one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit to another, the word of knowledge, according to the same spirit, to another faith by the same spirit and to another gifts of healing by the one spirit and to another, the effecting of miracles and to another prophecy and to another the distinguishing of spirits to another various kinds of tongues and to another the interpretation of tongues. The one in the same spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually, just as he wills or even as the body is one and yet has many members and all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body. So also is Christ for by one spirit, we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves are free.

And we were all made to drink one spirit. So that's just to confirm what you already said. All right.

Good. And Matthew, I'm going to come to you again on this next one, because I know you wanted to you were really want to kind of touch on these. So there's four main lists of spiritual gifts in the New Testament. These are Romans twelve, three through eight, first Corinthians twelve, eight through ten, first Corinthians twelve, twenty eight to thirty and Ephesians four, eleven.

So the question is, are these are these lists all inclusive or representative? And Matthew, take it away and do do with that question what you wanted to do. Oh, yeah. I forgot I was going to do that. Let me see if I still got it open in accordance.

Yeah, I was going to show a side by side of that. So hold on. It should be open because I didn't I didn't get rid of it. It saves your last session. Hold on one sec.

I should have thought about that. And I'm sorry to put you on the spot. Doing the other discussion first really threw me off.

All right. It's opening now. It's a good thing I'm not using logos or logos.

I tried the trial version and it took like 10 times longer to open on my computer. It's a little bit bloated in terms of its resources. Yeah, I was trying to I was trying to work with it a little bit, too, after you used accordance last time.

I was like, well, I've got logos. I might as well try to use it. And it just bogs everything down.

I can't do anything with it. Yeah. Having a bunch of stuff open at once is pretty rough. OK, hold on. OK, it looks like they closed. So I am just going to close all that. Open up a new copy. Yeah, this is a sorry, guys.

Keep you waiting. I thought it'd be cool to show it side by side, though. That's a lexicon.

I don't need that. Oh, great. Can you see my screen with the accordance? Yes.

Now I can see it. OK, cool. All right. So I figured this would be good to kind of show side by side, have all the different passages. So it was Romans 12 through three through eight. I'll just have that. OK. And it was Ephesians 4, 11, right? Yep.

Sorry about that. OK, so it seems like when we're looking at Ephesians chapter four and first Corinthians 12, 28 and following, those are kind of talking less about specific gifts and more about offices, if I'm right. So feel free to jump in if you guys have comments or things you want to point out. But yeah, so when I was when I was going through these, it seems more like the beginning of Romans 12 and first Corinthians 12 are more specific to the actual specific gifts. So when we compare Romans 12, three and verse 12 or sorry, chapter 12, verse four in Romans, for just as we have many members in one body and all the members do not have the same function. So we who are many as one body in Christ and individually members of one and one of another. And that kind of mirrors what we what we were reading in first Corinthians 12. Let me just show the whole chapter.

I think we I think I read that earlier. Right now, there are varieties of gifts, but the same spirit and their varieties of ministries in the same Lord. There are varieties of effects, but the same God who works all things in all persons. But to each one is is given the manifestation of the spirit for the common good. And then but one in the same spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually, just as he wills.

So I think these two chapters kind of corroborate each other the purpose of the gifts. And then when we actually go into the actual lists in Romans 12, we see since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, each of us is to exercise them accordingly. If prophecy according to the proportion of his faith, if service in his serving or he who teaches in his teaching or he who exhorts and his exhortation, he who gives with liberality, he who leads with diligence, he who shows mercy with cheerfulness. And then when we compare kind of lists of gifts in 1 Corinthians chapter 12, we see, starting with verse 8, for to one is given the word of wisdom through the spirit and to another the word of knowledge according to the same spirit, to another faith by the same spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one spirit, and to another the effecting of miracles and to another prophecy and to another the distinguishing of spirits to another various kinds of tongues and to another the interpretation of tongues. In 1 Corinthians chapter 12, 28 and following, let's see, it speaks of all are not apostles are they, all are not prophets are they, all are not teachers are they, all are not workers and miracles are they, all do not have gifts of healings do they, all do not have, do not speak with tongues do they, all do not interpret do they. So some of those are speaking of offices, apostles and prophets and teachers and some are speaking of miracles, gifts of healings, tongues, interpretation, assumedly of tongues, and we see in Ephesians chapter 4 says he gave some as apostles and some as prophets and some as evangelists and some as pastors and teachers. So we see that as kind of mirroring what's said in 1 Corinthians 12 in terms of the types of teaching offices or gifts and abilities that God has set up in the church and he gives the purpose in Ephesians 4 verse 12. For the equipping of the saints for the work of service to the building up of the body of Christ until we all attained the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God to a mature man to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ. As a result we are no longer to be children tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men by craftiness in deceitful schemes. So I don't think these are mutually exclusive lists, of course we would see that Scripture as a whole corroborates each other, but there are slightly different purposes I think to each passage.

But overall it's the spirit that's calling, that's enabling, that's giving all these gifts and it's for the betterment, it's given individually but it's for the betterment of the body or the blessing and the edification of the body. So that's kind of the major points I want to point out. It's kind of nice to have all these side by side to show that in comparison with one another. Is there anything you guys wanted to add while I still have this up? No that's good, I want to hear Michael's one word answer.

Hold on, what was my one word answer? Oh, the lists are representative. I mean it says right there in 1 Corinthians 12 that there's a variety, right? So if it really is just limited to what it says in these two passages that really isn't much of a variety, so I'm just taking the Scripture at its word that there is a variety, so I assume that there's more than what's listed there.

Yeah I agree with that. Just kind of going back to Cottrell, he says, you know, many will agree that these lists even when combined are not necessarily all inclusive. There may be other gifts not named in the New Testament that have been or are being bestowed by the Spirit, sometimes in view of new needs that may arise. I agree with Pettigrew, there probably were other gifts, although the ones that Paul discusses are representative of the types of abilities bestowed on early Christians. So just kind of quickly, you know, move through the lists in each passage, Romans 12 through 8, prophesying, serving, teaching, encouraging, contributing to the needs of others, leadership, showing mercy. 1 Corinthians 12, 8 through 10, the message of wisdom, the message of knowledge, faith, gifts of healing, miraculous powers, prophecy, distinguishing between spirits, different kinds of tongues, interpretation of tongues, then moving to 1 Corinthians 12, 28 to 30, apostles, prophets, teachers, workers of miracles, gifts of healing, ability to help others, administration, kinds of tongues, interpretation. And then Ephesians 4, 11, apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers. So, yeah, good to have those lists up.

So moving on to kind of the next question. What does 1 Peter 4, 10 to 11a have to say about the categories of the spiritual gifts? Is it justifiable to distinguish between types of gifts based on this passage?

Michael, what do you think? So I looked at this passage, and my thought is it goes along with what we've been saying up until now that there's one spirit that is giving all of these different gifts. And so I don't think that we can distinguish between them as being, I mean, I guess it depends on what you mean exactly by that. But to me, it seems like they're all from the same source.

So I don't see them as being different types unless you're just talking about different uses. Is that what you meant? Yeah, no, not necessarily. So let's read the passage. So it's 1 Peter 4, verses 10 to 11a, which says, And as each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. Whoever speaks is to do so as one who is speaking the utterances of God. Whoever serves is to do so as one who is serving by the strength which God supplies so that in all things, God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. So the idea here, I guess, is that there's kind of a distinguishing between the one who speaks and the one who serves, right? So maybe there's different categories of these spiritual gifts, prophesying, maybe prophets, apostles, leaders.

Those would fall into the one who speaks versus the one who serves kind of thing. So some theologians use this passage to kind of make a distinction between types of spiritual gifts that would have ceased versus types of spiritual gifts that would have continued. So I'm kind of digging into whether or not you think this passage is useful for that. Okay. Well, with that context, I just don't see that from this verse personally. I wouldn't use it like that. I just don't think there's enough information in there to actually make that argument. What about you, Matthew?

What do you think? Yeah, I could go either way. As we were reading the passage, it kind of more speaks to me as to what, it's differentiating what type of gift it is or how it's expressed in the body. So like you said, by speaking or by serving, we have different gifts, but they kind of are manifested or they're operated in different ways. So I guess you could, it's kind of more saying, it's more giving instruction as to how to use these gifts, but all for the common purpose of serving one another and helping one another.

Yeah. But I can kind of see what you were saying, how one could interpret that as saying that some gifts have different purposes or leading into the next question. But yeah, I'm not entirely certain either that that's kind of what it's saying. The distinction that's kind of drawn is, and I'm not trying to convince you because I'm not necessarily convinced myself.

I'm just exploring this as we talk. But the distinction that is kind of drawn is that maybe the gifts of those who speak would be prophecy, revelation, that kind of thing. That those are more supernatural than say the stewardship gifts or the Samaritanship gifts, which are more just kind of naturally human abilities. So it really is looking to kind of draw this distinction between supernatural versus natural and suggest that some of the supernatural gifts have ceased.

That's something that we could even spend a lot of time talking about, but I won't. But yeah, I've always thought about how there are a lot of gifts that some people may be given that aren't maybe the most, quote unquote, desirable. You know, we see someone who's really good at listening or helping people go through their issues or who has experience, and I think that is a gift that God can give. This gift of counseling or a gift of ministry that's not as maybe glamorous as being able to preach really powerfully like a Spurgeon.

And so what do you think? Do you think that is the spirit working in them? Or do you think God has just kind of providentially prepared that person to be naturally good at that? Or do you think it's the spirit enabling them to perform that work? Do you see what I'm saying?

I'm trying to work off of what you were saying to see if I'm understanding what you're saying. So you're asking whether I think someone who's good at counseling specifically or, but you mentioned also Spurgeon, so you're asking potentially preaching as well and asking if either of those are the spirit working through that person? Yeah, I meant more of the first, the former, like, you know, things that it seems like, well, anybody could do that, you know, you and an atheist could be a nice person, you know, could take, could help the sick or, you know, say a kind of word to somebody. You know, do you think that's God working in them through the spirit? Or do you think maybe that's more God just providentially working out, you know, putting somebody in the right place at the right time? Yeah, I mean, I think it's definitely possible that it's God working through them.

You know, we talked earlier about Pharaoh in the Old Testament, Saul, right, who had times in which they spoke a word or showed some sign, right? And so I think it's definitely possible to say, and especially if you agree with what we were talking about earlier, where, you know, we kind of say, okay, that there were gifts of the spirit or giftings of the spirit present in the Old Testament, even among people who were not followers, even among people who were not saved believers. So, yeah, I think that's possible because, you know, we said earlier, or at least, you know, my theology professor that I read from earlier said, you know, that there's no connection between the spirit as gift and the spirit as giver. So those gifts don't necessarily come to us as the result of the indwelling presence of the spirit. So yeah, I could see God working through others. And it doesn't necessarily need to be some kind of supernatural event to be a gift of the spirit. Right.

Michael, you came off mute. Yes, I was just thinking too, I mean, you've got, you know, atheists that can perform music and sing better than Christians can. But then you've got, you know, these ministry teams, and I'd say that's a gift of God, you know, and one of the things that it talks about in the list of scripture that we read is that these gifts are to glorify God.

And so when it comes down to it, even if they're not singing as well as the atheist is, they're glorifying God more than the atheist is. I don't know if that's even relevant. I'm just like throwing in some weird random comments, but it was just something that jumped into my head.

Yeah, that's what we were talking about. We were all born and raised in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah, more commonly referred to as the Mormon faith. All of us have left that religion and have been drawn to faith in Jesus Christ based on biblical teachings. The name of our podcast, Outer Brightness, reflects John 1-9, which calls Jesus the true light which gives light to everyone. We have found life beyond Mormonism to be brighter than we were told it would be, and the light we have is not our own.

It comes to us from without, thus outer brightness. Our purpose is to share our journeys of faith and what God has done in drawing us to his son. We have conversations about all aspects of that transition, the fears, challenges, joys, and everything in between.

We're glad you found us and we hope you'll stick around. All right, so what about the sign gifts then? So namely, speaking in tongues, healing, prophecy. Are these evident in the church today? Are you a continuationist or a cessationist and why do you take the position that you take?

I'll go first. So when I was transitioning out of the Latter-day Saint church and kind of going into Christianity, one thing that attracted me originally to Community of Christ is they have basically the same view of gifts of the Spirit that the mainline LDS church has. You know, to me it just seemed strange to have a Christian church that doesn't believe in modern revelation or doesn't believe that they have the authority to heal and things like that. And it took a long time for me to kind of transition and understand and read Scripture and read arguments given by Christians.

And the final word, the book that I mentioned previously, really kind of helped to kind of give a big scale picture of the gifts and specifically the sign gifts. And it's really hard, I think, to give a straight up just proof text of cessationism, you know, because there's a lot of passages you can point to where to not forsake prophecy, you know, to not rebuke prophets, you know, things like that, not to scorn prophets from giving a word of prophecy. And it's a lot easier to point to those and say, well, see, we're not supposed to, you know, we're supposed to accept prophecy, we're supposed to receive it willingly and joyfully.

There's not a specific passage that says gifts have now ceased, you know, so it's a lot harder to prove cessationism. But I think when you look at the grand scheme of Scripture, what you see is these these periods of time where incredible manifestations of God's working in time are kind of limited to certain periods of time. So we do see God giving prophecy through certain people, but when we talk about the major miracles, we basically see that working in Moses with the parting of the Red Sea, the water coming out of the rock. We see that with Elijah calling down a fire from heaven. We see that with Elisha, but we see long periods of time where we don't see these grand, miraculous miracles performed by God.

We may see prophecy, we may see an occasional healing, but there's not these grandiose miracles that are being performed. And we see that oftentimes in the Old Testament context as being a sign or an approbation from God that these people are sent from God. So like, was it Mount Carmel that Elijah was on? Is that the name of the mount? I get all the mounts mixed up. Or is Mount Carmel the Mount of Transfiguration? There's too many mounts.

We need to make mounts fewer again. I don't know. Mount Carmel is a Carmel sundae from McDonald's.

On top of Mount Carmel, all covered in Carmel. Okay, I'm done. I'm done. That was terrible. That was terrible.

No, I think it's Mount Carmel. Correct me if I'm wrong, but anyways, you know, it was to show that the God of Baal was not the true God and that Yahweh was the true God. You know, he consumed the pyre that Elijah had set up, even though it had been doused with these barrels of water. It was God giving a sign for a specific purpose. And it's kind of the same thing with Elisha, you know, like proving that he was the chosen successor to Elijah, that Moses was God's chosen leader to lead Israel out of Egypt. And we don't see that for a lot of the history of the Old Testament. And then when we come to Christ, that's again when the miracles start showing in a more grandiose fashion, healing the sick, raising the dead, all kinds of miracles. Yes, I do not have the gift of singing.

I apologize. And we see that with the apostles also, you know, after the day of Pentecost, they were given the gift of the Spirit that fell upon them and there was prophesying, there was healings. It says that there were multitudes of people that came to Peter and they just hope that the shadow of Peter would cross over them so that they might be healed. And it says they were all healed. So there were these miraculous healings on a massive scale going on. But as we see, I think you can make a solid case that over time, it started to become less and less of this, you know, entire multitudes of being healed. There were people still being healed, but it was more on an individual level. And then towards one of the last epistles that was written, you know, the last epistle from Peter, I think, 2 Timothy, and he was saying to Timothy to drink wine for as many stomach ailments. Why didn't he just tell him to go find an apostle or healer to get rid of that stomach ailment?

Instead, he tells him to drink wine for his infirmities. So we kind of see that like there was a huge burst of miraculous healings at the day of Pentecost and afterward, and then it kind of slowly dwindled over time. And so I think that when I read it all in context and the fact that these healings started in Jerusalem and they went in concentric circles, you know, it started with the Jews, the believing Jews in Israel. And then it kind of moved outwards and moved to the Samaritans and to the God-fearers, which were Greeks that were kind of amenable to Judaism, but hadn't been officially converted.

And then it moves finally to non-Jewish, non-believing Greeks. We see that we see God working outward and each time he goes to a new people group, you know, these miracles are shown. So it's to demonstrate God's sanctioning or God's power, giving the authority to these apostles, to these people, showing that these are his people.

He is working in them and it's for that specific purpose. And so when the church was set, you know, the church was set up, elders were set up in every city and, you know, there was the completion of the canon. We see we don't see these miracles anymore in history. And so it's hard to prove cessationism, but that's what I am is a cessationist, not a hard cessationist and saying God can't do anything today. But it's more of a, well, God does heal, but there are not people with the gift of healing. You know, there's not people that go around and can touch, people that can heal, whatever they heal. And, you know, there are stories of people that supposedly in missionary, you know, where the languages aren't known, they're able, there's miraculous instances of them being able to speak the language supernaturally. And I don't, you know, I can't testify whether or not that's possibly true, but it's definitely a possibility.

So that's kind of why I'm more of a, I don't know, I don't want to say a cautious cessationist, but more of just like a, you know, not a firm cessationist. But when we're talking about the sign gifts, they were given for a specific purpose and time. And once that purpose had been fulfilled, then those sign gifts were no longer operative in the church. And for those that would say, well, there's still no passage in the Bible that says that these aren't supposed to operate today. Well, I point to passages that say what the what the gifts should look like. You know, tongues was not just incoherent speech, it was actual languages. So if you want to show me that the tongues are operative today, then show me a congregation where they're all just randomly starting to speak Russian and Japanese when they've never studied, when they never studied it before. And to have someone interpret that perfectly through the same spirit. And then I will, I will become a continuationist. But until then, I guess I'm a practical cessationist? I don't know.

Sorry for that. I could I could go all day about that. That makes a lot of sense to me.

It's pretty close to what my my kind of position is as well. Going back to the question that we discussed in another episode, can you limit God? You know, that's why I guess I would say I'm a cautious cessationist, right? I like I'm with you, Matthew, I think it's hard to it's hard to prove it from the Bible, but it logically makes sense in terms of even the way, you know, John writes his gospel and in demonstrating, you know, the signs that Jesus did the sign passages and the gospel of John.

And, you know, the purpose for them being to show that Jesus was the Son of God come in power. Michael, what do you think? This isn't a question that I really thought about too much before preparing for this podcast. Hadn't really taken a huge solid position on this. And I think the reason is I'm not typically a huge like really big into the non-essential doctrines because I don't like things that divide us. I'm really big into Harmony among Christians. And so I'm very reluctant and sluggish to get into any of those doctrines.

Like I don't even like I don't even know what the whole like pre-mill and all that stuff is to be honest. I'm like, I'm going to get into it at some point and I know I'm going to be a fanatic about all of those things, but I'm just taking my my sweet time. And I do I do tend to talk a lot to Latter-day Saints and I view it as a bit of a hindrance because I'll have Latter-day Saints say all the time. Like, oh, well, if I become a Christian, does that mean I have to believe that there's not gifts anymore? And I like to be able to say, no, you don't have to believe that, you know, that is a that is a non-essential doctrine. But if I had to say that I leaned one way, I'm the opposite of you guys as far as where I lean, I would say that I'm a cautious continuationist. Just because to me, you know, there isn't a scripture in the Bible that that says that they were supposed to end.

And to me, if God is the same yesterday, today and forever, then those should still exist. That said, I am extremely skeptical a lot of times when people are speaking in tongues or giving a prophecy. So I'm probably somewhere on the line with it. I could go either way tomorrow.

But at the moment, yeah, I'm a cautious continuationist. Makes sense. Makes sense. Your kind of allusion to the conversations with Latter-day Saints is a good segue into our final question. So how do you experience the gifts of the Spirit now as a Christian and how is it similar to or different from your experience as a Mormon?

Michael, why don't you tackle this one first? It's your opportunity to speak to the Latter-day Saints who kind of questioned you. Yeah. So one of the things that came to mind just now is that Latter-day Saints, you know, they have the article of faith. We believe in the gifts, you know, all the gifts still being present.

Book of Mormon is very strong on this. And I don't know if either of you heard this, but Elder Bednar gave a talk in January at BYU, you know, basically saying people ask me all the time, why don't we still have the same miracles that the restored gospel had when it when it started? He said, oh, these miracles are still happening. And he gave these examples. Bill Real and RFM did an episode on it.

Highly recommend going and listening to it. But he gave these eight examples of people just going to the temple and not having much time and getting the work done and calling that a miracle. And it just simply does not compare to what the LDS church says was going on when the church first started. You know, seeing Elijah having angels coming down and giving the priesthood and all these things that they said happened. And so it's kind of funny because in Mormonism, they've kind of taken a, you know, like that the miracles have ceased, sort of like it's more of a theoretical thing.

But you don't really see examples of that going on. So it doesn't seem like it's really a point that Latter-day Saints have currently to actually go on. What I would say is, as a Latter-day Saint, I didn't have a lot of experiences where I felt like I was receiving the gifts of the Spirit. There's one thing where I was on my mission and I prayed that God would give me the ability to speak well. And I felt like I was able to do that when I came home from my mission. And so I attributed that to, you know, a gift of the Spirit. Of course, I've left the church now. I'm not supposed to even have the Spirit, but if I'm giving a prepared presentation, I still am able to do it just as well as when I was a member of the church.

So that tells me that it's not really related to it. Now, at this point, I experience the gifts of the Spirit a lot, especially when it comes to my writing. So I'm constantly finding myself having writer's block because I try to put out an article every month. I've probably got 10 articles right now that just have an introduction, maybe one or two sentences that I started, and I couldn't figure out what in the world to write next. And yet every month I'll start, I'll go back to one of these articles and I will suddenly just know exactly what to write.

And this last month, I did an article that we're going to talk about in a future episode, which is called The Vicarious Atonement, a proclamation to Latter-day Saints. And I started writing it and my fingers were moving faster than my mind could. And some of the things that I wrote down, I'd never considered until after I typed it up. For example, one of the things I said is that when the dead receive ordinances in the LDS temples, they are not receiving a covenant that they can break, but one that is treated as if they've obeyed it perfectly. And that's not something I'd ever thought of until I wrote it. So I felt like the Spirit was just telling me what to write, if that makes sense.

So that's probably one of the biggest ways I see it. Another way would be with my sanctification. I had an experience not too long ago where God really convicted me because I was thinking more about my glory than his. And I just felt it in my heart, like, oh my goodness, this isn't good. And I know that didn't come from me, not from my heart.

No way. And the same thing when I first got saved, I was in a really bad marriage and I was considering, you know, as an unsaved individual, like I wanted to have an affair. Like things had gotten so bad and then I got saved and God completely changed my heart and I fell back in love with my wife. And so I've just seen this over and over again where, you know, maybe there's something that I'm struggling with and through my own efforts, I can't change my heart. But then when God moves upon me, it just changes. And so that is the power of the Spirit working in your life right there. Yeah, good.

Matthew? You should have had me gone first, man. I can't follow up on that.

You got the original trilogy and you got the sequel trilogy coming up. Yeah, I don't know. I've thought a lot about it. And it's something I struggle with as a Latter-day Saint, like, you know, you're supposed to figure out what your gifts are and what you're skilled at. And I don't know. Well, I would say as a cessationist, I wouldn't say that all gifts of the Spirit first off are ceased. It's just talking about the sign gifts for that specific time. So God's still operating. He's still giving the gift of faith, the gift of knowledge, you know, a word of wisdom.

Not the no coffee and tea and alcohol thing, but like, you know, words of wisdom, you know, to the receiver. So God is constantly working in his people to guide them. And I don't know, it's easier to have other people around you to kind of consult with them and ask them, you know, like, what do you think? How do you think God is using me to help you? Or how do you think he's using me to bless others?

Or what do you think I'd be suitable for? And that's something that I think Latter-day Saints think of. So I think it's, you know, like if it's right, it's right. You know, it doesn't have to, not everything they'll just believe is wrong. But, you know, I've had, you know, my girlfriend, you know, will just be talking about something and she'll say, well, you know, I never thought about it that way or I never really, you know, thought about this passage that way. And she says, you're gifted with teaching like that.

And I was like, you know, and I didn't think it was that great. But I guess just the certain way that I spoke or said something or talked to her about something from Scripture really helped her to understand it. Or there would be times when she needs encouragement.

So I would share passages with her that really touched her. And so I think, you know, there's ways that God works in us to the betterment of others that may not seem supernatural to us or may not seem like it's the working of the Spirit. But kind of like Michael is explaining in his writing, you know, ideas and thoughts come to his mind. You know, we may, God may work in us without us really realizing it.

You know, I guess you could explain it that way. But ultimately, I think if we're seeking after God and we're trying to understand his word and live a life that's pleasing to him, you know, whether we're successfully doing that to one degree or another, if we're constantly seeking after the Lord, he'll use us. You know, we may fret and worry and constantly ask, well, you know, maybe there's a gift I'm not using or maybe there's something that I'm not doing right. Or I think if we're just there and we trust in God and we have a place that God's put us, you know, a church that he's put us into, where we can be a blessing and we just pray for God to help us to be a blessing and to use our gifts, I think he'll open the doors for us, you know, he'll put a path before us where maybe we'll say something that touches someone or maybe we'll have an experience in our life that can be used to comfort somebody else, you know. So I think God paves the path for us to use us in certain ways as he needs us. It's not so much like, you know, we have one gift and that's the only gift that we have. And so we've got to really, you know, work at that gift to make it like as good as it can be. I think God gives different gifts to different people at different times, you know. So, yeah, I don't know.

That's kind of what my thoughts were. Yeah, good. Thank you for that.

Thank you both for that. You know, this question kind of bookends our discussion here on the gifts of the Spirit. We started part one with the first question asking how we experienced the gifts of the Spirit as Latter-day Saints. And now we're ending here with how we experienced the gifts of the Spirit as Christians. For me, you know, I talked about how, as a Latter-day Saint, almost you're too busy sometimes to be able to kind of ponder and think about, you know, the ways in which God might be gifting you. And also you're kind of pulled in directions that maybe you're not gifted in just by virtue of the way that callings are handed out within the LDS church in terms of necessity.

We have an open calling and we have a warm body fill it. So, you know, as a Christian, it's been kind of enlivening to me to consider the ways in which the Spirit is gifting me. And one way that, you know, that I kind of sensed God was gifting me and one of my mentors kind of called it out for me is, you know, the gift of being an encourager, an exhorter is kind of the way it's sometimes translated in the scriptures. You know, I've found great joy in encouraging people in their walk with Christ. And, you know, it's been, like I said, enlivening for me to kind of find that. Another one is just the gift of faith. You know, it's been kind of an amazing ride to see God work in my life over the past 10 years, coming up on 10 years in August since I've been a Christian. And so that gift of faith that is just abiding and keeps me grounded in Christ is kind of amazing. And so I'm happy to share that with others. So, yeah, that kind of brings us to the end of our discussion of the gifts of the Spirit. It's been fun, guys. Next week, we are having our Easter episode.

So we'll be talking about the pinnacle event in Christian history, the resurrection of Jesus. And because we are the Outer Brightness podcast, Fireflies, we will be tying that in with Mormonism in some way. You'll have to listen in to find out how. All right. Thanks. You can also send us an email at outer brightness at gmail dot com. We hope to hear from you soon. You can subscribe to the Outer Brightness podcast on Apple Podcasts, Cast Box, Google Podcasts, Pocket Cast, PodBeam, Spotify and Stitcher. Also, you can check out our new YouTube channel. And if you like it, be sure to lay hands on that subscribe button and confirm it. If you like what you hear, please give us a rating and review wherever you listen and help spread the word. You can also connect with Michael, the ex-Mormon apologist at from water to wine dot org, where he blogs and sometimes Paul and Matthew do as well. Music for the Outer Brightness podcast is graciously provided by the talented Brianna Flournoy and by Adams Road.

Learn more about Adams Road by visiting their ministry page at Adams Road Ministry dot com. Stay bright, Fireflies. The holy one of God. The word made fresh, the risen Son. Heaven and Earth will pass away, but the word of the Lord endures forever. All this world is in decay, but the word of our God through ages remains. Lord, you promised that we, as your church, would remain upon this rock and the gates of hell will not prevail against us.

Cause you have power to keep your word unspoiled in purity. Heaven and Earth will pass away, but the word of the Lord endures forever. All this world is in decay, but the word of our God through ages remains. As the rain falls down from heaven and waters the earth, bringing it life.

So the word that goes out from your mouth will not return empty, but does what you desire. Lord, we hear your word and believe in you. Heaven and Earth will pass away, but the word of the Lord endures forever. All this world is in decay, but the word of our God through ages remains. The word of God remains.