How do we as the church deal with the "sign" gifts, their benefits, manipulations, and abuses? Do they do more harm than good? Could it be that we need to approach the matter from a different angle entirely?
Here's a thought......
(I wrote the following previously as a response on a friend's blog.)
Such a paradox right? The gifts…so complex, and yet so simple. So valuable and potentially so destructive. It’s no wonder a large portion of the church avoids the entire mess. With that said, I’ve got a great story. I'll do my best to recount it the way it was told...
This summer I heard a kid named Eric share during a service at Tithemi (a hardcore church in Redlands, CA.) He and his band had just gotten home from tour. Eric said that one night he was prayer-walking around the outside of the venue they were playing…an awesome dive of a bar inside an Asian food restaurant. While outside, he saw a kid with a sling on his arm and knew he wanted to pray for him. Later that night, he saw the kid out behind the restaurant and, ignoring the couples making out in the vicinity, he asked the kid how his arm was hurt and if he could pray for him. The kid looked at him kinda strange, but agreed. So Eric gathered a few other band members around and prayed something along the lines of “Jesus please heal this kid’s shoulder,” and he was healed. Just like that. Eric told the kid, ”that’s just God letting you know that He loves you and knows who you are and He just wants to say 'Hi'.” There were more accounts from that evening, but that’s the one that really convicted me.
How does it all get so complicated? Could it be that within the layers of truth on this subject, that John 13:34-35 is to be the priority? "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." That the abuses of exercising spiritual gifts are abated when performed with that kind of love? I suspect there is much to learn in the parking lots of asian food restaurants... seeing broken kids reaching out to other broken kids and telling them there is hope because God loves them.
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I concur. These gifts must be used in love to be legitimate. The minute we forget that we are dealing with other people who are just as fragile as we are is the moment we open up a floodgate of problems.
ReplyDeleteThere are two things that get consistently overlooked in teachings on spiritual gifts.
The first is that every person is given different gifts and should only use them in accordance with his or her measure of faith (Romans 12:3-8). I believe this requires some input from mature spiritual leaders, because one who is immature will almost always think more highly of his abilities than he ought.
The second thing that gets forgotten is that the two passages of scripture that deal most explicitly with spiritual gifts are framed by messages about love. Romans 12:3-8 is immediately followed by a passage encouraging Christians to be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Also, 1 Corinthians 12 & 14 are divided by the most famous passage on love in the entire Bible. Paul clearly makes the point in verses 1-3 of that chapter that the spiritual gifts he talks about in chapters 12 & 14 are absolutely meaningless without love. Additionally in verse 11 he encourages the Corinthians to quit acting childishly.
One of the primary outcomes of godly love is that we become more concerned with others than ourselves and are willing to make sacrifices to help others. Without this selfless attitude, the spiritual gifts (particularly the sign gifts) become a playground for showmen and spiritual con artists. People get hurt be these gifts when they are used for any motive that is not rooted in a deep love for God and for other people.
My experience tells me that these gifts are not used in love disturbingly often. As such, we should be extremely careful when using them and be ever mindful of our own intentions in doing so.