Welcome to be on Sunday, an extension of the preaching
ministry of LEMC. I'm Pastor Jonah Chitty, joined
here by Pastor Jake Ends and Pastor Joe Pinner.
How are you guys doing today? Doing all right.
Good, good. It's really nice weather.
Like somebody said, it seems like it's Florida outside, but
yeah, it's really nice. I can still wear my flip flops,
which is great. No snow yet.
What What is the cut off for you in flip flops?
Is it like a certain amount of snow?
I guess you don't really know yet.
This will be your first winter. If I'm not working outside, I'm
probably going to wear flip flops from the car to the office
and from my house to the car. It's fine.
I'm just going to wear them year round.
People are going to make fun of me and that's fine.
But yeah, I'm a flip flop guy. So, Joe, you preached a sermon.
I don't remember the title. I did.
I didn't even reference I. Think you made one up right?
I did I, I sort of just made a title because I had to.
I didn't really reference it in my sermon, but it was how can I
help understanding your spiritual gift, which maybe some
people felt like, well, I didn't really understand it anymore
after the sermon. Then I maybe it's good I.
Didn't put the title on the screen that time.
So your text was First Corinthians chapter 12, verses
1:00 to 11:00, right? Yeah.
So why don't you give us an overview of the sermon and then
we can kind of go from there. Yeah, so again, I, I, I joke
about, you know, maybe people didn't understand it anymore
before than after. And I did sort of feel slightly
guilty about that because I, I know that this is an area where
people really struggle and they struggle to know their gift.
But at the same time, like I, I can't tell you what it is, I, I
can't help you find out what it is.
And, and so I, I thought there were principles in the text that
we really needed to understand before we really got into the
spiritual gifts. But I do feel a burden to, to
help people to know their gifts the best that we can.
And so. I think that I'm going to
interrupt you. 1st just a second.
That's fine. And maybe we can get into it
later because you're doing your overview.
But like, I think we we may not be able to tell them explicitly
what their gifts are. But like, like you do help me
understand mine, right, by confirming things for me like as
we talk and as and JQ do too, like, you know, we we like
that's part of sharpening each other, I think is helping people
determine what their gifts are. We can't explicitly say, yeah,
you have the gift of prophecy. Well, we don't know that for
sure, but if we see it, we can point out that you have
tendencies towards that. Right.
So I didn't mean to interrupt you there.
I just, I didn't want us to, like, make that distinction
right away. Yeah, no.
And it, and it is helpful, right.
And, and I guess like we know each other well, right?
And so, and so we're not, we're not obviously going to know
everybody that well that closely.
And, and I guess quite honestly, I, I don't know how much we
think about serving each other and serving in church in terms
of spiritual gifts, right. We usually just look at like,
here's a need in the church or here's an opportunity for
someone to serve. Who do we think would best fit
in that role? And so it's sort of like we're,
we're talking about spiritual gifts, but not really talking
about spiritual gifts. We're just looking for the
people that God is gifted to serve in those roles.
The best. And so the principles that I
brought out in my sermon were I had three main points.
The first one was if you have the Spirit, you have a master.
And so I think that's Paul's starting point where he's
talking about, you know, if you have the Holy Spirit, then you
recognize Jesus is your Lord. And so you're no longer of this
world and you're no longer your own.
And so you would use that spiritual gift now to honor your
master and in service of your master.
And that's sort of the starting point.
And if you have this spirit, you have power was the second point.
But we need to recognize that that power is from God and it is
for others. And so we do nothing about what
gift we get, what gift we receive.
It's from God. We don't take any credit for it
and it's not for us. It's not so that I can exalt
myself, but it's for the purpose of serving others.
It's for the common good. Paul says that it's to build up
the church. And so and then the Third Point
was, if you have a gift, have the Spirit, you have a gift.
And so Paul does mention gifts, but I sort of brought up that
it's the Spirit who gets the glory and the Spirit gets to
choose. And so the Spirit is the one who
gives the gifts as he wills. And so he gets the glory for
those gifts. We don't get to take any credit
for them. We don't get to boast in and of
ourselves. They're they're for the church.
And so, but the Spirit is getting the glory because the
Spirit is choosing. And then I spoke, spoke briefly
on each gift that Paul mentions here.
And, and, and really ended like with a with a story of a
conclude or a made-up thing at the end with Austin Matthews,
right. And I really just wanted to get
this at this idea that like in our world, you know, I used
Austin Matthews getting paid $16.7 million a year just to sit
on the bench. You know, that's ridiculous,
right? Like no hockey team would ever
do that. No business would hire an
employee and pay him 50 thousand $60,000 a year to just do
nothing. Like, that's ridiculous, you
know, And in the same way, the Spirit doesn't come into your
heart to give you power and to give you a gift for you just to
do nothing, to just sit on the bench, you know, the purpose of
that gift is to edify and strengthen the church and to
help it grow. And until we're all doing that
and all working together, the church will not be built up as
it should be. Yes, it was, it was really that
illustration at the end was very impactful to think about.
And, and when you think about like, OK, I mean, even if you
don't know what your gift is there, you, you, you should
realize that you're supposed to be doing something right.
We're not just meant to, to come and to to to take.
They're supposed to be some, some form of, of action on our
part to go out. I think it was a really helpful
illustration. I would have used a football
illustration or, or a baseball one.
I thought about like the entire payroll of the Detroit or not
Detroit Lions. Detroit Tigers, Yeah, that one
baseball team that doesn't exist.
Yeah. Anyway, that was less than,
almost, almost less than what Austin Matthews makes in like
one season, which is insane to me.
So, yeah, I would. But the idea on that, that
illustration is really good. Yeah.
And then you went to John, the end of John.
And I was thinking about that, too.
John and the disciples are just fishing.
So, So. OK, So Jesus came and spent
three years of his life with you, disciple you one-on-one,
and then you're just going to be out fishing.
You're going to go back to the exact same thing that you were
doing before. And it's almost the same
illustration, right? He's, he's empowered them with,
with these gifts like they, they now have, I don't know, maybe
they didn't have the spirit just now.
He's, he's going to give it to them, right?
This is before the ascension. So but they're sitting around,
they've they've experienced the Lord Jesus and they're they go
back to what they were doing before he came and found them.
And he says, no, you're going to follow me.
You know, I thought it was such a good.
We're not meant to go back to do what we were doing before.
Maybe maybe your maybe your job. Yeah, but there's something
different about you now. There's something that you have
to do, right? That's that's that you're
compelled to do by the Spirit living inside you.
So it was really good. I thought it was a good
illustration. Your purpose for existence
changes. Yeah, that's a good way to put
it. Yeah.
Yeah, really good. Yeah.
So now you you go. Maybe you go back to that same
job you were doing before, but now you're looking for
opportunities to to give glory to Christ by sharing the gospel.
Or I've commented on this before and different people.
That one guy went and told me that when he started out in
ministry, it was basically church.
Always got in the way of everything, he said.
But then eventually he said it changed.
Now everything gets in the way of church.
It can't feel that way when you're not going, when you're
not doing things with the right attitude, when you have your
priorities out of alignment. And often, I mean, I think we
can all fall prey to that trap, right?
Like we feel, oh, I just wish I could have a, a minute to
myself, you know, we could fall. I think we all can fall prey to
that. So.
Yeah, I think there's also another element.
When Jesus talks to Peter, Jesus does warn him.
There'll come a day when others will lead you and somebody else
will do this and that for you. And, and it was not necessarily
OK, you're going to have this gift.
You're going to, you're going to feed my sheep and all the wine
and roses that was not there. And so the, the living out of
the gift is not an easy task. It's not an easy, easy journey.
Yeah, I think when I was listening to your sermon, the,
the idea that that the, that the Spirit is who gives the gifts,
right? They're from God.
And then like, and then the reason for the gifts that
they're for, they're for the edification of the church.
But then and then also Paul doesn't explicitly mention it
though, but like, but because he keeps saying this, this gift of
the Spirit, it's also to to glorify the sun, right.
So I think it's like I just wrote, I I drew a picture in my
mind or on my paper so I could remember this.
So they come to us like the spirit gives us gifts for us to
give them away, like to give our our to use our gifts to help it
build up the church. And then and then what does that
do? Well, it points back to Jesus,
right. And so because we can't take the
credit, you know, it's they're from the spirit.
We don't get to choose all that stuff.
It's just a really helpful, just just a helpful dissection of the
passage. You did a really good job.
I think like the breaking the passage into different pieces so
that we can understand the gifts are from God for God, right?
Ultimately, they're for him. So, yeah, and I and I think that
that ties into like, like our vision, like we talk about that
as pastors that, you know, we want every ministry of this
church to point to Christ. You know, we would never want
anyone to leave church service or a Wednesday night study or
anything that we do here as a church feeling like we were that
it's it's self help or it's just picking up, picking yourself up
by your bootstraps. Like no, we want the gospel to
saturate everything that we do that everything is empowered and
fueled by Christ. Everything is for the purpose of
glorifying Christ and, and everything should point to him
so that people leave here feeling like they need to draw
closer to Christ. Not to us as pastors, not to us
as a church, but everything that we do is pushing people to
Jesus. Yeah.
Yeah, and that use the Ephesians passage there.
I think you're right to show like our what did you call it?
You said I forget exactly how you said it, but it's the equip
the Saints for the work of the Church.
Yeah, but I think that would be our purpose statement, right.
Like if if we had to pick something that was like just a
verse, I think that would be like we would all agree that
that that is what we're here to do.
We're not, we're not here to like to take on all the work for
the church and to do all the work for the church.
We're here to like to empower other people to use their
God-given gift. I think there's a challenge
there for us to to consider. I remember years ago at a
meeting, we were debating in the service, not this church, but in
a different church. We're talking about what we need
so and so or such and such to do this and this and this ministry.
All of a sudden one of our leaders got up and he said if we
want, if it was a youth pastor in particular, he said if we
want a youth pastor or a different another pastor just so
we can do less than we want him for the wrong reason.
I thought that was so deep and so profound, it never left me.
So the point is not to get this and that kind of help so that
someone who can sit on the bench.
Right. Yeah.
And I, I remember hearing a pastor share a story like that
years ago where he said, you know, people will come up to me
and they have a burden on their heart for a specific ministry.
And they go, we ought to be doing this.
And then he's like, oh, great, when are you starting?
You know, because I think there is this perception that it's
like, yeah, it would be great if the church did that.
It's like, it's like, it's like I remove my burden and I just
hate the church needs to do this.
It's like, well, first of all, no, you are the church.
And so you, if you have a burden, you ought to be doing
it. But it's like, it's so sort of
that idea that like if you're burdened by it, why would you
put delegate it to the church? Because the church is not going
to do as good a job. Someone in the church is not
going to do as good of a job trying to stir up the passion
and emotion that you already. Have.
To do this ministry, it's like you need to be the one to do it
because you're the one that's going to do it with energy and
excitement and you're passionate.
You're fueled by that. And so that's what we would say
as a church. We want to empower people to to
use their gifts to serve. And then if it has happened in
my case where I've talked to an individual, somebody talked to
me, we should be doing XYZ. And then if I kind of push it on
them a little bit, we quickly find out how serious or how
genuine it really is. Yep.
Yeah, right. Because if the fire goes out and
you say OK, take it. Yeah, I'm glad to hear that.
Wow, this is an interesting thing.
So what are you thinking about? What?
What would you be doing? So when can you what you talk
about when to start? How can we do this and kind of
make it their job, right. All of a sudden some and some
are doing very well. They have, I have this thought,
I have this plan. And then you just roll with it
and you just affirm them and you just support them others.
No, no, I wasn't thinking about myself so much.
I think the church. Should.
Yeah, I've had that too. Right.
Yeah. And then you know it's not going
to go. Anywhere.
Yeah, exactly. Joe, you also taught us a new
word. Simony Yeah, yeah.
I. Thought it was really good.
I I I I learned that this week. I'd I'd never knew that.
That was interesting. It was really cool.
I think I've heard it before, but I have not for years.
Just something right Again, yeah.
Using religion as a means of gain.
We had a question that didn't come in from to be on Sunday,
but I found it on a child's notes as we were as I was
cleaning up. They wanted to know like what
works? So there for those of you don't
know, like if your kids are in the service, we're putting out
these like little sheets for taking notes for the kids.
They're on the in the foyer for you to grab.
And on there it's got a little section for a word that you that
you found that you don't, you don't understand.
And then like a question that you have from the sermon.
So this one had like, what is a Pagan?
Can you explain what a Pagan is Joe?
What is a Pagan? Pagan is is my least for my
research. Basically someone like who
worships like idols. Anybody other than God.
Yeah, there's not necessarily like the one true God.
It's like sort of like a plurality of of gods that they
worship sort of thing. And then this one's a little
more serious, but it came from the same paper.
And it also was one that I that I had.
And maybe it ties into your title a little bit is, you know,
how do we, how do we assess? Are there things that we can use
not tools. I know that you you had a, a
harsh thing to say about all these like tools that we use or
that you can find on the interwebs for finding your
spiritual gift, but like, what would you recommend as like a
starting point? Yeah, that's a really, that's a
good question. I and and if I came across harsh
against those two, no. You didn't.
I was just. Well, yeah.
And that was interesting to me. Like I had learned that this
week. I had never thought of that
before, right? Because I've, I've often thought
about these, these tools and these assessments and, but this
guy had sort of mentioned like, they're not, they're sort of
based on personality assessments.
And so that really doesn't distinguish between necessarily
a spiritual gift. It's distinguishing more between
personality and character traits.
And so I, I guess maybe there's a survey out there or maybe
there's an assessment out there that doesn't focus on those
sorts of traits, but focuses on Scripture in the Bible.
But again, you and I were chatting about this yesterday,
Jonah, and we were just saying that I think, I think it needs
it needs to be something that you do, but you have to bring
somebody else in to that conversation.
Because if I go, hey, you know what, I think I have the gift of
leadership and then I just begin pursuing leadership.
And then someone else is like, you don't have the gift of
leadership. Like someone else needs to
affirm that in you, right? Because you may be misguided and
you may be because we all know people who, who think they're
good at something and it's like, well, maybe, maybe they're not
though. And so I think it's one thing
where it's like you're maybe prayerfully discerning.
I think just I, I, I think I mentioned this, I wasn't very, I
wasn't in my notes 100% of the time on Sunday.
And so I may have said something.
I know I said it in one of the services, but I may not have
said it in the other one, but it was in the recording, which I
listened back to yesterday. And I had said that find an area
that you think you might be that you might want to serve in, in
the church or maybe in a ministry And you sense like,
Hey, I feel like I have a good personality for this.
I feel like I'd be really gifted in it.
And then try try serving in that area and maybe you immediately
recognize like, yeah, this is exactly what I'm looking at and
I'm gifted in it. And then someone else sees you
doing, oh, wow, you're actually really good at that.
Like then, you know, right. Or maybe you do it for a while
and you're like, no, I hate this actually.
And, and I don't like this, I don't feel like I'm gifted in
it. Well, then move on from that and
try something else until you find an area that you feel
empowered in it. So it might just be trial by
error until you find something you feel empowered by.
And I guess that's what I wanted to emphasize that once you find
an area that you are spiritually gifted in, you will like it
because you've been gifted to do it.
And so it won't be a burden. It won't be something that you
feel annoyed at doing. You will be excited and willing
to sacrifice for it. Like you said, Jake, this person
that now it's like now I, I can't get enough of church,
right? Like everything else in life is
getting in the way of me getting to church and serving.
That's exactly what it will be in service that like now, I I
don't mind sacrificing my time to do this thing because I, I
enjoy it. Yeah.
I had an experience some years ago, a gentleman who really
believed he had the gift of preaching, and I think only he
believed it. I don't know if anybody else
did. And I felt sad for him because
he was a dear St. and he was a great man of God in every other
way except that he wanted, he wanted the microphone.
And my comment to him was, if God is calling you to do that,
he will affirm it through the body.
It will come out. And he was teaching and I'm not
saying it was bad or anything, but nobody else really thought
that he was a strong teacher or even a preacher at all.
And so it, it just, it never went anywhere.
And he was a good man otherwise. But so my, I did have a
question. How do you help a person
sincerely believes they have a particular gift, but no one else
believes it. How do you help to navigate
that? Wow, that's tough.
Well, I think, I think it would be that, that honest way, right?
Like if someone I, I in no way, I mean, it would depend on the,
the area of service, right? Like there, there may be areas
of service where like it's not that they're less important, but
they, they don't require as much.
But let's say we're like ushering like that doesn't
require a whole lot of background training and a
background, all these different things.
You don't need a whole lot of, of training to do that.
So that may be a job where it's like we could fill a position
and it's filling, it's meeting a need here at the church and you
get like, well, let's put you there and see how you do.
And then after a while, you know, the head usher comes up
and says, this guy's just horrible.
I can't depend on nothing. He doesn't know what he's doing.
And then maybe you would go, OK, well, maybe you don't have,
maybe maybe that's not an area of service for you.
And so I think it would be like working with that person, being
patient with them, maybe trying to ask questions of like, well,
why do you feel you have that gift?
Has anybody else affirmed that gift in you?
It has there, has there been anything in your life where you
felt like, let's say it was leadership, let's say, do you
have any stories or, or things that have come up in your life
of, of opportunities that you had to lead, where somewhere
where you led a situation and, and you helped someone?
And so maybe try helping them. And again, if it's like, well,
if there's no fruit of leadership ability in your life,
well, maybe they're just not old enough and maybe they need to
cultivate it more and maybe it needs to be hashed out.
But also maybe they don't have that gift.
I think also sometimes a a person who is very gifted and
doing a great job sometimes just needs affirmation because they
get tired. I think of Moses in the desert.
He'll actually accused God. What did I ever do to deserve
this? God hand picked him and chose
him and and delegated this job to him.
And he was a great leader. He was, he was excellent.
But he did get tired. Yeah, it might be helpful.
I'm just listening to you guys talk about it.
It might be helpful to distinguish the gifts, the
spiritual gifts, from areas of service.
That's that's. True, because, because like like
just let's just, let's just take one example.
Like what would what gift? Spiritual gift would be
beneficial for someone on our welcome team to have.
Like friendliness. Like a spiritual gift.
Spiritual gift, not a talent, not something like that.
Let's what is a like a spiritual gift that it would be good for
them to have. I think like.
I would like one would be encouragement.
Encouragement, absolutely. Yeah, yeah, you, you, you.
And then the other one, I think would be another one that would,
could, could help would be discernment, being able to
discern is this person having a hard day, a compassionate heart,
someone who has the gift of hospitality, right?
Someone who's like a, a welcoming person already.
So like the gift of those gifts, all of them are different,
right? We would say they're all
different. They're all manifestations of
the spirit, but they're all being utilized in one area of
service. So like, for instance, for your
man, for your man who, who's thought, thought he was a great
preacher, well, if he didn't have the gift of knowledge or of
wisdom, then he's probably not going to be a good, good
preacher. Someone who has the gift of
knowledge or wisdom can, can convey truth from the, from the
scriptures and then and then like apply them to someone's
life. Not everybody has that gift.
They may be the best teacher like as far as like teaching
normal things, but they can't explain scripture at all.
That's that's not something that has to gift the spiritual gift
of teaching. Yeah.
That's just a talent, right? Yeah, well, and that's that's
probably a good opportunity to talk about those differences
between spiritual gifts and natural talents you.
Actually had a question come in about that.
So what are the like? Can talent become a spiritual
gift? Here's I'll just give you one of
the hypotheticals. You use this one in your sermon.
So if someone has a talent to bake or cook and they love
hosting, is that more of a talent at this point or is it a
spiritual gift? Yeah.
And so the way that the way that I would distinguish talents and
and spiritual gifts is like, I guess the purpose of a spiritual
gift in my mind would be to strengthen someone's faith or to
strengthen someone's understanding or to grow somehow
grow them in Christ, right. And so does eating a pie
strengthen my faith in Christ. Sometimes if it's, if it's like
a mince pie, yeah, it restores your faith for sure.
It encourages you. No.
And I, and it's so like that's where I would distinguish it.
It's like, well, no, a pie doesn't strengthen my faith.
Food doesn't strengthen my faith.
Like even like the ability to play a guitar or musical
ability, it doesn't necessarily strengthen my faith at all.
But can that gift, can that natural talent rather be used in
tandem with your spiritual gift to strengthen someone's faith?
Yes, absolutely. So if I'm an excellent at baking
pie, which I'm not, then I might use I might bake a really great
pie. And I'm good at making cake
pops. I I do.
I've tried my hand at cake pops and they're pretty good
actually. But yeah, I could now make cake
pops invite some people over and we would have an edifying
conversation talking about our faith, talking about what God's
been teaching us in his word. And so the cake pops aren't
strengthening someone faith, but the conversation that we're
having around that talent that I have that does.
And so how do we use our talents?
And so the same thing with the musical ability, right?
Like the Holy Spirit doesn't gift somebody with acoustic
ability. You know, you don't wake up one
day. Like after I receive the Holy
Spirit, it's like now all of a sudden I can play acoustic
guitar. Amazingly.
No, that's not what he does. That's a natural talent that you
can develop, which you can use to facilitate strengthening
someone in the Lord. And so that's the distinction
that I would make. That's helpful.
Yeah, I hope so. And it's helpful for me too,
right. Like I, I, I've been encouraged
by other teachers who have sort of helped to clarify those
different things, but I would say the spiritual gift is a
specific way for you to strengthen someone's faith.
And in my mind, just a practical way that we do that because I
also want to be careful of like maybe we've unhelpfully yoked
together spiritual gifts with service of the church.
I. Think so, yeah.
And I. Don't think that that's a direct
correlation. Can you use your spiritual gift
to serve the church? Yes.
I think so it's true. I think that's true because the
way that the conversation started, right?
Like we, we just naturally, all of us, even in this room, like
we naturally gravitated to, Oh, well, you'd use, you know, we
always all of a sudden start talking about like areas of
service, which which I mean, but I think that's like that's the
danger, right, of us thinking like to maybe too broadly or
maybe too narrowly, I don't know, that we're just thinking
in the wrong way. So go ahead.
I didn't mean to cut you off, but we're guilty of it too.
We are. And, you know, well,
conveniently, spiritual gifts is coming up at the season where
we're nominating volunteers for ministries, right?
And so, you know, we really could have pushed for that and
obviously we would encourage people to serve.
I think that's sort of a distinction a brother on Sunday
helped me to see to see that. I mean, I, I recognize the
distinction, but he helped me to see that distinction even more
clearly in the text that it says there's a variety of gifts.
There's a varieties of service, there's a varieties of
activities. And so maybe those are all three
separate areas, right? Maybe there's specific gifts
that I can use. And so that gift that I have,
whether it's mercy or knowledge or wisdom, I can use to build
someone else up in the Lord. But then there's also activities
in service. And maybe that's where we would
say, here's ways for you to be serving in the church to just
practically help us. You know, when we get together
on a Sunday, there's a lot of practical things that need to
happen. We need ushers in the parking
lot to help park cars. We need greeters in the
sanctuary to help people find their seats and to welcome
people. We, we need Sunday school
teachers and Sunday school helpers to help facilitate those
things. Like there's a practical reality
to those things that are also needed, right?
And so usually your spiritual gift may work in tandem with
that, but also there may just be like a sacrifice involved in
like in giving to the church. But yeah, I, I sort of saw that
like maybe maybe we unhelpfully yoke those things together and
it's not always true. Because I think probably we all
would agree that the greatest way that you should be using
your spiritual gift is not like, oh, well, I was, I did, I did.
I was in Usher on Sunday. And so now my service is done.
No, no, no, no, that's, that's a misunderstanding of what your
spiritual gift is. I think probably the most
practical direction that we're headed as a church is
discipleship groups. Everybody has a responsibility
to strengthen others in their faith.
And so if you're a part of a group of men or women and you're
holding each other accountable to read, you're holding each
other, you're praying for each other, you're memorizing God's
word in those conversations that you're having on a weekly basis.
You're going to strengthen my faith in a way that like, wow,
like you, the way you, God showed that to you and the way
that you saw that, like I would have never noticed that, right,
right. And we can strengthen and edify
each other by sharing what God is doing in US, in and through
us, through His Word, right? And it will also help you find
out what your gifts are, right? Because you're, you're using
them in a group like, and you're being like, like you mentioned
earlier when I said that like very beginning when I was saying
just just distinguishing. We can't help each other find
out, right? But then you said, but we know
each other really well. Well, that's part of it.
Like, like you're not going to be able to show up on a Sunday
and me know you for three days and say, Oh yeah, your spiritual
gift is prophecy, Jake, or you must have the gift of
apostleship. You know, it's like you're not
going to find that stuff out unless you've spent lots of time
with someone and you've seen how God uses and gifts them, you
know, and that way you can clearly point out, yeah, you do
have the gift of teaching or, or discernment even like
discernment is, is something that that we talk about it a
lot, like our wives probably have greater discernment than we
do. A lot of times they can, they
can just like a conversation after a conversation, right?
You've had a conversation with someone, both of you were there
and you get a decent read on them.
And then your, your wife says that person is creepy or
something like that. You know, you just sort of like
they, they have a bet sometimes they have a better way.
And I know that that's true in my in my family.
And I'm glad. Oh, oh man, I'm glad.
And if I had just, I need to have the gift of being able to
listen to my wife at times about that stuff.
So, yeah, but that comes with just knowing people, right?
Like, like you don't know that about your wife on the first
date. Yeah, that's helpful.
I think like talents. Talents are used are ways that
you express your gift maybe. Well, and I and I would.
I was that you can get to it. Yeah.
And, and I will add to that that like, I mean, let's just, let's
just say if someone has a natural ability, let's let's say
for like having like a, like an outgoing personality or like
public speaking, let's say, for instance, like now if the Spirit
gives you with leadership or wisdom or knowledge or the
ability to preach and teach, it's like, well, your natural
gift is going to tie in very well with that, that gift that
he's given you to lead, right? Well, I mean, now I just think
of like, but that this is a good, good differentiation, like
between like being able to do something well and then being
able to do something well as a Christian.
Like, like, I don't know, I don't, I don't know if this
person's a Christian or not, but like take like Jordan Peterson,
a fantastic communicator, communicates a lot of truth, but
I don't know if I, I can't tell if he's a Christian, but like
probably not. Like I don't know.
I mean, but, but like then you take, if you, if he were to
become a Christian and like to be expounding truth from the
scriptures, from the pulpit, it would be like you would be using
a talent that he gave that he was given and, and as a gift to
the church, right. So that like, that's the thing,
you know, I don't know, maybe I'll get maybe I'll find out I
was wrong. And I hope I am, I hope, I hope
he does get safe. You know, I was thinking
another, another one that's famous of Malcolm Gladwell, a
famous podcaster, another Canadian.
He's a fantastic communicator, but he would say probably that
he's not a believer. You know, he grew up in a
Christian home, but not a believer.
But these these, these people have extraordinary talent to be
able to convey stories and all these things.
But it doesn't mean it doesn't mean that they're that they're
that that's their spiritual gift.
It is a talent, spiritual gift would be you're using it for the
for the edification of the church.
Yeah. So I don't know, that's good.
Yeah, that is helpful. I, I, I hope it's helpful to see
that distinction. It they may also tie together
when I mentioned this, this story of Simon the Sorcerer,
like I, I have in this mind like so here's a guy who who was
famous. He was very well known for his
public, his public ministry of magic, right?
And here it almost seems like like Peter seems to call out
like this desire in his heart to to continue.
Now in his, you know, it says that he believed.
We don't know if that meant that he was truly converted or not,
but he believed and wanted to be a part of the ministry.
And now it seems like he wants that same fame and that same
glory. But now through the laying on of
hands. And I sort of get this picture
in my mind. I have no idea what happened and
I have no idea if this is true or not.
But maybe God in his sovereignty would have Simon the sorcerer in
a very private area of ministry. If he if he truly became a
Christian, maybe sort of as a as a play on his life in ministry.
Now he was going to serve in some less well known way, but he
was very content to do that because like we think of you,
Jake, you mentioned Paul many, many times over the years where
it's like here he has this, this great ministry, but then after
he Christ calls him, he's like, I'm going to show him how much
he has to suffer. There's like a there's like a
direct correlation to like what you the way you lived before
Christ and a total contradiction to the way you're going to live
after Christ. That's really helpful.
And so maybe God in his wisdom would would make it the opposite
of your talent. You know, maybe he would go.
Well, you were famous for that before, and now it's now you're
not. And if it's real, as it wasn't
Paul's, like he didn't mind the hardship and the pain and the
suffering. He took it as a service for
Christ. Yeah.
So another question we had,
we'll shift gears a little bit. Yeah, in your sermon you
mentioned you sort of like outed yourself as a a nuanced
cessationist. Cessation is like, like you
think some of the gifts may have ceased or like, for instance,
apostleship. I think like, like, I don't know
where Jake stands on this, but like I, I would think that
apostleship is one that is gone. My definition of apostleship
would be someone who was trained, discipled by the Lord
Jesus directly. And so like so.
They were an eyewitness. Eyewitness.
Yeah. Like in the book of Acts when
they had to replace Judas, it was like, OK, it has to be an
eyewitness. It has to be someone who was
with us from the beginning. So like there are very few of
those people, right? Like those were people who were.
So I think that that's so that's my definition of that.
I think some others might define apostleship like, like someone
who wants to be frontline ministries, so like church
planting in unreached places of the world, they might say they
have the gift of apostleship. I think it's like maybe like in
the, the theme of Apostolic ministry, like frontline work.
But but I think that that gift has ceased.
I don't, I don't think we have, we don't, I don't think we see
those anymore. So that's like that.
Maybe, I mean, that's for a broader conversation, if anyone
wants to have a conversation with us happy.
But in Eastman, you mentioned specifically you use the gift
that of healing. That was in the text here.
And so we had one question come in about that.
They just, they just asked for you to elaborate on what you
said about the no one having the gift of healing.
I don't know exactly what you said because of the certain time
or the season that we live in. And then they they referenced
James 14 to 16 and they said it sounds like God wants to heal
people all the time. Just wanted to hear your
thoughts about it more. So could you elaborate on that a
little bit? Yeah, well, and so I'm, I'm, I,
I've read over the question a number of times and was thinking
through it. And I sometimes, sometimes it's
hard to get at like the root of a question.
Like you're trying to, I analyze words very carefully.
And so you're trying like for a living.
What are, what are, what are they, what are they trying to
get at? Because I don't, I don't want to
misunderstand the question, right?
I, I don't want to assume things.
I don't want to misunderstand. I think what they're asking is
it seems like it, it seems like when you read this text and when
he seems, when you read James's text, which, yeah, Tony, you can
maybe pull it up and read it for us.
This person is saying that it, it seems like healing is, is a
part, is supposed to be a part of the life of the church always
like that, that God will still heal, that healing hasn't
ceased. And so it needs to be a part of.
Yeah, church ministry or this seems like it's supposed to be
normative in church ministry even today.
Yeah. All right, So I'm actually going
to start at 13 because I think it's helpful for context.
Is anyone among you suffering? He should pray.
Is anyone cheerful? He should sing praises.
Is anyone among you sick? He should call for the elders of
the church, and they are to pray over him, anointing him with oil
in the name of the Lord. The prayer of faith will save
the sick person, and the Lord will raise him up.
If he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.
So there's the text. Yeah.
And so I mean, there's, there's a lot there, right?
I was sort of sort of thinking through that text.
And I guess I'll start at the beginning.
OK, So cessationism, like you said, is this idea that there
are some gifts that were for a season there.
They're called sign gifts, which is that they were, they were a
sign of the coming of the Messiah.
And so some people believe that those gifts have ceased.
There's there's no longer a need for them because the purpose of
the sign gifts like healing and miracles were to validate Jesus
ministry. And so the, the need for those
gifts has has ceased. And prophecy would be another
one, right? Like, like we would say there
there's prophesying in the sense of like speaking forth God's
word. And then there's prophesying,
which is like foretelling God's word.
And we would say that there, there's a sense in which
there's, there's no, like, there's no longer a need for
prophecy. Like, like we have the full, we
have God's full word. Jesus was the final prophet.
He's come and, and we don't need any prophetic word because we
have God's word. It's, it's useful for every
area, right? Timothy.
And so with, with cessationism, it's not to say that healing and
miracles have ceased. That's not what it's saying.
And so I, I, I did say that in my sermon.
I, I hope I communicated that faithfully.
I do believe God works miracles. I do believe God works healing.
IA 100% believe that I I had a number of stories shared with me
this week and in the past and and I've heard them.
I've witnessed them even in my own life.
And it's like I know God does miracles.
I know God does healing. And I guess maybe I even it to
my own perspective. As I, as I thought about it this
week, I thought maybe I was thinking a little bit too
narrowly when it comes to like this gift of healing.
Because what I was thinking in terms of healing is like, well,
if I look at someone who has the gift of preaching and teaching,
they use that gift all the time, right?
Whenever they have an opportunity, they'll use that
gift. And so when I was thinking of
the gift of healing, I'm thinking like, OK, well, maybe
someone, maybe at that time, someone had the gift of healing
and they could just walk around and heal people at will.
And so maybe I was thinking a little bit too narrowly in the
terms of what healing is. Maybe, maybe there's someone who
has healing and, and, and a strong faith and just when they
feel prompted by God, they can pray for a person and they've
seen fruit from that, right? And so I'm open to that.
And, and I guess my point was, if the spirit is the one who
gives a gift and someone had the gift of healing, I would think
that we would see that in our church and we would know of it,
right? We would know that that if I'm
going to go pray for someone, I'm bringing this person along
because they have the gift of healing.
And if God's going to heal them, this is the person who has that
gift. In the same way that I would go,
well, if I need this sermon preached, I know Jonah and Jake
are excellent preachers. And so I'm going to have them
preach it because I know they have the gift of preaching and
teaching. And so God does work miracles.
I hope that's clear. I am not a guy who lacks faith.
You know, it's interesting to me even in that text of James, it
doesn't say if someone's sick, call the person in the church
who has the gift of healing. It says call the elders and the
elders will pray and the prayer of faith heals them.
Not the person who has the gift of healing, not the person who
has a spiritual gift. It's the prayer of faith.
And so I agree that. God does work miracles and
that's why we need to pray because we believe in a
supernatural God who does go beyond normal means.
And so we need to pray and we need to have faith that God can
and does heal. But we also need to acknowledge
that we do live in a fallen world and our faith in God is
not dependent on healing or miracles.
It's God is not God just when he heals and maybe you guys want to
add to that. I do want to share a quote, a
reading from from John MacArthur, but maybe OK, I'll do
that right now. This might just be helpful for
for us understanding again, this is just one man's opinion.
That's this is like his his teaching on healing.
He says healing was a temporary sign gift used by Christ, the
apostles, the 70, and a few associates of the apostles such
as Philip. This ability was identified as a
gift belonging to the apostles. Although Christians today do not
have the gift of healings, God certainly still hears and
answers the faithful prayers of his children and he references
James 5/13/16 there. Some people feel that healing
should be common and expected in every area, but this is not the
case. Physical healings are very rare.
Throughout the Old Testament record, only a few are recorded.
There was never a time before the coming of Christ when
healings were common. Only in His lifetime and that of
His apostles was there a veritable explosion of healing.
This was due to the unique need to accredit the Messiah and to
authenticate the first miracles of the Gospel.
Jesus and his apostles temporarily banished disease
from Palestine, but that was the most monumental area of
redemptive history and called for such authentication.
To normalize healing would be to normalize the arrival of the
Savior. This gift belong to the sign
gifts for that era only. The gifts of healings were never
used solely for bringing people physical health.
Paul and so I this was an interesting point that I wanted
to bring up too, that that healings are never just for the
sake of healing, right? That's that's not what the
purpose of what the healings were because and he references
Paul, Paul was sick but never healed himself or asked another
human to heal him. His friend Epaphroditus was near
death and Paul did not heal him. God intervened when Timothy was
sick. Paul did not heal him, but told
him to take some wine. Paul left Trophimus I'll at
Myletus. Healings were not the everyday
norm in Paul's ministry but did occur when he entered a new
region, for example, Malta, where the gospel and its
preacher needed authentication. That healing was the first
mention of healing since the lame man was healed in Lystra,
which was Acts 14, in connection with the arrival of Paul and the
gospel there. Prior to that, the nearest
healing was Peter in Acts Chapter 9 and the resurrection
of Tabatha in nine as well so that people would believe the
gospel Peter preached. And so he's making the point
that even in the apostles ministry, like it wasn't like
every 5 seconds someone was being healed.
It's like sometimes you go like 14 chapters and there's no
healing. Like it's not.
It was never meant to usher in this season of just constant
miracles and healing. They were meant to authenticate
and validate their ministry as being from Jesus Christ, the Son
of God. Yeah.
It's. A super good point to think
about that because like it's paradigm shifting, honestly,
because if you think about, if you think about the gospels,
like when Jesus did a miracle, like let's start his first
miracle, right, the wedding at Cana.
Well, he didn't turn water into wine for no reason.
He did it to show those who saw that he did that who he was
right? You can see like their eyes were
opened. Who is who is this man?
Well, this man is God. Then all the other miracles that
follow all the things that he did were done for the the for
the express purpose and intent to demonstrate that he was the
fulfillment like he's he's tell us he's complete.
He's telling us that that he has fulfilled all the prophecy and
that the Messiah is here. It was exactly what MacArthur
saying there to prove to them who he was now and then you say,
well, and then he gets to sort of frustrated with the
Pharisees. And then after after he's done
so many signs and they still want more, He's like, you're
hard headed right. You're you're like, yeah, it so,
yeah, you demand a sign. Well, I'm not giving you another
sign. I've already shown you who I am.
So like I've proved who I am. Then you go to that to Acts
where MacArthur like gives out this all that was for, for
people to believe the gospel, right.
So like I would argue that like if there is a miraculous healing
now, like, like that's not something that that that's just
done on its own. It's done for a purpose, like if
God chooses to heal someone and he does and the people who I've
had like the like testimony from that say the Lord healed me.
They don't say, hey, I went this guy healed me.
They say the Lord healed me, right, I was healed by the Lord.
And so it's for the testimony of demonstrating to others.
Maybe it's your you. Maybe it's a testimony to an
unbelieving Doctor Who is who who God is drawing to himself
and and is like wanting to prove that that he's real.
But it it there's always a reason behind it.
The edification of the church, but also to glorify God.
And so if like, healing happens outside of that, then I don't
know. Yeah, go ahead, Jake.
There's a, there's another element here that comes to my
mind as I'm listening to, to you both talk about this.
And I, I, I would, I would agree the, the idea that God still
does miracles is true. And I think it, I think it's
also very specific. And for me now to just say, OK,
we have somebody in the church who can pray that prayer of
healing and just anybody happens.
No, I wouldn't go there. At the same time, I think
there's certain points in time. For instance, I had a missionary
tell me a story one time. It didn't happen to the
missionary himself herself, but to to somebody else.
And they shared the stories were in Latin America and a very.
Poor. Backwards, primitive society.
But they started the church there, and this church, of
course, they had no access to medical care and whatnot.
It was just just very primitive. So they studied the Bible.
They learned the Bible and then one day somebody is sick.
And so the elders of that church, they prayed and they,
this missionary was there. They prayed over the sick person
and then they all left. Later on, the missionary found
out the elders had gone back to pray again.
And the mission asked, why did you go back to pray again over
the sick person after I left? I said, because we knew you
didn't believe. They said we knew you didn't
believe, you didn't have the faith.
And so I don't know what the outcome was of that prayer, but
that was a powerful like rebuke almost to this missionary that
this missionary God doesn't do that or basically, we'll pray,
but nothing's going to happen, kind of that thing, you know,
and I'm not saying that I believe that God does miracles
all over the place just because somebody has the gift of
healing. At the same time, I agree with
you Joe God does miracles still. Yeah, for sure.
Yeah. And I think again, always going
back to Christ in the in the garden is, is such a wonderful
example because the, the thing that we have to be careful of is
this movement of people who say, like, man, if you just had
enough, yeah, hard enough right then.
And I feel like what a cruel thing to say.
I know someone shared with me on Sunday that they they heard of
that experience that someone went, they would go to a family
and say you just didn't have enough faith.
What a cruel thing to say to a family after their loved one
passes away that like, it's your fault they're dead.
And so that's the thing that we're being cautious of to say
it's like, that's not true. That's not biblical because who
had more faith in Jesus? No one.
No one had more faith in Jesus. Jesus was perfect.
And he prayed that if it was possible for the cup to be
removed. But he is seeking God's will
above all. And it was God's plan and it was
the the triune God's plan to save humanity through his death
and resurrection. And so his suffering was used to
bring life to sinners. And so in the same way for us
that you said it's paradigm shifting to think about about
the way the healings were used, I think that that should shape
our prayers not just for healing, but also for suffering.
How is God using? And we should pray for that.
If someone gets cancer, if someone gets sick or if someone
is healed, our prayer should always be God.
Use this for your glory in death.
Use this to draw sinners to yourself in healing.
Use this to draw sinners to yourself to see your power.
But in everything that like God gets the glory, yeah.
Absolutely. You remind me of that the story,
I think, I think we talked about this yesterday.
You're about using death as a way to draw people to to the
Lord. And like we were talking about
the difference between weddings and funerals for I preached a
wedding or I officiated a wedding over the weekend and we
talked about which ones we like better.
We'd probably say we like funerals better.
And then you're like, what, why? And then, well, this is the
story that one of our professors said.
He said that he he preached a lot of weddings, but he preached
funerals too. And there was this, this one
lady who he preached their funeral and, and he said, like a
decade later, like he would have people come to him and say, I
got saved at so and so's funeral, like I got, and he
would say it was more than one. People were like, so that the
Lord used the death of a St. where he could go and preach the
gospel and, and, and like faithfully preach the gospel and
people are listening. So he used that as a way to
like, to draw someone in to himself and to save them.
And so like, don't we? We shouldn't overlook the fact
that God is doing so many things, you know, and they're
like, if we could get past our own, like, selfish desires and
understand that, yeah, it's, it's horrible to lose a loved
one, but the Lord is doing something right.
He's teaching. He's teaching someone through
it. He may be drawing someone to
himself for salvation through it.
Yeah. We don't want to be guilty of
like, you know, going against the will of the Lord.
So anyway. And well, that's really
important because to, to pray for something.
I, I think we need to pray with faith.
But at the end of the day, I think, I, I don't think it's a
cop out to say, but your will be done.
I, I, I think there's people who say that it is right, like, oh,
that's just a lack of faith. You're, it's sort of your cop
out to go like, well, if God doesn't answer your prayer, We,
we were consumed with God's. No, it's not a cop out.
That's faithful praying. That's that's praying that
acknowledges that. Who am I to get to decide
anything right? Like I am asking because I have
faith that God can do it, but I am not ultimately seeking my
will. But Paul did, he asked three
times in order to remove this thorn from me.
And God says my strength is sufficient, right?
So Paul did not get that prayer answer.
And of course, Paul had lots of faith.
Yeah, yeah, exactly. And so, but we have to be
subject to God's. He's our master.
He's the master. It's just like the kids come to
you and they ask you for something and they can ask, they
can, they can ask and sometimes you'll say yes, but maybe other
times you'll say no. Ultimately the decision's up to
you. And that's that same sovereign
will that God has that we're subject to his plan and his
purpose. We don't know what he's doing.
We don't know how he, his plan is to use something.
And so we have to be subject to his will.
But I guess just to maybe clarify, I, I'm open, I'm
opened. I was going to say this in my
sermon and maybe I should have said it just to clarify to
people. I sort of thought of saying, you
know, if all of a sudden the Holy Spirit gifted someone in
our church and like they healed cancer, broken bones and they,
they healed people. I am totally open to that.
Like I, I wouldn't be like, no, that gift is ceased.
I wouldn't do that. I would be like, praise God, we
have somebody in our church who can heal cancer.
Anybody who has cancer, go over to that person's house and
they'll pray for you. I'll be healed.
I would praise God for that. I'm totally open to that.
I just think, I just tend to think it was, it was for a
season. And I think now God still
answers those prayers at times, although I think it's not
normative, I think death and and disease and suffering are, are
usually the ways that God uses us to draw him to himself.
And our ultimate healing, our, our prayers for healing are
answered. They are the moment we die and
we usher and we're ushered into the presence of our Savior and
we're healed forever more. That's the ultimate healing.
And I would say even before that in this life, our prayers for
healing are ultimately answered in our salvation, spiritual
healing, the spiritual healing, because we're, we once were
dead, but now we're alive in Christ.
And so I, I just don't want anybody to think that like, I
don't believe in healing. I don't believe in, I don't
believe in faith. I, I think God does do those
things. I absolutely do.
And and so I think we should pray, we should have faith, and
we should ask God and we should believe that he can do it.
Amen. Any final thoughts on your
sermon? Oh, Jake.
Joel, sorry. Before we get to final thoughts,
Jake has one more thought. This whole concept of gift, I
think is so fascinating and it's intriguing.
It's it's I think a great topic to discuss and I'm all in on it.
And I think we come with such a wide variety of perspectives and
differences, and it's important that we remain unified as a
church body in this. But there's 11 aspect of this
whole gifting thing that we won't go into too much, but the
whole gift of tongues. And we know what's happened to
the charismatic movement. And somehow it's been this whole
thing has been pulled from the past in today's context and just
hijacked it. And people now have this idea of
speaking in tongues, which may or may not happen.
But Paul talks about this one little short piece I read in the
book called Dangerous Fire. I believe it is, but I think
it's been MacArthur. Yeah, it's been MacArthur.
I just read a short little snippet.
Strange, strange fire. Strange fire.
Sorry. Yeah, anyway, so this idea that,
okay, now somebody have the gift of tongues, you can go to a
foreign country and just start. He doesn't have to take language
training. He just not goes there.
You know, that's foolishness. And so I'm not saying that God,
well, God did that the book of act, but it's the only time we
find it in the Corinthian church too.
We talked about how they the taking this paganism into into
their midst. And I think we have to be
careful when even when we talk about gifts in general, that we
don't start mixing it up with all kinds of other stuff, new
age stuff and all kinds of experiences that are not real.
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. It's very important.
Yeah, with tongues, with just like any other gift, right?
Like, well, I feel like I'm beating the dead horse here.
What would be the purpose for it?
To edify the church and to glorify God, not to bring us
some new revelation, not to. So like, if you're speaking in
tongues, then I would believe that the purpose for that would
be to edify, to build up the church and and.
If it doesn't do that, then. Then it's not a gift of the
Spirit. Yeah.
So it's that's that's an easy one that honestly is an easier 1
to discern than a lot of the others.
If it happens and you're there and and no one interprets it,
that's obviously not an utterance from the Holy Spirit.
Then again, if it's if it's just random and this doesn't build up
to edify the church, then you know it's not.
And I don't think we can conjure them up right.
Right. And I was, I was, I was clear to
mention that too. I think that's sort of the point
that it's like this, this, if it's a spiritual gift, it's not
something you can just do in your flesh, right?
It's something that has to be empowered by the Spirit.
Which would differentiate it from a talent.
Right, go ahead. But I but I would say even like,
I mean, maybe you guys have experienced this.
I know I have. It's like I can preach in the
flesh, but then it bears no spiritual fruit.
The Holy Spirit may use it to, to bear spiritual fruit, but
it's like, but I need to be using my gift in tandem with the
Spirit. It's it's a spiritually
empowered gift. And so, yeah, like you said,
then it would just be a talent if I'm having it in my flesh.
Yeah, that's good. OK, Now Joe, any final words?
I I would just encourage people to to pursue it.
I know again, maybe we've not been super helpful in like
resources to look into. I think maybe let's not
overcomplicate it. I don't think it needs to be the
Super complicated thing like like ask people, pray about it.
Look at look at ways that you can sense that you're gifted in
strengthening and encouraging other people.
So find your gift, find find what area you feel like people
after their, after they talk with you, they feel
strengthened, they feel edified, they feel encouraged.
And then look for activities, look for areas of service.
Again, we have tons of areas of service in the church.
We always need Sunday school teachers.
We always need Sunday school helpers, worship ministry and,
and, and that in there, the music ministry.
I mean, I don't like to call it the worship ministry.
I like all, all, all aspects of our Christian life are
worshiped. And so we call it the music
ministry. But there's lots of areas to
serve there. There's the need for ushers,
welcome team, those sorts of things.
Like there's lots of ways that you can serve your fellow
brothers and sisters in Christ. And so look for opportunities
and you may be getting a text from us.
I can say one one way. You won't be able to, like,
discern it. Like you'll be very hard to
discern your spiritual gift if you're not in the Word.
Yeah. You need to be in the Word every
day. The Lord's not going to gift you
with something if he knows you're not going to use it.
Yeah, so. And you have to.
Function as a part of the body. Function in the body.
Next Sunday we'll talk about that like you have to be one
with the body for it to work. That was an excellent segue,
Pastor Jake, to to what like, you know, give us a like a quick
overview of what you're going to be, you're going to be teaching
from the same chapter. The last part, well, the
starting from verse 13 to the end, and one, it's basically
many members, many gifts, one body.
Yeah, there's all very key parts.
Yeah, foot, lot of big toes. Not a very good foot, is it?
We're different, serving the same God through the same Spirit
with different gifts. Yeah.
And I want to expand on that next Sunday.
That's exciting. Looking forward to that.
Yeah. One final thing, things we like.
Joe, did you have anything that you like that you'd like to
share with the church community via the podcast?
Yes, I do. Compelling community.
There we go. I almost forgot it last week.
I listened to a book, an audio book called Compelling,
Compelling Community by Mark or sorry, Mark Dever.
Mark Dever is one of the editors on it, the other guy.
I'll pull it up in a second, but it was an excellent book on how
the body of Christ is how it is to be a unique body and it's
different from anything in the world.
So it was by Mark Dever and Jamie Dunlop, the compelling
community. And so one of the the things
that I appreciated most about the book.
I would recommend it to anybody who wants to see what the
purpose of the church is. But talking about spirit
empowered things, he says a lot of times we gear our church to
to being distinct in the ways that like the world is.
So let's say like, oh, if you're a young 20 something, then we'll
put you with other young 20 somethings.
And if you're a single mother, then we'll put you with other
single mothers. And if you're 55 years old and
in whatever, then we'll put you with other 55 year old people.
And he says the problem is that's not a spirit empowered
gospel community because those distinctions would exist in the
world. We see them everywhere.
The power of the gospel is seen in the fact that you have
Italians in Mennonites coming together and worshiping Jesus.
The fact that you would have older generation and younger
generation coming together and having gospel community.
And I thought, wow, that's so interesting that like a gospel
knit community is people coming together in Christ in ways that
you wouldn't see in the world, right.
And so I, that was just one of the things that really stood out
to me, but it's, it's an excellent book.
You mean you mean to tell me like former Catholics, Baptists
and Mennonites can all be in the same church and have unity?
Praise God. Amen.
That's really cool. So compelling, the compelling
community. I'll put it in the show notes
and then I have one that I like things that I like.
My pastor back in Louisville. Joe and I actually had the same
pastor back in Louisville. He put out a new book.
It's called A Savior is Born from Heaven's Throne to
Bethlehem's Manger, and he goes through the accounts in Matthew
and Luke around Jesus birth just in time for Christmas.
It's like a devotional style. It's not necessarily like you
would see devotions, like daily devotions, but it's written in a
way that that's not super academic.
It's just a way for the church to be strengthened in learning
about our Savior's birth. So it's perfect for Christmas.
So we'll put this in the show notes as well.
All of his resources have been fantastic.
We've been through. We did Victory over the enemy
just recently. As far as a Wednesday night,
then maybe this will be a Wednesday night study before
long. Who knows?
Maybe not this year. But a saviour is born by William
Cook. Yeah.
So that that's what I like. Pastor Jake, you didn't have
anything this week. Not this week.
You don't like anything. It's fine.
Next week you'll come back with something that you like.
I know you had a busy week. You got married off your son.
Yep, he got married and so it's been a very busy week for us,
but other than that it's all good.
Great, great. Well LMC, we are praying for
you. Umm, let us know how we can
serve you and until next time, you guys have a great week.