635 Uniqueness and Spiritual Gifts - 1 Corinthians 12:7

How many spiritual gifts are there? And if there are only a few, then how unique are they? Let's talk about it. 

Hi, I'm Mike Henry with Follower of One. Thanks for joining me on the Follower of One Podcast. Today, we're going to step on some ground where my brain may not work the way you expect. But I, when I think about spiritual gifts, I come to this first and first Corinthians 12:7.

"To each is given the manifestation of the spirit for the common good." That's from the English Standard Version. 

Paul's challenging us with a summary statement and he's been talking about the gifts of the Spirit. And this is not really a summary statement. He goes into more detail both before and after this passage.

And there are several places where he's making the point that there are varieties of spiritual gifts. When I look to see the number of spiritual gifts in the Bible, there are different people who have different ideas of how you count them and how you categorize them. Are there nine? Are there 23? 

I think Paul's challenging us, to focus on our unique ability to manifest the Holy Spirit. What does it mean to manifest something? It's to make it visible. Manifesting the Holy Spirit means we make the Holy Spirit visible; we make Him known in the world. The Holy Spirit becomes visible through our actions and the things that we do differently simply because we follow Jesus.

And so your spiritual giftings, they may fit along the lines of your temperament, or you may resist going into a box like I do. Either way, the way the Holy Spirit works through you is how He becomes visible in our world. And I believe that Paul's telling us that there are all kinds of different spiritual gifts because the spiritual gift is the action you take, that makes the Holy Spirit visible, that is based on who Jesus is, and who the Holy Spirit is, and what you believe and think. 

Our gifting, our abilities, our strengths, our makeup, our personality, our background, and our experiences all go into how we relate to the Holy Spirit. And when we follow Jesus, we have this possibility of making Him visible. 

To me, that's exciting. It's exciting to have this role and this ability. Each person, when they become a believer, is given the Holy Spirit. And that Holy Spirit then makes himself visible by giving different abilities and strengths and passions and energies, and those combine with your who you are and how you've made up.

And the Holy Spirit uses that to glorify God. That's, to me is an exciting idea. We're not manipulated in any way. We are given the opportunities to take who we are and go stick to who we are in the world so that the Holy Spirit becomes visible. You don't have to be someone you're not. In fact, we need to focus on being the someone we are. When we focus on the someone we are, and we continue to improve and draw near to God, then He draws near to us. And we glorify Him. 

Today in your marketplace ministry, I'd like to challenge you not to think so much about the labels of spiritual gifts, but rather to ask the Holy Spirit, how He would have you show up in the world today.

What does He want you to do? And how can you get that done so that He becomes visible? He becomes manifest. 

Thanks so much for being a marketplace minister. And thanks for joining us in the Follower of One Online Community. This is an online community of people who connect globally to encourage one another, to go and engage the world with their faith on a daily basis, regardless of their job. Check it out at https://community.followerofone.org. Thank you very much.