The Gifts of the Spirit – A Special Arrangement
We are indebted to Paul for a further explanation of the power of the Holy Spirit. While God’s power is unlimited, the power bestowed upon various individuals at different times was limited.
Paul gave a clear and concise explanation of these gifts in his letter to the Corinthians: “There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. There are differences of ministries, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of activities, but it is the same God who works all in all. But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all: for to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, to another the word of knowledge through the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healings by the same Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another discerning of spirits, to another different kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. But one and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually as He wills” (1 Cor. 12:4-11).
All power to do the abnormal or super-normal came from God, but not to all alike. Whatever power was necessary in a given situation was granted. whether the need was for a means of escape from an enemy or the courage to stand before heathen rulers. What were some of these powers granted?
• The Ability to Speak and to Write
Paul was abundantly blessed with both these gifts. His letters to the various churches contain some of the most comprehensive teaching of the Scriptures. When he defended himself before magistrates or kings, he was never at a loss for words.
Paul’s teachings never contradicted the teachings of Jesus and the other apostles. He let it be known from whence he received his authority: “The things which I write to you are the commandments of the Lord”; “I make known to you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached by me is not according to man. For I neither received it from man, nor was 1 taught it, but it came through the revelation of Jesus Christ” (1 Cor. 14:37; Gal. 1:11-12). It was through the power of the Holy Spirit that Paul was able to receive instruction from Jesus.
• Miraculous Powers
Paul is better known as a missionary and a writer, but he also worked miracles through the power of the Holy Spirit. Early in his career, when confronted by the wicked Elymas, he rebuked him sternly and caused him to become blind. At Lystra he healed a man who had been crippled from birth and at Troas he restored to life a man who had fallen to his death while listening to him preach. These miracles, and all others done by Paul, were through the power of the Holy Spirit, the power of God.
• Directions from the Holy Spirit
A study of the Acts reveals that the Spirit of God was the power behind the entire missionary effort. When Paul set out on his first missionary journey, it is recorded that they were “sent out by the Holy Spirit” (Acts 13:4). His second journey also was influenced by the power of the Spirit, this time in a vision commonly known as the “Macedonian Call,” which resulted in the Gospel being carried into Greece.
Through the same power of the Spirit, Paul was told where he should not go as much as where he should go. In the course of his second missionary journey “they were forbidden by the Holy Spirit to preach the word in Asia,” and again, when they tried to go to Bithynia, “the Spirit did not permit them” (Acts 16:6-7).
While Paul was at Corinth (Acts 18:9-10), the Lord spoke “to Paul in the night by a vision,” saying, “Do not be afraid, but speak, and do not keep silent; for I am with you, and no one will attack you to hurt you; for I have many people in this city.” Heeding the instructions, Paul taught there a year and a half. Again, on his way to Jerusalem, Paul testified that the Holy Spirit had informed him that hardships and imprisonment awaited him in every city (Acts 20:23-24). And on board the doomed ship on a boisterous sea, God saw fit to send His angel to Paul with a cheering message: The ship would be lost, but there would be no loss of life; Paul would be brought before Caesar.
All these instances were the work of the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit. God Himself, through His Spirit, was directing the missionary work of the Great Apostle and his companions.
The Holy Spirit for a Limited Time Only
The gifts of the Spirit played a major role in fulfilling the command of the Lord in Mark 16:15: “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.” The signs and wonders that followed were the work of the Holy Spirit and gave convincing evidence that God was behind the movement. As explained by Paul in a long dissertation in 1 Corinthians, the gifts were many but they were not possessed by all. And in due time, all were to end: “Whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease: whether there is knowledge [super-human knowledge], it will vanish away” (1 Cor. 13:8-9).
Paul, through the gift of prophecy given him by the power of God’s Spirit, was foretelling that the Holy Spirit power would be withdrawn and miraculous powers would cease. They would no longer be able to speak in an unknown tongue; they would no longer be able to heal the sick or raise the dead. Such miracles would not be done again on earth until the power was restored. History confirms the fulfillment of Paul’s prophecy; there is no evidence of any supernatural knowledge or of any miracles such as those done by Jesus or His apostles during the years following the end of the Apostolic Age. Jesus’ own words were fulfilled. He had promised to be with them “unto the end of the world,” as translated in the King James Version. The Greek word aion is here translated “world,” but among the meanings of the word are “generation,” “Space of Time clearly marked out,” “age.” Many of the newer versions of the Bible translate aion using the word “age.”
The Holy Spirit in Our Day?
Most major denominations today claim to have the Holy Spirit. To the majority the Holy Spirit is “He,” the third person of the Trinity, God in the person of the Spirit, a “spirit being” that enters into and guides all Christian believers. But believing the words of Paul, that the power was to cease (1 Cor. 13:8), and observing the dearth of spirituality and miracles in our modern world, we take the position that it did end and there have been no miracles, visions, tongues or prophecies since the end of the Apostolic Age.
The Holy Spirit, as generally understood, cannot be found in the Scriptures. That is the Holy Spirit of theology, not the Holy Spirit of the Bible. The idea of an inward witness that assures the believer that he is in possession of the truth and that he has entered into fellowship with Christ, is wanting in the Scriptures. The Holy Spirit of the Scriptures was a wonder-working power that bore witness to the Gospel in the New Testament just as the Spirit of the Old Testament bore witness to God by angelic visits, subduing of enemies and other miraculous works.
• The More Excellent Way
In his long dissertation on the gifts of the Spirit, Paul made the brief statement, “And yet I show you a more excellent way” (1 Cor. 12:31). These few words, rendered in the New English Bible as “the best way of all,” point out the way for us today. Continuing in his discourse, Paul explained that the gifts of the Spirit would end: “Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part will be done away…And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love”. (1 Cor. 13:8-10, 13).
At that time they had the power to do miracles, to prophesy, to speak in tongues; they had superhuman knowledge when it was required, yet it was not the complete knowledge of God. But it was to end, to “vanish away,” when “wholeness comes,” or as rendered in our Common Version, “when that which is perfect is come.” That which is perfect or whole is the Holy Bible. When the Bible was completed, when John had completed his record of the vision he received from Jesus, and the Bible was complete, it was the end of the Apostolic Age. Since that time there has been no Holy Spirit power as the apostles knew it.
But we have no need of it-we have the written word. “We have the…more excellent way,” the way of faith, for “we walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Cor. 5:7). The more excellent way that was to abide was as stated above: “Faith, hope, and love; but the greatest of them all is love.” Love is the greatest because “love is the fulfillment of the law” (Rom. 13:10). And according to John, who was also an apostle, “this is” the “love,” of God “that we walk according to his commandments,” or again, “This is love, that we walk according to His commandments” (2 John 6).
The “more excellent way” is that we learn His commandments from the Bible, His Word which He has given us, and that we keep, or obey those commandments, and “grow up in all things,…till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ” (Eph. 4:15, 13).