The Gifts Part 91
Tongues continued...
Unless I missed the memo, God’s standard hasn’t changed, nor have His expectations in regards to His children. As such, it would be a wholly unjust affair for a just God to maintain the same level of expectation while simultaneously removing certain indispensable gifts from among His children. It would be as though God demanded two individuals, one whose hands and feet were bound, and one who had free reign of his limbs to run the same marathon during the same allotted time.
If we are commanded to fulfill the great commission, if we are commanded to be the bold, righteous, sanctified and holy Body of Christ as those who came before us were, then reason itself would dictate that we would have the same resources at our disposal as those who came before us did.
I will be the first to admit that we are seeing less of the gifts of the Holy Spirit today than those of the apostolic age, but the reason for this has more to do with us than it does with God.
Although the promises of God have not changed, although the gifts of the Holy Spirit are as readily available to the congregation of God as they ever were, it is man who took it upon himself to seek emancipation from the word of God and the commandments it sets forth.
It’s not God’s fault that we are not seeing more of the gifts within the church, it is our fault for continuing to flirt with sin, for preferring the world rather than God Himself, for perverting and diluting the gospel of Christ, and for believing that God has no choice but to make do with the duplicity, hypocrisy, indifference and lip service that passes for the congregation of the saints in today’s culture.
Add the enemy’s ongoing assault against the gifts of the Holy Spirit and their availability to the already spineless, ineffective and impotent nature of many Christians today, and you can readily understand why the gifts are so sparsely distributed in our day and age.
The easiest way to get someone to stop searching for something is to convince them that it no longer exists. To this end the enemy has put on a masterful campaign, infiltrating the house of God itself, and making the nonexistence of spiritual gifts a doctrine all its own.
Whenever anyone brings up the fact that the word of God never says the gifts will cease until the return of Christ, or that it is illogical for them to have been among us for a season then summarily removed, they’re called ignorant, disruptive, divisive, and subsequently banished for fear of ‘poisoning’ the minds of the rest of the congregation.
Luke 11:8-9, “And I say to you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.”
Luke 11:13, “If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him?”
The promise that if we would ask, it would be given to us, if we would seek, we would find that which we are seeking, and if we knock, it will be opened, was not made by mere man, but by Christ Jesus the Son of God. This is a promise that stands the test of time, is a promise that does not waver, just as the One who made the promise stands the test of time and does not waver.
In Christ’s discourse, there were things He instructed us to do, things that are incumbent upon us to do, namely ask, seek and knock, all actions that must be initiated by us.
When I ask something of someone I am certain of two things. The first thing I am certain of is that the individual who I am asking possesses that which I am asking for, and the second thing I am certain of is that it is within that individual’s ability to give me that for which I asked.
When we ask of God however, there is a third element, a third certainty that comes into play, and that certainty is that we will receive that which we are asking for.
Christ made it clear, for it is He who said that everyone who asks receives, and everyone who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. He did not say that most of those who ask will receive, He did not say that some would receive, or even that few would receive, but everyone who asks receives.
We have not because we ask not, and we ask not because we’ve been convinced that what we would be asking for is unavailable to us. It is a perfect little paradox that plays itself out in the lives of countless believers, who do not believe that they have access to the gifts of the Holy Spirit, therefore they never ask, and because they never ask they never receive, proving their initial claim that this present generation of believers cannot possess the gifts of the Holy Spirit.
Before claiming and vociferously so that ‘God doesn’t do that anymore’, I would ask if truly you have sought, if truly you have knocked, and if truly you have asked of God in faith, and standing on His promise.
If evil men know how to give good gifts to their children, how much more will our heavenly Father give us the Holy Spirit if we ask Him?
God’s desire is to thoroughly equip His children, God’s desire is to pour out the power and the manifest gifts of the Holy Spirit, God’s desire is that we walk in authority with signs following, but we must first ask, we must first knock, we must first seek.
If you ask, you will discover the abundance of what God has in store for you, if you knock, you will discover the heavenly Father opening the door with haste, and if you seek, you will find the answers you’ve been searching for because He is a good God, a good Father, and a good King.
With love in Christ,
Michael Boldea Jr.
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