Spiritual Gifts

Hello, and welcome to the Salt Church Podcast. Thank you for tuning in to this week's message. Join us as we explore God's Word providing practical teaching for day-to-day living. The message you are about to hear was recorded live at our Sunday morning worship experience. If you would like to learn more about Salt Church, please visit us at saltchurch.

org. We hope that you are encouraged by today's message. So, we are in week two, or week three rather, of our series, The Holy Spirit. And the theme of this is in Acts 19, 1 and 2. And Paul is talking to some individuals that were Christians, were followers of Jesus.

And they said, while Apollos was at Corinth, Paul took the road through the interior and arrived in Ephesus. There he found some disciples. Disciples were simply Christians. There wasn't a Christian-tagged name to people during that day. They just called them disciples of Jesus.

They were followers of Christ. And asked them, did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed? So, I can just imagine Paul walking up to these people. You're followers, but did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed? Because I want you to have this thing called the Holy Spirit.

I want you to have Him in your life. And they said, and they answered, no, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit. We haven't even heard of this. Tell us about this Holy Spirit. And for so many today, people do not have a clue about the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity.

We know about Jesus and His sacrificial love for us. We know about the Father who gave His Son and cares for us and He's all sovereign. But we often neglect the third person of the Holy Spirit. And I want to be a church that fully embraces the power and presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives. So, in week one, we talked about the Holy Spirit and what it really means.

Who is the Holy Spirit? And in translation of the original language, we've learned that it means wind or means air. And He is a breath of fresh air. And He desires to help us and set ourselves on course. Especially when we're stagnant and we feel like we're in the doldrums of life.

He wants to set ourselves and set our course. He is a breath of fresh air. And then last week, we wanted to remove the confusion of the idea of Pentecost or Pentecostalism. Because there's a lot of tags that are placed on Pentecostalism based on human packaging and our personal experiences. And we think in different ways about Pentecostalism.

So, we took a real look about what a Pentecostal is or what the meaning of Pentecostalism is. And we learned that it was a holiday that was celebrated for one. And the Jews understood it as a celebration or a holiday to commemorate the giving of the law and the power of God. And then the fulfillment came when the Holy Spirit came upon the church. And we call that the day of Pentecost because it happened during that Pentecostal period where God took the Holy Spirit off of just one individual or a few individuals and laid it upon the church.

The power of God. Next week, we're going to talk about something that a lot of people really don't understand. And that's the infilling of the Holy Spirit. There is actually a second act that God wants to bestow or endow you or fill you. And that's with the Holy Spirit.

He wants to plug you in. And He wants to activate what you have inside of you. Amen. I need that. You need that.

We need that. The Holy Spirit's activation. We're going to talk about that next week and remove any confusion of what that might be or might not be. But this week, I want to talk about this idea. And I'm going to start off just by setting up the message of using this word charismatic.

Charismatic. Charismatic. Some of you hear that word and you're like, oh, man, this is good. I'm sitting on the edge of my seat. Let's play ball.

You know, you're ready to go, right? Let's see what this is all about. When you hear the word charismatic. For others of you, you're like, charismatic. Now, when I think about charismatic churches, I don't know about that.

There's some, you know, I've been to some of those churches. Or, do you guys handle snakes, you know? Or, well, what's going on there, you know? I heard a pastor, he shared a story with me about being in our office. And this lady was the receptionist.

And he knew she was a believer because she had, you know, the fish and all the little things going on on her desk. And she was just a really happy person. And he didn't tell her he was a pastor or anything. He thought he'd play with her a little bit and cut up with her and says, oh, what's this? What's that, you know?

And then she's just like, she gets excited. She's talking about, you know, her church. She says, oh, yeah, I go to this church. You should come. Now, it's a little different, okay?

Like, we play loud music, okay? There's loud music. And the pastor, he's kind of like powerful. I mean, he's loud, you know? And he does all those things.

But don't worry, we're not charismatic or handle snakes or anything, okay? And he's like, okay, you know? And that's what people tend to relate from that side that may have had some kind of experience with charismatic churches or charismatic worship. And then there's others of you that are like, what the heck are you talking about, Leon? I've never even been in church and I don't know anything about this thing called charismatic.

Well, good, because today I'm going to talk about it. I'm going to talk about charismatic and what it means to have the charismata when we see it in Scripture, which is, and I know some of you are like, Leon, you've got to go deeper because I don't understand yet. Bear with me. So, here's what I want to do. I want to introduce us by showing you three gifts that God gives to us.

Three gifts that we need to work through in order to understand this thing that we're going to talk about today. First of all, God gives us the gift of eternal life. The gift of eternal life. We dug into this a little bit last week, but I want to say it again. And I'll say it every week if I have to.

This stands alone. You do not need to work for it. You do not need to go to church for it. You do not need to pay your tithe to get it. You do not need to do good to get it.

Romans 6, 23 says, for the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. So, we have a wage we have to pay whether we wanted it or not. We have a wage that needs to be paid. A bill that you have to pay because of your sin. And it's death.

You owe death for your sin. But what God did, he didn't want you to have to pay that debt. And so, he sent his son Jesus to die on the cross, his son, so that you could be free. So, and it's a gift. A gift suggests that there is no work.

So, you don't have to work for it. You don't have to get it by doing enough. And even after you receive the gift, you don't have to work from it. You know, you don't have to continue to do good, do good so I can keep my gift. It is never taken from you.

This is a free gift. And God was very careful on how he labeled that gift. It is a free gift of eternal life. And it's interesting how people actually confuse that or miscombobulate that or whatever happens. In fact, in a ministry I was in in the past, there was this man I was talking to.

And he had been a believer for most of his life. And he just kind of leans over to me one day and he says, you know, how do you ever know you're good enough? How do you ever know? I mean, I work hard. How do you ever know that?

And it just shocks me that people can be in church. Their entire lives hear the message of Christ and still never get that it's a free gift, no, nothing. All you have to do is believe and receive and ask God to be in your life. That's all it takes. And on the other hand, there's a guy on the flip side that I was ministering to in the past, and he said, you know, I went to church my entire life, but I never knew this.

I never knew that the cross actually forgives me, that I can actually have freedom in Jesus. So there's people on both sides of the coin that do not get this. And that's why Ephesians 2.8 says, for it is by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not from yourself, but it's a gift from God.

It's not from you. You can't do anything. You can't be good enough. Because, you know, God has all the credit. You don't have any credit for this.

That's how God wants you to see this. You can't do enough to earn it or keep it. And the reason I point this out is because God does have some gifts that you're actually going to have to work for a little bit. But this gift is not to be worked for. Second gift, and we're going to dig into this more next week, is the gift of the Holy Spirit.

The gift of the Holy Spirit. Jesus says he has a gift for us. And after he goes away, he will send a helper. Right? That's what he told us.

Acts 1, 4 and 5. And he says this to that hundred or so people in the church. He says, do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my father promised. And Jesus talked a lot about this gift before he left. And then he said, for John baptized with water.

That's the first gift. That's salvation. He baptized with water. But in a few days, you will be baptized with this second gift, the baptism of the Holy Spirit. I will baptize you with the Holy Spirit, which is the second gift.

And we'll talk more about that next week and what it means to be filled with the Spirit. Be infilled with the Spirit. And then there's the third gift, and this is what I want to get to today. And it's called spiritual gifts. God gives us spiritual gifts.

So you're wondering what the term charismatic or charisma or charismata means in the Greek. It simply means spiritual gifts. Spiritual gifts. And our topic today is that God has some spiritual gifts for you, whether you know it or not. And a simple way of saying this is spiritual gifts are divine enablement from God.

He's going to divinely enable you to do things beyond what you are capable of doing. And you need this. You absolutely need this. And a lot of people get confused about this. Even in the early church, they were really confused about this.

And Paul had to address this subject of spiritual gifts because they were all over the place. I mean, they were fighting. Some of them were charismaniacs, you know, and they were just doing whatever. And then others over here are like, we need to forbid these gifts from doing this. And Timothy and some of the leaders of the church, they sent letters to Paul.

He says, how do we handle this? And the Corinthians church, he wrote back to them. He says, now, about spiritual gifts, brother, I do not want you to be ignorant. I don't want you to be in the dark. I want you to understand spiritual gifts.

So I'm going to lay out this letter to you in order for you to be able to handle spiritual gifts. And like Paul, a lot of us have been in the dark about it. We don't talk about it. Or we've been led to believe a certain thing that was human packaging. And we need to go to the Word of God in order to understand spiritual gifts so that we can receive spiritual gifts by the power of the Holy Spirit so that we can do what we're called to do.

So there's some teachings out there. Let's just go through some teachings real quick and dig a little deeper. There are some teachings out there about the spiritual gifts that are bad, that are simply bad. There's one teaching, the first teaching I want to talk about is cessationism, cessationist theology. Cessationist theology is the belief that the gifts have ceased.

They were launched for the church, the start of the church, and after the final apostle passed away and the canonization of Scripture, meaning the solidification of Scripture by the council of Nicaea and the church leaders who got together. And once the canon was placed, there was no further need for spiritual gifts. And they used the Scripture. And you're probably asking, why would they even believe that? Well, they go to 1 Corinthians 13.

1. We know 1 Corinthians 13 as the love chapter where he talks about love. And they pull this out. But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is perfect shall be done away. Or that which is in part shall be done away.

Apologize. So, when the perfect comes, and they would interpret perfect as the Bible, the canonization of Scripture, or in part, in the things they saw in part during that time would be done away with because we would be fully in the knowledge of who Jesus is and the Son of God and all of these things. So, we no longer need spiritual gift. But in context, this is really, really bad teaching. Cessationist theology is actually a fairly new concept.

In the last few hundred years, it came. So, throughout church history, just a cursory view of church history, many, many years after the church was established, and even the canonization of Scripture, we can go back and look at some of the saints and St. Augustine and St. Francis of Assisi, and we see none of the cessations of the gifts. For years and years and years, we saw none of this.

This is a fairly new concept. And in context of that Scripture, it's not referring to the canonization of Scripture. And why this is kind of hilarious to me is that when we read that, Paul had no idea, no concept. The Scripture wasn't even written yet. They weren't thinking about the Nicene Council, you know, a few hundred years in the future.

They weren't thinking about any of that, right? They were simply, he was simply, by the power of the Holy Spirit, teaching the people. It was the furthest thing from his mind. And the perfect, when he talks about the perfect, it's not an idea that, it's not the idea that we're, oh, well, you know, the perfect has got to be when we finish our Scriptures, and we finish our letters, and we put them all together, and we've got them in a little tight package, and everything's good. So what do we do when we interpret Scripture?

We have to read it in context. So when we look at the context of that whole Scripture, first of all, it's a love Scripture. The focus is love. And then we go to verse 12. It says, For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror, then we will see face to face.

Who is that that we will see face to face? Why do we see in part now? Why do we see in part now? Because we don't have a full view of all the things that God has in store for us. That's the beauty of spiritual gifts and God working.

He's given us glimpses of his kingdom. But one day, one day, we will see who face to face? Our Lord Jesus, face to face. And guess what? When he returns, when he makes everything, whether we pass from this life and we're with him, or he returns, if he should not tarry during the life we're here, if he returns, we will see him face to face.

Then the perfect has come. Amen? The perfect has come. That's the perfect. So guess what?

Nothing's perfect yet. Amen? So we need the Lord to be working in our lives. We need the Holy Spirit to be working and using our spiritual gifts. So that's cessationist theology, believing that the gifts had ceased.

And then we have people who are kind of halfway. They're like, you know, I'm okay with the gift of faith and the gift of mercy and the gift. But man, some of these other gifts, I'm just going to, you know, we're going to prophecy and tongues and all that stuff. I don't know about that, you know. And they're just like, well, I'm just not going to.

Accept that gift, because, you know, that's kind of a weird gift, and I'm gonna, you know, but faith, yeah, I could pray in faith, you know, hallelujah, faith, you know, I could serve coffee, you know, that's cool, I could be a hospitality, I have to get the hospitality, but when it comes to that, they just kind of, but I'm telling you, we want everything Scripture gives us, amen, we need to pursue absolutely every gift, and then on the other hand, we have those who focus on just a few gifts, and not the other gifts, right? Like, they focus on prophecy and tongues, and then they forget all those other gifts, and there's certain traditions that, that, that's like the main gift, and we're so focused on that, so here's what I want to do, I want us to pull back everything, okay, what we've been taught, what we've been shown, what church is misrepresented on either side, and let's look at what God has for us, how many of you want God to do something amazing and powerful, powerful in your life? So let's focus on why. Why do we need all the gifts? Why do we need this?

Well, 1 Corinthians 12, 7, and I love how the NLT says this, a spiritual gift is given to each of us so that we can help each other. I love how it just makes it simple, so we can help, the, the, the, the spiritual gifts are for everyone, and we all need to be operating in our gifts. Why? To help each other. We need to be equipped to be able to help each other, and to reach others, and if we look back to the Old Testament, just to give you a quick theological look, understanding of how it all happened, if we look at the Old Testament, if we look at the Old Testament, we see the gift working on specific individuals.

We don't see it. We see kings. We see prophets. We see priests, and we see warriors, and we see different people that the Holy Spirit comes upon, or the Holy Spirit, you know, moved to do this, and we see them operating in specific areas, but something different happened. After Jesus left, He says, I'm going to the Father, and I'm going to send my Spirit, and He's going to do something different that you've never experienced before, and He spent His last days just teaching these guys.

I'm getting ready to send something. I'm getting ready to do something, and at the beginning of the church, something did happen, and Jesus, and on the day of Pentecost, something unusual actually happened, and God poured out His Spirit. Acts 2, you can read it, go through it, read the entire chapter, because I lack time. I got a lot of stuff to share with you today, but on the day of Pentecost, something unusual happened. He poured out His Spirit, and they began to speak in different tongues, and something like fire.

The Holy Spirit fell on them. It says, like fire, and they began to go out, these people, and proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ with power, and little old Peter, who was hiding just a few days before, was out proclaiming the gospel to people, and he began to quote Joel, saying, this is the fulfillment of prophecy that the prophet Joel talked about, that I will pour out my Spirit on what? On all flesh, and you're young, and old, rich, and poor, and everybody has this available to us, and the people, man, these people are drunk, you know, they're crazy, but others said, no, because He's speaking in my language, and He's proclaiming this power, and this good news, and this authority in my language. How can this Galilean know anything about that? But He was, He was preaching it.

In Acts 2, 17, 18, He shares the Joel prophecy. But as time went on, and here's what happened. Why did everything kind of shift? As time went on, the church became a bit more organized, right? I mean, that has to happen at some point when you got a lot of things going on.

It's got to be organized, and then it went from being organized to being institutionalized, institutionalized, and they began to hire these people called clergy, and this is not in the Bible anywhere, you know? They just, well, let's pay a professional person to be the clergy, to be over, and clergy simply means the reading of Scripture, one who handles Scripture, one who reads Scripture. And they can have all the gifts, and we'll just pay them to have all the gifts, all, how many, 27 plus gifts in the Bible. He could just have all of those, and then we can just pay Him. And then the congregation came in, and they began to call the congregation lay people, and they just kind of laid around, because they were lay people, right?

They didn't do anything, right? And then the church just kind of left what it was originally meant to be, and then along came this man named Martin Luther, and he began to look at the Scripture, and he says, wait a minute. We don't need professional people to help us understand Scripture. This Scripture is for everyone. And the Protestant Reformation took place, and they introduced this doctrine called the priesthood of believers, meaning we are all priests in Christ, but many different gifts, but we all have spiritual gifts and callings in ministry that has been placed on us.

And this doesn't happen just on a professional level. These gifts, these talents, these things that God has put up, placed on us, is for everyone. It's for you, it's for me, the, the, the, not just the clergyman, but everyone. And, and, and, and there's a lot of people who, who think there's two different levels to Christianity. There's, there's, you know, there's the pastor's level, you know, like he's up here, and he's doing his thing, and then we're just kind of down here, and we're not, we haven't quite made it up there, but I'm telling you, man, you guys, some of you are, are, are much further along in some area than I am, amen?

I'm, I'm glad of that. I've got to trust in Jesus just as much as you have to trust in Jesus. And it's so funny, because when you talk to people, when you tell them you're a pastor, that's kind of the first thing that comes up. Well, you know, I was at a surf contest one day, and a big cloud was rolling, and I was helping announce it, and doing some things at a surf contest, and the cloud started rolling in, and one of the guys looks at me and says, uh, pastor, you got, you got ties with a big guy, right? You know, can you pray, pray that rain away?

And I'm like, dude, I'm not in management, I'm in sales, you know? I leave management to God, pray, you know? And, and, and that's, that's the deal. I mean, people see Christianity as, as like, different levels or a hierarchy of, of some type, man, but, but there's this theology of the priesthood, this doctrine of the priesthood of believers, and what I want you to understand today, we all have different spiritual gifts, and what will make us more influential and more empowered as a church in this community, in Virginia Beach, throughout the world, the church in general, what really helps us and empowers us is our calling, the call, a calling that, that, that the Holy Spirit enables upon us, and we're called to do something important. We're all called to be a part of ministry, and my job is different than your job, and your job is different than mine.

My job is called, I've been called to lead and to communicate and, and, and to equip, and maybe you have another job, and maybe you don't know what that gift is. Well, that's okay. Guess what? We have materials for you to be able to identify those gifts. We have a salt life track.

If you haven't attended our lunch with Leon, we, we hand out a salt life track, and the cool thing we're doing now is we're going to put it online for you, so you can actually go in and do it on your own time, and you can actually discover your gifts and, and, and, and set a course to make a difference in this world. Here's a, here's a, just a simple definition of spiritual gifts. A spiritual gift is a supernatural ability. It's not a natural ability. It's a supernatural ability that God gives.

Each of his children, so that together the church, that's we, all of us together, the priesthood of believers, can advance his purposes in the world. Amen? That's what we're called to do. And I'm honored. I'm just, can I lift up our dream team today?

Can y'all give our dream team a hand? There are volunteers that come in every morning and set this up. Guess what? We are a team of priesthood of believers. And when we come together, we are using our gift.

If somebody's using their gift right now out there to watch your child so you can sit in here today and listen and enjoy worship, and they're using their gifts. And there's all kinds of gifts. We come together using our gifts. Many, many people come early and set up and do things, the things that you don't even see or know that's going on, coming early in the morning because we believe that together we can make a difference, that we're fulfilling the purposes by using each of our gifts. So that we can minister to this world.

That's our calling. So let's take a minute and just look at spiritual gifts. What does that mean for us? How does that work for us? Well, number one, you need to discover the gifts God has for you.

You need to discover those gifts. You need to go on a discovery, a journey for those gifts. It's not going to be obvious to you. It's funny how gifts work. I mean, sometimes you just don't know, and we get that, you know?

And they're not that obvious to you because these gifts are supernatural gifts. It's not a natural gift. It's not just a skill. It's something internally that God empowers you to do. And you need to go on a discovery of those gifts.

And that's why we're here, to help you go on a discovery of those gifts. For me, I never, ever, ever thought I would be on a stage communicating to people. I'm just going to be honest with you, okay? I'm an introvert. I gain my energy being alone.

I get, every Sunday, I'm actually nervous before I walk up here. I'm pacing around, you know? What's wrong, Leon? Are you okay? Are you okay?

Yeah. I'm not called to do that. But by the power of the Holy Spirit, He enables me to get up here and preach. Preach the gospel. And He empowers me.

And I discovered that for myself as I was growing in the Lord and as He started giving me the enablement to do things. I mean, in Romans 12, 6, it says, we have different gifts according to the grace given to us. I love that word grace because He's graced us with different gifts. So we need to get you in a scenario, as a church, we need to get you in a scenario where you can look at the spiritual gifts. The spiritual gifts, and this is a great place to do it in our Salt Life track, in our small groups.

I encourage, in your small groups, begin to assess, begin to pray together, begin to discover. That's the place where it gets deeper and it gets more real with our spiritual gifts. We all have unique gifts. Not everybody has the same gifts, and that's okay. Because the literal meaning of charismatic is grace gifts.

So God chooses to gift you with something, and God chooses to gift me with something. God has graced you to do things I can't do, and I've been graced to do things you can't do. And that's the beauty of it, because we need each other, and we need to help each other. The first thing that came to mind is many of you are probably familiar with the ministry, 99 for the One. They're a fairly new ministry in the area, and they're just rocking it and doing some amazing things for the homeless.

And I was having lunch with Jeremiah one day, who leads the group, or leads the ministry. And he begins to share all these passions he has about wanting to live out in the woods with the homeless. And then I would even be willing to, he said, I would be willing to sell my house and live in a bus. And if I'm not mistaken, they just bought a bus, and they started talking about living in this bus with their kids and his wife. And I'm like, that's the furthest thing I want, you know, in my, you know, I got, I like my house.

I like being indoors. On the other hand, on the other hand, it's, this right here is not him. This is not his thing. He wouldn't be on stage for a second, you know, preaching and teaching. It's just not his gift.

Everybody has their gifts, and we work together to accomplish the greater purpose. He's been graced with the gift. I've got mine. He's got his. You've got yours.

And that's your gift. We have a gift that is specifically, I mean, specifically tailored for us. Did you know that? Specifically your gift. And you're like, this is my gift, and I'm going to use this gift.

And all my power and ability. And guess what? When you start using that tailored gift you have, and you discover it, you discover that gift, you know it's yours. And it's not a burden to use that gift. It's a joy to use that gift because it empowers you.

And God wants to help you. The Bible describes the church as a body. A body. It's symbolically a body. The feet, the hands, the eyes, and Jesus Christ is the head of the church, right?

So he's the head, but we can't work without the eyes and without the hands and without the feet and all these other things. It's just a simple message that Paul shared about the church and the Bible, and often throughout the Bible we see that. So we need each other. But you have a gift. If you're a hand, you are specifically tailored to be a hand.

If you're an eye, you are specifically tailored. You were designed, designed by our Father to be an eye. If you're a foot, you are designed by our Father to be a foot. Psalm 139, 13 through 16 says this, For you created my inmost being. Not just my external, but my inmost being.

My very soul you created. You knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Your works are wonderful. I am a work of art.

You have designed me a certain way. You have tailored me a certain way. And I know that full well. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. He has a book, and he's written those things down.

Even before you were, he knew exactly who you were going to be. Your passions were going to be. The bad things you would go through in this life. The good things you would go through in this life. The ups and downs.

The ins and outs. He knew exactly how your personality would be right at this point. He tailored you a certain way. And he has spiritual gifts. He's ready for you to discover so that you can have an impact in this world.

Amen. Y'all believe me on that one. He created you. You have, thank you for that hand clap. Come on, give me some hand claps here.

Help me out here. Amen. Thank you. Thank you. You have desires that God has created.

Your inmost being. And he wants to work those desires and shape them and tailor them to specific ministries and needs. For you guys who have help gifts, you know, you probably walked in today and you were looking around and you were kind of straightening up chairs, you know. These needs to be lined up a little more. We're missing a few lights over there at the coffee shop today.

So, you know, maybe you're thinking that, you know. Because you have helps. Or maybe you have the mercy gift. Maybe you saw somebody sitting by themselves and you're like, I can't stand them being alone. I've got to go sit with them and be with them and talk to them.

Because you have the gift of mercy. Or maybe you have the faith gift where you're excited. You want to pray for impossible things to happen in people's lives. And you want to be up here praying over them. You know, that cancer would go away.

That sickness would go away. That... Financial burdens would dissipate, you know. That terminal illness, you have that faith gift, you believe in miracles, and all of us have different gifts that we bring to the table, and God wants to use us in those gifts because we're working together. Or maybe you just don't know.

Maybe you just don't know. And that's why I plug, you know, get involved, get engaged in our church. Go through our life track. Get involved in small groups so that you can discover your gifts. God's design in me reveals his destiny for me.

God's design in me reveals his destiny for me. You need to write that down if it's not in your notes. It may be in your notes. God's design in me reveals his destiny for me. And you didn't say that over and over again, so it sets in.

Number two, not only do you need to discover your gifts, you need to develop those gifts. You need to eagerly desire those gifts. When you discover them, you desire them, you develop them, you mature them. God develops and matures our gifts. Because when we first discover our gifts, it can be a little challenging.

You know, how do we use these gifts? If I have a prophetic gift to me or a gift of discernment, and I feel like I need to exhort somebody or share something with somebody to help encourage them along, how do I go about that, you know? And I'm going to tell you, some people, they're still trying to discover how to use those gifts because they'll freak you out sometimes, you know? I was in a ministry one time, and this girl came over to me and grabbed my hand and says, I believe that you're going to get married in 2000, so-and-so, and this, and this, and this, and this, and this. You know, that was younger then.

And she just started going through my life, almost like a life story. And I'm like, whoa, that's just way too much for me, you know? You're going to meet this person in 2006, and then in 2008, you're going to do this. And then in 2010, you're going to do this, and do this, and do this. And half of them, none of them actually came true.

And it's just like kind of weird, you know? So tame those gifts and work on those gifts and understand what prophecy actually is, you know? You know, and that's why we have small groups, so that if somebody feels they have the gift of prophecy, you know, which is a very interesting gift for a lot of people because they don't understand what it really means, then we can go to the Bible together and discover it and grow in it. And it's just like a child. When a child is born and is coming up, they begin to discover things, but they don't know fully how things operate, right?

They don't know that the stove is hot, and they can't touch the stove or it will hurt them, you know? My daughter did that last night. We cooked something. It was sitting up on the stove. She wanted to look at it, and she began to reach out.

And I said, no, no, no, no, you know, get away from it. It's going to hurt you, you know? And as they develop, as you develop, you understand how to use gifts and how not to use gifts, and when is it appropriate to use gifts, and in what format it's appropriate to use gifts. So we grow and we develop our gifts, and we seek more gifts. We seek more gifts.

It says, 1 Corinthians 14 says, follow the way of love and eagerly desire spiritual gifts. So the Bible actually tells us, desire spiritual gifts. Some versions say, covet spiritual gifts. We should be coveting the spiritual gifts. Yeah, we've run away from them, and we're scared of them, but God has so much for us, He's asking us to desire the spiritual gifts, even those you don't have.

Even those you don't have. When you discover your spiritual gifts, there may be more gifts that you want to lean into. In fact, Paul says, you know, I speak in tongues more than all of you, but the better gift is prophecy because it edifies more, right? So he says, I want all of you to be desiring to prophesy over those things, you know? Like be edifying to the church.

So there's other gifts that we should be reaching for. 2 Timothy 1.6 says, for this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God which is in you. Fan into flame the gift of God. And some versions say, stir those gifts in you.

So we need to know the gifts, and we need to stir the gift. And lastly, the third point I want to make is, use the gifts God has given you. So don't just discover them. Don't just develop them internally, but use them. 1 Peter 4.

10 says, Here's the key point. See, gifts aren't just so that you can be better than somebody. We talked about that last week. Gifts, you know, the power of the Spirit isn't so I'm better than you, and I'm closer to God than you. It does this.

Here it is. It manages them well so that God's generosity can flow through you. We want God to be glorified. We want God to be magnified. We want this church to be able to use their gifts together to be enabled to do things beyond what we're capable of doing.

Amen? That's what we need. We want. God can do things beyond what we're capable of doing. And when you don't manage something, it becomes ineffective, right?

When you're not managing something properly. So we want to effectively manage the gifts. So here's the question. Take the next step. What's your next step?

What's your next step? At Salt Church, we exist to do a few things. And we've got a lot of in-rows into this church. We've designed a spiritual growth track for you to take so that you can take the next step. And that first step is to know God.

Is to know God. How do you know God? We talked about that at the beginning. He doesn't care about anything from your past. He doesn't care about where you've been or what you've done.

None of it is new news to Him. He just cares about you knowing Him. He wants a relationship with you. So first, before you can go anywhere else, you've got to know Him. And then you need to find freedom.

Because you can find Jesus, but you can still be locked down. And this is why you need the Spirit of God to help you. And you need others around you to help you get through and break free of some of these bondages that you're under. Because God wants to deliver you. He wants to set you free so that you can be all you can be.

That's why we have small groups. That's why we have people that meet together and pray together and learn together and discover together. So that we can break the bondages. We need each other. We need each other so that we can be free from these things.

And then what does God want you to do? He wants you to discover your purpose. So our third step is to discover your purpose. This is spiritual gifts. We need you to find your spiritual gift and get plugged in in a team.

And it may not even be this church. If you're here visiting today and you say, well, I believe that, but this is not my church. Well, then you need to get plugged into a church and be using your spiritual gifts in a team together. Because we're about the kingdom of God. And we've got a lot of things to do in this world before He returns.

He's called us to do big things. So you need to discover your spiritual gifts so that you can accomplish purposes beyond what you think you can accomplish. He enables us to do that. And then, finally, and this is the key, we want you to be on mission. We want you to make a difference.

Make a difference. That you not only use those gifts and develop those gifts in the church, but that you go out and you make a difference. All of us want to make a difference. We want to be difference makers. Difference makers.

I don't know where you are on your spiritual journey. But I guarantee you, I know for myself that God is continually moving me and developing me and pushing me closer to Him. So you may have been a Christian for a long time, and maybe your next step is, I do need to do that. I need to discover my purpose, because I'm wandering through this life. Maybe you're back on the freedom side.

I need to be free from this bondage I've been in for a long time. I think wrongly of myself, and I need to think rightly of myself. And I need to discover, first of all, that I have freedom in Jesus and nothing else. And it doesn't matter what people think of me, or what the world thinks of me, that Jesus is delivering me and has defined who I am, and maybe that's where you are. Maybe you need to discover your purpose.

Maybe you're completely free, but you aren't making a difference yet. And you need to discover where you are and who you are. Who you are in Jesus. You need to discover your purpose. And once you do this, this track is here.

The spiritual journey is here. So I need to do this, and you need to say this. I need to do this until I'm able to say, I was made for this. I was made for this. I was uniquely tailored, knitted in my mother's womb, so that I could accomplish the things I was made to do.

The thing that really gives me joy. The thing that really gives me hope. Nothing in this world will give me hope. Only what God is enabling me to do, what He has designed me to do, will give me everything I need to live this life. Amen.

Amen. With eyes closed, the Spirit of the Lord is thick in this place today. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Spirit of the living God, just come through and touch us, Lord Jesus.

Hallelujah, Jesus. As we just wait on You, God. The expectation this morning as we were preparing for the service was powerful. Lord, we were believing, God, that You were going to do big things today, and today is today. Whether it's somebody who's been away from God for a long time and is ready to come back, or maybe it's somebody in here that has never made a decision for Jesus.

We know that You're pulling hearts towards You. Maybe it's somebody who's really struggling right now, Lord. Lord, break them free from that struggle, Lord. Break the chains, power of the Spirit. Maybe it's somebody who needs to discover who they are, Lord.

Begin to stir up in their hearts a gift, Lord. A gift. Their inner being, Lord. Stir it up in their hearts, Lord. But it all starts with square one.

And with all heads bowed and all eyes closed, if there's somebody here, and I beg and I plead, this is the reason I do this. I can't wait for this moment because I know this is the thing that changes everything. This is where it starts. If there's one that does not know Jesus today, and I'm not talking about having a knowledge of Jesus. I'm talking about a personal relationship with Jesus.

He is your Lord and Savior, and you're ready to commit your life. Make that decision today by just raising your hand and letting me know, I'm ready, Pastor, I'm ready, I'm ready. And I'm making a bold statement today. I'm not going to embarrass you or scare you. Just lift your hand and say, I'm in.

I'm in, Pastor. I'm in. I'm ready. I want to do this. Because I've tried it my way for too long.

And I, amen. I've done it my way for too long. Amen. I've done it my way for too long. I've done it my way for too long.

Hallelujah. For those hands that were raised, I want you to say this prayer, and I want you to mean it from the bottom of your heart, from your inner being. It's time, Lord. It's time, Lord. Not just to know about you, but know you.

And I'm going to be all in. I'm all in. So, Father, I believe that you are the Son of God, that you died on the cross for my sin. I know I was far from you trying it my own way, but today I receive you as my Savior, my King. And I don't go halfway in.

I go all the way. I'm going all the way today. Lead me. The wages of sin is death. But pay off the death for me, Lord Jesus, so that I can have eternal life today.

I celebrate that you're doing that in my heart. Amen.