Sunday, January 12, 2020

Christians need to seek the baptism and supernatural gifts of the Holy Spirit


Christians need to seek the baptism and supernatural gifts of the Holy Spirit

By Julio Severo
Seek the baptism in the Holy Spirit. After salvation, this is the most important spiritual experience.
Seek the supernatural gifts of the Holy Spirit, especially the gift of prophecy. The Bible teaches:
“Pursue love, and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy.” (1 Corinthians 14:1 ESV)
When the Apostle Paul dealt with the church in Corinth, there was an abundance of dysfunction and misuse of the gifts there. Instead of forbidding the gifts, he gave biblical instructions on how to use them.
The Corinthian church was full of supernatural gifts, sins, and scandals.
Not only did Paul not forbid the gifts in a church where they were abused, but he encouraged them to seek more gifts.
He dealt with sins, abuses and scandals without extinguishing the flame of the Spirit.
It is a stark contrast to modern Pharisaical theologians who use (real or imagined) misuse of gifts in some churches as an example that Christians should avoid such gifts, when Paul did just the opposite.
Paul’s biblical example is:
* Where there are no supernatural gifts of the Holy Spirit, Christians need to study God’s Word and earnestly seek them.
* Where the gifts are abused, Christians need to study and practice the Word even more and seek the gifts much more, especially the gift of prophecy — following the path of love.
Churches that reject the gifts need Paul’s instruction.
Churches that have scandals and abuse gifts also need Paul’s instruction.
Recommended Reading:

No comments:

Post a Comment