The Finger of God – Distributing Gifts
The Finger of God – Distributing Gifts.
“Remember, it is the same Holy Spirit who distributes, activates, and operates these different gifts as He chooses for each believer… Every believer has received grace gifts, so use them to serve one another as faithful stewards of the many-colored tapestry of God’s grace.” (1 Cor. 12:11; 1 Peter 4:10).
God leaves His fingerprints everywhere, because that finger of His is always working. God has a finger? Yes, it is now time to bring the Holy Spirit into the conversation. Scripture and Christian thinking ever since the early church supports the idea that the finger of God is a symbol of the Holy Spirit. God’s finger represents the power of the Holy Spirit, and in fact is the working member of the Godhead that demonstrates God’s power and accomplishes His will.
It’s easy to think about the Holy Spirit as like the wind or a breath, since spirit, wind and breath are the same word in Hebrew, “ruach.” God’s Spirit is often thought of as Divine Energy or Life Force as well, since He serves in that capacity in the world. But it stretches the imagination a bit to think of the Holy Spirit as the finger of God’s right hand. A finger is tactile, an actual physical object that we can imagine. The wind, breath and energy, though, are formless, without shape. We can hold onto a finger, but of course we can’t grasp the wind or a breath. To feel the wind in our hair or a breath on our face is a completely different experience than being tangibly touched by a finger. But as we will see, we can be inspired by, or literally inspirited by, the finger of God as well as a divine wind or life force. Don’t we all have a desire to be “touched” by the Spirit?
“The Holy Spirit is the finger of God when He distributes the gifts that shine forth among the faithful.” (a quote from an anonymous source, dated to medieval era).
A Trinitarian Work. God the Father loves the world so much that He gave the ultimate gift: His only Son; The Father and the Son love believers so much that they gave another ultimate gift: their Holy Spirit. The Spirit of God loves us so much that He has given us grace gifts that will build up His Church and enable it to be a shining light in the bleak darkness of the world. Because of the spiritual gifts, each believer can have a part to play in the strengthening of the Body of Christ. The Trinity is the original source of the Spirit’s gifts. “There are many different gifts, but it is always the same Spirit; there are many different ways of serving, but it is always the same Lord; there are many different forms of activity, but in everybody it is the same God who is at work in them all.” (1 Cor. 12:4-6).
Gifts of the Spirit. The Greek word here is “charismata” which is plural for “charism.” It is derived from “charis,” which means grace. So the gifts of the Holy Spirit have often been called grace gifts, finding their origin in the unmerited love God offers to all believers as we seek to minister to each other for the common good. As has been often said, a charism, a spiritual gift, is given for the benefit of others, not oneself. A gift is given by the Spirit to enable believers to do or say something beyond one’s natural ability. The gifts are given for the building up and strengthening of Christ’s Body. These gifts are sparks from the holy fire of God so that it will be a light to the world. A gift is not a mere human talent, it is not a gift of natural heredity. A spiritual gift is a supernatural ability, not a natural one. The gifts are given to believers to meet the needs of their local body of believers, to help that local faith community founded on Christ to function effectively and enable that church to increase in maturity as they grow in faith and ministry. The most excellent spiritual gift is the Spirit’s pouring of agape love into our hearts (Ro. 5:5), a love that is not basic human love, or the natural love received by all people, but instead a love that is only possible when given by the Lord above through the Holy Spirit. Agape love, the greatest gift of the Spirit, is a true litmus test of faith in Jesus.
Authentic. St. Paul was quite concerned about the gifts of the Spirit evolving into something that mimics the pagan services of that day: chaotic, divisive, incoherent, undisciplined, unloving, focused on the spectacular, and self-serving. The authentic spiritual gifts produce a church environment which is loving, unifying, peaceful, understandable, and very vibrant. The operating of the spiritual gifts might be somewhat unpredictable, but it will not be chaotic or exceedingly disorderly. The gifts may be active and expressive, with dancing, raised arms, bent knees; but the gifts will be used with a sense of discipline and purpose, and with a leader offering a wise management of the proceedings. The gifts are not out of control or meant for the “spiritually elite.” Users of the gifts do not take part in spiritual one-upmanship. A believer need not be fearful when letting the Spirit roam where He wills, because God is a loving Lord who only wants what is of benefit to the Church. The spiritual gifts tend to be wisely managed as an organic aspect of the church’s worship experience, growing naturally out a church’s obedience to the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The early church spoke often of the need for the spiritual gifts to be in harmony with humility.
Fair Warning. Demonstrating gifts of the Spirit does not guarantee spiritual maturity or even a meaningful relationship with God. Look at what Jesus pointedly said, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven; but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that Day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophecy in your name, and in your name cast out demons, and in your name perform many miracles?” And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you! Depart from me, you who practice evil!” (Matt. 7:21-23). Evidently, and everyone admits this is somewhat of a mystery, people can practice even spectacular gifts of the Spirit and still not be kingdom-ready, still not actually doing God’s will. The fundamental will of the Father is to love each other and to grow in relationship with Jesus through the Holy Spirit in honor of the Father. It looks like we will be judged, at least in part, by how well we actually know Christ, and how deeply we have allowed Him to know us.
Standardizing the Spirit. The wind of the Spirit continues to blow where it wills (John 3:8), and cannot be predicted or standardized or put in a box. The gifts will assume many different forms, depending on the needs of the local church and the openness to the Spirit of those believers. There are a “variety of gifts,” and the ones mentioned below are examples, but that list is not exhaustive by any means. The Holy Spirit possesses an inexhaustible supply of ways that will build up the church for the common good to the glory of God.
A Composite List of the Spiritual Gifts Mentioned in the New Testament.
(1.) Word of Wisdom – God’s wisdom, not man’s, providing the deepest truths applicable to a situation.
(2.) Word of knowledge – The Spirit’s revelation of the facts needed in a situation, not merely human insight or learned knowledge.
(3.) Faith – An unusual measure of trust in the miraculous power of God.
(4.) Healing – The ability through prayer to heal all manners of sickness, injury, impairment.
(5.) Miracles – A supernatural suspension of natural laws to confirm gospel truths.
(6.) Prophecy – A word inspired by the Holy Spirit to speak a message from God; to be God’s mouthpiece; to legitimately be able to say in the Spirit, “thus says the Lord.”
(7.) Discerning of Spirits – Able to wisely distinguish between spiritual, natural, and demonic spirits.
(8.) Tongues – Praising God in an unknown language under direct influence of the Holy Spirit; glossolalia.
(9.) Interpretation of Tongues – An inspired interpreter of the tongues must be present when tongues occur.
(10.) Serving – Practically ministering to others with a spirit of helps, with the strength God gives, not the self
(11.) Teaching – the ability to open Scripture up and plumb its depths in a way that makes practical sense and helps others to understand the truth found in the Word.
(12.) Exhortation – To come alongside someone to encourage, comfort, counsel, strengthen, and advocate for the Greek word is “paraclete,” and can mean all these important ministries.
(13.) Giving – to generously give to others in need; to hold loosely one’s possessions so can be of service to others.
(14.) Leading – to manage others with diligence and a spirit of servanthood, guiding others to achieve the vision and live into its mission.
(15.) Showing Mercy – to show compassion with cheerfulness to others who don’t necessarily earn it; to offer a consistent love-in-action.
(16.) Missionary – In the spirit of apostleship, sent out to be a special messenger of the gospel and able to communicate well with unbelievers as a representative of Christ.
(17.) Administration – to be able to effectively preside over the community and guide the church with good management and organization.
(18.) Evangelism – one who is able to present the Good News effectively, to present the gospel to unbelievers.
(19.) Pastor – to care for those in the church as a good shepherd, guiding the members in church to what will meet their needs.
(20.) Hospitality – to cheerfully show compassion and practical love to strangers, visitors, foreigners.
Thinking Out Loud. From personal experience, as an eyewitness, as I read Scripture, as a logical thinker, and considering Christian tradition, I will assume that the gifts of the Holy Spirit have remained operative through the centuries and will remain so until we walk through those pearly gates. At that point, I would like to think of agape love as the central mode of living, and who knows how the other gifts of the Spirit will be used. The Holy Spirit still operates, then, and thus so do the gifts of the Spirit in the life of the Church world-wide.
… The spiritual gifts were intended for the building up of the church and making it effective in this world. As is clearly obvious, the Christian church still requires a lot of the Holy Spirit’s gifts. So, logically, the spiritual gifts remain operative for the sake of the rebuilding church. Maybe once the Church is fully mature and doesn’t need rebuilding, there will be no need for the gifts. But until then, full speed ahead on the gifts!
… Jesus once said that His followers would do the same works as He did. “The person who believes in me will also do the works that I do, and in fact will do greater works than these, because I go to the Father.” (John 14:12). This would seem to me to mean that, as He operated fully using His gifts in the Spirit, we will do likewise.
… Perhaps the spiritual gifts should be experienced on a need-to-operate basis. The gifts should be put in motion by the local church according to what their needs are and how it appears the Spirit wants the church to minister. Maybe the local church’s setting and needs should help determine which gifts are in operation. On the other hand, being open to the fresh movement of the Holy Spirit will provide all the direction a church needs.
… I don’t see much biblical support for one of the gifts being a litmus test for one’s faith. It looks like every believer will be given a gift of the Spirit, but there are so many gifts, and the Spirit blows where He wills, and there doesn’t seem to be one special gift to authenticate a person’s faith.
… The gifts of the Spirit need never get in the way of one of the major functions of the Spirit within each believer in the life of the church: “The Holy Spirit is within us to make us deeply and refreshingly aware of God’s love for us.” (R. Cantalamessa). If one of the gifts is keeping us from experiencing the love of God, then something is wrong.
… It could be that each church needs to send an engraved invitation to the Holy Spirit to be present at their church. “Come, Holy Spirit” is all that needs to be said. If it’s true that the meeting place for God and His creatures is the Holy Spirit, the invitation couldn’t come soon enough, every worship service. We (my wife and I) have found that the “three streams” approach has been the most effective church environment in which to operate the spiritual gifts: the Sacraments; the Charismatic; the Scripture. When the church participants love to use their minds to worship and learn, as well as their bodies in a biblical way, and the emotions that are meaningful and move the heart; when the imagination is captured by God and Scripture and ministry through music, story, and all the arts available; when the desires of the heart are affected by what goes on in church; when the minds are inspired to understand and discern the truth; when the worship service is multi-sensory, participative, experiential, thoughtful. When we ask for the presence of God in church, we are in essence asking for the powerful Holy Spirit to be present. There is no perfect church till we get to the throne of God in heaven with the saints and angels. Every church is full of hugely imperfect people like me, sinners who can so easily be misguided. Anyway, those are some thoughts, for what they are worth.