1 Corinthians 12:11

But all these things worketh that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as He will.

The work of the Spirit

I. Christ promised that He would be present with His Church unto the end of the world (Matthew 28:20). And this is that which differenceth His Church from any other society. If Christ be not present there is no Church. The foundation is wanting; and where there is no foundation, the higher the building, or the more glorious its appearance, the sooner it will fall.

II. Christ is thus present with His Church principally and fundamentally by His Spirit (John 14:1; John 15:1; John 16:1). Christ hath no vicar but the Spirit. Some say that Christ is no otherwise present than by outward ordinances. I grant that these are pledges of His presence, and instruments wherewith, by His Spirit, He doth effectually work. But make them Christ’s whole presence, and we have no better Church state than the Jews.

III. This presence of the Spirit is promised, and given unto the Church by “ an everlasting covenant “ (Isaiah 59:21).

IV. It is from hence that the ministry of the gospel is “the ministry of the Spirit” (2 Corinthians 3:6).

1. There were never but two ministrations, the one the ministration “of the letter and of death,” the other “of the Spirit and of life”; the one of the law, the other of the gospel. Any other is antichrist’s.

2. The ministration of the Spirit must signify--

(1) That the Spirit is the efficient of the ministration, giving spiritual gifts to the ministers of the gospel, to enable them to administer all gospel ordinances to the glory of Christ and the edification of the Church.

(2) The communication of Him, and so the effect of the ministration (Galatians 3:2). Then it follows that, so long as there is the preaching of the gospel, there is the communication of the Spirit.

V. The general end, why the Spirit is thus promised unto the Church. God hath promised unto Christ a kingdom and Church in the world for ever (Psalms 72:17; Isaiah 9:7; Matthew 16:18). The accomplishment of this promise must depend upon the Spirit. If He should cease as to either of His operations, either in working internal saving grace or spiritual abilities for gospel admimistrations, the Churh must cease.

VI. The Holy Ghost thus promised and given furnishes the ministers of the gospel with spiritual abilities in the discharge of their work; and without it they are no way fitted for it.

1. Read Matthew 15:14. Note in this parable--

(1) That wherever Christ calls and appoints a minister in His house, He gives him spiritual abilities for that work by the Holy Ghost. He set none at work, but He gave them talents.

(2) For men to take upon them to serve Christ who have received none of these spiritual abilities is a high presumption, and casts reflection on Christ, as if He called to work and gave no strength, as though He called to trade and gave no stock, or required spiritual duties and gave no spiritual abilities.

(3) Those who have received talents or gifts of the Holy Ghost are to trade with them.

2. Read Romans 12:4. Note here--

(1) That this discourse concerns the ordinary state of the Church in all ages.

(2) That gifts are the foundation of all Church work.

(3) That not only does work depend on the administration of gifts, but the measure of work depends upon the men, sure of gifts (Ephesians 4:8).

VII. As spiritual gifts are bestowed unto this end, so they are necessary for it. The way whereby the world lost the spiritual ministrations of the gospel was by the neglect and contempt of spiritual gifts, whereby alone they can be performed.

VIII. That there is a communication of spiritual gifts in all gospel ordinances we know by experience. This is derided by scoffers, but we plead the experience of humble Christians who have a spiritual acquaintance with these things. (J. Owen, D.D.)

The operations of the Spirit are

I. Rich in their variety. Gifts--

1. Of power.

2. Of grace.

II. Free in their dispensation.

III. Sovereign in their distribution.

IV. Beneficial in their design. (J. Lyth, D.D.)

Variety in unity

I. The divine worker.

1. “Every good and perfect, gift is from above.” Bezaleel and Aholiab were filled with the Spirit of God even as Moses and Aaron. The tact of the man of business, the fancy of the poet, the skill of the scientist are all from Him.

2. So in the spiritual sphere. Spiritual life is His gift; that life is preserved by His renewing, and all its progressive developments must be referred to Him. All aspirations after purity, all high purposes of consecration are from Him. In whatever way we are able to strengthen the Church and bless the world, the gift is a talent entrusted to us by Him.

3. There is great comfort in this thought. Men who have done eminent service pass away, and sometimes the anxious inquiry will arise, Where shall the host of the Lord find its leaders? Fear not! His gifts never fail, and His Church can never be abandoned. Moses died, but Joshua conducted the people to the promised land. Stephen fell a martyr, but the gap in the ranks was more than filled by Saul. Our Lord told the disciples that it was good for them that even He should be taken away, that the Comforter might come.

II. The characteristic of His works. Variety in unity. Variety is everywhere a condition of strength and beauty.

1. We should soon weary of landscapes in which the same features were ever reproduced. There would have been little beauty in the firmament if star had not differed from star in glory.

2. Intellect has been able to render humanity real service because it has had “diversities of gifts.” We want men of science and men of action to reduce their thoughts to practice; some to give strong and noble impulses, and others to apply the check of caution and experience; some to bear us aloft to the world of fancy, others to detain us among the hard realities of life.

3. So in the highest region of all.

(1) The ages of the Church’s story have been marked by different characteristics. There have been missionary ages, ages of defence, ages of quiet building to which we owe the great works of our theology, ages of pulling down so as to reform, to purify, to revive, and ages of suffering--heroic times. Here is variety, and the wise observer will see the presence of God’s Spirit in all, and admire the wisdom that has made all contribute to the prosperity of the Church.

(2) So is it with the various sections into which the Church has been divided. Men formed with different powers and temperaments, trained amid diversified circumstances, are sure to arrive at different conclusions. As to questions of Church polity, some will be sticklers for authority, while others will be concerned to maintain the rights of the individual Christian. In ritual some will attach importance to external beauty, others will refuse to depart from primitive simplicity. Some may be moved by an irrepressible enthusiasm, others will adhere to a mere formal service. Some may state truth in a way which may be offensive to men of culture, while others may seek to present it philosophically and disgust men of earnest heart. Yet everywhere we may feel that the work of the Church is more thoroughly done as the result of the diversified agencies enlisted on its behalf.

(3) The same manifoldness is seen, too, in individual character and experience. The story of no two souls is exactly alike.

(a) There are varieties of agency. Always the same truth must be the power of God unto salvation, but there are many avenues by which it obtains admission to the soul, and gains power and dominion there. In one the conscience is awakened to agonising convictions of sins; others are led by soft and gentle hands into the ways of peace. Lydia and the jailor were converted in the same city by the agency of the same apostle; but to the one the Spirit came in the “still small voice”; to the other He spoke in the terrors of an earthquake. Some are brought to enter the kingdom through a great “fight of afflictions,” and others are drawn as “ by the cords of love.” Here the work is instantaneous, there gradual. One is converted by the appeal of the preacher, another by solitary meditation on the truth, another by the artless words of a little child.

(b) There are diversities in the result. In all there is faith in Jesus, but with innumerable points of difference. In some there is a burning enthusiasm, in others holy quiet. One is all activity and daring; another, like Mary, loves to sit at the feet of Jesus. One is a Boanerges, another a Barnabas. These, then, are the phenomena, and they are just such as we might have expected. “The wind bloweth where it listeth.” Sometimes its music is soft and sweet, anon it is clear and shrill, and again it is deep, solemn, and sad.

Conclusion:

1. We have here a rebuke of intolerant exclusiveness. There is a strong tendency in most men to expect that piety should be cast in one mould, and fashioned after one pattern.

2. We have a call to earnest diligence. The manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal. Whatever gift the Spirit bestows on any man--by whatever impulse He stirs the soul, the design is that the talent should be used for the advancement of Divine glory. (J. Guinness Rogers, B.A.)

Ethnic and Christian views of Divine influence

So much of our knowledge comes through the senses, it is not wonderful that many persons believe that all our knowledge comes through the senses. So large a part of our time is occupied with this outward world of sights and sounds, no wonder many think that this is all we have to do with. What is spirit, what is soul, but a higher development of matter? What do we know of either, except what we see through forms of material organisation? This is modern materialism, which does not deny spirit but maintains that all we know of it is what comes to us from without, through forms of matter. It is not curious that multitudes of men should have been materialists; for matter impresses itself constantly and necessarily on all. But the really curious fact is that the great majority of mankind should have always been Spiritualists; believing in spirit more than in matter--in the infinite more than the finite; believing not in evolution, but emanation; accepting as the origin of the universe a dropping downward out of the infinite, into the finite, or a creation of the world by the Gods.

I. Christianity differs from all other religions, in maintaining the universality of this influence. Other religions, so far as I know, have limited inspiration, either to a few select souls, as prophets and saints; or, secondly, to some select class; as priests; or, thirdly, to those who sought it by seclusion, by meditation, by solitary prayer, by self-denial, going apart into caves and cells to macerate the body by starvation and asceticism. But on the day of Pentecost, in the first words which Peter said, he declared that the prophecy of Joel was fulfilled--“It shall come to pass, in the last days, saith the Lord, that I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh, and your sons and daughters shall prophesy.” Accordingly, through the Book of Acts, and in all the Epistles, we find that wherever the gospel was preached, all were told that they were to receive the Holy Spirit. All Christians were inspired; but their inspiration showed itself in different ways. It inspired some of them with knowledge, helping them to a clear sight of truth. It inspired some of them with wisdom, helping them to see what was the best thing to be done in any emergency. It inspired some of them with faith, enabling them to feel the presence and love of God amid bereavement, loneliness, bitter disappointment, and sharp trial. It inspired some of them to be good physicians, tender and careful nurses of the sick. If they saw a man or a woman who had a gift of healing, they said, “She is inspired by the Holy Ghost to heal disease, as the Apostle Paul is inspired to preach.” Gifts were special, but the inspiration was universal; one and the same for all, from the lowest to the highest. God was in every heart in this happy community of brothers and sisters. This, therefore, is one of the characters of the true Christian doctrine of Divine influence, that God’s influence comes to all of us whenever we wish for it. This is what Jesus says: “If a hungry child asks his father and mother for bread, will they give him a stone? No! Do you think, then, “that if any of you ask God for power to do right and be right, He will not give it to you? So certain it is that God will give His Holy Spirit to them who ask Him.”

II. According to the New Testament, the Divine influence is not only universal, but it is continuous, constant, a never-flowing stream, descending into every open soul. It is not only for all men, but it is at all times. Undoubtedly there are seasons when the human heart is more tender, more susceptible, more open to Divine influence, than at other times. So in this opening season of the year, the seeds and buds are more susceptible to the influence of the sun. The buds are swelling by millions on the trees; every day they become a little larger; presently they open into delicate, soft leaflets; then they hang out their pretty forms more and more unfolded. Some immense force is pushing them from within, and attracting them from without. The small plant in the sick girl’s window in some narrow city lane feels the same influence; the weeds and grasses over ten thousand miles of latitude feel the influence. Every twenty-four hours swells this tide of vegetable life which flows in upon us like the ocean. Thus, too, there are doubtless spring seasons in the human soul, when we are more susceptible to Divine influence than at other times. God is not necessarily nearer than at other times, but our hearts are turned more towards Him.

III. A third peculiarity of the Christian view of Divine influence is, that it considers inspiration as natural, rational and practical.

1. It is rational. It does not come to confuse she mind, but to give it more insight, deeper knowledge. Part of our knowledge comes to us from the outward world by observation; but another part, and often the best part, comes to us from within, by intuition.

2. The Divine influence, according to Christianity, is not only rational, but also practical. We have seen that one of the gifts of the Holy Spirit is the gift of “healing.” We also read of the “gifts” of “helping,” of “governing,” of “discerning of spirits.” One man who believes in inspiration, and looks up for it, will be filled with a Divine power of helping those in difficulty, of showing them what they ought to do, of lending a hand to a weak brother or sister. Another man will, in answer to his inward prayer, be gifted with executive ability to direct and guide and govern. We know how some persons can govern without seeming to govern. Some are born leaders, but some are also inspired leaders. They are enabled by a power not their own to guide, repress, restrain, uplift, and bring together many hearts, till they beat as one. This is also a gift of the Holy Ghost. And others are made discerners of spirits. The eye is made clear and penetrating to discern shams. The hypocrite and deceiver is unmasked in their presence. These various powers of the soul are all as much quickened and fed and vitalised by the Holy Spirit as that of the prophet who speaks with the tongue of men and angels, or the rapt devotee who wears the stones with his knees in constant prayer. It is one spirit by which all God’s servants are baptised into that one body, the invisible church of good men and women.

3. Although this influence is supernatural it is also natural. The Divine life, flowing down through human souls into the world, must be, and is in harmony with the same Divine life flowing down into the world through external nature. Consequently, wherever God sends a fuller tide of religious inspiration into any period, it is followed by a greater growth of art, science, knowledge and civilisation. What we ought to believe, therefore, is that God is always inwardly near to us, in the depths of our soul, and always ready to strengthen us, and lighten our darkness, when we turn inward to Him. But it is a mistake to speak of any irresistible influence of the Holy Spirit. God respects our freedom, and, if we choose to resist these tender attractions and illuminations, they are never forced upon us. Let us not harden ourselves against the voice within, whether it comes to give us better insight into truth, or to show us how acceptably to work: whether it open our eyes to see, our ears to hear, our hands to act, our lips to speak, or our hearts to love. (James Freeman Clarke.)

One Spirit, many gifts

But now these best gifts of God, as well as all His other gifts, are in danger of being profaned by men. And it seems that the Corinthians did profane them. They employed the power of speaking new languages, as well as other spiritual gifts, to their His glory, and not to God’s glory alone. His mystical body, the Church, is like His natural body, or any of our bodies, in respect that although it is made up of many members, each having its own office, yet it is truly, strictly, mysteriously one. What makes it one, and binds it together, is the Holy Spirit of God dwelling in each person’s soul and body, to unite him truly to Jesus Christ. Thus are Christians put in mind of the one Church, to which all alike belong; and they are also put in mind of the diversity of gifts, whereby each member is made different from another. First, to the weaker and less honourable member he says, you are not to be cast down nor discontented, as if no one cared for you, because others have higher places than you. “Nay,” it might be said, “you surely have in you the same life, the same blood, that any other limbs of the body have. The pulse which beats in you comes from the heart, the power and will which guides you from the head; you are as much a member of the Man as any of the limbs which are most precious. If you hear instead of speaking, if you move instead of ruling, if you act instead of ordering, you are not therefore the less parts of the body.” And much more should we quiet with the same gracious words all discontented and envious thoughts. Are you not a member of Christ? and what is it, in comparison of so great mercies, if another man is more learned, more respected, richer; or healthier than you are? The weak then are not to envy the strong, and the strong on the other hand are not to despise the weak. “The eye is not to say to the hand, I have no need of thee; neither again the head to the feet, I have no need of you.” Those who are above others, either in learning or in dignity, are of course in some danger of becoming proud and contemptuous. Let this then be the lesson settled in our hearts; to believe that we are Christian brethren indeed, and to cherish in our hearts true brotherly feeling one towards another. Now, then, with this deep faith in Christ’s Holy Spirit, as having really been given to dwell in our hearts, let us think on any other person, whomsoever we will, as being also partakers of the same Spirit. Consider; if he were partaker of the same blood with us, if it were our brother or sister after the flesh, should we not be full of love for him? Again, because this Spirit deals not with all exactly alike, but divides to every man severally as He will, how should the remembrance of Him fail to make us content in our places, orderly and diligent in our duties? since wherever we are in God’s work, He assigned us our place. Are you then a rich and prosperous person? do not trust in your own riches: beware of thinking that you can do without the poor, that you need them not. Are you, on the contrary, a poor man? Then beware how you allow yourself to think sadly on the rich, as being better off than you are. Such thoughts are too likely to end in repining and envy. Again, are you in comparison learned? are you able to read the Scriptures? yet do not trust in your reading: do not think that you can make out your duty, and save yourself well enough: you still need the prayers of Christ’s afflicted and poor. Are you, on the other hand, an ignorant person, and does it mortify you to see and feel that you know much less than most others? care not for it, but turn your thoughts to the infinite and wonderful truth, which, as we all know, belongs to us and to the very wisest alike. Are you so far blameless as to have kept, by God’s mercy, your soul and body from wilful deadly sin? You know it is altogether the work of God’s Spirit: believe and think of this; it will keep you from pride and self-righteousness. (Plain Sermons by Contributors to the Tracts for the Times.)