That is stunning news from Paul in 1 Corinthians 12.
We forget so easily that in our everyday work and interactions, we are always presenting who God is; if we have determined to live God's way and given him total control over our lives, he gets busy. God's Spirit gets worked into our lives according to his purposes. Paul wants us to understand this process:
The various ways God's Spirit gets worked into our lives...is complex and often misunderstood, but I want you to be informed and knowledgeable. Remember how you were when you didn't know God, led from one phony god to another, never knowing what you were doing, just doing it because everybody else did it?
It's different in this life.
God wants us to use our intelligence, to seek to understand as well as we can.If we are going to represent God with our lives, we must actively work to understand. Chase God. Immerse ourselves in what he says through Paul and so many others. Find out how to show who God is.
God's various gifts are handed out everywhere; but they all originate in God's Spirit. God's various ministries are carried out everywhere; but they all originate in God's Spirit. God's various expressions of power are in action everywhere; but God himself is behind it all. Each person is given something to do that shows who God is: everyone gets in on it, everyone benefits.When we live under the banner of our various giftings, our work together prospers:
We say yes to what God has given each of us to do.
We do not think our gifts are in any way superior to those of others.
We know God's purpose in our gifts is to display who he is through loving and serving others.When we meet him face-to-face, it seems important that we will have recognized our gifts of the Spirit, asked God how to best use them, surrendered our lives to the working out of those gifts, and allowed them to accurately reflect who he is.
That is a high calling on each of us.
Tomorrow: Arguing truth.
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