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Charismatic Seat Belt

1 Corinthians 14:1-33

August 11, 2019 • Tyler Burns • 1 Corinthians 14:1–33

Summary:
"Let’s suppose that a kite could come to life and develop its own personality. On the one hand, it would feel the exhilaration that comes from the surges of wind that direct it through the sky. On the other hand, it would almost immediately take notice of something annoying. The tugging of the string at its center; a feeling of constraint; resistance. And soon the kite begins to think to itself, “If only I could detach, then I could really fly.” - (Beautiful Eulogy, "The String That Ties Us")

As we know with kites, if there is no string, it cannot fly for very long. In the same way, driving without a seat belt is inherently dangerous.

God has given us instructions around the way to practically use the spiritual gifts He has blessed us with. At times, these instructions can seem to hinder us, or might even seem trivial, but they are given to us to allow His Church to flourish.

Transcript:
This media has been made available by Mosaic Boston Church. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston and our neighborhood churches, or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com.

Good morning church. Welcome. For those of you who don't know me, my name is Tyler. I'm the team director here at Mosaic Boston Brookline. And if this is your first time here, welcome. Pastor Jan is away and Pastor Shane was away and he got back last night. So I'm filling in.

But today we will be continuing our sermon series that we've titled Prodigal Church where we will be going through the book of 1st Corinthians and today we will be in 1st Corinthians chapter 14 verses one through 33. If you're wondering, "Why are we skipping the last few verses of the chapter?" It's because Pastor Shane actually already preached on them. And if you're like, "What? I didn't know that." You should download the app or go to our website and listen to Pastor Shane's sermon on chapter 11. And while you're there, just listen to the whole series again because it's that good. But now, will you pray with me over the preaching of God's word?

Heavenly Father. Lord, we come to you today and we humbly ask that you reveal your truths to us. You use your words, you use your scripture to reveal the secrets of our heart, to convict us, Lord, and to encourage us, Lord, in the gifts that you have blessed us with and the work that Jesus Christ has done on the cross, so that we can cultivate love in this church, proclaim the gospel to those who don't know, and build up your church here in Boston. We thank you and we praise you. In Jesus' name, your son, we pray. Amen.

What comes to mind when you think about seatbelts? For many of us, the first thing we think of is how restricting it is, how uncomfortable it is. Sometimes we think, "Oh, I'm only driving down the block. I don't really need to put on a seatbelt if I'm just going like five minutes. It's okay." Or sometimes you might even think, "How do I click it so that I don't get the ticket and so that my car isn't blaring an alarm at me for 10 hours, and I could put it like behind me so that I'm technically following the law, but it's not actually doing anything?"

But if any of you here have ever been in an accident or know anyone who's been in an accident where the seatbelt has saved you from injury or sometimes even death, the idea of a seatbelt takes on a whole new meaning.

Here at Mosaic, we like to say that we are charismatic with the seatbelt. And the reason for that is what I just explained about seatbelts, in that there are certain instructions, there are certain guidelines that God has given us in terms of how to use the gifts he has blessed us with so that they can be life giving and saving.

Sometimes we might think that they're restricting our ability to use the gifts, or we might say, "This is trivial. It's not that big of a deal." But to God, he knows that it's life giving and saving. And so when we read these instructions, we want to praise him and thank him for them because he knows he has our best interest in mind and the interests of others.

Today we will be spending our time in three parts. The first part is what are tongues and prophecy? Throughout this whole chapter, Paul is talking about tongues and prophecy. So we're going to have to define them because there's a lot of confusion around what they mean. And then the second part we're going to be talking about is building up the church in Corinth. And then lastly we'll be talking about how to build up Mosaic here.

Because it is a long text, we're going to be reading the first half now and then the second half with the second point. So if you have your bibles, will you turn with me to 1st Corinthians chapter 14. We'll be reading verses one through 12. And if you don't, you can follow along on the screen behind me.

"Pursue love, and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy. For one who speaks in a tongue speaks not to men but to God; for no one understands him, but he utters mysteries in the Spirit. On the other hand, the one who prophesies speaks to people for their upbuilding and encouragement and consolation. The one who speaks in a tongue builds up himself, but the one who prophesies builds up the church. Now I want you all to speak in tongues, but even more to prophesy. The one who prophesies is greater than the one who speaks in tongues, unless someone interprets, so that the church may be built up.

Now, brothers, if I come to you speaking in tongues, how will I benefit you unless I bring some revelation or knowledge or prophecy or teaching? If even lifeless instruments such as the flute or the harp, do not give distinct notes, how will anyone know what is played? And if the bugle gives an indistinct sound, who will get ready for battle?

So with yourselves, if with your tongue, you utter speech that is not intelligible, how will anyone know what is said? For you will be speaking into the air. There are doubtless many different languages in the world, and none is without meaning, but if I do not know the meaning of the language, I will be a foreigner to the speaker and a speaker or a foreigner to me. So with yourselves, since you are eager for manifestations of the Spirit, strive to excel in building up the church."

So first, because we talk about tongues and prophecy so much in this text, we're going to define them. And I'm going to start with tongues because I think that this one is the more controversial of the two. And so we can define, I'm using Wayne Grudem Systematic Theology. So if you have questions, you could look at that and read from there. But we are defining tongues today as speaking in tongues is prayer or praise spoken in syllables not understood by the speaker.

This deals with human languages. So if I'm up here talking in syllables, syllables together make words, we could say words, that I have never heard before, I've never learned. And the great community of Russian speakers we have here are like, "Wow, Tyler's speaking in Russian." That's an example of the gift of tongues. I don't have that gift so that's probably not going to happen.

But also, as Paul is talking about here, he says, "For when someone speaks in a tongue, he speaks not to men but to God." So there is this aspect of speaking in tongues that is between a person and God and speaking in syllables that they don't understand. And this is where it starts to get a little controversial and a little bit prodding.

So in order to really understand what the gift of tongues is, what its purpose is, and why we are given it, we actually have to look back into the book of Genesis in chapter 11 at the story of the Tower of Babel. I mean, you might be thinking this is out there. Follow along. Trust me. It makes sense.

In the book of Genesis at the story of the Tower of Babel, the people decide, "We're going to build this tower up into the heavens." And they say in chapter 11 verse four, "Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its tops in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth."

And God sees this, and he responds by saying, "Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do now will be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and there confuse their language so that they may not understand one another's speech."

So what God sees as the real issue with them building the tower, they say that they're building a name for themselves, but God says, "And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them." You see, the people in the story, mankind was using the gift of unity in language that God had blessed them with to build a name for themselves, to say, "Yes God, thanks for this gift so that we could all talk to each other. Now we're going to build our name for ourselves so that we don't need you. We could do anything we set our minds to. We don't need God's help. We don't need to seek his guidance. We can do whatever we want."

And in doing that, there were two major consequences. The first is the one that we always think of, is that God confused the language of mankind and that people no longer had this unity in language. And the second is that we actually hurt our community ... our communication and our relationship with God in this moment because we said, "God, you've given us this gift of communication. I'd rather use it to build up myself and our people rather than be built up in you." So when we look at the gift of tongues, we have to be looking at it as redeeming both aspects in the story of the Tower of Babel.

When we look at the day of Pentecost in Acts chapter two, we see God redeeming the effects of the Tower of Babel and that the confusion of human language. In chapter two verse 11 he says, "We hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God." So the people were listening to the apostles, and what they heard was them speaking in their own tongues. In this moment, God unified their languages. But also it was for the purpose of declaring the mighty works of God. Back in our definition, it's prayer or praise to God. The focus of it is on God. The focus isn't on the human relationships. The focus is still on God.

And then for the aspect of redeeming this consequence of hurting our communication with God, we look here at this text in chapter 14, and this is what Paul is talking about. That's why he says, "The one who speaks in a tongue speaks not to men but to God."

Wayne Grudem in his Systematic Theology puts it this way. He says, "The fact that speaking in tongues occurred in known human languages once in scripture does not require that it always happened with known languages, especially when another description of speaking in tongues indicates exactly the opposite." He's talking about 1st Corinthians 14 here.

Paul does not say that the foreign visitor to Corinth will understand the speaker, which is what we would expect from Pentecost, but he says that when someone speaks in tongues, no one will understand and the outsider will not know what the person is saying. In fact, Paul explicitly says that quite the opposite of the phenomenon at Pentecostal will happen in the ordinary conduct of the church. He's talking specifically about verse 23 in our text, which we haven't gotten to yet, but I'll read it for you.

Paul says, "If therefore the whole church comes together and all speak in tongues and outsiders or unbelievers enters, will they not say that you are out of your minds?" In the day of Pentecost, outsiders, unbelievers came in, and they heard, yes, some said that you're out of your minds, but others heard and believed. Here, Paul says, no one will understand.

So we have to understand that the description in the book of Acts chapter two and the description we see here and in other places in the book of Acts. They're not in contradiction. They're not in conflict in any way. They are God giving us this gift to work harmoniously to redeem the effects at the Tower of Babel. As Pastor Jan talked about last week in chapter 13, he said that the gifts, specifically tongues and prophecy are a glimpse. They're like looking into a dim mirror as to what will happen when Jesus Christ comes and he redeems us completely, when there's the new heaven, the new earth, or when we're in heaven.

You see, the gift of speaking in tongues is a glimpse into the unity we will have in communicating with each other, even people of different languages, different nationalities that we will have in heaven, and also it's a glimpse into the unity we will have in communication with God, uninhibited by the effects of sin and uninhibited by the fall.

This is something that can be challenging or prodding. Maybe you've never heard this before and you're like, "Whoa, this is a little strange." What I want to encourage you with is this is not the gospel. This is not what saves us. Jesus Christ is the only one that saves us. But this is the truth in scripture. And so if you aren't sure about this, if you're not sure, that's okay. What I would ask is that you'd spend time in prayer asking God to reveal his truth, so you're asking him to work on your heart and reveal what he has said in scripture.

In addition, in verse four when Paul says, "The one who speaks in tongues builds up himself," this isn't a knock against the gift of tongues. This is actually Paul understanding that, what he's talking about it, the gift of tongues is primarily used for an individual to build up and strengthen their relationship with God because they're speaking to God. Whereas the gift of prophecy is able to welcome in others and to build up the whole church.

So with that, keep that in mind. This is what we're talking about when we're talking about tongues. Now we're going to move onto the definition of prophecy. Prophecy we can define as telling something that God has spontaneously brought to mind, primarily, as it says in verse three, for the purpose of upbuilding and encouragement and consolation.

But how do we know it's the spontaneous brought to mind thing? What does that mean? This is from verse 24 and 25 where Paul says, "But if all prophesy, and an unbeliever or outsider enters, he's convicted by all, he is called to account by all, the secrets of his heart are disclosed, and so, falling on his face, he will worship God and declare that God is really among you."

If an outsider comes in, how can you know the secrets of their heart? Who is the one that knows the secrets of their heart? That's God. And so it takes this divine revelation, this divine inspiration in the moment for you to know what God is using you to say to this person, to speak into their heart, to challenge them, to convict them, and to show them the love that God has for them.

Here's a quick example for you. I think a lot of times when we think about prophecy, we have this high lofty idea, which is this amazing gift. But I think we think of like movies where it's like, "Oh, you must fulfill the prophecy." It's like, "No, that's not what we're talking about." And so I'm going to give you a mundane everyday example of prophecy that you might be able to relate to a little bit more.

One Sunday I was talking with a friend of mine. And this friend would openly say he believed in God but would never say he believed in Jesus. And the reason for that was there was past hurt in his life by people that came to him, not wanting to know him, not wanting anything to do with him, but just demanding that he believed certain things about Jesus. And because of this he became embittered, and he didn't want to talk about Jesus. He didn't want to know about Jesus.

As we were talking, the spirit placed on my mind the story of the Good Samaritan. So in that moment I was able to realize that this man was hurting because he felt that no one in Boston cared for him, no one really cared for him. And the people that claim to be Christians, they didn't care for him. They just were walking by proclaiming Jesus to him and not caring for him.

So in that moment, the spirit prompted me to talk to him and to reveal to him how, yes, there were people in his past that walked by him, even claiming to be Christian that weren't caring for him. But there were brothers and sisters here at Mosaic, there are people here that were caring for his physical needs, helping him in his times of need, and also praying for him every week, caring for him, answering his questions.

And when he recognized this, his whole demeanor changed. He went from a position of arguing with me and yelling at me all of the horrible things Christians have done throughout history and has instead started asking me about who Jesus is, his characteristics.

And so I'm just answering his questions. His words were just like firing them off. I'm going down the line and out of nowhere he says, "Oh, so that's what you mean by the Trinity?" I was shocked because I had never mentioned the word Trinity. I did not use that at all. We were just talking about Jesus. And he had that connection. So I was like, "Yeah." And he was just like, "Oh, that makes sense."

I was like, "Wait a second. This is crazy. Like what's just happened? So you're telling me you believe that Jesus is equal to God. He's the son of God, fully God?" He's like, "Yeah, it has to be." And I was like, "Whoa, so you're telling me you believe because Jesus is God, he was the only one who was able to die on the cross, to pay the penalty for anything you've ever done wrong and give you this perfect relationship with God?" And again, he said, and I quote, "It has to be."

You see, this is exactly what Paul is telling us prophesy will lead to. In verse 25 as I read, it says, "So falling on his face, you will worship God and declare that God is really among you." In that moment he said, "Yeah, Jesus is God. The God that we are worshiping here at Mosaic is the true God." I say this because this had literally nothing to do with me. This was something the spirit brought to mind, and as we were talking the spirit changed something in his heart that I didn't even talk about. And this is what prophecy does.

Prophecy isn't always exactly quoting scripture in the way that the story illustrates. Sometimes it is something more particular or practical to the individual you are talking to. If you want to know more about, that after service, come talk to me about the time the Holy spirit made me talk about baseball. It's a weird one. But anyway. But what is true and what is certain is that the gift of prophecy will never contradict scripture. The gift of prophecy is not over the authority of scripture. It is working in unity with scripture for the sake of revealing God's truth about the gospel to someone in a practical way that they can understand and convicts them.

As Paul says in verse three, in verse five, in verse 12, three times in the first half of this chapter, he says, "Build up the church." You don't use the gift of prophecy. You don't use the gift of tongues for yourself. In church, we are to use it for building up his church, strengthening God's church, bringing people and welcoming them in.

Now we're going to be looking at specifically what Paul was challenging the church in Corinth to wrestle with and how that applies to us. So now we are going to be reading verses 13 through 33.

Paul says, "Therefore, one who speaks in a tongue should pray that he may interpret. For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays but my mind is unfruitful. What am I to do? I will pray with my spirit, but I will pray with my mind also; I will sing praise with my spirit, but I will sing with my mind also. Otherwise, if you give thanks with your spirit, how can anyone in the position of outsiders say 'Amen' to your thanksgiving when he does not know what you are saying? For you may be giving thanks well enough, but the other person is not being built up. I thank God that I speak in tongues more than all of you.

Nevertheless, in church I would rather speak five words with my mind in order to instruct others than 10,000 words in a tongue. Brothers, do not be children in your thinking. Be infants in evil, but in your thinking be mature. In the law it is written, 'By people of strange tongues and by the lips of foreigners will I speak to this people, and even then they will not listen to me, says the Lord.'

Thus tongues are a sign not for believers but for unbelievers, while prophecy is a sign not for unbelievers but for believers. If, therefore, the whole church come together and all speak in tongues, and an outsider unbelievers enter, will they not say that you are out of your minds? But if all prophesy, and an unbeliever or outsider enters, he's convicted by all, he is called to account by all, the secrets of his heart are disclosed, and so falling on his face, he will worship God and declare that God is really among you.

What then brothers? when you come together, each one has a hymn, a lesson, a revelation, a tongue, or an interpretation. Let all things be done for building up. If any speak in a tongue, let there be only two or at most three, and each in turn, and let someone interpret. But if there's no one to interpret, let each of them keep silent in church and speak to himself and to God. Let two or three prophets speak, and let the others weigh what is said.

If a revelation is made to another sitting there, let the first be silent. For you can all prophesy one by one, so that all may learn and be encouraged, and the spirits of the prophets are subject to prophets. For God is not a God of confusion but of peace."

All right, so a lot of text again. The problem that the church in Corinth was having was that they were lifting the gift of tongues above every other gift. They were saying that, "If you have the gift of tongues, you are held to this position of honor. And if you don't, well, you're not as important." And this led to a lot of issues. The first issue was that there was division in the church. You weren't all equal. Those few who had tongues were higher and the people that didn't were lower.

But the second was that as someone was speaking, another person over here would stand up, start speaking in tongues with no one to interpret. So half would be like, "What in the world's going on?" And then another person over here would come and start speaking and speaking in tongues and everyone would be like, "What in the world is going on? They're saying different things. What's happening?" And this led to confusion in the church. And when outsiders or unbelievers came in, they said, "You all are crazy. You're insane, and you're out of your minds. We want nothing to do with this."

So the instructions Paul was giving here are for the sake of creating an environment where outsiders or unbelievers can come to church and hear the gospel proclaimed uninhibited, undistracted.

I know this whole chapter and this whole book is about the local church. And the reason for that is that the way in which God has designed us to use the spiritual gifts he has blessed us with is in the local church. This is why Paul says that the gift of prophecy is greater than the gift of tongues. He's not saying, "Oh, you have the priorities wrong. Flip them." What he's saying is that the prophecy, the gift of prophecy has the ability to build up the church, whereas the gift of tongues does not on its own unless someone interprets. So use the spiritual gifts that God has given you, whatever gift it is, for the sake of building up the church in your local church at Mosaic. If you're not using your gifts here at Mosaic, I challenge you and I encourage you. Use them here.

God has a place for you to use your gifts here. We need to be blessed by them, but also you need to be blessed by the people that God has given other gifts to, to challenge you, to encourage you, and to strengthen you in your faith. So hold onto that and remember that for the last point.

But back to this, this section. In verse 13 Paul starts the section by saying, "Therefore, one who speaks in a tongue should pray that he may interpret." This further supports our definition that he has to pray to interpret because he doesn't know what he's speaking. So speaking in syllables, he doesn't know.

But the important thing to know here is that interpretation of tongues it's not like interpreting modern art, so not like you could put a picture up on the wall and one person comes and says, "Oh, when I look at that, I see two people looking into the sunset and walking together, holding hands." And then another person comes, "Oh, when I look at that what I see is, I just feel warmth and happiness." And another person comes up and says, "Literally, that is circles and triangles with red and blue plaint spattered on it. I don't know what you're talking about."

That's not what we're talking about when we're talking about the interpretation of tongues. Interpretation of tongues is like interpreting the language. Here's a little thought experiment for you. What comes to mind when I say this sentence: For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. It's one sentence. It's biblical. It's a good, good thing to say.

But when I read that, some of you might be focusing on, "Oh, God so loved the world, the love he has for us and his creation is vast and great." Another person hearing that might be saying, "Oh, Jesus Christ is the only Messiah. He is the only way to have and no one else." Another person might be thinking, "Oh, I need to put aside my doubts and believe, commit to Jesus."

All of those are accurate interpretations of the verse, but they were different emphasis for the individual. And this is where interpretation of tongues needs to be careful because there is one meaning, there's one language, it is one thing that's being said, but there might be different emphasis to the individual. So this is why they encourage only one or two or three to speak in tongues and for there to always be interpreters around so that they could use each other to interpret what was said and keep each other in account. Just with prophecy. Same with tongues will never contradict scripture, it is not over scripture. It is under the authority of God's word.

He follows this up by then saying, "Worship with your spirit, pray with your spirit, but also do it with your mind." And he's saying this because he understands you might be using your gift of tongues or just naturally be praising with only your spirit and not your mind. What he means by this is he says that when we pray and when we sing together in church, we are to do it so that the people next to us can say amen to what is being said. The word amen means this is true, this is verified, I wholeheartedly agree.
And so if you're speaking in a tongue that no one else can understand, people next to you are going to think you're crazy. But also to them, it doesn't matter if you're actually worshiping God or not. To them, they don't know what you're saying, but yes, it's good, you should be worshiping God when you do. But to them, they, as far as they know, you could be worshiping Satan in church. They have no idea.

So this is why Paul says, "Worship with your spirit and with your mind so that the people around you can say amen. What you are saying, what you are worshiping, what are you are praying is true, it is right." The easiest example I can give of this is worshiping through song. If you have the gift of tongues in your singing, the song in tongues, great, worship with your spirit, but also sing the actual lyrics to the song so that the people next to you can hear what you are saying. See that you are worshiping with your spirit and validate that what you're saying is true, is glorifying to God and say "Amen" and be encouraged and built up by your worship.

Using the gift of tongues in the church can be difficult. This is why Paul explicitly says, "If there's no one to interpret, don't do it." This is also why he then says in verse 19, "Nevertheless, in church I would rather speak five words with my mind in order to instruct others, than 10,000 words in a tongue."

Every single spiritual gift can be used to build up the church if we are willing to put on the seatbelt, put on the way God has instructed us to use it. This helps. Think about it. Like the spiritual gift is a car that God has blessed you with. He's given it to you. So you can use it for his ministry. But if you're not willing to put on the seatbelt, if you're not willing to follow the instructions God has given you, Paul is saying it's better for you to walk than even step foot in the car. He's saying it's for me to speak five words with my mind, with the natural gifts God has given me, than to be using the spiritual gift incorrectly, not building up the church.

So I challenge you again. Use your gifts for building up the church. Paul wants you to use your gifts, but for the sake of building up the church, not for building up yourself and not to be a distraction to others. Build up the church.

Now we get into what some scholars argue is the most confusing text in all of scripture, and I did not understand it until I was talking to Pastor Jan and Pastor Shane and Andy about this, and they were able to help me together. We all worked together. This is verses 20 through 25. In verses 22 Paul says that the gift of tongues is for unbelievers, whereas the gift of prophecy is for believers. Tongues, unbelievers, prophecy, believers. Then in verse 23 through 25 Paul says that when an unbeliever hears tongues, they'll think we're crazy. But when an unbeliever hears prophecy, they fall down and worship God.

Paul, this seems like you're saying the exact opposite of what you said before, tongues for unbelievers. But unbelievers will think we're crazy. Prophesy for believers. But unbelievers are the ones that worship God when they hear it. What are you talking about?

So in order to understand what Paul is saying, we have to understand that his idea of election and his idea of believer are so intertwined that when we're talking about them, we can't fully separate them. He doesn't use them to mean the same thing, but they are intertwined and connected. So the one that I think makes the most sense is the easiest to understand is prophecy for believers.

So when Paul says that an unbeliever hears prophecy, they're convicted, called to account, and the secrets of their heart are disclosed, what does this make you think of? This is the moment when someone recognizes that they are a sinner and need a savior. This is when they are convicted of the sin that is inside them. They are called to give an account for the secrets of their hearts and the sin they have committed, and they say, "Lord, I'm not worthy. I am not able to come to you." And prophecy is able to speak into their hearts in a way that changes it so that they're able to say, "God, you are the true God. You are the one who saves me. You have forgiven me for my sins."

So the gift of prophecy is a way in which God chooses to use us to draw his elect from the state of unbelief into the state of belief to build up his church. So now the gift of tongues is for unbelievers. And in order to understand this, we have to read the prophecy from the book of Isaiah in verse 21 where he says, "By people of strange tongues, and by the lips of foreigners, will I speak to the people? And even then they will not listen to me, says the Lord."

Gift of tongues is a sign for unbelievers, but it's not a positive one. The word that's used for the tongues, the sign is a sign for unbelievers can also mean against. And it has this idea that when an unbeliever comes and here someone's speaking in tongues, they're going to say you're crazy, they're going to say you're out of your mind. And it's proof. It's validation of their unbelief.

This is why Paul is so urgently charging the church in Corinth to focus on prophecy over tongues because they're speaking in tongues, and all they're doing is revealing people's state of unbelief. Whereas the gift of prophecy has the ability to be used by God, to draw people from unbelief into belief. This is how the church is built up. We are to be used by God to draw his elect from unbelief into belief. And this is how we are called to use the gifts even today.

So thinking about Mosaic and how we can build up his church here. If you've been to Mosaic before, you probably know that we don't struggle with lifting the gift of tongues above every other gift. That's not our struggle. We don't have people speaking in tongues all over and going crazy. Like that just doesn't happen here.

So what is the gift? Do we have a particular gift that we struggle with lifting above every other gift? And I think we do, and I think it's because the culture has so taught us to value the gift of utterances of knowledge above everything else. We only care about what is being said if it stimulates our mind, if it's an argument that is argued in such a way that it's the most persuasive thing we have ever heard and the neurons in our brain are firing and going crazy as it's being said, that we neglect anything that involves a heart change, anything that even has any emotion in it. We say, "No, I don't want that. Emotions aren't logical." And we neglect to allow the spirit to change us from within and reveal truth to us because we have formed in our mind what we have determined to be knowledge.

Have we quenched the spirit working inside of us to challenge us, to strengthen us because we said, "Nope. There's not enough physical evidence for that. That's not what I understand or how I think He work. That's not what I know." Quick example of this. I am guilty of doing this and I can say that honestly. I'm in seminary currently at Gordon-Conwell. In my first year I was taking a class called Introduction to the New Testament. And for one of my exams I had to memorize the order of events in the book of Acts. Crazy.

So I was reading the book of Acts over and over and over and over again. And as I'm reading, the Spirit's prompting something inside me. You see, before this moment, I had only believed in the gift of tongues as the definition of Acts chapter two. I would say, "This text is crazy. I don't know what to do with that."

And God's Spirit was speaking to me saying, "Hey, what do you think about this? What do you think about this verse? What do you think about what I'm saying here?" And I said to God, "God, you know I have an exam tomorrow. You know I need to study this so that I can do well on my exam. And by the way, God, you know that I'm studying and taking these classes so that I can serve you God. Like I need to do well on this exam so I can serve you here at Mosaic." And in that moment I quenched the spirit because I had determined that what I believed to be knowledge, memorizing the events of scripture was more important than what the Spirit was trying to change in my heart. That was sinful. That was wrong.

Praise God. I am thankful that he has then worked on my heart after then, and he had grace for me. I had to come back and fall at his feet and say, "Lord, I am so sorry." And he was able to convict me again. But have we so valued knowledge that we have diminished the works of the Spirit in other ways? I want to be clear. The gift of knowledge is good. It is important. It is hugely important in the church and is vital in building up God's church. However, it is not more important than the other gifts.

Furthermore, we talked a little bit about the problems with worshiping with just our spirit, but I think the problem that most of us here struggle with is worshiping with just our mind and not our spirit. Thinking about when the songs are playing, we are saying the words, we're affirming the theology and the lyrics, but we're not worshiping with our spirit. We sing songs like praise God from whom. Like, no, we're not joyful. We're not praising God when we're singing. As Paul says, the issue with worshiping with just your spirit and just your mind is that the people around you will not say amen and will not be praising God because of that.

To prove this point, I have had multiple teens in Mosaic teens that when I ask them, "Oh, do you believe in Jesus?" They're like, "Yeah, I think so." I'm like, "What do you mean? What's holding you back?" And they say, "When I go upstairs, I see so many people worshiping ingenuinely."

Now that's not good theology for them. I correct them by saying, "Yes, we're all sinners. We are all working towards worshiping God rightly. That shouldn't be a reason to not believe in God. It's not a good reason," but it proves the point that Paul was making here, that when people see us worshiping with just our mind or just our spirit, they're going to say, "Ah, I don't know if I could say amen to that. I don't know if I could say this is true."

And this one I think is the best thing to be working on because when you are worshiping with both your spirit and your mind, you are so much greater deepening your relationship with the Lord. You are worshiping him wholeheartedly. You are able to understand the love he has for you and praise him in the best way possible. Like this is good for you too. But then also, the people around you can see and say, "Wow, God is here. The spirit of God is moving in this place. I could say, amen. God is really here."

I say this being fully guilty of not doing this perfect. As I was sitting over there this morning, I had to remind myself that I'm preaching on this because I was trying to go through the sermon that I was about to say in my head and I was like, "Yeah, I was saying, ha, ha, but I'm really thinking about the sermon." I was like, "No, no. I am preaching on how exactly wrong that is. I need to not worry about that and praise God in this moment."

Lastly, I want to say this. I think our view of church is far too narrow. We view church as the hour and a half we meet here on Sunday and that's it. We show up just in time to miss the meet-and-greet so we don't have to say hi to anybody, or we show up just in time for the sermon to start. So we miss all of the worship through song. And then the second I say amen and I walk off the stage, half the people are out the door and then the rest wait until the last song is done and then are immediately out the door.

And then you hear me saying, "Use your gifts. God has a place for your gifts here at Mosaic. Use them here. We want you." And you say, "Ah, there's not really a place for me to use them here. Like the band is up there doing their thing. Pastor Jan, Pastor Shane, me, Andy, like you're up here talking. Like there's not really anything else for people to do."

First of all, there are so many different ways to serve here at Mosaic, and each one of the spiritual gifts that God has blessed us with needs to be used in them. I wrote down the list from chapter 12 so I didn't have to turn there, but utterances of wisdom, utterances of knowledge, faith, healing, miracles, prophecy, distinguishing between tongue ... distinguishing between spirits speaking in tongues and interpretation of tongues. We need all of them. We want to be one whole unified body and you can use in there.

But even before that, even before you commit to a service team, which you should, but what about the time before service starts and after service ends? Are you in a relational community with people here that you can use your gifts then? Do you have the gift of prophecy? Are you speaking with people before and after service saying, "Hey, I know you're struggling with this. God has encouraged ... wants me to encourage you, to console you, to build you up with this."

If you have the gift of tongues, go find someone with interpretation. Pray together, praise God together, and get to know the knowledge, the revelation, or whatever is being ... God is using you in that time. If you have the gift of wisdom, of knowledge, are you helping people in between? If you have the gift of distinguishing between spirits, someone's struggling with something. I don't know if this is God leading me or Satan trying to deceive me. Are you helping people?

There are so many opportunities for everyone here to be using your gifts. There's really no excuse. And remembering that God has designed us to use our gifts in the local church. Yes, we should be using them elsewhere. But if we really want to build God's church, his kingdom here on earth, we are to be using his gifts in the local church here at Mosaic. Are you willing to let him use you here? Are you willing to let him use you now?

Let's pray. Heavenly father. Lord, we come to you humbled, recognizing that we are not worthy and we praise you that you have blessed us with gifts anyway. Lord, we thank you that you have saved us and blessed us with opportunities to be used by you. Give us that wisdom. Give us that understanding to use your gifts here in your local church. Help us to use them rightly in the way you have guided us for the sake of building up your church. We want to see people come to know you and to love you more. Use us. Give us a heart to be used by you. In Jesus' name, your son, we pray. Amen.