Psalm 36:5-10

Psalm 96 or Psalm 96:1-10

1 Corinthians 12:1-11

John 2:1-11

May the words of my heart and the meditations of my mind be acceptable oh Lord my strength and my redeemer.

When I looked up the lessons for today earlier in the week I was indeed grateful!  The reading from the Epistle of Paul to the church of Corinth is one of my favorite readings.  The topic of spiritual gifts is one that I enjoy talking about.  In preparation for today I read the lessons in the translation called “The Message” by Eugene Peterson. I will be using this translation throughout my sermon.

Paul starts out this section of his letter to the church in Corinth by saying:

“What I want to talk about now is the various ways God's Spirit gets worked into our lives. This is complex and often mis-understood, but I want you to be informed and knowledgeable. “

In this translation we hear that Paul trying to explain that there is not a just one singular way that the Spirit comes into our lives.  There are many ways and they are all equally valuable.  Just because I feel the power of the spirit in certain situations and you may find it in a very different setting does not mean that either one of us is wrong.  As I see it Paul was trying to get across to that early group of feisty Christians that there is no singular cook-book way to understand the workings of the spirit of God.  When we talk about our faith stories and how we have seen the hand of God about in the world about us I find the diversity of experiences amazing.  God is using every trick in the book to get our attention and sometimes, in my life anyway, seems to have to resort to the figurative 2 x 4 upside the head to get my attention.  Have you ever had one of those occasions when it seemed like God was using the 2 X 4 approach?  One time that it happened with me was when I started to preach.  Father John, our interim Rector at the time, walked up to me one day and said “You need to start preaching”.  Just like that.  Out of the blue.  My response was nope! Not in this lifetime! That is not a gift that I have.  Fr. John insisted that I did have the gift of preaching and he could see it in me.  I was confronted so directly that it made me at least try and see if I could preach.  Well, for better or worse, here I am preaching on a regular basis and actually enjoying it.  For me that was the spirit of God using the 2 X 4 to get my attention.  Other times it has been more subtle.  I have had many occasions when it just seems like everything falls quietly into place and I am able to do things that I thought I could never do. 

Paul continues:

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. For instance, by using your heads, you know perfectly well that the Spirit of God would never prompt anyone to say "Jesus be damned!" Nor would anyone be inclined to say "Jesus is Master!" without the insight of the Holy Spirit.”

Paul is telling the Christians at Corinth to use their heads!  That we have to use our intelligence to understand to seek out what is good and what we are called to do.  There was a wonderful ad that the national church did a number of years ago that basically said that the Episcopal church was a place where you did not need to leave your brain at the front door!  We are not called to just sit back and have our faith spoon fed to us.  Verna Dozier, a great teacher and author, repeatedly said in her writings that the laity cannot abrogate the responsibility for studying our faith.  If we merely come to church and worship God on Sundays, content to have the so called “Leaders” of the church tell us what God wants us to do we will not be equipped to go out an follow Jesus in the world outside of these walls.  How I see God at the work in the world about me may connect with the one or more of you in the congregation but it may not.  However, If I can get you thinking, perhaps start a spark of interest, that will cause you to go out and explore what is your reality and how you see God at work then I have accomplished something. 

Paul finally tells the church in Corinth that all of the gifts that the people have are from God:

 

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. All kinds of things are handed out by the Spirit, and to all kinds of people! The variety is wonderful:

   wise counsel,    clear understanding,  simple trust.   healing the sick,   miraculous acts,   proclamation,  distinguishing between spirits,  tongues,  interpretation of tongues.

   All these gifts have a common origin, but are handed out one by one by the one Spirit of God. He decides who gets what, and when.

Paul is trying to get across to the feisty group of people that no gift is better than any other gift.  Just because someone has a very visible gift in one  setting doesn’t mean that it is better than the person who works behind the scenes  It is just different.  That is what makes our world work.  If we all had the same gift the world around us would not work.  For example, If we all were given of healing and were Doctors and no-one was an engineer we would not be able to build great building. We might be healthy but we would probably still be lining in mud huts! It is both the variety of gifts and the abundance of the types of spiritual gifts that have been given to mankind that I find remarkable.  I am amazed by some of the gifts of creativity that surround me.  There are times that I wish that I had the gift of painting, for example, but if I stop and thing about it I have different gifts including the gift of enjoying the beauty that surrounds us in the world.  I think we all do this.  We tend to view some people and their gifts as better and some as lowly.  That is our Human nature but not Gods nature.  God sees that we need a mix of gifts and that no single person can have all of the gifts that are needed in this world.  Some will work in very visible roles and others will work behind the scenes.  Both are needed to bring the

Kindom of God’s love to our hurting and hurtful world. As we at St. Paul’s go forward into creating a structure for our ministry at this place and in the world we will have to be cognizant of the gifts that have been given to each of us.  Our ministry here, for example will not look exactly like the ministry at Trinity Cathedral because we have a different mix of gifts.  We will share some of the same gifts and will do similar activities but we should not think that either one is getter.  Our ministries are just different.  After all, as Paul said “All these gifts have a common origin, but are handed out one by one by the one Spirit of God. He decides who gets what, and when.”  I invite you this week to examine the gifts that the Spirit have given each of us.  What are we being called to do with our gifts that will help bring God’s loving presence to those who need it in our World?

Amen.