Reasons to Determine our Spiritual Gifts and Let the Holy Spirit Teach—R Fritz
In the Old Testament, God’s Spirit came upon believers to do God’s will. When Jesus died the Comforter (Holy Spirit) came to teach all things which explains what God wanted the Holy Spirit to be. Spiritual gifts to some are given at birth and used or seen through our fleshly eyes. That does not mean we know how to use them. God’s Spirit can come upon and move people before the Holy Spirit comes to dwell inside us. God can use an ass to speak or make his point. Numbers 22:22-23,25,27-29,31,33 says “And God’s anger was kindled because he went: and the angel of the Lord stood in the way for an adversary against him. Now he was riding upon his ass, (donkey) and his two servants were with him. And the ass saw the angel of the Lord standing in the way, and his sword drawn in his hand: and the ass turned aside out of the way, and went into the field: and Balaam smote (hit) the ass, to turn her into the way. And when the ass saw the angel of the Lord, she thrust herself unto the wall and crushed Balaam’s foot against the wall: and he smote her again. And when the ass saw the angel of the Lord, she fell down under Balaam: and Balaam’s anger was kindled, and he smote the ass with a staff. And the Lord opened the mouth of the ass, and she said unto Balaam, “What have I done unto thee, that thou hast smitten me these three times?” And Balaam said unto the ass, “Because thou hast mocked me: I would there be a sword in mine hand, for now, would I kill thee”. Then the Lord opened the eyes of Balaam, and he saw the angel of the Lord standing in the way, and his sword drawn in his hand: and he bowed down his head, and fell flat on his face. And the ass saw me, and turned from me these three times: unless she had turned from me, surely now also I had slain thee, and saved her alive.” God used a donkey to change Balaam’s direction and speak to him because the donkey saw the angel and moved or the angel would have killed Balaam because his way was perverse before God. Balaam saved his own life by showing and giving his will and obedience to God by bowing his head. Balaam was disobedient.
People do not understand God can and will use anybody and anything to change our direction. God can take anybody off the street whether they know God or not to give us a message, we need to listen and ask the Holy Spirit the truth. It was no mistake God used the ass, donkey, to speak to Balaam as well as us. You have to understand the characteristics of a donkey and what we believe as stubbornness. I wanted to be sure about the characteristics so I investigated why donkeys (asses) act the way they do and found their behavior is motivated by fear, pain, not understanding what is asked and the behavior or attitude of the handler, biblically donkeys were seen for peace, humility or wisdom and memory knowledge, the ability to remember the things that happened to them.
Our attitude or behavior of stubbornness before following Jesus Christ is really a form of fear and lack of trust. It is an attitude of being afraid of change. Fear is a tool of Satan and that attitude is changed by Jesus Christ coming into our life. It does not stop completely without the Holy Spirit and us surrendering our will. The Holy Spirit has shown me many times in the last month that we need to get our feelings and emotions under control with the Holy Spirit. It was shown to me how easy it is for Satan to take our emotions and push them over the top to say and do things Satan wants us to do. The Holy Spirit puts us back on track and stops us from reacting where love instead of anger is applied. This is why our will needs to be surrendered. I have been in discussions where somebody would say something that normally would set my emotions off but because I am surrendered, I felt peace and said nothing. We are supposed to speak what the Holy Spirit wants, not how we feel. There is a time when we can speak for ourselves if it does not mess up what God has planned.
The Spiritual Gifts are given by God to people to work together for God’s glory. Each of us has gifts and a responsibility to know what they are and want for us to find out. I knew some of my gifts when I read 1Corinthians 12:1-31 twenty years ago. I am going to focus on 1Corinthians 12:1,3-4,7-10 which says “Now concerning spiritual gifts, I would not have you ignorant. Wherefore I give you to understand, that no man speaking by the Spirit of God calleth Jesus accursed: and that no man can say that Jesus is the Lord but by the Holy Ghost. Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal. For to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit; To another faith by the same Spirit; to another the gifts of healing by the same Spirit; To another the working of miracles; to another prophecy; to another discerning of spirits; to other divers (several) kinds of tongue; to another the interpretation of tongues: These are the gifts from God. They are given life by the Holy Ghost. There are different gifts with the same Spirit that works together.
There are people that have more than one gift, they are used through the Holy Spirit. To be able to use these gifts we have to be in tune with the Holy Spirit. That is a relationship with the Holy Spirit first showing our gift or gifts and then how to use them. I saw some of the gifts I had after I read about the gifts. I also looked at my life years ago and saw one of the gifts back then, it was discerning spirits. Many years ago, I did not understand what I was looking at and now the Holy Spirit has shown me what I saw. I have asked the Holy Spirit to sharpen my ability to use my gift and keep on asking for more. My spiritual gifts have been sharpened to give me the ability to look at with my spiritual eyes and help people to get through the issues they are struggling to get through. Discerning spirits is being able to see and deal with spirits from all directions and behind people through the Holy Spirit.
The problem is God’s people are not using the gifts or having a relationship with the Holy Spirit asking what their gifts are and wanting to use them. Churches for the most part are not teaching or even talking about spiritual gifts. These are the tools for believers to overcome evil and Satan. The reason people have different spiritual gifts is for the body of Christ to discern Spiritual issues going on in the church or any group of believers.
We can be a formidable force for Jesus Christ if each of us would do what God called us to do. Satan uses his tools so we do not do what we are called to do. It is time to use God’s tools to overcome Satan and his schemes. God Bless.
