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Wasted Talents · Pastor John Piper's answers

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  Speaker 1: You are talented, You have gifts, maybe even pulling off
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  Speaker 1: marvels with your own hands. You are impressively gifted. But
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  Speaker 1: there's a catch. You can be a miracle worker and
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  Speaker 1: waste your gifts. Spiritual gifts are like dynamite. In the
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  Speaker 1: right hands, they blow up rocks to build tunnels and highways.
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  Speaker 1: They can produce, but in the wrong hands, hands seeking
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  Speaker 1: to puff up spiritual gifts are good for nothing. Today
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  Speaker 1: I asked Pastor John, wasted talents, and that brings us
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  Speaker 1: to the Love chapter Firs. Corinthians thirteen, which we read
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  Speaker 1: together today, and to this question from Martha in San Diego.
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  Speaker 1: Pastor John, Hello, and thank you for taking my question.
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  Speaker 1: And one Corinthians thirteen, Verses one to three. Paul teaches
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  Speaker 1: that spiritual gifts, though valuable, are meaningless without love. He
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  Speaker 1: explains that no matter how impressive or beneficial a gift
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  Speaker 1: may seem, whether it's speaking in tongues, prophesying, even given
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  Speaker 1: away all of our possessions, it all amounts to nothing
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  Speaker 1: if it isn't motivated by love. Spiritual gift plus that
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  Speaker 1: gift put in action minus a motive of love equals nothing.
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  Speaker 1: That is a powerful warning from Paul, how does this
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  Speaker 1: challenge our understanding of the role of spiritual gifts in
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  Speaker 1: the church. And why do you think Paul places love
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  Speaker 1: even above the most powerful spiritual abilities.
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  Speaker 2: I think the reason Paul makes love the measure of
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  Speaker 2: the right use of spiritual gifts is because it is
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  Speaker 2: so easy for us to lose sight of the fact
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  Speaker 2: that spiritual gifts are meant for the upbuilding of other people,
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  Speaker 2: not the manifestation of our own powers powers. In other words,
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  Speaker 2: spiritual gifts are wonderful and dangerous, just like dynamite is
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  Speaker 2: wonderful and dangerous. In the right hands, it can blow
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  Speaker 2: a mountain out of the way for a highway, and
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  Speaker 2: in the wrong hands it can blow your head off.
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  Speaker 2: And love is the criterion that Paul uses for how
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  Speaker 2: not to blow your head off but create highways of
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  Speaker 2: Christian truth and Christ's exalting faith and obedience. In one
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  Speaker 2: Corinthians eight one, Paul says knowledge puffs up. Love builds up,
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  Speaker 2: So there's a wrong use of knowledge. It doesn't build
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  Speaker 2: up the other person, It puffs up the one who
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  Speaker 2: presumes to know. But the measure of the right use
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  Speaker 2: of knowledge is love, because love doesn't puff up the lover,
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  Speaker 2: is it builds up the beloved. Then when he gets
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  Speaker 2: finally what four chapters later to spiritual gifts, in chapters
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  Speaker 2: twelve to fourteen, he says, let all things be done
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  Speaker 2: for up building or for building up chapter fourteen, verse
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  Speaker 2: twenty six, which is virtually the same as saying in
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  Speaker 2: chapter sixteen, verse fourteen, let all that you do be
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  Speaker 2: done in love. So, since everything is to be done
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  Speaker 2: in love, and since love builds up instead of puffing
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  Speaker 2: up or tearing down, therefore everything is to be done
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  Speaker 2: for upbuilding, and that makes love the measure of all
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  Speaker 2: the right uses of spiritual gifts. You can see him
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  Speaker 2: applying this measure, for example, in one instance fourteen four,
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  Speaker 2: when he governs the use of tongues like this, the
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  Speaker 2: one who speaks in a tongue builds up himself, but
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  Speaker 2: the one who prophesies builds up the church. So unless
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  Speaker 2: there's interpretation, Paula is saying interpretation for the tongue. He says,
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  Speaker 2: the one who prophesies quote is greater than the one
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  Speaker 2: who speaks in tongues. That is, he's more loving. Why
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  Speaker 2: is he greater because building someone up, that is loving
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  Speaker 2: them is the measure of the right use of the
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  Speaker 2: spiritual gift. He says again in verse seventeen, when you
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  Speaker 2: pray in tongues, you may be giving thanks well enough,
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  Speaker 2: but the other person is not being built up, that is,
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  Speaker 2: he's not being loved. So the question becomes, well, if
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  Speaker 2: love means building up, what does building up mean? I
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  Speaker 2: think a lot of people don't stop and say, what
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  Speaker 2: are we talking about here? That's like a building is obvious,
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  Speaker 2: it's not obvious. I think most agree when you do
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  Speaker 2: the textual search most degree, it means building up someone's faith,
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  Speaker 2: that is, helping them be stronger, more firm, more steady,
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  Speaker 2: more durable in their faith in Jesus in his word
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  Speaker 2: in the Promises of God. Colossians two seven says, as
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  Speaker 2: you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him,
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  Speaker 2: rooted and built up in him, and established in faith.
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  Speaker 2: And Jude one twenty says, build up yourselves in your
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  Speaker 2: most holy faith. So I think it's right to say
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  Speaker 2: that building up refers to building up a person's faith,
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  Speaker 2: that is, faith in Christ, making it stronger, more durable.
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  Speaker 2: So what it boils down to is that Paul wants
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  Speaker 2: the church, the fellowship, the use of gifts to be
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  Speaker 2: all about Christ, the trusted Christ. Spiritual gifts are to
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  Speaker 2: be done in love. Love builds up, Building up is
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  Speaker 2: the strengthening of faith. Faith is in Jesus Christ. That's
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  Speaker 2: the issue. Ultimately, it's the centrality of the glory, the trustworthiness,
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  Speaker 2: the beauty, the worth of Christ trusted building up that trust,
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  Speaker 2: building up, that treasuring, building up that love for Christ
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  Speaker 2: is the issue. Christ is honored when He's trusted, treasured, believed.
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  Speaker 2: The right use of spiritual gifts is ultimately the question,
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  Speaker 2: are you making much of yourself or are you making
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  Speaker 2: much of Christ? Now Here's what makes one Grinthan is
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  Speaker 2: thirteen so provocative and so penetrating and surprising, right to
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  Speaker 2: the core of our motivation and whether Christ is at
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  Speaker 2: the heart of it. Paul doesn't just say that the
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  Speaker 2: gift of tongues without life is a clanging symbol and
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  Speaker 2: that the gift of prophecy and knowledge without love is nothing.
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  Speaker 2: He also says it is just so shocking faith itself
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  Speaker 2: that removes mountains if it does not have love, gains nothing.
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  Speaker 2: And even more amazing, you can even give your body
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  Speaker 2: to be burned, which certainly looks like love, and yet
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  Speaker 2: not have love and gain nothing. In other words, the
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  Speaker 2: very things faith and love, the very things that are
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  Speaker 2: supposed to be the measure of the right use of gifts,
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  Speaker 2: Faith and love can themselves masquerade as the real thing
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  Speaker 2: when they're not so use Verse two. If I have
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  Speaker 2: all faith so as to remove mountains, but have not
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  Speaker 2: love nothing, And if I give away all that I
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  Speaker 2: have of and deliver my body to be burned, I mean,
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  Speaker 2: what can you do more loving than that? And have
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  Speaker 2: not love? I gain nothing. Paul is so convinced of
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  Speaker 2: the deceptive power of sinful human nature that he feels
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  Speaker 2: the need to point out that there is a kind
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  Speaker 2: of love that sacrifices its own body and is not love,
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  Speaker 2: And there's a kind of faith that can move a
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  Speaker 2: mountain and is not saving faith. You can sacrifice yourself
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  Speaker 2: in a self exalting way, a way that's not concerned
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  Speaker 2: to build anybody up, but rather to make much of
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  Speaker 2: your own self sacrificing virtue. Yes, you can. Hell deceitful
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  Speaker 2: is our heart, and you can trust God mark this.
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  Speaker 2: You can trust God to work a miracle, to show
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  Speaker 2: off your miracle working faith, and not with any concern
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  Speaker 2: that the christ exalting faith of others be built up.
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  Speaker 2: So what First Corinthians comes down to is whether our lives,
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  Speaker 2: including the use of our spiritual gifts, is motivated by
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  Speaker 2: self exaltation or Christ exaltation.
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  Speaker 1: Yes, spiritual gifts are wonderful and dangerous, just like dynamite
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  Speaker 1: is wonderful and dangerous. Spiritual gifts are not for us
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  Speaker 1: to put on a trophy case to show off to others.
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  Speaker 1: They are tools meant to build up the faith of others.
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  Speaker 1: In love and speaking of gifts and talents and getting
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  Speaker 1: things done for all the right reasons. We've covered personal
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  Speaker 1: productivity from a lot of the angles on the podcast
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  Speaker 1: over these past thirteen years now and for more see
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  Speaker 1: the as passers On book in that section on purpose,
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  Speaker 1: productivity and Laziness on pages eighty five to ninety four
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  Speaker 1: for more. To catch up on what we've covered over
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  Speaker 1: those thirteen years now on purpose, productivity and laziness, Thank you,
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  Speaker 1: Pastor John. Fur Babies and pet Stewardship, Oh boy, that
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  Speaker 1: should be interesting up next time. I'm Tony RANKI see
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  Speaker 1: you on Thursday.