House Church Talk - cessation of spiritual gifts

[jesusislord343 at juno.com]

Hello, Ross--
Thanks for your reply here.  It appears rather that you are arguing for
the "mature church" view, instead of the more popular "completion of the
canon" theory.  

Allow me to pose a couple of the further incongruities I observe with the
cessation theory.  First of all, the epistle of I Corinthians identifies
itself throughout as a universal epistle, for observance throughout the
churches in all ages (1:2, 4:17, 7:17, 11:16, 14:33-36, etc.).  Thus I
Corinthians 14:26-40 is identified as "the commandments of the Lord" for
"all the churches of the saints" (vv. 33, 37).  Indeed, these are things
to be observed until the Lord's return (11:26).  

So what I find incongruous in the cessation theory is that the gifts of
the Holy Spirit are:
1. Presented and explained in chapter 12
2. Then said to be about to cease in chapter 13
3. Then nevertheless commanded to be used universally throughout the
church age in chapter 14

In other words, if this theory is valid, we are to left to think that
Paul goes to all the trouble of spelling out in great detail how
Spirit-led corporate assembly times are to be ordered--but all with the
expectation that the specific gifts mentioned in the passage (languages,
interpretation, and prophecy) are about to cease in a few short years.  

As I would view the matter, the mention of languages and prophecy at the
heart of our Lord's commandments for assembling in I Cor. 14:26-33 is
instead potent evidence that these gifts will continue to be sovereignly
distributed throughout the age--that is, until we see our Lord "face to
face," and know Him fully as we have been fully known by Him (Gal. 4:9).

So while we may not observe many of these gifts today, it is not
necessarily because the Holy Spirit is no longer distributing them. 
Rather, it may because the churches are failing to heed the repeated
commands of the word of God to zealously pursue the greater,
church-edifying gifts--a theme repeated no less than five times
throughout the short span of I Corinthians 12:31-14:39 (12:31; 14:1, 5,
12, and 39).  

So again, the incongruity exists of Paul commanding in I Cor. 14:1 the
zealous pursuit of prophetic gifts *which the cessation theory holds were
about to cease*--remarkably, based on the very verses leading up to it
(13:8-13). 

In closing, if we see a great departure from the interactive corporate
instruction presented us in the word of God, we may attribute much of it
to the spiritual gifts cessation theory.  God has given us His commands
for how the churches will be edified in the faith, and our adversary is
at work with his lies to subvert the churches' much-needed edification. 
If the eight verses of I Corinthians 14:26-33 can be effectively removed
from our Bibles, he has gone a long way toward accomplishing his schemes,
and taking us away from ALL ministry being done by means of spiritual
gift (I Pet. 4:10-11).

May we continuing reading the word of God past what we suppose we are
discovering in Paul's poetic reflections in I Corinthians 13, and onto
our Lord's last words on these matters, where He commands: "Therefore,
brothers, desire earnestly to prophesy, and do not forbid to speak with
languages" ( I Cor. 14:39).

Grace in Christ,
Glenn S.
  
On Fri, 2 Jul 2004 00:53:31 -0500 Ross J Purdy <rossjpurdy at netwurx.net>
writes:
> Hi Glenn,
> 
> You ask, "Did Paul live to see the completion of the canon of 
> scripture?" I
> can speculate that he did and I do, but that is not germane to my
> understanding of the perfect which I think is something altogether 
> different
> to the completion of the canon (but not necessarily totally 
> unrelated). I
> believe that whatever communication they needed they had, even if it 
> was
> only a part of what we call the New Testament writings. I suspect 
> various
> churches had collections of letters from Paul mostly and perhaps a 
> few other
> apostles most of which we do not have (and of which we were not 
> intended to
> have).
> 
> In Christ,
> Ross Purdy

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