God the Holy Spirit, Mentor's Guide, MG14

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G O D T H E H O L Y S P I R I T

“spirituals”: “To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.” Manifestation means that something is made clear or obvious. In other words, we can talk about spiritual gifts, not only as a specific kind of God given ability for ministry, but also as anything which makes the presence and the power of the Holy Spirit evident or visible. Therefore, an understanding of verse one in English might more understandably be written as, “Now concerning manifestations of the Spirit , brothers, I do not want you to be uninformed.”

3. Toward a definition of spiritual gifts

a. “Whatever thing, event, or individual serves as an instrument of the Spirit, or manifests the Spirit, or embodies the Spirit is a spiritual gift” ( Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible ).

b. “A gift is a Spirit-given ability for Christian service” (Leslie B. Flynn, 19 Gifts of the Spirit ).

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c. “A spiritual gift is a gift of divine grace that is evidenced by some ability that benefits the body of Christ” (Thomas C. Oden, Life in the Spirit ).

4. In all cases the purpose of spiritual gifts is to empower the Church to accomplish its mission in the world. Spiritual gifts, therefore, exist for the “common good” (1 Cor. 12.7) rather than for the individual.

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C. “How many spiritual gifts are there?” and “What are these gifts?”