God has given each redeemed believer one or more “spiritual gifts”, the Greek word CHARISMA, which mean grace gift. Such gifts are different than natural abilities since we gain them not by our physical birth but rather our spiritual birth. Today’s verses examine in more detail 3 examples of such spiritual gifts, i.e., gifts of serving, teaching, and exhorting.

“SUNDAY EXPOSITIONS” are extended weekly Bible teaching times in which I go through a Book of Bible verse by verse. My current exposition is I Thessalonians. The SUNDAY EXPOSITIONS are posted on Sunday each week.

God has given each redeemed believer one or more “spiritual gifts”, the Greek word CHARISMA, which mean grace gift. Such gifts are different than natural abilities since we gain them not by our physical birth but rather our spiritual birth. These gifts were given to us because we are “body parts” of the “body” of the local church. As a “body part”, we have important functions within the local church family and the church is hurt to the degree we don’t faithfully use our gifts. In fact, our spiritual gifts actually belong to the local church family, not to us, and God commands us to “use” the gifts He has given us! God gives us the example of “prophecy” to illustrate these points.

“SUNDAY EXPOSITIONS” are extended weekly Bible teaching times in which I go through a Book of Bible verse by verse. My current exposition is I Thessalonians. The SUNDAY EXPOSITIONS are posted on Sunday each week.

God has given each redeemed believer one or more “spiritual gifts”, the Greek word CHARISMA, which mean grace gift. Such gifts are different than natural abilities since we gain them not by our physical birth but rather our spiritual birth. To understand God’s purpose in giving us such spiritual gifts, vs. 4-8 explain a number of perspectives on gifts and gives us definitions of some of the gifts. We learn here that we are a “body part”, not a “body” unto ourselves. The different “body parts” have different function within the body, which is the local church family. In fact, our spiritual gifts actually belong to the local church family, not to us!

“SUNDAY EXPOSITIONS” are extended weekly Bible teaching times in which I go through a Book of Bible verse by verse. My current exposition is I Thessalonians. The SUNDAY EXPOSITIONS are posted on Sunday each week.

A core conforming pressure of the world is human pride, which God defines as “thinking more highly of ourselves than we ought to think”. Pride makes us think we don’t really need God to enable us to face life successfully, that we have the power within ourselves to solve our problems and live our lives. God’s Word tells us the opposite is true, that apart from Christ we can do nothing! Pride deceives us into thinking we don’t need to obey Romans 12:1-2.

“SUNDAY EXPOSITIONS” are extended weekly Bible teaching times in which I go through a Book of Bible verse by verse. My current exposition is I Thessalonians. The SUNDAY EXPOSITIONS are posted on Sunday each week.

“SUNDAY EXPOSITIONS” are extended weekly Bible teaching times in which I go through a Book of Bible verse by verse. My current exposition is I Thessalonians. The SUNDAY EXPOSITIONS are posted on Sunday each week.

God makes 3 intense appeals/commands to His redeemed children in light of His wonderful mercies revealed in Chapters 1-11. These three choices define how to please God with our lives as redeemed people. The first of these is the importance of choosing to present our bodies as living sacrifices, to determine to let Christ be Lord in our lives! The second choice is to determine to no longer be conformed to the world culture surrounding us, to adopt its ways. The third choice is to be transformed through a renewed mind, found only through God’s word and the work of the Holy Spirit within us.