What Spiritual Gifts Are Not

Every believer needs faith to believe, has duties and responsibilities as a Christian, should be displaying the entirety of the fruit of the Spirit, and probably has at least a couple spiritual gifts that need to be taken out of the spiritual closet and opened.

May’s Awakening, Day 4

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Galatians 5:22–23 NIV 

            Spiritual gifts are not the fruit of the Spirit. The fruit of the Spirit is a work of the Holy Spirit in every believer to bring about all nine of those listed attributes or characteristics to make a believer mature and complete. The fruit of the Spirit is the cooperative work between believer and the Holy Spirit to continually in increasing fashion, display those listed attributes in all their fullness—all for everyone. Spiritual gifts are unique for each believer.

            Likewise, there are some spiritual gifts which seem the same as our normal Christian experience and responsibilities. For instance, there are the spiritual gifts of faith, giving, intercession, and evangelist. We will specifically define those later, but they are distinct and separate from every believer’s necessity to have faith, to give of their tithes and offerings, to pray for others, and to share their testimony and the love of Jesus Christ with others. And remember, we’ve already stated that the spiritual gift of tongues is separate and unique from a believer’s private prayer language when praying in the Spirit—every believer can potentially pray in the Spirit, but only a few believers will receive the spiritual gift of tongues, and the spiritual gift of tongues is a public gift requiring an interpretation for building up the body of believers, while praying in tongues is generally private or in small groups with no interpretation.

            As a final note, remember that the Holy Spirit is a perfect gentleman and as such the utmost respect and order should always be displayed when the spiritual gifts are exercised. No particular gift should be coveted or seen as superior as we are all essential parts of the body of Christ. Additionally, one should not neglect your gift nor your assumed duties and responsibilities, regardless if that is your area of spiritual gifting or not. The desired result of the gifts is to bring glory to God, not self, and to build each other up. Many of the gifts are interdependent and work best together—either from separate individuals or an individual possessing multiple gifts.