Cessation of Gifts.

During my time in high school, there was a book we used in our CRE (Christian Religious Education) lessons; the title was ‘God speaks to men.’ Looked at in different angles, the title of the book can mean many things:

1.      That God does not speak to rocks but to mankind.

2.      That God spoke sometime ago to mankind and he no longer speaks in the same way he did.

3.      That God, going by the tense of the title of the book, still speaks to men today.

It is the third view that I want to expound on in form of asking and answering two questions:

1.      Did God speak in history past? Does He speak today?

Did God speak in the past?

There is no doubt that Almighty God spoke in times past. Several Scriptures testify to this and here I list a few:

 Numbers 12: 6. And he said “Hear my words: If there is a prophet among you, I the Lord make myself known to him in a vision, I speak with him in a dream.”

 This together with passages like Joel 2:28 clearly show that God chose various ways in the past to speak to men (Heb 1:1-3). Moses would meet God in the mountain and speak to Him as a man speaks to his friend. Moses was a prophet of God just like Isaiah and Jeremiah amongst others. Surely, God spoke to men in the Old Testament.

When we come to the New Testament, we see that God reached out to men through visions and dreams as well. Joel 2:28, and in Corinth we see even gifts of speaking in tongues in place.

However, though such gifts through which God spoke to His people existed even after ascension of Christ, it appears that their use was clearly coming to an end in the ministry of the apostles. And Hebrews 1: 1-3 hints to this fact. All that God had endeavored to say in the Old Testament culminated in the coming of the Son. The Son was the object of the prophetic words. The Old Testament prophets therefore ministered to people about the Son to come and the Apostle later ministered concerning the Son who has come, whom they have seen in His human form and heard speak to them in person (1John 1:1-4, 2Peter1:16-19).  One can therefore say that the Son is the culmination of the prophetic message. What this means is that it is the twelve Apostles that received the full message of Christ without any addition or taking away. What they heard and received is now deposited in the Holy Book of the Bible which I can argue here that it is the final revelation of the will of God to the Apostles, now deposited to us in print form. It is safe for any Christian to stick to the Apostolic message in this holy Book.

This brings us to a short overview of what Christians believe about the Bible:

1.      The Bible is an inspired Book of God. God is the one who gave out the words to the Apostles to write down for our instruction.2 Tim 3:16, 2Pet 1:20.Every part of the Bible is God given including the words there in.

2.      The Bible being the word of a perfect God, there can be no error in it.

3.      The Bible being the word of the Almighty powerful God, it has authority in it.

4.      The Bible being the word of inerrant God is therefore accurate.

5.      The Bible being the book of God is sufficient and final and therefore should not be added to or any word removed from. This warning is sounded out three times in the Bible, at the beginning, in the middle and as it closes lest man forget (Deut 4:2, 12:32. Proverbs 30:6. Rev 22:18).

All the above five beliefs that Christians hold concerning the Bible can be proved but that is beyond the scope of this work. For now I want to pull out point number five above to argue for the sufficiency and finality of God’s speech to man with regard to the cessation debate that has been going on amongst Christians today. The question this debate seeks to ask and answer is whether some gifts like prophecy and tongues still exist as means through which God gives instruction to His people today.

The question begs: If the Scripture as it is in the Sixty Six books of the Bible is final and sufficient, what is the need for further talks of ‘the Lord told me?’ Assuming that the Lord is still telling people some things then it follows that the Bible as it is, is not sufficient and final hence we have further room for the Lord to keep on telling us more things. 

If this be the case, passages cited above on point five are rendered meaningless and presents our God as very confused. At one point He says that His words are final and sealed and on the other hand He still chooses to reveal further stories to men. Either we take it that God is lying to us or those who purport that God is speaking to them are the liars. And it cannot be our Holy God telling lies here. Far be it. Further to this, we believe that the Bible has authority and is the rule of faith in all the congregations of God. These congregations are suppose to be under the rule of one voice, that of God. What we see today are competing voices, sometimes contradicting one another and we are expected to believe that God is speaking contradictorily. Surely, these men must be speaking to themselves and assuming that God is. 

I have already mentioned that passages like Hebrews 1:1-3, 1John 1:1-4, 2 Peter1:16-19 all point at the finality of revelation in Christ the Man. That is why Peter can afford to say that ‘and we have the word of prophecy made more certain (in Christ) and you will do well to pay attention to it.’ Vs19. Mark this: You will do well to pay attention to Christ and teachings of Christ other than adding other strange visions to words of prophecy already existing in the Bible.

It is interesting that even in the Apostolic churches that existed as Paul said that ‘Therefore, my brothers, be eager to prophesy, and do not forbid speaking in tongues’ (1Cor.14:39), this is said in the background of some chaos that did not pass God’s message to the congregation. Prophecy (forth telling) pointed to Christ’s messages to the church in a much orderly way than un-interpreted gibberish gimmicks of tongues. It is also noteworthy that when Paul gives to Timothy (a pastor in Ephesus) the church liturgy in 1Tim. 3:14, we never hear him say things like ‘after hysterical worship Timothy, allow time for tongues and prophesies.’ He clearly says that: ‘Although I hope to come to you soon, I am writing you these instructions so that if I am delayed, you will know how people ought to conduct themselves in God’s house hold…’ The whole of first letter to Timothy therefore is how people ought to behave in the church. In 1Tim 4:13 we have a glimpse of what must be done in a church service. Prophecy and tongues are nowhere.

But one may ask: Was there times in the New Testament when God spoke to people either by word of prophecy or tongues? My answer is straight yes. I have already alluded to this when Paul does not condemn speaking in tongues and prophecy in Corinth but wanted order so that they are instructive. However, we must appreciate that during the time of the early church, the Apostolic church, the privilege of having the full Bible (New Testament) was not theirs, yet an instruction on NT was necessary for the existing churches before its compilation. The contents of this missing link of the Bible (New Testament) were being revealed to the Apostolic churches in prophetic way and tongue speaking-including declaring the Gospel in strange tongues to strange people who are not Jews. Now that we have the entire Bible (NT and OT compiled) , as per the revelations in Apostolic times, anything more is time barred and is tantamount to additions and taking away from God’s word and is the Devil’s trick to divert attention of the people of God from His revealed will.

Lastly.  All gifts are given to the church for the edification of Christians and not to scare them and add mystery to their lives (1Cor 14:5, 17). The word ‘edification’ in Latin means ‘build’. So we are talking of gifts as means of building saints in their faith. Aah! I have heard several strange prophecies including ‘God spoke to me commanding the church to build me a big house and buy me a Range Rover car’ This is not only abusing prophecy, but claiming a gift that is no longer in existence. No wonder people can say anything in the name of prophecy. Some prophecies have come around many times giving scary dates of sad events that never was-nothing to build saints in their faith.

Dear readers, if we truly treasure the Bible as the word of God, let us not add or minus from the Holy Book in anyway. Not only in form of pen and paper but also with our tongues which is small but can set the whole forest on fire and can corrupt a whole person.

I here turn briefly to attend to some passages that proponents of prophecy do run to.

John 14: 26

Many people have argued from Jesus’ words here that after all He was promising that the Holy Spirit will teach us new things. To get the meaning of Jesus’ words here correctly a few questions need to be asked in form of interrogating the passage and letting it speak to us without putting words in its mouth:

Q1. Who was Jesus addressing? All Christians or the apostles? Reading the passage from Chapter 13 will clearly show that Jesus has retreated from the public to have a somber moment with the Apostles. This is a very sad time for Jesus and the twelve and he needed to encourage them pending his departure from the world. In the last part of the verse Jesus clearly says: ‘remind you of everything I have said to you.’ The you here are those that have been in Christ’s school for now three years since he called them to be His Apostles. So the promise here of the Holy Spirit (in the context of John 13-14) as a teacher and a reminder is to the Apostles, not every Christian.

Q2. What are the ‘all truths’ mentioned here? I see this as the Scriptures which the Apostles left for us. Some of the things we have in the Bible were revealed to the Apostles after Christ’s ascension but without contradicting His teachings. The active time Christ spent with His Apostles was only three years. This may have not been enough to teach ALL things.

I conclude that John 14: 26 promises no further revelation to Christians in all ages but to the twelve Apostles ONLY and their words are left for us in the Bible today.

 Joel 2: 28-32.

I submit that the prophecy of Joel was fulfilled during the Apostolic ministry and before the Bible was compiled for us. For those who want to claim that this passage support continuity of prophetic gifts and dreams and visions, you still have to tell us what you mean by sufficiency and finality of the Scriptures. Peter read Joel with this in mind, that the promises of Joel was fulfilled during their time (Acts 2:16-22).

Ephesians 4:11-13.

This passage has nothing to say concerning continuity of prophetic gifts and the likes. Instead the Apostle is looking at the church in its full life from Apostolic times to end time and its gifting according to the need throughout history with the twelve Apostles playing the foundational role. As I have already accepted, during the foundational years of the church before the Bible was compiled, there was need for gifts of tongues and prophets to declare the will of God. In our times, the last lap, we now need more of pastors and teacher of the revealed word of God just like during the times of Corinthians they needed interpreters of tongues lest the word of God spoken in tongues hold no meaning. We must seek God in our churches to give us more capable expositors of the word and not prophets and tongue speakers. When Paul is instructing Timothy and Titus  on what to look for in choosing elders, in both cases he instructs them to look for men ‘able to teach’ and not  ‘able to prophesy and speak in tongues’(1 Tim 3:2. Titus1:9). There is a reason for this, the church was clearly heading towards the way of needing more people who are able to expound Apostolic teachings with the imminent departure of the Apostles and the cessation of prophetic and gift tongues.

Reasons why Christians must hold tenaciously to cessation of these gifts.

1.      It makes no sense to hold to the teaching of the Bible being sufficient and final word of God when on the other hand still hold that God is still speaking to some people today.

2.      We get in to deep confusion in verifying the words the ‘super apostles’ purport to have come from God through them. In August 2014, I attended a conference in which there were two ladies of the ‘God speaks to me type.’ Prophetess A later gave us a written prophecy for our reading and prayer. It had some drawings of some pictures expressing unprintable words. Later at night, in their dormitory, my wife reported to me the chaos that ensured when prophetess A met prophetess B with another upcoming prophetess C. Chaos exists where God is not.

3.      Most of the time the ‘message’ of the prophets/prophetesses today is basically ‘repent, repent and repent.’ Is this any different from what the Bible tells sinners to do?

4.      The Bible will cease to be the ONLY rule of faith and of authority since competing rules and authority exist side by side in the name of prophets and ‘tonguers’ and ‘visioners.’

5.      Be careful, where chaos and confusion is the order of the day, the devil will have a field day and it is very clear that already he is having a field day in these churches.

6.      Church History has consistently showed the dangers of accepting any other authority in the church other than the Bible. Why did reformers cry out Soli Deo, Sola Scriptura? This is what saved the church from going to the rule of men without God.

7.      You need a prophet for daily guidance? The Bible can do this, 2 Tim 3:16-17.

8.      In African context, one needs a prophet/prophetess to tell them where his poverty, sickness and misfortunes come from. These prophets have been imported in to churches and given the seat of honour. They are even consulted to say a word of prophecy just like my dad would consult his witch doctor. He took me as a young man to some of his visits and I would have fun seeing my dad sitting there obediently drinking in those lies. Be warned of the wolves in sheep clothing right in church masquerading as prophets. These are the very clouds without rain and shepherds who feed not the flock but themselves Jude 12.

9.      Loud whisper is now in the air that churches that stick to Scriptures alone are narrow minded and end up limiting God to a book. This is the MOST dangerous call. In the entire world, no book has ever been compiled that presents to man the whole will of God to man than the Bible. I think that the proponents of this view are the very agents of the devil. Be warned. 

I conclude that every Christian worth his salt and every minister worth his salt must insist on the cessation of prophetic gifts and tongues and similar gifts that seem to suggest that God is still speaking in this manner. But if anyone wants to insist otherwise, it is better for him to declare openly that he does not believe in the long preserved doctrines of Scripture, and go headlong to listening to all kinds of voices that speak around him.

Does God still speak to men? Yes He does, but ONLY through the Bible. Extra biblical claims are basically not from God but man speaking to men.

By  Sam Oluoch (Grace Baptist Church-Kisumu-Kenya)

What is the Gospel and what is Gospel ministry?

 There are a lot of ‘gospels’ going around. There is the gospel of heaven now – how to get as many physical blessing as possible as quickly as possible. More subtly, there is the gospel of ‘commitment’ – give your life to Jesus, surrender control to him, ‘get born again’, and God will forgive you, transform you, steer you to heaven (and bless you on the way if you walk closely with him). In the gospel of ‘heaven now’, stuff is king. In the gospel of ‘commitment’, decision is king.

The gospel according to the apostle John is quite different. Let’s look at chapter 3 briefly. We all love John 3:16. But first comes the conversation with a religious man about the need to be born again. The order is important: new birth, then belief.  Naturally we all love darkness rather than light (Jn. 3:19). The Light of the World turns up and our natural reaction is to run from the light like bats and owls or to try to snuff it out as our enemy. In our natural state we do not understand what true blessing is. We reject it when it stares us in the face. In our natural state we will never make a ‘decision for Christ’. We must be born again – a radical once-for-all death of our old man and the birth of a new man, no longer from Kisumu or Nyeri but from heaven. This new birth doesn’t come from our decision and will (Jn. 1:22); but from God and his will, as free and unpredictable as the wind (Jn. 3:8).

Once we’re born again now we have eyes to see and ears to hear the gospel. It comes famously in John 3:16 but it’s even clearer a couple of verses earlier: “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man must be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.” Jesus is taking us back hundreds of years to the time when the people of God have just been rescued out of Egypt and they’re wandering around in the Sinai desert and grumbling against God – throwing his grace back in his face.  God sends venomous snakes into their camp; they start biting people and people are dropping dead all over the place.  And the people come to Moses and say, "Please pray that God will take the snakes away from us." So Moses prays for the people and something very weird happens – God doesn’t take away the snakes, he said to Moses, "Make a snake and put it up on a pole; anyone who is bitten can look at it and live."

Now that is a weird story.  But Jesus is saying that is exactly why I’ve come – I’m going to be the snake on a pole who’s going to save you from the plague.  The sinless one will become sin for us so that we can be called righteous (2 Cor. 5:21). He will rescue us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us (Gal. 3:13). As he hangs on a tree he will become the problem – become us, sinful flesh, corrupt humanity, evil and curse. The bowl of God’s wrath will be poured out upon that sin and curse and corruption until the bowl is completely finished. And how do we receive that rescue, that salvation? Just as the Israelites in the desert did – simply by looking.

 Believing in the Son means recognizing the obvious fact that I’m cursed, infected, perishing, in a desperate helpless state like the snake-bitten Israelite, and looking at the Son hanging on the Cross, being my sin, being me, perishing instead of me – and as I look I live, now and eternally.

So if that is the gospel, what is gospel ministry? Surely it is simply to lift up Christ crucified so he can be looked upon; to paint word pictures of Christ crucified before people’s eyes so that they can see him and live (Gal. 3:1). John the Baptist is a brilliant model of this. He doesn’t point to himself, he points to the Light (Jn. 1:7-8). He doesn’t try to ‘be Jesus to people’ – again and again he says “I’m not the Christ, I’m not the Lamb of God, I can’t do anything for you, I can only get you wet, go to Jesus over there, he’s the one who will be the sacrifice for your sins.” John is like a new Moses, lifting up Jesus, pointing to him as the one way of escape from the plague.

When John’s disciples notice that Jesus’ ministry is drawing bigger crowds than their man they start getting worried (Jn. 3:26). But John could not be happier. Here is a minister who is glad when attendance at his church falls, overjoyed when people walk out on him... so long as they head off south west to Judea to find Jesus. Because that’s his job – to point people to Jesus (Jn. 1:28). And he absolutely loves it – “The friend of the bridegroom rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice. Therefore this joy of mine is now complete. He must increase, but I must decrease” (Jn. 3:29-30). John’s great privilege and joy is in being the best friend of the heavenly bridegroom. And now he is the MC at the greatest wedding in history and his supreme joy is for the Bridegroom to be front and centre and for John to fade into the background.  John’s joy is ‘complete’, goes off the scale, overflows when Jesus is the centre of attention, when everyone is running to Him, looking at Him, finding their joy and salvation in Him. That’s being a servant of the gospel.

Article by: Andy Harker, servant of the gospel at iServe Africa.

Mending the Broken Chain of Evangelism

Martin Luther the Reformer

It’s Centuries now since the great renowned period in Christian History; the Dark Ages.  Looking closely at this time in history, Christianity was at cross roads with many seeking after establishing a simple Christian faith and a clear way to salvation that was solely dependent on God and not on man as it were. These among many were key principles of purpose for the group of men and women that rose up to champion for the propagation of the gospel in its entirety. To these men such as Martin Luther, John Calvin, and Karl Barth among other reformers, man was a total sinner and could never do anything to save himself from the Judgment of God that was looming.

From cradle to grave his default position was to always succumb to his sinful nature and thus could not help it but just sin. This is to say by ourselves we are sin factories, producing sins as products that are nicely wrapped and ready for the market; interestingly enough we do not have to do the marketing. With all the helplessness of man to save himself, the God of heaven chooses to come after him out of total love. This nature of God is the true depiction of Love such that while we were still full of sins and by extension enemies of God, God out of his own mercies comes down to reconcile the relationship between us and him. He says come and let us reason together in Isaiah Chapter one verse 18. Again while we were still yet sinners Christ died for us. These gospel truths on the way of salvation made the reformers of old rise up to evangelize and preach the gospel.

 In many of his teachings, Martin Luther referred to the teachings of Apostle Paul in one of his letters to the Church in Galatia. From the book of Galatians, Paul writes to the Galatians pointing out to them that the Salvation of God to us men is by grace lest anyone should boast about it. This tells us that anyone and anybody can be saved for salvation belongs to God. Such truth made these men to labor towards preaching the gospel and leading people to Christ. No one can actually think of themselves as being more saved than others. As a matter of fact there is no first class and second class kind of salvation. God out of his own mercies has taken us all that have received his salvation through his son to be heirs in his Kingdom. We all are a royal priesthood just like Apostle Peter records. Whether rich or poor, black or white or whichever prejudice you would want to think of, the salvation of God transcends all barriers and gives life to all of us. Such is the nature of God’s salvation.

Any Christian in the contemporary world would want to quickly wish away any thoughts of the dark ages catching up with us again.  Much as we are not there yet, we are slowly slipping back to those days. The days when it was hard to preach the true gospel that lead to salvation. The struggle might have changed a little bit, but the concerns remain to be the same, the 21st Century Christian may not be battling with reformation but evangelism. Many of us Christians me included have grown cold in sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ which is the way to eternal life and a perfect reconciliation to God.

It is in our times when we have more focus on certain issues that fall within our priorities. We are preoccupied with the here and now so much so that the sharing of the gospel and evangelism remains to be a preserve of the few whom we think need to go out in the remotest places and stay there serving as long term Missionaries. For those of us living in the cities, ours is to be good Christians who are very pious and pragmatic in nature and form. Observing and keeping religion to the letter. We are saved and going to heaven perpendicularly with no horizontal interference. Sunday to Sunday we attend services sitting in warm pews, singing along to wonderful songs and hymns. We even recite prayers together before getting the word of the day and finally sharing the words of grace together. Then we wait for the next service. Slowly but sadly we have become 

ritualistic attending to our most spiritual needs and seeking after edifying others as well with the amazing grace. This is not meant to send us to a guilt trip but give us a reminder and point to us the state of things as far as evangelism is concerned.

It is very easy to feel warm and comfortable in the midst of other believers and glory in that safety. Are we for instance perturbed by the number of Mosques that are ever rising yet there are very small efforts to plant Biblical Churches? Nearly every market center has a Mosque. It is hard to spot Biblical Churches live alone these charismatic cults. My assumption is that there are lots of efforts and activity from the Muslims who are trying to propagate their faith in this world. My lesson, is, there such an effort from us Christians?

How many of us are out there serving as missionaries? And how many of us have known that we all are to be accountable as far as the great commission in Mathew 28 :16 ; comes to mind. Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ calls us to go ye and make disciples live alone converts. Who are we to go to? Not only the people in the remote corners of the world but the very person you sat close to in the Matatu, at the Market Place, at the gymnasium need to hear the Gospel. Think of the various places of contact where you come close to another friend who happens not to know about Christ and Salvation through him. It’s time to mend the broken chain of evangelism.

Article By: Bonface Ochieng’ Grace Baptist Church Kisumu