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)