Some people have Gifts we do not have. They are more talented in certain areas than we are.

God bestows Gifts of the Spirit upon whomever He chooses and at His will, not ours.

One of the biggest hindrances of Apostolic Renewal in our churches and fellowships is people feeling threatened, because others have spiritual gifts they don’t have.

Even our leadership has hindered the return of full Apostolic power and demonstration, because they feel they should have these gifts and it makes them look less than if others, can demonstrate deeper things in the Spirit than they can.

We are taught to desire and seek Spiritual gifts and many of us have done so fervently.

However, because we seek those things with all our heart does not mean God will endow us with those we would like to have!

There is no rule of thumb about who will have these gifts bestowed upon them and who will not.

It seems very clear that the Apostle writer said that all of us should seek to Prophesy.

Word of Knowledge and Word of Wisdom are not really that difficult to perform if you truly present yourself to the Spirit as a channel through which He can operate to speak to others.

The power of these two gifts alone is awesome, being able to speak a word that ministers to another person or group, especially if what is spoken is something the one giving it could not possibly know, something only the Spirit has knowledge of.

You don’t have to be a spiritual guru to be mightily used of God!

We often forget that even one word, one single word spoken by the Spirit can accomplish more in a moment than we could ever hope for in ages.

Just why do people feel threatened in this manner, especially those who claim to be full of the Spirit?

Somewhere along the way we forgot the most important issue: that is, that the job gets done and God gets all the honor and glory.

In our right way of thinking, it seems hardly important who prays the prayer of Faith and someone is healed or a miracle is performed.

If you are truly in need of a miracle in your life, it simply does not matter who has the Gift to do it, only that the work is done.

Unfortunately, we are not always in a right way of thinking.

I have a feeling that if someone can rise from a wheelchair and walk or their blinded eyes are opened, they could care less who laid hands on them, or even what kind of oil was used.

The problem might be that too many have lost sight of just who is to be glorified here.

It is often likely that those who are intimidated or threatened in this manner, are unsure of themselves, insecure, and have not recognized their own special place in the Kingdom of God.

People who know who they are, know where they belong and are confident with their own place and position, are not bothered by others’ gifts.

I am careful in saying this, but often Pastors are afraid, even of their laity, who possess certain Gifts of the Spirit they do not have.

Somehow, we have developed a condition and attitude that as a pastor we must have greater gifts than our saints and it makes us look less than if a lay member can demonstrate something we can’t.

It’s all such a waste of time and energy. If you know without doubt that God has called you to pastor a certain group, then you should rest in the assurance that absolutely no one else can fulfill your job, no one can take your place.

You see, not everyone can pastor. It takes a very special person to do that job; patience and endurance, that even an evangelist or prophet may not have.

The most successful pastors I’ve know, had no fear of God using anyone in the gifts, just as long as the mighty deeds of the Spirit were done and God’s work got done, the Church was edified and lives were changed.

I heard one mightily gifted man say that it can look bad if a minster asks an evangelist to come to his town and tons of people receive the Holy Ghost, whereas he has been striving for years with little results and not so many have prayed through under their ministry.

This is utter madness, but it does happen. It shouldn’t matter who brings the break-through, but that it comes.

There could never be a crop if someone had not prepared the soil first.

We should never forget that one tills, one plants and another waters, but it is God who give the increase. Everyone benefits from the Harvest.

There are likely at least two reasons for all this blocking of the Gifts operating as they should.

One is envy and the other is, trying to control and dictate what the Spirit does, placing Him in a box that must adapt to our schedules and control issues.

Those who do not feel threatened, have no problem being fine-tuned to the Spirit and allowing the Spirit to interrupt their protocol.

If the moving of the Spirit is not absolutely number one, few gifts will operate.

Allowing the Spirit to use whomsoever He wishes, as He wishes, is mandatory, even if it’s a little person or one of less esteem.

If our people are taught to recognize the true moving of the Spirit, everyone knows what is of God and what is not.

Allowing the entire body to discern what is of the Spirit, allows more freedom and prevents one person from dictating.

Liberty in the Spirit is not relegated to only a few. Saints are the Church too, bona-fide members of the Body of Christ.

God gifted them for a reason, and if they have been taught by the Spirit as well as by Teachers of the five-fold ministry, they have the authority and wisdom to operate decently and in order, just as the offices over them.

Greed and power hungry people in the Church have stymied the flow of the Spirit.

This warped control system we have allowed to permeate our churches and fellowships must be disassembled if we are to see the mighty move of the Spirit we so desperately need.

Absolutely no one, I repeat, no one is an authority unto themselves. We have tried to control this thing until we have all but stamped it out.

Envy is a cancer, a wicked human sin that must be confessed and eradicated if we are to see the move we long for.

The Spirit is not going to compete with us. We should have learned that long ago. He will be first to us, or He will be nothing to us.

God will raise up those to operate His gifts, with or without us. There is a dying, lost and hungry broken world that does not have time for our petty games and puffed up authority figures.

We are proclaiming a mighty end-time revival while some of us are getting even weaker and our apostolic performance wanes less and less.

Having only a few prophets and apostles in our entire fellowships whom we allow to operate, is not God’s will.

Using only man’s credentials and voted-in officers to approve whom God can use and whom the Spirit can be manifested in and through, will only result in more of the same, a watered down version of who we say and claim we are.

Over 6 billion people on this planet are in need of a miracle or spiritual manifestation in their lives and our petty few will not get the job done.

If the Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists and Teachers cannot fully operate within the walls of our man made structures, God will move them out into the highways and bi-ways to perform miracles, signs and wonders and it will hardly matter whether the elected higher ups approve, sanction or give them permission or not.

Some of us have waited entire lifetimes for our elected officials, including pastors, to bring about the return of the Gifts, fully operating.

The truth is, some of our people died waiting for the church to loose what we were promised in the Spirit.

What was declared in my time, even more that 50 years ago, has not happened among us.

Mighty apostolic revival is indeed happening in other parts of the world, while we settle for tongues and interpretation…. once in a while.

Not seeing this revival, not personally viewing these mighty Gifts working among us in full, has made many of us bitter and doubtful.

There is a stirring among those who are gifted. The Spirit has been teaching these people all along, whether the leadership allowed it or not.

We have been the people of His name and the Spirit has been patient with us for a very long time — but time is running out.

It might shock some of us to know the Spirit actually allowed some of us to be driven into the streets in order that we might become more receptive and open to what is real and what is simply not of the Spirit at all.

As long as we can rely on our dogma, our debates, our man-made rules and live on doctrine alone, we will not see the mighty works God has in mind for this end age we see closing around us.

Only absolute powerful manifestation of the Spirit, as some of us have seen years ago, will save us and our children, our churches and fellowships.

In closing, don’t covet someone else’s gifts or how God uses them. You will likely never know the price they have paid to have what they have.

Another great reason we do not have the awesome manifestation of the Spirit is that we are not willing to pay the price for it.

I say in humility, if I can, that all must go back and read once more what it cost the Apostles to perform miracles and minister the way they did.

Read Paul’s life again. And in the end, almost all of them were killed for what they did, including our precious Lord Jesus Christ.

Don’t be threatened. Get yours, everything He has for you. Know your place in God.

We all have a place in this. It is up to each of us to find what that place is and stand in it.

If I don’t have even one gift like others have, if I am true to Him, I will walk through the same Beautiful Gate as everyone else and my Mansion will be just as big as yours.

If I pray for you, hold your hand and lift you up, we will walk through those gates together.

Amen.

First published: August 14, 2011.

~ Robert Blackburn

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Robert Blackburn

 

 

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