Excel

DEVOTION

1 CORINTHIANS

EXCEL

1 Cor 14:6-12

6 Now, brothers, if I come to you and speak in tongues, what good will I be to you, unless I bring you some revelation or knowledge or prophecy or word of instruction? 7 Even in the case of lifeless things that make sounds, such as the flute or harp, how will anyone know what tune is being played unless there is a distinction in the notes? 8 Again, if the trumpet does not sound a clear call, who will get ready for battle? 9 So it is with you. Unless you speak intelligible words with your tongue, how will anyone know what you are saying? You will just be speaking into the air. 10 Undoubtedly there are all sorts of languages in the world, yet none of them is without meaning. 11 If then I do not grasp the meaning of what someone is saying, I am a foreigner to the speaker, and he is a foreigner to me. 12 So it is with you. Since you are eager to have spiritual gifts, try to excel in gifts that build up the church.

NIV

We are in the middle of instructions to those in Corinth who may well have been abusing one of the gifts, or at least spending much of their time exhibiting the one gift, tongues. It seems they were getting carried away with just this one gift, and that gift alone does not build up the church, which we should see in the next part of these instructions. Yet we can see still another truth within this section about what we say and how we say it. Even if  we are not speaking in a language that we do not know, for that is in fact the gift of tongues, we still need to speak so people understand us. That is we need to make sense in our presentation of what we are saying. If we are sharing the gospel, or our faith experience, we need to be intelligent about how we explain it. If we simply attack the unbeliever about having to have faith, that there is no real reason to accept the stories in the Bible as fact, but they just have to believe, that makes no sense, and they cannot understand. If we teach other believers, we need to present our course study in a plain and understandable way, so they we see the truth we are examining, which helps them grow and builds up the church. If we try to make ourselves out to be so super spiritual, or super intellectual and try to use fancy words which may not be understand, we are not helping them, but only edifying ourselves. There is also the truth within this section that encourages us to excel in gifts that build up the church. That means we should really be looking for the Spirit to be doing the work, but at the same time, we should truly be open to the Spirit to me gifted, and when so, excel, that is use that gift we all our energy, for the common good. It does appear, at times, that many among us do not want any part of the gifts, or any part of building up others in the church. Is that judgmental or simply the truth? It does seem quite clear that each one of us should be exceling in some gift that builds up the church. That would mean we cannot simply show up on Sunday, sit and soak, and leave, going back to our own personal lives. We must excel in some gift that builds up the church. Do we get to choose which gift that is? It does not appear so. As we have seen in 12:11 He gives to each one a gift as He determines. So we must seek the Spirit, understand which gift He has determined to give us, and then try to excel.