Bible Backgrounds/Church History 2012

I wanted to answer a question that I think it was Stan asked a couple of weeks ago. We're going to get to the subject, spiritual gifts of tongues, prophecy and knowledge, when and why the biblical gifts ended. But before we do that, I want to answer Stan's question about the Friday, April 3rd, 33 AD crucifixion date.

It's one that increasingly, even as of this year, additional evidence seems to be pointing in that direction. There are those who have other views. And we'll talk about that in a minute. So it's not like everybody says this, but as I examined it, I would say the evidence is increasingly leaning towards the direction that Christ was crucified on.

Friday, April 3rd, 33 AD. That specific date. And let's go over it. 1973, Harold Hohner, late professor of Dallas Theological Seminary, published the book Chronological Aspects of the Life of Christ. I have a copy of it in case you'd like to take a look at it. So anyway, on pages 65 to 93, he put forth Friday, April 3rd, 33 AD as the most likely date of Christ's crucifixion.

So he goes through all the different considerations. We'll just touch on some of that briefly. We won't go through every page of the almost 30 pages, which you'll be glad. The Passover is the first day of the seven days of unleavened bread. There are seven days of unleavened bread.

Passover is the first one of those. which is the evening after the first full moon as observed in Jerusalem, so notice it's not just full moon anywhere, it's as observed in Jerusalem, that's the way it's judged, that occurs after the spring equinox. The month is Nisan, the first month of the Jewish holiday cycle.

The day is the 15th, which begins at sundown ending the 14th, that is You have the evening starting at sundown of the 14th until the sundown on the 15th. That's the full Passover day. The Passover is eaten on the evening of the 14th and then Passover day continues into the next day, the 15th. The Passover lamb is slain around 3 p.m. the afternoon of the 14th of Nisan. It is then roasted. At sundown, the Passover begins. This is the 15th day of Nisan. The 15th then begins the first day of unleavened bread is also the day of Passover.

So far as the crucifixion week, This is the traditional chronology which I've got there in pictures as to what takes place on each day. This is Friday in Jericho with Zacchaeus, Saturday raising Lazarus, and then proceeding through each day of the week, this Thursday then being the Passover meal, the Lord's Supper was instituted on that day. So that Thursday then is the Passover meal and that's when the Lord's Supper was instituted for the church. Here's Friday crucifixion and then Saturday in the grave and that's the day when the soldiers are stationed at the tomb. And then Sunday resurrection.

So that's the traditional chronology There are people who have held to a Thursday crucifixion, and even a Wednesday crucifixion. Having examined it, I don't hold to that, but there are people that do hold to that view. The question is, assuming that you have a Thursday night Passover, and then a Friday crucifixion, and then Saturday in the grave, which of the years have a Thursday evening Passover?

And the years that our candidates are 30 A.D. and 33 A.D. So you only got those two choices, assuming you have the traditional chronology. So those two years, and of those two years, the evidence continues to line up more and more in favor of the 33 A.D. event. This is the date of the 14th of Nissan.

And so that is an astronomical measure by the phase of the moon, right? So that's one astronomical measure, but it's not the only one that may be relevant. Additionally, that same date would account for a lunar eclipse, which would explain some of the darkness, right?

Now, is it possible that the darkness that day was simply a miraculous event and not a natural event? Yeah, it's possible. The Lord doesn't say how it occurred. It wouldn't have to be a moon eclipse though to make the day dark. It would have to be a sun eclipse. A lunar eclipse would be on the wrong side of the universe from 12pm to 3pm darkness. So, in this case, it occurred at the rising moon.

Now, it was reported in the May issue of the International Geology Review that evidence of the earthquake sets the date of Christ's crucifixion on Friday, April 3rd, 33 AD. So that was just reported this last spring. And that was looking at, okay, when do we have geological evidence of an earthquake? and that particular day fits it. So at any rate, several different evidences.

I didn't include this in a handout, but I'd be glad to email it to anybody that would like. Now, evidence regarding Christianity outside the Bible in the first and second centuries? No. We're going to be doing the spiritual gifts chart that's on the fifth page of your handout. So you've got a two-page handout, three page handout. It's that fifth page that has this chart in it. And what we're going to be looking at here particularly is this part of it, up in the upper corner.

And to look at it, it's the apostolic era gifts that we would say ended with the apostles. Those in Pentecostal and Charismatic groups would say that those Apostolic Era gifts continued. But our point today is, no they did not. Those Apostolic Era gifts ended with the Apostles. They had a particular purpose during the lifetime of the Apostles that ended with the Apostles. We would even say, and we'll go over this point, that tongues ended earlier than that, and that a great many of the apostolic era gifts had already been ended even before the time of John. Yes? Particularly speaking, there was one instance there in Scripture where the gifts of didn't go, but in any case, he asked people to pray. So there are various instances like that that point to kind of a waning expression of the apostolic gifts.

So we'll be taking a look at these particular set of gifts here as we study today. Notice that the spiritual gifts are listed in four passages, two of those being in 1 Corinthians chapter 12. and we've broken those up in separate listings. So those are the four, 1 Corinthians 12, 8-10, 28-30, and then Romans 12, 6-8, and Ephesians 4, 11. Now question, are there other spiritual gifts aside from the ones that are listed here? We do have that there, yeah. But what I'm saying is, are there any spiritual gifts aside from what's given in Scripture?

The reality is, how would you know? Scripture reveals these gifts, and as a matter of fact, if you look at the chart, we have a fair amount of detail about them. But aside from that, how would you know? Is it possible that God could grant some special gift in some special instance? It's possible. The difficulty is, how would you know? Because scripture allows us to be specific and certain about things. Aside from that, who knows? So, when you ask the question, are these all the spiritual gifts? I would say these are all that are revealed. If God has granted any others or done any other things, I don't know how you'd know.

You have a handout that goes like this. We'll be stepping through that slide by slide, and we'll begin by going to these first two slides in your handout. It shows the passage in poetic form, and one of the things we'll do, we'll start off with this first one here, 1 Corinthians 13, 8-10. We've put these to show the poetic form, and also one of the other things we've done is to fill in where Paul has spoken with ellipses carrying over the meaning from an earlier part of the sentence.

An example here, love never falls off but whether there are gifts of prophecy they will be done away. And then he just says whether there are tongues and we insert there in brackets the meaning whether there are gifts of tongues, right? And then the next one, they will cease, whether there is a gift of knowledge, it will be done away. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part, but when the completion and maturity comes, that which is in part will be done away. You might also have noticed, aside from the poetic form, that I have changed the translation in a few places.

And one of the places that I've done that His love never falls off. Usually a lot of the translations will say love never fails and my problem with that is that it seems to imply love always succeeds and that's not the point. The point is love never falls off, not love always succeeds.

So that's an important distinction. Another place is, as I said, when the completion and maturity comes, because that idea is, I believe, based on the context, a better way to carry the language across. Notice, too, we have prophecy, tongues, and knowledge, not all of the apostolic era gifts. But three of them particularly are represented here.

And also notice, whoop, also notice here I've done some color coding. And one of the reasons, let's see, I didn't do the color coding in your printout here. But I've done color coding on the slides. The color coding is to accent the in part, in part, in part, and the will be done away, will be done away, will be done away. You can underline that if that helps.

And then notice, will be done away for prophecy, will be done away for knowledge. And then the application of will be done away, but for tongues, do they use will be done away? No, they use cease. And so there's a different word in the English and in the Greek for the ending for tongues. And there's a different They're different voice, different voice, middle voice. Yes. Yes. That's right and we'll talk about that. Very good question. We'll talk about that in just a minute. I'm glad you observed that because that's something that we will be paying some attention to here. Here's the next part, verses 11 to 13.

When I was a child, I used to speak like a child. And then I put in brackets, because Paul speaks in ellipses, carrying over the meaning from where he said it before. I used to think like a child. I used to reason like a child. So that carries the pattern. When I became a man, I did away Some of the translations will say put away or something, but I specifically did did away with childish things. And one of the reasons for did away is that the same word is done away here. I did away, past tense, with childish things.

For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then we will see Here's it again where Paul uses ellipsis by implication there. We will see face to face. Now I know in part. Here's the in part like we saw three times before in the prior slide. In part, but then I'll know fully just as I also have been fully known.

But now faith, hope, love abide these three now. But the greatest of these faith, hope, and love is love. 1 Corinthians 8-13 is all about how long certain things last and what is of value. How long does this last and what is of value? Those are the two questions that he is addressing. What's valuable? How long do things last? And he doesn't give the same answer for everything, as we'll see. Yeah, Tom?

That reminds me so much, and this does relate to things of the war, but the picture of that covered wagon It reminded me so much of back in the 70s, there was what looked like a slightly better shaped covered wagon with a skeleton there, and the sign was mounted on it, Camp Hydro Hodge. That's probably what it would look like now.

The specific things that Paul addresses about how long they last are spiritual entities of faith, hope, and love. Faith, hope, and love is a trio of words that kind of shows up from time to time in the New Testament, and this is one of those passages. One of them that he addresses, how long they last, are faith, hope, and love. And what does he say about love? Love never falls off.

Then, spiritual gifts of prophecy, tongues, and knowledge. Prophecy, tongues, and knowledge. So we have this slide here that with that, those things being pointed out, kind of gives the picture about what lasts and what doesn't. Notice something else that this passage also has A number of words that talk about timing.

Never is the first one. When. When. Now. Then. Now. Then. Now. And so what you see is lots of timing words because the passage is telling you how long things last. Now, and then when it says when, that's telling you about something that's not now, right? When this happens, when that happens. So, anyway, those are, and the then is also another thing that points out timing. Okay, Paul presents these things in a way that he does in the way that he does in this passage because the believers in Corinth were valuing entities and gifts that would soon end. Things that would soon end. But not valuing love that would last forever. See the distinction there? They weren't valuing love and he was saying you need to value love that's going to last forever. How long will love last? Forever. How important and valuable is love? Very.

So he wanted to get that point across to them because they weren't being loving, and the issue was their exercise and beliefs about spiritual gifts. So, the context and themes of 1 Corinthians 13, 8-13, in the middle of a passage which deals with spiritual gifts, 1 Corinthians 12-14, Paul addresses the fulfillment, ceasing, or end of faith, hope, tongues, prophecy, and knowledge, but not the end of love, not the end of love. Paul's pattern of verbs, voice, and by that we mean like middle voice, you know, passive voice, those kinds of things, and nouns in this passage is quite remarkable, and it's exceedingly consistent.

The final message is that love lasts forever, so love is the greatest of all these things. What's the greatest and most valuable? Love. That's what his message is. He's saying you guys are getting all amped up over something that's temporary and you're forgetting the one thing that's going to last forever. You see that? That's his central theme in this passage.

If you're really spiritual, what does that look like? The Corinthians were thinking, if I'm really spiritual, then I'll go and have this miraculous gift and everybody will be impressed with it. And what Paul is saying is if you're really spiritual, you will love.

I'm thinking of a pretty good illustration for the current day. If someone walked up to you and suddenly decided that they wanted to act out their radical Islamism and basically off you, what could be better in reaction before the fatal step was taken than to just hug them and say, I love you, Lord, anyway?

Well, that would certainly be hard for them to understand. So, let's take a look here. The passage has patterns. The passage has patterns. Love does not end though faith and hope do fall off or end. And we have that in a, this is a kind of an abbreviated form of one of your slides there on the first page. The spiritual gifts of prophecy and knowledge also end. They're done away, right? The spiritual gift of tongues ends as well. It ceases, and that's middle voice, unlike the other done-away statements for prophecy and knowledge.

Paul chose to use three different words that mean fall off or end for each of these. Why would he use different words for fall off or end? Emphasis would be one, and that's true. Is there another reason you can think of? Yeah, how it happens and the timing. The timing of when it happens. And so we'll talk about that. Paul used a different voice for these three words telling how the end happens. Does it happen because of some outside action or does it happen of its own doing? Middle voice would say it ends of its own doing. That's what is said of tongues.

The first and last subject in this passage is love, but what most translations miss is the definite article in front of love. It isn't love as the translation has it. It's the love. And in the Greek language when you use the definite article it means something. It is the love, the specific love. Why would you have the love? What's different between just love and the love? Yes, it is the love of God. The love of God. The love, the specific love, is Paul's focal point.

And it's missed in our English translations because the definite article is dropped out. Paul's point is not that love doesn't fail versus succeeding. But love never ends. It doesn't fall off. It doesn't fall off or drop out. There is no end of love. Christ's love for us does not end. Yes? Yeah, that's true. There's no dropping off or fading. We're going to see that the other things We're going to see that the other things do in this passage. Faith, hope, gifts of tongues, prophecy, and knowledge all end. Those things all end, but how they are said to end is different.

Now, so love never fails is that word fails is translated in Acts where Eutychus fell out of the third story window in Acts 20. Acts 20 verse 9, that is the same word for Eutychus falling out of the window. So when we say love never fails, it's love never falls off. Love never falls out. It never drops out like Eutychus dropped out of the window. So, an important clarification there. So now these three remain, but love never falls off. It continues. It keeps going. does far more than the ever-ready Energizer Bunny.

Faith and hope, however, fall off when fulfilled by seeing Him. And faith and love fall off not in some specific time, but for each one of us as we go home. And we'll talk about that. Love never falls off in time, but faith and hope both fall off. Right now, faith and hope and love all remain. So that's why he says these three remain right now. They remain. Yes. But we still have faith and hope. Yes, we do. Even though it fell off. No, it hasn't fallen off. It will fall off, and I'll explain that here in a minute. Faith meets its end when we go to be with the Lord. Right now, I believe that I will see Him. Though I do not physically see Him, I still have a belief, a faith, that I will see Him face to face one day. Yes.

Because of what you're saying, you either die or you fall asleep, as they would say. And there's no need for it. So here is one believer that dies. James, John's brother. James dies. It's recorded in Acts 12. At that point, faith and hope meet their end and are fulfilled for James.

He's face-to-face with the Lord, and then Paul and Peter in the 60s AD died, went home to be with the Lord. For them, then, faith meets its end and hope is fulfilled. They, up until that point, had a certain, that is a fixed and absolute hope, that they would go see the Lord again. Once they see the Lord, are they hoping to see the Lord?

No. This week Nancy and I will have been married 39 years. Am I hoping to get married to Nancy? No. Why? Because it already happened. I don't hope to marry Nancy because we've already been married for almost 39 years. It's been fulfilled. My hope to marry Nancy was fulfilled almost 39 years ago. So that's what we mean by faith and hope and why it's fulfilled as each person goes home to be with the Lord. And it meets its end. And we have several different passages for each of those instances to demonstrate that that's the character of faith and hope. You okay so far? Yes? No? Okay. All right. Now, let's look at this.

Both the spiritual gifts of prophecy and knowledge will be done away with from an outside of interaction. I say will be done from the perspective of Paul's writing. In other words, will be future from the time frame of Paul's writing. Both the spiritual gifts of prophecy and of knowledge are said to be in part. So you see that in the passage there. Both of them are said to be in part.

The spiritual gifts of prophecy and knowledge both served a temporary need in the church, since only a few books of the New Testament had been completed at that time. Only a few books of the New Testament had been completed. Here is the church. They've got the Old Testament. Is the Old Testament inspired? The Old Testament is inspired of God. It is definitely valuable for us to study. Is it everything the Church needs? No. And why is it not everything the Church needs? We need to know some new things.

Does the Old Testament tell you that you've been identified with Christ in His death, burial, resurrection, ascension and seeding? Not so much. It doesn't say that. As a matter of fact, who were the Jews baptized into. They were baptized into Moses and that's something we'll see in the main service here.

First Corinthians 10 verse 2. That's where the statement comes from. So what happens until we have that revelation, we've got miraculous gifts of revelation to the church to help give the church guidance and insight until these books are written and collected and distributed.

The turning point in this passage, what is the perfect? And that's been something over which various people have argued and whatnot. The Greek word that is translated perfect can have these meanings. Perfect as it's translated in the New American Standard in the King James.

Completion or maturity. And obviously in my somewhat expanded and explained, I put in completion and maturity as the concept. Since the passage has in part four times and verse 11 is about maturity, when I was a child, right? About maturity, Paul intended the word to convey the completion and the maturity.

The understanding of the meaning of a word is governed by the context. So that's why we call it, you know, not the perfect, but the completion and maturity. Why didn't the translators just put that in there? Here's the, here's, I'm glad I'm a pastor and not a translator, because the translators get under the gun from the publisher. You shall not multiply, use lots of words. So guess what I do when I do it expanded and explained. I use lots of words, and if necessary I'll put in, you know, completion and maturity to get both ideas of what is clear from the context. But the translators are told, you know, just pick a word and move on, right?

So I'm glad I'm not in that spot. Yeah, Stan? Was the Greek New Testament an existence or an inspiration to you? Well, Paul's writing it. Right. But wasn't, what's that called, the Greek New Testament? What's the long word for that? I'm not quite sure what you're... It was written in Koina Greek. Koina Greek.

Yeah, and prior to that you had various forms of classical Greek and there were different dialects. Alexander the Great in round numbers, you know, three centuries before the New Testament. He simplified the language and made it consistent and then militarily enforced it and spread it in that form. So most of this they knew that they were in the process of writing a canon, right?

Yeah, earlier in this very book, chapter 4, verse 1, you guys need to understand, and he used the same reckon as in Romans 6.11, you guys need to reckon, figure it out, He added up that we are stewards of the mysteries of God, earlier in this very same book. So that is what that is conveying, completion and maturity.

The completion of the New Testament would do away with the need for the gifts of prophecy and knowledge, which were in part, and that fulfilled a real but temporary need in the church. Did they need prophecy and knowledge when they didn't have the New Testament? The answer is yes. But now that you have the New Testament, you don't have the need for that continuing revelation. You've got what God has inspired and revealed in the New Testament. So as the New Testament was increasingly being written and collected and distributed, then the need for these miraculous gifts would diminish.

So, then we see this 1 Corinthians 13, 11-13, when I was a child, I spoke like a child, thought, reasoned, etc. when I became a man. So this is the maturity focus. This is why I would translate that word that's translated perfect, that's why I would translate it with maturity. So completion of the New Testament is the one understanding and the other part that's brought out in the context is the maturity issue, right? So, speak, think, reason. Tongues, knowledge, and prophecy. Tongues, knowledge, and prophecy would be the gifts that would correspond to each of those statements.

So in verse 11, Paul's point is that the church, by means of the completed Word of God, would grow out of the need for the gifts that once fit. These are gifts that God gave because you needed them, but they're not going to last because you are going to have the completed New Testament, and you won't have to have ongoing special revelations in the church. You won't need it. You will have the Word of God. When the church was like a child, it needed them. But as the church grows to a place of maturity and the completion of God's Word, those will be done away.

Now, then we talk about mirrors. The mirror is not smoke and mirrors. Corinth was famous for its mirrors, and interestingly, both of Paul's letters speak about mirrors. Not just this one, but 2 Corinthians 3.18 also speaks about mirrors. And that's the only place that Paul writes about mirrors to the church that's in a city that's famous for its mirrors. When I went to the British Museum a few years ago, they had mirrors from Corinth. So Corinth was famous for its mirrors.

Paul drew upon that to represent the partially completed New Testament as through a mirror dimly. Only about five of the books were completed. What they would do is they didn't have the idea here's a clear piece of glass. They didn't have clear glass back then with some kind of a shiny finish on the back. That's what we have now. What they would do is they would have a metal mirror and you would have to actually repolish it all the time. because they didn't have a way to keep it, you know, so that it was clear and reflective. It would get tarnished or rusted or whatever and you'd have to go and polish it up every time so you could see. But there's an example from the British Museum.

So, they were missing most teaching on being identified with Christ. There wasn't anything in the Old Testament about that. All the teaching about being seated in, having heavenly citizenship, and setting one's mind on the heavenlies, and being blessed with every spiritual blessing. At this point, they didn't have that because all those teachings were not fully laid out until Paul was in Rome, 61 AD, or thereafter. There is where you get the teaching from Ephesians, Philippians, and Colossians written from Rome. You had identified with Christ earlier, but not in the heavenly aspect. That was only in those later written books. Here you have Jude 3.

Contend earnestly for the faith. Notice it's singular. which was once for all handed down to the saints. And Revelation 22, 18 and 19, I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book, if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plague which are written in the book. If anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his part from the tree of life and from the holy city which are written in this book. These speak of the finality of written revelation. if anyone adds to them. But the other uses of mirror in the New Testament also represented the written Word of God.

2 Corinthians 3.18 and James 1.22-24. And that second one in James is where it most explicitly spells out the mirror is the Word of God.

The complete New Testament clarifies. We see things clearly with the complete New Testament. So the New Testament revealed so many things about Christ and about the Church that were not at all revealed in the Old Testament. That is why we have the word mystery, a truth, now revealed, previously not revealed, because the New Testament revealed new truth. Then beginning with Moses and with all the prophets, he explained to them the things concerning himself in the Old Testament. So the Old Testament spoke of Christ, but it didn't say everything and it didn't talk about the Church. The Old Testament was inspired, but the church needed much more.

And we have little phrases here that are only in the New Testament. In Christ, a new creature, sealed with the Holy Spirit. That's only written in Paul's writings. Caught up, rapture. The rapture is not in the Old Testament, but it is in the New. Not under law, but under grace. The Old Testament say you're not under law, but under grace. You have Apostles exclusively in the New Testament. Walk in the Spirit. Walk in the Spirit. That's New Testament only. Baptized into Christ. That is New Testament only. So you have New Testament truth and these brief phrases and words convey some things that are exclusively New Testament teachings.

While some view face-to-face as our seeing Christ in heaven, the New Testament does not use it that way, and 2 Corinthians 3.18 is about our beholding Christ now through the Word of God. See that?

2 Corinthians 3.18 is about our beholding Christ now through the Word of God, not when we go to see the Lord directly.

Tongues will cease of their own. The primary value and purpose of the gift of tongues will be separately fulfilled, as indicated by a different word that means to end, and not being called in part as with the two other gifts. Prophecy and knowledge are called in part. Tongues is not. Tongues ceases using a different word and a different voice. So it operates under different principles and ends under different principles. Okay, here's a worn out battery.

Tongues, by the evidence of both the Old and New Testaments, had a special purpose that was fulfilled in 70 AD, when the Romans defeated Jerusalem and valid tongues ceased. What is the last New Testament book that mentions tongues? First Corinthians. This one we're studying is the last New Testament book that mentions tongues. Not mentioned after that. Tongues would cease in about a decade and a half. Yes? Yes, what is exercised today, I would say, is not valid tongues.

It's a phenomenon that can be learned by some. Even atheists have spoken in tongues. Tongues was exercised in the Mormon Church early. As a matter of fact, that was the first charismatic church in the United States, the Mormon Church. And tongues is also exercised in almost every other major world religion. It's a psychological phenomenon, a linguistic phenomenon, as it's exercised now, not a spiritual gift. Yes?

But we do know from the Book of Revelations that prophecy will again be reinstituted. during the final time, so God can bring these things back. But will it be the gift of prophecy in the church? In other words, you're correct, there will be prophecy, there will be those who prophesy, but even the Old Testament prophets, the ones who speak for God, even the Old Testament prophets were not displaying the spiritual gift of prophecy as in the church. It was not a church gift.

And you're correct. Prophecy was, in the Old Testament, something that was indeed valid, because there were true prophets. And there will again be prophets, but it's not the same as prophecy in the church. Yes. This is a matter of seeing gifts particularly, and prophecy particularly, as a church-specific giftedness.

There is another handout that you have here that goes into details on tongues. I won't go over the details on that here, but that's a supplement that you have available to you there. And that has those three pages, the third page of which has that spiritual gifts chart.

These are intended to show how tongues is expressed in the past and how tongues ended in the specific periods of time. There is also, the last page of your handout, is receiving the Holy Spirit in the Book of Acts and what that phenomenon looked like. There are four instances of receiving the Holy Spirit and tongues was evident in three of them.

In Acts 2, Acts 10, and Acts 19. Interestingly, here's the pattern of tongues. Tongues was expressed among Jews in the Jewish land, Acts 2. Acts 10, it was expressed among Gentiles in the Jewish land. And then Acts 19, it was expressed among Jews in the Gentile land. See that pattern? Jews in the Jewish land, Gentiles in the Jewish land, Jews in the Gentile land. Those are the three times the tongue shows up in the Book of Acts. And you'll see that kind of detail here in this tongue supplement. So here is the pattern, and this is from page two of your front handout.

So now these three remain, but love never falls off. Faith and hope both fall off when fulfilled by seeing Him. Prophecy and knowledge both are done away by the completion of the New Testament. We don't need to have prophecy and knowledge because we have the complete New Testament.

We need to study and read it. This is about 96 A.D. with the death of John, who had just the prior year written the book of Revelation. Tongue ceases of its own by 70 A.D. That's why it has a different word for ending. It's translated cease. and it has a different voice, middle voice, it ceases of its own. It just stops of its own because its purpose in warning about future judgment has been fulfilled. So are there any other confirmations that this apostolic year of gifts ended with the apostles?

Here we have Ephesians 2, 19 and 20. You are fellow citizens with the saints and are of God's household, you referring to the Gentiles, having been built on the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, Christ himself being the chief cornerstone. That Apostles and Prophets term is used three times in Ephesians 3.5 and 4.11.

The foundation serves to make a good start on a building. One does not keep on building more and more and more foundation. Suppose you came here and here they are building Holly Hills and they just keep building more and more foundation. You're going to say, wow, what are you guys doing? We can't just use a building that's just all foundation. You put the foundation in it as the start and then you build the rest of the building.

That's what the apostles and prophets were in the New Testament sense. They were the foundation, but you don't keep going with it. So by calling it a foundation, that tells us that, okay, I'm going to do the rest of the building differently and not continue on building the foundation.

We have also this, Hebrews 2, 3, and 4, it was at the first spoken through the Lord, it was confirmed, notice the past tense, to us by those who heard, who is he speaking of? Certainly Jews, but particularly talking about the apostles, right? God also testifying with them both by signs and wonders and by various miracles and by gifts of the Spirit according to his own will." So notice he talks about the expression of these signs and wonders, and this was written in about 66 AD. It would be about the latest it could have been written, but about 66 AD. He's speaking of the signs and wonders in the past tense, even by this time. The Apostolic Era gifts are looked at as these are past.

In Galatians 3.5, So then, does he who provides you with the Spirit and works miracles among you do it by the works of the law or by hearing with faith? So that's the working of miracles among them during the Apostolic Era. Yes? You may have mentioned this, but I missed it. Yes.

The tongues had a primary purpose in warning the Jews. Warning the Jews of coming judgment. I didn't go into detail about it, but your three page handout, particularly the first two pages, is the supplement that addresses what tongues are for. The actual beginning warning about tongues comes out of Deuteronomy. that they would have people of foreign tongue come with as a warning of judgment.

And that continued in the Old Testament. And so you have those passages given there. Let me see if I can quickly reference those so you'll have those to work with. On your tongue supplement, which is the one that has the map on the bottom and then four slides up on top, Tongues had a primary and temporary role as a sign for the Jews and as a ministry to the unbelieving, as revealed in 1 Corinthians 14, 20-25. Then we see in the next slide over, here is Deuteronomy and passages in Isaiah and Jeremiah that also talk about tongues as a warning of judgment. And then finally, that warning showing up in a few different places among the apostles.

Tongues are mentioned in the third slide, Tongues in the First Century. Tongues are mentioned from Mark 16-17, those three times in Acts, Acts 2, 10, and 19, and 1 Corinthians 12-14. Those are the places the tongues are mentioned in Scripture with the Roman victory over Jerusalem. that was prophesied in Luke 21, 20-24, that would be the end of the purpose of tongues because it was a warning of coming judgment to the Jews. Then you have several references, tongues in the church after 70 AD, several references that indicated that in subsequent times, after 70 AD, tongues had ceased. One fellow that I have there, Clement, wrote to the Corinthians from Rome about everything that Paul had already written about in 1 Corinthians. The one thing he didn't write about was tongues, because it had ceased.

So anyway, that quick answer to your question, but feel free to look that over. Yeah? So, taking that tongues, knowledge, and prophecy have all ended, and they've been done away with, where are certain individuals, groups, today operating from? Are they using these terminology? Yeah, what people do is they say, well, I'm still doing it.

And so tongues, for example, the technical term is glossolalia. And what's interesting is I was talking with Bob Eccle about it, since he knows a lot more about genetics than I do. I was giving him certain percentages that at the time I had clearly in my mind. There's a certain percentage of people who can quickly learn how to produce tongues, and it doesn't matter what their religious background is or anything. They can be atheists. It's a psycho-linguistic phenomenon.

There are other people that with some coaching and training can learn, and then there are other people who just can't do it. no matter how much you coach and train them. My grandparents were both Assembly of God pastors. And my mom, having grown up in that household, would tell about people that no matter what they tried or how much coaching they got, they just couldn't speak in tongues. What about knowledge and prophecy?

Yeah, what you will see is somebody will come up and they'll say, you know, you did this or, you know, you're going to do this or something of that sort. And that's the way it's expressed in charismatic circles. And I've seen it. I've even had people come up to me and, you know, do that sort of thing. You know, having my grandparents and aunt and uncle, all involved in this thing. I've seen it.

But I would say it is not the biblical gift. Yes? That kind of borders on the occult and the outside realm as well, because some of those people who make those Yeah, and so the question is, yeah, if I do have somebody who's carrying out the gift, supposedly, where's that coming from? I would say with glossolalia in great part, It is a psycholinguistic phenomenon that can be carried out by people of any religion or no religion at all. It can be carried out. Then there comes the gift of interpretation. And of course the question is, is somebody really interpreting it?

One fellow in Southern California carried out an experiment. He had learned fluent Hebrew. He was in a church where everybody stands up and they do the gift of tongues and you have somebody interpret. And so he stood up and recited the 23rd Psalm in Hebrew. And then they had a guy doing an interpretation, and the interpretation was, of course, way off. And he said, you know, I just recited to you the 23rd Psalm in Hebrew. Your gift of interpretation is bogus.

Yes? Well, it's kind of confusing because for me, the way I view it is that And understand that sometimes it's a language, a foreign language, a known language. So it's not just babbling or whatever. It has to be somebody that doesn't know the language that speaks it, and then somebody that hears the language. tongues to language. Yes, and that's one thing, we say tongues, but it's actually, you could say the gift of languages, because that's exactly what the word means. It doesn't mean some, you know, angelic language or something.

There's also something else, and that is sound groupings called phonemes. We would say, for example, in the word spring, SP, is a phoneme, okay? It's a sound grouping. Ng would be another, you know, phoneme. So you've got phonemes within, you know, words. What happens is tongues is often just a random, you know, pouring out of usually less than a half dozen phonemes. And what's interesting is that depending on what language is the native language of a person, different series of phonemes tend to come out. In our culture, a lot of the phonemes that tend to come out are Shandala, a lot of those kinds of phonemes.

Yes? that God was working among the Jews, the Gentiles, and the Holy Spirit actually was being presented as per God's direction. So it was to bring glory to God, not glory to man. But when you get into these sects today where people talk about tongues, they're bringing glory to how well they sound, and how good they're sounding. This is all self-interpretation. And that's wrong. point in terms of where is the focus.

What will be the ministry of the Holy Spirit? Jesus is talking in the Gospel of John, which we'll be studying next year. Jesus is talking in the Gospel of John and he's telling the disciples that the Holy Spirit will put a focus on who? Christ. Whereas what happens in the typical Charismatic meeting, and like I say I've seen plenty of it, And the typical Charismatic meeting puts the focus on the Holy Spirit, and one of the other aspects of it is that there's even songs and pleadings about the Holy Spirit falling afresh on me. But we saw in Romans, if you don't have the Holy Spirit indwelling you, you're not Christ's.

You're not saved. One instance that I would say demonstrates the point that we're making here, in a church in California where my brother is a pastor, there was a gal who had been in a charismatic church and she had been demonstrating all these tongues and other charismatic phenomenon. Then she came to my brother's church and became a believer. She'd had all these manifestations, and she'd done it herself, all the tongues and these various things, and had all the manifestations, she wasn't saved. So my brother tells her, well, you know, this is the gospel, and this is what you need to believe, and if you haven't been told that yet, and if you haven't believed it yet, you're not saved. And it's most certainly not the Holy Spirit who is producing all these phenomena. Let's see if we can get there.

2 Corinthians 2.12, there would be another passage to look at. Spiritual gifts are for the ministry in the church to express God's love through us to others. Those spiritually disoriented saints in Corinth were looking at their spiritual gifts as a tool to make them each look better here and now. God had eternity in mind.

That's why love is most important. Because it will be forever. These gifts, they're going to pass. All of them will pass. They're not gifts to hoard. Boy, I sure want this gift and that one. But I will look really good. I will feel so good about myself if I have this gift or that one.

It's when we go to see the Lord all that will pass. The spiritual gifts were intended by God to fulfill an earthly need of the church toward an eternal and far more glorious purpose to be expressed in a love that would outlast the gifts. See that? The spiritual gifts were intended by God to fulfill an earthly need of the church toward an eternal and far more glorious purpose and to be expressed in a love that would outlast the gifts.

So what do we take home from the passage here? And I think we've got to quit. I've got to stop there and let you finish the rest of the thing on your own. Let's pray. Lord, we do thank you that you've revealed some things clearly here. You've revealed some things that give us insight and understanding. And also put the focus on the right thing, on the Word of God and upon Jesus Christ, rather than the focus being upon the Spirit. And Lord, we do thank you for what you've revealed because you love us and care for us so much. We pray in Jesus name. Amen.