“Paul’s Second Letter to Timothy — Rightly Dividing the Word of Truth Demands That We Follow Paul — Part 4”

Today we look carefully at Paul’s primary teaching on the gifts of the Spirit to members of the Body of Christ.  Miraculous powers were indeed given to believers under Paul’s ministry.  But, he teaches in 1 Corinthians chapters 12 through 14 that these special gifts from the Spirit would be given and useable only for a short time.  He teaches that they were appropriate only for that time of “the partial” revelation of God’s word.  When “the perfect” or“the completed” revelation was available (through Paul, of course), then those special gifts would no longer be given or even used if given previously.  Many have wanted to tie this revelation to the Second Coming of Christ, but that does not make sense in this context.  Col. 1:25-29 is about that completed giving through Paul of that special “secret” revelation previously kept hidden but now revealed.  Summarizing that, Paul writes there of “the Christ in you [Gentiles], the hope of glory.  That is God’s work today with great power as Paul writes in Col. 1:29.  This explains the teaching about the “maturity” of that revelation concerning the Dispensation of grace itself found in 1 Cor. 13:11-13.  Now “we know even as we are known”.  This correlates as well with Paul’s final words to Israel recorded in Acts 28:25-29.  With Israel set aside, there was no more need for any miraculous signs, since primarily they were for the Jews.  Praise God for his unspeakable gift.