Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I do not want you to be unaware.
Paul is going to talk about spiritual gifts, but he prefaces that discussion with this:
You know that when you were pagans, you were led astray to the mute idols, however you were led.
These people were saved out of a culture that recognized many gods, and worshiped them as idols or statues. Statues have no life, but demons can be behind these statues, to answer prayers or do miracles. So they had been led to honor and adore these idols.
Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God says, "Jesus is accursed;"
Jesus took upon Himself the curse God had put on Mankind, and the Scripture says,
If a man has committed a sin worthy of death, and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree; his body shall not remain all night on the tree, but you shall surely bury him that same day; (for he who is hanged is cursed of God;) that your land be not defiled, which the Lord your God gives you for an inheritance (Deuteronomy 21:22-23).That's why they had to take Him down off the Cross before nightfall. But even though Jesus took our curse upon Himself, He was not cursed.
and no one can say, "Jesus is Lord," except by the Holy Spirit.
When we say that Jesus is our Lord, we're considering Him to be the Boss who tells us what to do. These are not just words, they mean that we are obeying His rules, because we are thinking His thoughts and adopting His attitudes toward life. The only way we can do that is by the power of the Holy Spirit in us.
This is Paul's introduction to the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Why he would cover this first is probably to differentiate between the power of demons through the idols and God's true power through His Holy Spirit in us through His spiritual gifts.
O my Father, thank You for all Your goodness to all of us every day. You have known us, and even though we are Your enemies who have rebelled against You, You have still Loved us more than we can imagine, sending Your own Son to be our Savior from the power of sin over us. And Redeeming us out of the slave-market of sin to give us New Life in Your own Holy Spirit, causing us to be born spiritually, comparable to how we were born physically.
And You have equipped us to do Your work, Father; to accomplish Your plans for all of us, for each of us to play our part. You have planned out the whole panoply of existence, before You made any of it. And You have placed us where and when You have for us to play out all You want done.
Teach us, Father, how to use all the gifts You have given us, along with all our natural abilities You caused us to be born with, with all the different personalities You gave us, from all the experiences we have lived through so far. And You have given to each one of us a heart to love and enjoy and desire what You are pleased to grant us.
Help us all, my Father, as Your children, to display Your sterling character in each of our relationships, and to use all the tools at our disposal to accomplish with skill all You want done to prepare for the coming of Your Son, our King.
Even so, come, Lord Jesus!
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