God's Arsenal: Unity in Trinitarian Diversity Text: 1 Corinthians 12:4-11
Introduction: Gifts, Grandstanding, and the Gospel
The church at Corinth was a mess, but it was a gifted mess. Paul tells us at the beginning of this letter that they came behind in no gift. They had it all. Prophecy, tongues, miracles, you name it. If there was a spiritual gift on the list, someone in Corinth had it, and was likely quite proud of it. But their giftedness did not translate into spiritual maturity. In fact, it was quite the opposite. They were carnal, arrogant, and divided. They were treating the gifts of the Spirit like merit badges, turning the church service into a stage for spiritual grandstanding. They had turned God's arsenal into a toy chest, and were using the weapons of the Holy Spirit to beat each other over the head.
We face a similar problem today, though it manifests in two different ditches on either side of the road. In one ditch, you have a dry, formal, functional deism. In these churches, the Holy Spirit is treated like the eccentric uncle you don't talk about at family gatherings. They are cessationists, as I am, but they are the sort of cessationists who act as though the Spirit clocked out after the apostle John died. Their church services are orderly but often as dry as last year's toast. They have the truth, but it is truth in the freezer.
In the other ditch, you have the wild-eyed charismatic chaos. Here, the Holy Spirit is treated like a cosmic slot machine. Subjective experience is king, and the weirder the better. They chase after signs and wonders, confusing emotional ecstasy with genuine spiritual power. They often have zeal, but it is a zeal untethered from the Word and from wisdom. They have the fire, but it is a fire outside the hearth, and it is burning the house down.
Paul's instruction to the Corinthians pulls us out of both ditches. He doesn't tell them to stop desiring gifts. But he fundamentally reframes their purpose and their source. He grounds the spiritual gifts, not in the spiritual prowess of the individual, but in the unified, Trinitarian life of God Himself. The gifts are not trophies for the spiritually elite; they are tools for the whole body. They are not for personal status; they are for the common good. And they are not distributed by our whim, but by the sovereign will of the Spirit.
The Text
Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit.
And there are varieties of ministries, and the same Lord.
And there are varieties of workings, but the same God who works everything in everyone.
But to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit for what is profitable.
For to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, and to another the word of knowledge according to the same Spirit;
to someone else faith by the same Spirit, and to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit,
and to another the workings of miracles, and to another prophecy, and to another the distinguishing of spirits, to someone else various kinds of tongues, and to another the translation of tongues.
But one and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually just as He wills.
(1 Corinthians 12:4-11 LSB)
The Trinitarian Fountainhead (vv. 4-6)
Paul begins by anchoring the whole discussion in the Godhead. Before we can understand the gifts, we must understand the Giver. And the Giver is the Triune God.
"Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are varieties of ministries, and the same Lord. And there are varieties of workings, but the same God who works everything in everyone." (1 Corinthians 12:4-6)
Notice the beautiful Trinitarian structure here. We have diverse gifts (charismata) flowing from one Spirit. We have diverse ministries or services (diakoniai) directed by one Lord, Jesus Christ. And we have diverse workings or effects (energemata) empowered by one God, the Father. This is not just a clever rhetorical flourish. This is the foundational grammar of reality. The ultimate philosophical problem is the relationship between the one and the many. How can reality be both unified and diverse? Paul says the answer is found in who God is. God is one essence in three persons. He is the ultimate unity in diversity. Therefore, His body, the church, must reflect His nature. Our unity does not require uniformity.
The Spirit is the source of the gifts. The Lord Jesus is the one who directs the service. The Father is the one who provides the power and the effect. Think of it like a perfectly coordinated military operation. The Father is the commanding general who sets the strategy and provides the resources. The Son is the field commander who assigns the tasks and directs the troops. The Spirit is the one who equips each soldier with the specific weaponry and skill needed for his assigned task. There is perfect unity of purpose, but a diversity of roles and equipment. To be proud of your gift is as foolish as a rifle boasting against a grenade. Both were issued from the same quartermaster for the same war.
Tools, Not Trophies (v. 7)
Next, Paul establishes the purpose of these divine endowments. Why are they given?
"But to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit for what is profitable." (1 Corinthians 12:7 LSB)
There are two critical truths packed into this one verse. First, a gift is given to "each one." No Christian is left out. The Spirit does not have a tiered system of membership. If you are in Christ, you have been gifted for service. You are not a spectator in the kingdom of God; you are a deputized participant. There are no benchwarmers on God's team. This demolishes any spiritual caste system. The quiet woman who faithfully teaches the toddlers in Sunday School is just as gifted and necessary as the man who preaches from the pulpit.
Second, the gifts are given "for what is profitable," or for the "common good." The gifts are not private toys for our personal enjoyment. They are public tools for building up the church. A gift is not measured by how it makes me feel, but by how it serves my brother. It is a "manifestation" of the Spirit, meaning it makes the Spirit's presence visible and tangible in the life of the church. When a gift is used rightly, people don't say, "Wow, what a gifted man." They say, "Wow, what a gracious God." The spotlight is always meant to swing back to the Giver.
The Apostolic Arsenal (vv. 8-10)
Paul then provides a representative list of the kinds of gifts the Spirit was distributing in the Corinthian church.
"For to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, and to another the word of knowledge according to the same Spirit; to someone else faith by the same Spirit, and to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, and to another the workings of miracles, and to another prophecy, and to another the distinguishing of spirits, to someone else various kinds of tongues, and to another the translation of tongues." (1 Corinthians 12:8-10 LSB)
We must read this list with the whole counsel of God in mind. Scripture tells us that certain gifts were foundational and temporary. These were the "signs of an apostle" (2 Cor. 12:12), the authenticating credentials given to the men who were tasked with laying the foundation of the church and writing the New Testament. Gifts like prophecy, tongues, and miraculous healings were revelatory gifts. They were how God delivered His Word before the canon of Scripture was closed.
To claim that these sign gifts continue today is to fundamentally misunderstand their purpose. If prophecy is happening today, in the same way it happened with Paul or Agabus, then we have an open canon. If God is still speaking with that kind of "thus saith the Lord" authority, then we need to be writing it down and adding it to our Bibles. The mainstream charismatic movement tries to have it both ways, claiming to have prophecy, but a kind of fallible, "prophecy-lite" that doesn't carry the authority of Scripture. But the Bible knows nothing of this category. God does not stutter.
This does not mean the Spirit is inactive. God still heals people, often in remarkable ways in answer to prayer. He still gives men wisdom and knowledge to preach and apply His completed Word. But the unique, apostolic, sign gifts have ceased because their purpose has been fulfilled. The foundation has been laid, and you don't keep laying the foundation when you are working on the third floor. The other gifts, the speaking gifts and serving gifts mentioned elsewhere, continue. The Spirit continues to equip the church with everything it needs for its life and mission, but He does so now through the completed Word He has already given us.
The Sovereign Distributor (v. 11)
Paul concludes this section with a thunderclap of divine sovereignty that ought to silence all our pride and envy.
"But one and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually just as He wills." (1 Corinthians 12:11 LSB)
This is the death blow to all spiritual consumerism. The Holy Spirit is not a vending machine where we can insert our faith and select the gift we want. He is the sovereign third person of the Trinity. He distributes His gifts "just as He wills." His will, not our wish, is the determining factor. He is the one who decides who gets what, and how much, and for how long.
This is profoundly liberating. It means you don't have to feel like a second-class Christian because you can't speak in tongues. It means you don't have to envy the man with the more public or prominent gift. Your responsibility is not to acquire a gift you don't have, but to be a faithful steward of the gift you do have. The Spirit, in His perfect wisdom, has equipped you precisely for the role He has assigned you in the body. He has not miscalculated. He has not left you unequipped. He has given you exactly what you need to do exactly what He wants you to do. Our job is to get on with it, with gratitude and diligence.
Conclusion: One Body, One Mission
The Corinthian error was to take a Trinitarian reality and make it all about "me." They took the gifts that were meant to display the unity-in-diversity of God and used them to fuel their own disunity and pride. They were acting like a bunch of disconnected limbs, each claiming to be the most important part of the body.
The solution is to look away from the gifts to the Giver. It is to see that the Spirit, the Lord, and the Father are all working in perfect harmony to build one church. The gifts are not a hierarchy of holiness but a diversity of functions. Whether you have the gift of teaching, or administration, or mercy, or helps, it was given to you by the sovereign Spirit, for the service of the Lord Christ, to the glory of God the Father. It is for the common good.
Therefore, we must reject both the dead formalism that quenches the Spirit's ongoing work and the chaotic subjectivism that abuses His gifts. We are to be a people of the Word and the Spirit. We recognize that the Spirit has given us everything we need in the completed canon of Scripture. And we trust that same Spirit to empower us, through the gifts He continues to give, to understand that Word, to obey it, and to build a robust, joyful, and unified body that can effectively advance the kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ in the world. The Spirit has equipped His church. Our task is to take up the tools He has given us and get to work.