Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I do not want you to be unaware. 1 Corinthians 12:1.
Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are varieties of ministries, and the same Lord. There are varieties of effects, but the same God who works all things in all persons. But to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. 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 another faith by the same Spirit, and to another gifts of healings by the one Spirit, and to another the effecting of miracles, and to another prophecy, and to another the discerning of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, and to another the interpretation of tongues. But one and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually just as He wills. 1 Corinthians 12:5-11.
Today your LORD (יהוה) God says:
I want all to know Me from the least to the greatest, from the youngest to the oldest, from the first to the last. I stand at the door and knock, and if ANYONE hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me. I want you to hear My voice, share My thoughts, just as I hear you and know your thoughts. Every person can hear from Me very clearly in all things, but what grieves Me and My Spirit is that most people do not desire enough to do that or take the time to learn how, but I set it out for you in My Word and Jesus came to show you the way. He communicated with Me constantly and did nothing except what I showed Him to do. He explained, and you should be able to say this with Him, “Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on My own initiative, but the Father abiding in Me does His works. Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me; otherwise believe because of the works themselves.” John 14:10-11. And again, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, unless it is something He sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, these things the Son also For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself is doing; and the Father will show Him greater works than these, so that you will marvel. For just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, even so the Son also gives life to whom He wishes.” John 5:19-21.
But how do you know Me? How do you talk with Me and share My thoughts? How do you have access to My very throne room and intimate presence day and night? ‘“Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,’ says the LORD of hosts.” Zechariah 4:6. By My Spirit in you and on you. You know Me by My Word but it takes My Spirit on you and in you to have revelation knowledge of My written Word, until you hear the voice behind that Word, and My Words are Spirit breathed, they are Spirit and Life. When you walk about, My Words will guide you; when you sleep, they will watch over you; and when you awake, they will talk to you. For My Word is a lamp and the teaching is light; and reproofs for discipline are the way of life. Proverbs 6:22-23. I can tell you things that you need to know and give you constant direction. Do not lean on your own understanding and knowledge so hard to make decisions and get direction, it is time you learned how to get the information you need at every moment from Me.
And that brings us to the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Every believer, every member of the Body of Christ, should be operating in these. They will become the delight of your life. It is good to be with Me constantly. In the presence of My glory, in communication with Jesus and a cloud of witnesses, Peter cried out, “Lord, it is good for us to be here; if You wish, I will make three tabernacles here, one for You, and one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” Mathew 17:4. But now I have made you into a tabernacle of the Holy Spirit and My Kingdom is accessible within you. You have entered into the cloud of witnesses, kind of like how easily you access the Cloud on your computer and enter vast vistas of cyberspace where time and distance are made all into one in one virtual space.
So let us return to the gifts I tell you to desire earnestly as you pursue Love. The last two Life Lessons in this series were about the first two gifts listed in Paul’s letter to the Corinthians—that is, the Word of wisdom and the Word of knowledge. The Word of wisdom brings about My plan and purposes in the earth by telling you of things to come in your life, another’s life, or in the life of a nation or state, and revealing what you should do to stop them or avoid them if they are harmful, such as the Word of wisdom I gave Jonah for Nineveh, or to cause them to happen if they are good, such as the Word to Ananias to lay his hands on Paul so he could recover his sight. The Word of knowledge is the revelation of a present or past fact or event that you could not otherwise know without supernatural revelation, such as Jesus’ knowledge that the Samaritan woman by the well had been married to five husbands and the man she was living with at the present time was not married to her or Elisha knowing the battle plans of the enemy army so he could warn the king of Israel to avoid the ambushes they set up against him. Often you see the Word of knowledge coming first, such as the Word telling Ananias exactly what house Paul was in, and then the Word of wisdom, such as the Word that followed telling Ananias that I had chosen Paul to be an apostle and that Ananias should go and lay his hands on him, which both imparted the baptism of the Spirit to him and healed him.
Both the Word of wisdom and the Word of knowledge are very useful in your own life today. It is good for parents to have the Word of knowledge given them by the Spirit about what their children are doing during the day or night when they cannot watch them so they can admonish or correct them if they have been doing or viewing things that are evil (like Elisha did with Gehazi) or protect them if they are in danger. It is true also in your workplace or elsewhere to know if others are involved in wrong behavior or are being pulled into darkness and need you to lead them to salvation or need your encouragement. And a Word of wisdom about what is coming and what needs to be done to take the best path at the opportune time is very important for yourself, your family, and others that I point out to you. And you should also expect to receive words about your church and your nation, as John did on the Island of Patmos.
And today, we are coming to an extremely important but often ignored gift of the Holy Spirit. “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 another faith by the same Spirit. Faith. This is a power gift of the Spirit. I have given every born again believer a measure of faith, like muscles, you all have the same faith and you build yourself up in your most holy faith by reading, hearing, speaking, singing, and meditating on My Word. Jesus talked about no faith, little faith, lost faith, faith, great faith and the greatest faith, but that is your faith. The faith I am speaking of here is My faith. It is when My faith kicks in because yours is not enough to get the work done. It is like accelerating your car into high gear and pushing your speed pedal to the floorboard. It is supernatural faith. It is the difference between superman and your ordinary man.
Let Me show you a few incidents and you will recognize the gift. Do you recall the time that a man brought his son, who was possessed by an unclean spirit that made him mute and threw him into convulsions where he would foam at the mouth, grind his teeth, and stiffen up? The disciples could not cast that demon out, though they had been successful at casting demons out before. The man then asked Jesus, “if You can do anything, take pity on us and help us!” Mark 9:22. And Jesus said to him, “‘If You can?’ All things are possible to him who believes.” Immediately the boy’s father cried out and said, “I do believe; help my unbelief.” Jesus then rebuked the unclean spirit, saying to it, “You deaf and mute spirit, I command you, come out of him and do not enter him again.” After crying out and throwing him into terrible convulsions, it came out; and Jesus took him by the hand and raised him; and he got up. The man had faith enough to bring the boy to Jesus but not enough to cast the demon out. Jesus supplied His faith to get the job done.
Jesus is the author and finisher of your faith. Now Jesus is not among you in the same way He was when the man brought him his possessed son, but Jesus is in you now by the Holy Spirit and you have the authority to use His Name, and thus to use His faith. He told you this, “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do, he will do also; and greater works than these he will do; because I go to the Father. Whatever you ask in My name, that will I do, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask Me anything in My name, I will do it.” John 14:12-14. Peter and John understood this. After Jesus had ascended back to Me, Peter and John were going up to the temple at the hour of prayer and a man lame from his mother’s womb was sitting at the temple gate called Beautiful begging for alms. When he saw Peter and John about to go into the temple, he began asking to receive alms. But Peter, along with John, fixed his gaze on him and said, “Look at us!” And he began to give them his attention, expecting to receive something from them. But Peter said, “I do not possess silver and gold, but what I do have I give to you: In the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene—walk!” And seizing him by the right hand, he raised him up; and immediately his feet and his ankles were strengthened. With a leap he stood upright and began to walk; and he entered the temple with them, walking and leaping and praising God. Acts 3:1-8. The crowd there was astonished and were looking at Peter as if he had some kind of special power of his own, but Peter set them straight on how it happened, “Men of Israel, why are you amazed at this, or why do you gaze at us, as if by our own power or piety we had made him walk? The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified His Son Jesus, the one whom you delivered and disowned in the presence of Pilate, when he had decided to release Him. But you disowned the Holy and Righteous One and asked for a murderer to be granted to you, but put to death the author of life, the one whom God raised from the dead, a fact to which we are witnesses. And on the basis of faith in His name, the name of Jesus, which has strengthened this man whom you see and know; and the faith which comes through Him has given him this perfect health in the presence of you all.” Acts 3:12-16. Do you see the gift of faith? It was as if Jesus Himself was there when they called upon the Name with their faith, then His faith showed up to complete theirs and finish the miracle of healing. Do you see the unlimited possibilities for your life by faith in His Name? Remember what Jesus told the inquiring crowd that followed Him when He had multiplied the loaves and fish? They asked, “What shall we do, so that we may work the works of God?” Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you have faith in Him whom He has sent.” John 6:28-29. Now you understand what He was telling them. At the time He said it, they did not.
But now I am going to give you a definition of this gift from My prophet Isaiah and explain to you to what I am referring through him. “For the LORD will rise up as at Mount Perazim, He will be stirred up as in the valley of Gibeon, to do His task, His unusual task, and to work His work, His extraordinary work.” Isaiah 28:21. This is a treasure vein, so follow it to the treasure.
I will rise up as at Mount Perazim. The word “perazim” is a Hebrew word (פְּרָצִֽים) the root of which is “parats” (פָּרַ֨ץ) which means to break through. Perazim is the plural noun of this and it means “breakthroughs” in other word many break throughs. Now let Me tell you about the location of Mount Perazim, David fought a battle soon after he had been anointed king over Israel. When the Philistines heard that David had been anointed king over all Israel, all the Philistines went up in search of David; and David heard of it and went out against them. Now the Philistines had come and made a raid in the valley of Rephaim. David inquired of Me, saying, “Shall I go up against the Philistines? And will You give them into my hand?” I said to him, “Go up, for I will give them into your hand.” I gave him a Word of wisdom and he acted on it. You will note, he knew to first inquire of Me and you should too, David relied on the gifts of the Spirit. If you recall the Spirit had rushed ON him (not IN him as Christ had not died and been raised yet) when Samuel anointed him as king and My Spirit never left him. So the Philistines came up and David defeated them there; and David said, “God has broken through my enemies before me by my hand, like the breakthrough of waters.” Therefore they named that place Baal-perazim, which means Master (Baal) of the breakthroughs. 2 Samuel 5:20; 1 Chronicles 14:11.
So first in the prophecy of Isaiah you see Me rising up as the Master of the breakthrough, which is what you need if your faith is not up to the vastness of the mighty work that needs to be done, such as when Moses parted the Red Sea, that was the gift of faith in operation in him and it did cause a breakthrough of many waters!
Now look at the next part and let Me show you to what that refers “He will be stirred up as in the valley of Gibeon, to do His task, His unusual task, and to work His work, His extraordinary work.” Do you recall what happened at Gibeon? Not long after Joshua had led the people of Israel in to conquer the Promised Land, Joshua went up from Gilgal, he and all the people of war with him and all the valiant warriors, to battle the five kings of the Amorites who had come against the people of Gibeon, who sent word to him for help because they had made a covenant of peace with Joshua (and that is a whole other story). As he went up I gave Joshua a Word of wisdom about the five kings and their armies, “Do not fear them, for I have given them into your hands; not one of them shall stand before you.” Joshua 10:8. So Joshua and the army of Israel went and they were winning a great victory, I also fought for them by throwing large stones from heaven on the enemy and there were more who died from the hailstones than those whom the sons of Israel killed with the sword. But the day was getting towards evening and Joshua wanted to finish battle before they could get away under the cover of darkness. That was a bit beyond what his faith could do. So what did he do? “Then Joshua spoke to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the sons of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, “O sun, stand still at Gibeon, and O moon in the valley of Aijalon!” Joshua 10:12. And the result? “So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, until the nation avenged themselves of their enemies. Is it not written in the book of Jashar? And the sun stopped in the middle of the sky and did not hasten to go down for about a whole day. There was no day like that before it or after it, when the LORD listened to the voice of a man; for the LORD fought for Israel.” Joshua 10:13-14. My task, My unusual task, and My work, My extraordinary work was done. My faith with Joshua’s faith stopped the sun and the moon in their orbits. He consulted Me and then he spoke. And that is the Spirit of faith, believe in your heart and speak with your mouth.
And how does the chapter of Isaiah end where this wondrous word about supernatural faith is found? “This also comes from the LORD of hosts, who has made His counsel wonderful and His wisdom great.” Isaiah 28:29. Word of wisdom and Word of knowledge. And it also has to do with the gift of discerning of spirits. But that lesson is coming soon.
I love you. Next time your faith just does not seem to be getting the mountain moved and cast into the sea do not despair, you just need My faith to flow in and mingle with yours. My faith kicks in where yours leaves off. Extra acceleration revs you up to a whole new level of confidence where nothing can take you down. Like Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego thrown by Nebuchadnezzar into the fiery furnace for their faith in Me. You will note however their faith got accelerated power so that the fire never touched them and they did not smell like smoke. Why? There came Someone else who walked with them right through that fire. And Nebuchadnezzar was astounded and stood up in haste; he said to his high officials, “Was it not three men we cast bound into the midst of the fire?” They replied to the king, “Certainly, O king.” He said, “Look! I see four men loosed and walking about in the midst of the fire without harm, and the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods!” Daniel 3:19-25. Do you understand? for now that fourth Man that was in that fire lives in you and whatever you ask in His Name He will do. His faith created and moves the universe. He is My Word. And My faith is in My Word and when you hear it, it comes into you.