Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: ROBERT@kontu.utu.fi (Robert W. Johnson) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: October 6 Message-ID: Date: 7 Oct 90 03:18:01 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Lines: 23 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu The priest's lips should keep knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth. Malachi 2.7 It is possible that much so-called revival is on a wrong basis. Spiritual gifts are displayed, but without a ministration of Christ, and that is like having many utensils, but nothing to use them for. But it is worse, for without Christ, gifts are not only empty; they may also be deceptive. Some of them at least can be simulated in a way that a ministry of Christ can never be. What matters to the Lord's people is not our gifts of preaching or prayer or what-have-you, but the personel knowledge of Christ that we convey by them. In a hospital two nurses may use exactly similar spoons, but what they give in those spoons is the important thing; one may give costly and curative medicine, the other a more palliative. It is WHAT we minister that counts. ----- Robert W. Johnson Computer center, The University of Turku, Turku Finland robert@kontu.utu.fi (InterNet) robert@firien.bitnet (BITNET) The preceeding is my opinion and may not express the opinion of my employer and furthermore has nothing to do with my employment.