by Walter Beuttler
We will now consider the activities of the Holy Spirit. He is a worker and needs us, for we are His instrumentality, or the means by which He accomplishes His work.
“And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” I Thessalonians 5:23
Paul is pointing us to three major areas, spirit, soul, and body. The Holy Spirit employs instrumentalities to carry out the work of the Father in these three areas of our triune being. He does this by means of the various ministries of the Spirit of God, and He works with these ministries, through the Body.
I am speaking collectively of the Church of God. We are the Body of Christ; the Church. I do not mean any particular denomination, but rather, the Body of Christ consisting of all true believers that are born again through faith in Jesus Christ, whether they are in the Pentecostal sheepfold, the Presbyterian, the Episcopalian, or whatever. The idea being if we are truly born again through faith in Jesus Christ, we are all one family, one great body of believers regardless of what denominational tag we may wear.
Remember what Paul said, “Henceforth, know we no man after the flesh.” The Lord is mightily working today in all denominations, and is calling out a new people composed from the whole spectrum of all denominations. God is on the move, and I am moving with Him. What counts is our personal relationship to Jesus Christ.
The Holy Spirit is active as a person, as He is a person. As such, He has characteristics of personality, and He engages in intelligent activities. Here is what the Spirit of God is seeking to do in I Corinthians 12:7-11:
“But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man (this means to every person, the idea being everyone that is a true member of the body of Christ) to profit withal (or for the common good). For to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit; To another faith by the same Spirit; to another the gifts of healing by the same Spirit; To another the working of miracles; to another prophecy; to another discerning of spirits; to another divers kinds of tongues; to another the interpretation of tongues: But all these works that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as He will.” I Corinthians 12:7-11 (comment added)
These are generally called the nine gifts, or nine manifestations of the Spirit, by means of which He seeks to work through the various members of His body for the edification of the Church, for the accomplishment of the work of God in our triune nature: spirit, soul, and body. The Spirit uses these gifts to make us perfect in these three areas. The Lord also uses other means, but we are now dealing particularly with the activities of the Holy Spirit.
These nine gifts are divisible into three threes; three gifts that minister to us particularly in the realm of our spirit, three that minister particularly to needs in the realm of our soul (which includes the intellect), and three which minister particularly in the realm of the material, including our physical body.
I would not say that this breakdown is inspired, but it is a logical division of these gifts that will help us to understand the operation of the Spirit. “We are the members of His body.” Paul is implying that as we have physical members: hands, feet, ears, eyes, that minister to the entire body, so God has individual members in His mystical body, the Church, members which we are, through whom the Holy Spirit works.
For to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another the word of knowledge, to another this, to another that, to another something else, so that according to the plan of God, all these gifts should be operating as the need would require. We need to bear in mind here that the gifts of the Spirit are tools, not toys.
When I was a pastor, a lady said, “Brother Beuttler, do you know that you are not Pentecostal?” I said, “Well, I thought I was. But why do you think I am not?” She said, “I have never seen you cast out any devils.” I answered, “Out of whom do you think we should cast one?” She said, “I do not know.”
The truth is, if I had tried to start on anyone, she would have been my first object. And I have reasons for saying this. Paul said, “Covet earnestly the best gifts.” We should be interested in these things. I am troubled because the trend in the US among the Lord’s people is away from the gifts of the Spirit, a swing from the things of the Spirit to the things of the intellect. This has the effect of not only despising, but gradually displacing the gifts of the Spirit with the natural gifts of man, particularly gifts of the intellect. This is, of course, a great tragedy.
We should be interested, and jealously seek the Lord that we might be used by the Spirit of God in the gifts of the Spirit, as the need demands. If there is no need, then there is, of course, no demand. The Lord is not encouraging that we make an empty display of this. The gifts are available to meet a particular need. If there is no need, then there is no need for their exercise.
This raises a question: What are the best gifts? Since Paul said, “Covet earnestly the best gifts.” I have noticed that theologians, or would be theologians, as the case may be, have argued over this for centuries. Some say prophecy is the best gift; others say the word of wisdom is the best gift. Paul did not say, “Covet earnestly the best gift.” He said, “Covet earnestly the best gifts.” Notice that this is plural.
Now, what are the best gifts? I will give you my position for your consideration. Some years ago, I was in Algiers, Algeria. It is possible to cross the Sahara Desert at certain times of the year by car, but it is always a risk under the best of circumstances. At that time, the French were still in control of Algeria and they had very rigid rules concerning anyone driving across the Sahara. Their car had to meet certain specifications. They had to have a certain amount of gallons of oil, water, emergency equipment and other provisions, or they would not be allowed to go.
Two men decided to go across and did not receive permission from the authorities because it was too late in the season. It was the time of the sandstorms that would erase the tracks through the desert. They were not allowed to go, but they wanted to go anyway, and they went.
It was known when they went, but somehow they did not show up at the Niger River. The case was reported to the authorities, and they sent out a rescue party, and found that these Englishmen had lost the way. Both were lying dead next to their car, and had died from thirst. They discovered there was no water in the radiator of the car, so it was thought the men drank the water from the radiator. That was a logical assumption. When they examined the men later, they found that they had oil in their stomachs. They also found that there was no oil in the crankcase. The confusion was that these men took the oil from their crankcase being crazed with thirst and drank it. What the thirst did not do, the oil did.
Now then, what do you suppose would have been the best gift for those men? Supposing you had come with a brick of gold and said, “Fellows, look at this gold. Here is a gift for you.” Or, if you prefer: “Here, we have a barrel of water.” What would have been the best gift for these men, the gold or the water? As you can see, you could have offered them a ton of gold. They would have despised that gold. They would have taken the barrel of water. It was not a matter of intrinsic relative value. It was a matter of whatever met their need at a given time.
So it is with the gifts. “Covet earnestly the best gifts” What gifts? Those gifts for which there is the greatest need at a given time, so that the best gift today may not be the best gift six months from now. It depends altogether on the need.
We have these gifts divided into three areas. We have needs in the area of our spirit. We have needs in the area of our soul, to which belongs the intellect. We have needs in the area of the physical. The greatest, or the best gifts, are those which meet our particular need in any of these areas where the need is the greatest at a given time.
For the need of our spirit, are gifts of inspiration. For the needs in the soul, including the intellect, we have gifts of revelation. For the area of the physical, we have gifts of power.
Under gifts of inspiration we have prophecy, tongues, and the interpretation of tongues, that meet our need more particularly in the realm of the spirit where they inspire us. This includes prophecy, divers kinds of tongues, and the interpretation of tongues.
In the realm of the soul to which belongs the intellect are the gifts of revelation. This includes the word of wisdom, the word of knowledge, and discerning of spirits. In the realm of the material, which are the gifts of power; faith, the working of miracles, and gifts of healing.
“If therefore the whole church be come together into one place, and all speak with tongues, and there come in those that are unlearned, or unbelievers, will they not say that you are mad? But if all prophesy, and there come in one that believes not, or one unlearned, he is convinced of all, he is judged of all: And thus are the secrets of his heart made manifest; and so falling down on his face he will worship God, and report that God is in you of a truth.” I Corinthians 14:23-25
Prophecy, simply put, is supernatural utterance in a known tongue, a supernatural utterance given by the Spirit in the language of the speaker, and normally in the language of the hearers. It is just as inspired as tongues and interpretation, but it avoids this duel process and brings the message of God directly to our hearts.
Paul is saying, “Thus are the secrets of his heart made manifest.” There are many hearts with many secrets, and the Lord comes along with His word through an utterance in prophecy, which directly applies to us personally, directly meets the specific condition in our hearts, at a given time – something that no person may know about.
I went to Bible school in 1927, and was new in this. I knew that the Lord wanted me there, and then I met with what I thought was a great misfortune. The school had a matron, and the matron put me on the duty of washing dishes. Of all things: washing dishes! I did not like to wash dishes. I like to eat on clean dishes, but I did not believe that I should be the one to make them clean.
I told the matron, “Miss Sunder, I am not washing dishes.” She said, “How is that?” I answered, “I am a German.” She said, “What has that got to do with it?” I responded, “German men do not wash dishes. This is a woman’s job, and it is an insult to my manhood, to my dignity.”
She said, “Walter, you are going to wash dishes until you like it.” I could read her face. What I saw made me say within myself, “I think I would be well advised not to say anymore.” I was angry and I stamped back to my room and said to myself, “If I am in a Bible school that believes men should wash dishes, I am in the wrong school. And if I am in a religion that believes men should wash dishes, I am in the wrong religion, and I am going to quit both the school and Pentecost.”
Incidentally, I have changed. Bible school does a lot of things for you that you did not consider. I packed my cases and walked out of the school, in a huff. I was through with Pentecost, once and for all, and I meant it. But I knew that in a certain city nearby, was an All-Day Meeting on the last Friday of the month.
I am a sentimentalist in many ways and I thought, “I will go once more to a Pentecostal meeting, my last one, just by way of saying, goodbye.” So I went. My suitcases stood out in the hall. The church was in a house, as it was a small group. I sat in front of the preacher in the third row, rebellious in my heart, thinking after this meeting, I will go, but I had no idea as to where.
Suddenly, the minister spoke an utterance in the Spirit that cut me to the heart. You have never heard anything like it. No one knew a thing about the condition I was in. This pastor was a very kind Englishman. I heard him thunder in the Spirit. He shouted at the top of his voice, “Rebellious man!” I slumped down between the seats. It was as though a knife had pierced me, and that man came out with my rebelliousness against the will of the Lord. And then he added, “Submit yourself to the mighty hand of God.”
I then realized for the first time that the matron’s hand was the hand of God on me. The tone changed and he said, “And then the Lord will do thus and so.” There was a wonderful promise what God would do, if I would submit myself and return to the will of the Lord. I knew what it meant, “Go back to Bible school.”
“Thus shall the secret of his heart be made manifest.” God manifested to me the reality of my rebellious spirit, my great need of submission. I stayed for the evening service. After the service, I went back to school, but I got there after 10:00. At 10:00 o’clock they lock the doors. The matron’s apartment was right next to the door. She would be the first to open the door. Of all people, she was the last one I wanted to see, so I stood there wondering what to do.
I wondered what I should say, and I was scared. I thought, “I am going to try the door.” The door was not locked, as someone forgot to lock it. I went stealthily up to my room and put my things back in the dresser, went to bed and showed up the next morning in the kitchen to wash dishes.
A strange thing happened here. No one asked me where I had been, as I was gone all day. No one said a word about my absence. After I had washed dishes for four weeks, the matron came and said, “Walter, I am now changing your duty. You have washed dishes long enough.”
I said, “Miss Sunder, please do not change my duty. I like to wash dishes.” She had said, “You will wash dishes until you like them.” But it took a prophetic utterance in the Holy Spirit to expose my awesome rebelliousness to myself, and bring me back into the center of the will of God.
“Thus are the secrets of his heart made manifest; and so falling down on his face he will worship God, and report that God is in you of a truth.” No wonder Paul said, “You may all prophesy one by one.” From all appearance, prophecy is the one gift that should be more in exercise than any other. Why would he say, “You may all prophesy one by one?”
The purpose of all this tonight, is to give us an insight into the nature of these manifestations of the Spirit, so when the Lord wants to use us, we know what it’s all about, and we can cooperate with Him. We are not going to go into divers kinds of difficulties that go along with these things, simply because humans are humans.
You know as a young fellow, newly saved, I had a hobby. My hobby was turtles, little green turtles. I thought they were the cutest things that God ever made. I had never seen them in Germany. In New York or thereabouts, you could get them for a dime a piece. I had them in an aquarium. You know those things so captivated me that they interfered with my devotions.
I had read that you have to let them exercise or their legs would swell. So while I had my prayers, I took them out of the aquarium and let them walk on the floor. Later, I would find them stuck under the bed, or someplace where they crawled and couldn’t get out. So I had to crawl and get them out, and let them walk the other way, and go back to my prayers.
Finally, the Lord severely dealt with me to get rid of these things. So I got rid of the turtles, but I did not get rid of the aquarium (which cost a few dollars). I put it up on the shelf in my closet, just in case I wanted to change my mind. Then I would already have the aquarium, and the turtles were only ten cents. So I had this all nicely fixed, and the Lord took notice.
That evening I went to church, and this same pastor, Allan Swift, was speaking. I owe him a lot in my own ministry. In his teaching, he came to a place in which he said, “When God asks you to get rid of something, get rid of it, do not put it up on a shelf.” I was dumbfounded, as I knew right away. “Thus are the secrets of his heart made manifest.” God got to my heart, and I said to Brother Swift after the service, “Brother Swift, what made you say that?” He said, “I don’t know. It just came along and I said it.” Well, I didn’t tell him what was up, but I knew. I had to get rid of that aquarium.
There are so many needs in so many lives that demand the manifestation of the Spirit through the word of prophecy to touch the innermost need, and rectify the condition. There is a tremendous need for that kind of manifestations.
We have in the same list of the gifts of inspiration, divers kinds of tongues. I also want to read I Corinthians 14:21-22:
“In the law it is written, With men of other tongues and other lips will I speak to this people; and yet for all this will they not hear Me, says the Lord. Wherefore, tongues are for a sign, not to them that believe, but to them that believe not; but prophesying serves not for them that believe not, but for them which believe.” I Corinthians 14:21-22
There is such a thing as unbelieving believers. All believers believe in Christ or they would not be believers, but not all believers believe what is spoken from the pulpit. Now there may be times when it is better that we do not believe. There are many times when God is sending to us His pure word, His message to our hearts, and yet some in the audience will not believe.
I have mentioned incidents, experiences, just as faithfully correct as I know how, yet there were people in the congregation who simply would not believe. On many an occasion, God sent along an utterance in other tongues with the interpretation in confirmation of what has been said to cause the unbelieving believer to accept the spoken word, which God brings to them in His Spirit.
So tongues, among other things, is a sign to those believers who do not believe. God is verifying the truth when it is accompanied with interpretation. Many a times, the interpretation has convinced the person that the things spoken are true.
Through this duel gift, God is often getting across the acceptance by His people of the truth that He sends. Tongues and interpretation together are equal to prophecy. Now we do have tongues and interpretation that serve a purpose which prophecy does not, and it is this: The believers who have spiritual discernment readily accept a prophetic utterance, but there are others who would not accept that utterance if it did not come through the sign gift of tongues accompanied by interpretation. They will accept it through the duel witness of tongues and interpretation, while they would not accept it by the single witness of prophecy.
So then, tongues are for a sign to those unbelieving believers who will only believe when the Spirit of God comes along through the twin gift of tongues and interpretation. There is something else that I would like to mention. There is something here that has been a choice truth.
“For if I pray in an unknown tongue, my spirit prays, but my understanding is unfruitful. What is it then? I will pray with the spirit, and I will pray with the understanding also: I will sing with the spirit, and I will sing with the understanding also. Else when you shall bless with the spirit, how shall he that occupies the room of the unlearned say amen at your giving of thanks, seeing he understands not what you say?” I Corinthians 14:14-16
When Paul speaks about speaking with tongues and understanding, he is talking about the interpretation of tongues. Thus, he says, “If I pray in an unknown tongue, my spirit prays, but my understanding does not understand. What is it then? I will pray with the spirit, and I will pray with the understanding also. Else when you shall bless with the spirit, how shall he that occupies the room of the unlearned say amen?” The unlearned are those who are untaught.
There is such a thing as the Holy Spirit giving to someone a prayer in other tongues. All prayers in other tongues are not intended for interpretation. They are simply praying to God. But there are, on occasion, prayers given by the Spirit in other tongues for the purpose of their being interpreted so that the whole congregation can say amen to the substance and the intent of this prayer.
One year, during a class in the school where I taught, a girl sat in the last row of seats. I was in class one year in the school and in the last row there was a girl sitting. Suddenly, she threw up both hands, giving an obviously beautiful prayer in other tongues. It was an electrifying prayer. I did not understand it, but could sense the earnestness and the richness of this prayer. I still see her face, as this was 25 years ago. I still see her with the glow of the Spirit on her face.
A boy next to her interpreted, and the interpretation started out like this: “As the hart pants after the water brooks, so pants my soul after thee, Oh God.” Then it went on. It was a prayer of hungering and thirsting after the living God. It was a tremendous prayer. The Holy Spirit, by means of this interpretation, deposited the prayer in our hearts. When he was finished with the interpretation, hands were up all over this class, crying out earnestly for God to meet them.
The Holy Spirit put this prayer in the hearts of the entire class, and it became a rich time of seeking the face of the Lord. It was a case of praying in tongues and praying with the understanding also.
Then in the same verse it says, “I will sing with the spirit, and I will sing with the understanding also.” I have seen this so often, not to believe what I am telling you here, namely, that there is such a thing as singing in the Spirit in other tongues, and then to have the song interpreted also, by singing the interpretation. We have experienced this many times in our school in the earlier years, when the Lord still had the preeminence.
I was there when the Spirit gave on several occasions, an operetta in the Holy Spirit. I mean operettas where perhaps 12 and 15 people were involved in singing in other tongues and singing the interpretations. It was tremendous, and it went on for a long time. What was it? “I will sing with the spirit, and I will sing with the understanding also.”
We had a girl in school who had not personality. She had no girlfriends or boyfriends. One day she came to my office crying, and said, “Brother Beuttler, I need your help.”
I asked, “What is the problem?” She responded, “I have no friends. I never get asked on a date with a fellow. The other girls go out on a date and I have to stay in. Brother Beuttler, what is wrong with me. No one ever takes notice of me?”
Well, I knew what was wrong with her, but I could not tell her, as she had a dull dead personality. Finally, not knowing what to say, I said, “I will tell you.” I said, “The Lord will take notice of you.” Which is true, but I did not know what else to say. With that she left.
A few days later we were in chapel. I was sitting in the back and there was a divine presence in this chapel service. You could tell something was up, as there was a heavy presence of the Spirit. Then this same girl, walked quietly, without saying a word, to the front of the platform, and danced in the Spirit. She danced as if she had no weight and I was astonished. She went around worshipping the Lord, singing in other tongues, turning around, worshipping the Lord, spinning on her toes. I wondered if the girl touched the ground. She seemed weightless.
Another girl walked up and joined her. She danced too and sang in tongues. Another girl went up. Fellows went up, and to make a three-hour and a quarter story short, the Holy Spirit gave us an operetta, a pageant, if you please with operatic singing in tongues and interpretation.
These 12 or 15 students, whatever they were, acted out in the Spirit, the death and resurrection of Christ, and this gave us an insight into the crucifixion, such as I had never known. The crucifixion was described in minute detail. It was outstanding.
For instance: I had always seen pictures where a ladder went up to the cross and they nailed Jesus up there on the cross. This was not the way this came. They related in the Spirit how the Romans laid the cross flat on the ground. I never knew that. How they placed Him with His back on the cross, and He lay there on the cross on the ground, how they drove in the nails, and then they portrayed how they lifted up His cross, with Jesus hanging on it, and then dropped the cross with a thud into a hole in the ground that had been dug.
You could picture the awful agony of Jesus as they dropped the cross with a thud into the ground, as His awful agony was described. It was tremendous, with tongues and interpretation. At the end, the glory of God fell, as they pictured the resurrection.
What God is able to do by His Spirit most of us have never seen, let alone heard. We have had many of these movings of the Spirit of God in our school, manifestations and works of the Holy Ghost that would almost strain your credulity, but I was there.
Here we have the Holy Spirit equipment to meet our inner most needs in the realm of our spirit, “For to one is given prophecy, to another tongues, to another interpretation of tongues… all these works that one and the selfsame Spirit dividing to every man severally as he will.”
May the Lord divide, allocate His wondrous gifts of the Holy Spirit for the edifying of the body of Jesus Christ in New Zealand.