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Cessationists do not question the New Covenant or believe only *half* of it (whatever that means). They simply accept the fact that some spiritual gifts ceased after the Apostolic Age, and many did not. This quotation sums up the matter:
THE CESSATION OF THE CHARISMATA
When our Lord came down to earth He drew heaven with Him. The signs which accompanied His ministry were but the trailing clouds of glory which He brought from heaven, which is His home. The number of the miracles which He wrought may easily be underrated. It has been said that in effect He banished disease and death from Palestine for the three years of His ministry...
His own divine power by which He began to found His church He continued in the Apostles whom He had chosen to complete this great work. They transmitted it in turn, as part of their own miracle-working and the crowning sign of their divine commission, to others, in the form of what the New Testament calls spiritual gifts in the sense of extraordinary capacities produced in the early Christian communities by direct gift of the Holy Spirit...The number and variety of these spiritual gifts were considerable... The diffusion of these miraculous gifts is, perhaps, quite generally underestimated....
The argument may be extended to those items of the fuller list, given in I Cor. 12, which found less occasion for their exhibition in the formal meetings for worship, but belonged more to life outside the meeting-room. That enumeration includes among the extraordinary items, you will remember, gifts of healings, workings of miracles, prophecy, discernings of spirits, kinds of tongues, the interpretation of tongues—all of which, appropriate to the worshipping assembly, are repeated in I Cor. 14:26 ff. We are justified in considering it characteristic of the Apostolic churches that such miraculous gifts should be displayed in them.
The exception would be, not a church with, but a church without, such gifts. Everywhere, the Apostolic Church was marked out as itself a gift from God, by showing forth the possession of the Spirit in appropriate works of the Spirit—miracles of healing and miracles of power, miracles of knowledge, whether in the form of prophecy or of the discerning of spirits, miracles of speech, whether of the gift of tongues or of their interpretation. The Apostolic Church was characteristically a miracle-working church.5
How long did this state of things continue? It was the characterizing peculiarity of specifically the Apostolic Church, and it belonged therefore exclusively to the Apostolic age—although no doubt this designation may be taken with some latitude. These gifts were not the possession of the primitive Christian as such; nor for that matter of the Apostolic Church or the Apostolic age for themselves; they were distinctively the authentication of the Apostles. They were part of the credentials of the Apostles as the authoritative agents of God in founding the church. Their function thus confined them to distinctively the Apostolic Church, and they necessarily passed away with it. Of this we may make sure on the ground both of principle and of fact; that is to say both under the guidance of the New Testament teaching as to their origin and nature, and on the credit of the testimony of later ages as to their cessation... The theologians of the post-Reformation era, a very clear-headed body of men, taught with great distinctness that the charismata ceased with the Apostolic age...
Quotation from Counterfeit Miracles by B.B. Warfield
1stCenturyLady
Well-Known Member
I disagree, totally. The gifts, all of them, were part of our New Covenant - covenant being the operative word. Just as nothing ceased in the Old covenant until all was fullfilled by Christ, then ended, nothing ceases in the New Covenant, including the gifts of the Spirit, until Christ, Himself, ends it at His second coming. Human reasoning for anyone's lack of gifts is just that, human reasoning - or justification for their lack.
Yes, Jesus is the truth, but we need to love him even though we do not know him as well as we could or should. Many believers love Jesus but don't know him very well. Isn't that OK for new converts who know almost nothing about him, but they love him anyway? If we don't lose our first love, aren't we OK, even if we still don't know him very well... just so we know him even a little and are seeking God's kingdom and righteousness first?
It works like this; “Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.” (John 14:6) (KJV 1900)
If you follow the truth you follow Jesus. If you reject the truth and follow lies, you follow the Devil.
1stCenturyLady
Well-Known Member
So you are saying if you believe that part of our New Covenant is not for you, you are following lies and make the word of God of non effect? Interesting you should say that person is following the devil.
Tongues and prophecy wrote the New Covenant. And we have those same words collected in scripture today. But if you think tongues and prophecy remain for today, you are adding to the New Covenant scripture.
And these are the words of another gospel. There are countless other gospels, but only one Truth. For The Truth can only be found in Jesus.
All you had at the onset of the New Covenant was Old Covenant scriptures. Tongues and prophecy provided the words of the New Covenant. When the New Covenant became complete, tongues and prophecy passed away with the apostles.
1stCenturyLady
Well-Known Member
Prophecy, yes. Tongues, no. But, neither ceased completely. Just as there isn't a constant rain during dry spells, the gifts were in the early, and now latter rain.
1stCenturyLady
Well-Known Member
I agree, but there is more than prophecy.
1 Corinthians 14:
5 I wish you all spoke with tongues, but even more that you prophesied; a]">[a]for he who prophesies is greater than he who speaks with tongues, unless indeed he interprets, that the church may receive edification.
6 But now, brethren, if I come to you speaking with tongues, what shall I profit you unless I speak to you either by revelation, by knowledge, by prophesying, or by teaching?
But that is regarding the gift of diverse kinds of tongues. There is another manifestation of the Spirit regarding supernatural tongues called praying in the Spirit. It is the sign of perfect prayer, and perfect praise. It does not require interpretation, as the gift does.
St. John had a profound Revelation and it became scripture. But he was a prophet. Today's voice chasers are not. And I think a good many of them drive themselves crazy...from what I've seen.
1stCenturyLady
Well-Known Member
You cannot imagine what needless suffering I've seen in Charismatic circles that you don't see in mainline churches.
1stCenturyLady
Well-Known Member
The Charismatics I've seen are the happiest people I know. Instead of lukewarm, they are on fire!
Literally, I know one who poured gas on herself and lit herself on fire. I think her church drove her crazy.
1stCenturyLady
Well-Known Member
I know a non-Charismatic woman who killed her baby because of the fear of the Great Tribulation where Sunday keepers would persecute and kill Sabbath keepers. She didn't want her baby to have to face that death.
There are always stories, but what is true is the Word of God and our covenants with Him. The New Covenant does not end until we see Jesus face to face at the second coming. And just as not a jot or a tittle was removed from the Old Covenant until all was fulfilled, not a dotting of an "i" or a crossing of a "t" will be removed until the New Covenant ends. We have the Spirit, AND His gifts. "For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call.”
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