In 1 Corinthians 13, Paul contrasts three of the extraordinary gifts of the Spirit (i.e. tongues, prophecy and knowledge) with three of the ordinary gifts of the Spirit (i.e. faith, hope and love). He then says that the extraordinary gifts would cease and pass away, while the ordinary gifts would remain. Finally, Paul teaches that love is the greatest because love endures forever.

I was interested to see that the cessationism/continuitionism issue is surfacing again–due to Matt Chandler’s recent sermon, “A Supernatural Community and a Personal Word.” Matt’s introductory argument is as follows: Many Christians do not experience the extraordinary gifts of the Spirit (i.e. tongues, prophecy, knowledge, healings, etc.); therefore, they have wrongly concluded that the extraordinary gifts have ceased and that everything in the book of Acts is merely history. Without wanting to analyze and critique Matt’s arguments here in any sort of detailed way, I do want to make a few important observations about the fallacy of that argument in particular, based on the biblical rationale for cessationism.

In 1 Corinthians 13, Paul contrasts three of the extraordinary gifts of the Spirit (i.e. tongues, prophecy and knowledge) with three of the ordinary gifts of the Spirit (i.e. faith, hope and love). He then says that the extraordinary gifts would cease and pass away, while the ordinary gifts would remain. Finally, Paul teaches that love is the greatest because love endures forever. Elsewhere, Paul teaches that “faith will be turned to sight,” and “hope that is seen is not hope.” He is clearly intimating that during the New Covenant era of redemptive history, faith, hope and love would continue, while, at some point, tongues, prophecy and knowledge would cease. Then, after the consummation, only love would remain. That’s why love is the greatest of the gifts of the Spirit!