The Gifts and Fruits of the Holy Spirit

I recently had someone ask me about whether I believe in speaking in tongues, healing, and other gifts that are oftentimes called ‘charismatic’ gifts or appear to be more miraculous to our contemporary eyes. This topic can be such a divisive issue in the church.

I believe that all the gifts mentioned by Paul in the New Testament are active in the church today, whether that’s the gift of service or the gift of healing, and on and on. I do have some qualifiers on that, but it’s hard to go into all of those here.

What I would want to say is that a lot of folks tend to emphasize either the gifts of the Holy Spirit over the fruits of the Holy Spirit, or to emphasize the fruits of the Holy Spirit over the gifts of the Spirit.

We would do well to keep both of these aspects of the Holy Spirit’s life in the church together!! We need His strength and power to help us in service and action, but we also need His strength and power to help us become like Jesus in our lifestyle and character.

A couple of books that provide a really balanced view on this, in my opinion, are:
– Michael Green, I Believe in the Holy Spirit
– John Stott, Baptism and Fullness: The Work of the Holy Spirit Today