TONGUES and the SIGN GIFTS!
Vernon A. Schutz
Vernon A. Schutz
The Transition Period
Paul is separated in Acts 13 for the purpose of dispensing the new dispensation of the Grace of God Ephesians 3:2. The next twenty years from Acts 13 to 28 is by a transition from the Gospel of the Kingdom program, which is to diminish and be phased out, to our present program of Grace which is to increase and be established.
It is during this transition period, from Acts 13 to 28 or to the final blow of judgment upon Israel at the desolation of Jerusalem in 70 A.D., that God in grace continued to give SIGNS, even through Gentile converts, to unbelieving Israel for the purpose of saving "some of them" Romans 11:14.
We now know why the SIGN GIFT of tongues, as well as healing and miracles, were given. They were needed to demonstrate to Israel that Jesus was the true Messiah. When God finally broke off His relations with that nation, He ceased demonstrating that fact to Israel. The need for tongues ceased, so naturarIy, tongues as well as all the SIGN gifts ceased for a lack of a need for them. God never intended the SIGN GIFTS among Gentile members of the Body of Christ to be permanently exercised First Corinthians 13:8. They were operative only during the transition period.
The discerning Bible student will observe that when Christ commissioned His Apostles to preach the Gospel of the Kingdom and go only to Israel in Matthew 10: 1-10, they had power to perform all the gifts. In Mark 16:15-18 where the Gospel of the Kingdom was to be preached to all nations and every creature, all believers were to have all the gifts.
BUT twenty-six years later-during this transition period-we note in First Corinthians 12:28-30 that certain ones, that is, one person had only one gift. During this transition period, there was a turning away from the sign miracles. Why? Because God was turning away from, and setting aside the nation of Israel, the SIGN people.
There were no sign miracles seen by Felix, or Festus, or Agrippa, nor when Paul stood before Nero. Why? The purpose of sign miracles was to accredit the Messiah to Israel. and not. as generally supposed. to accredit Christianity to the Gentile.
Scripture clearly indicates, the sign miracles continued while the Gospel of the Kingdom was being preached during the Gospels and the first half of the Book of Acts. God's judicial-not final-rejection of Israel followed the stoning of Stephen. God pronounces judgment upon Israel First Thessalonians 2: 16, blinds them Acts 13: 6-13 with Romans I I: 25, casts them aside Romans I I: IS, and begins the Body of Christ First Corinthians 12: 12-27 We now enter the Transitional Period, between Acts 13 and 28. During this period Gentiles exercise the sign gifts for the benefit of unbelieving Israel. This sign gift ministry continues until the final rejection of Israel, which is recorded scripturally in Acts 28: 17-31 and took place historically at the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. THE SIGN MIRACLES OF I CORINTHIANS 13 WERE OPERATIVE ONLY DURING THE ACTS TRANSITIONAL PERIOD, NOT AFTERWARDS, FOR THEY CEASED WHEN ISRAEL WAS FINALLY SET ASIDE.
The Post
Transition Period
So in regards to the sign gifts, they are seen to be operative up to the end of Acts, BUT NOT AFTERWARDS. In the Pauline epistles written after the Acts period Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, First and Second Timothy, Philemon and Titus, which give us the normal course for the present dispensation, there is no mention of any of these sign gifts; there is no trace of them of any kind.. On the contrary, for ....example, the gift of healing has disappeared. Paul no ' longer exercises this gift. In the normal course of this dispensation we do not believe any man has the "gift" of healing. We do not believe in "divine healers," bu t we do believe in Divine healing through prayer and God's sovereign and gracious will Second Corinthians 12:7-9; Phillippians 2:25-30.
In Second Timothy 4:20 Trophimus, Paul's traveling companion in the Gospel, is left at Miletus sick. Epaphroditus is spoken of as dangerously ill in ~, Philippians 2: 25-30. It is not Paul's gift of healing but God's mercy that spares this minister of the Gospel. In First Timothy 5: 23 Paul's son in the Lord is given medical advice. Paul is no longer sending out aprons for healing physical afflictions as he did in the transition period Acts 19: 11-12. Why? Because after God has cast aside Israel. the sign gifts have no further place. After Acts 28, the normal course for the present dispensation has set in, and the only gifts we read about are special gifts for the saved in the Body Ephesians 4:7-11, and not the sign gifts for the unsaved in Israel.
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