Are miraculous gifts still for today or have they ceased?

Spiritual gifts are still in operation today because of who God is. To deny the gifts is to deny God’s activity in and through the lives of believers. Those who no longer believe in spiritual gifts (especially signs and wonders and tongues) are called cessationists, while those who believe they still exist today are called continuationists.

Concerning miraculous/spectacular gifts (e. g., prophecy, speaking in tongues, and healing) there are basically four views. One, cessationists believe that all miraculous gifts have since ceased when the Bible was completed. This is because those miraculous gifts were signs to authenticate their ministries/apostleship. Thereafter, not much was reported or recorded of miraculous gifts happening in Church history.

Two, continuationists-cessationists (open but cautious) believe that though miraculous gifts have ceased, God in his sovereignty does work miracles in exceptional circumstances.

Three, the continuationists (Pentecostals, Charismatics, and Third Wave, each with different emphases) believe they are still in operation today because nowhere does it state in the Bible that they will cease. There are evidences (missionary reports) that show they are still in existence especially in the third world country. Since God is the same yesterday today and forever, he can intervene. Hence, we should pray for gifts of healing, tongues, and prophecy.

Note that some common arguments used by cessationists to support their view that all spiritual gifts have ceased are the following: 1. the perfect canon is closed (see 1 Cor. 13:10); 2. apostleship is a spiritual gift (it is an office or ecclesiastical position) and it ceased along with the other spiritual gifts; 3. that apostolic signs, wonders, and miracles have not been reported frequently in church history nor are they equal in strength and intensity. My response? That they have ceased is textually, theologically, and historically weak and untenable.

What is the gender of the Holy Spirit?

The Holy Spirit is God and God has no gender. Since we have to use personal pronouns, the masculine pronoun (he) is used rather than the neuter pronoun (it) to indicate the Spirit is a living person. That is the usage in tradition.

In Hebrew, the word Spirit is feminine and in Greek, spirit is neuter. Note that grammatical gender, be it masculine, feminine, or neuter does not always indicate whether it is personal or impersonal, male or female. To say a noun is feminine or masculine is to identify what sort of endings or form the noun takes. Nonetheless, when the personhood is identified, the masculine is used especially in John’s Gospel where the Holy Spirit is called Paraclete.

Note that God and Lord in Hebrew are masculine nouns (Hebrew Yahweh and Elohim), while in Greek (Theos and Kurios) the Trinity (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) take the masculine pronouns.

How can we be sure that what others say/do is led by the Spirit?

We need to exercise discernment. In the words of Scripture, “Dear friends, do not believe everyone who claims to speak by the Spirit. You must test them to see if the spirit they have comes from God. For there are many false prophets in the world” (1 John 4:1; see also vv. 2–4). We need to double check with Scripture.

The Spirit will never bring God’s people a message that does not line up with the teaching of Jesus that we already have in the Scriptures, nor will he encourage practices and experiences that are inconsistent with the life that Jesus himself lived on earth. Of any teaching or exhortation we are given we may ask the following core questions: Will pursuing this teaching bring glory to the name of Christ? Will it keep the spotlight of my life on Jesus, or turn attention to others/me?

How many movements of the Holy Spirit have there been?

Generally and broadly speaking, there are three major movements (waves) of the Holy Spirit often called spiritual renewal. The first wave is called Classical Pentecostal Renewal (e.g., Assemblies of God) that began in the Azusa Street Revival (April 9, 1906 and continued until roughly 1915). It was a historic revival meeting that took place in Los Angeles, California led by William J. Seymour, an African-American preacher. The revival was characterized by spiritual experiences accompanied by testimonies of physical healing miracles, worship services, and speaking in tongues. Its central doctrine is that speaking in tongues is the initial evidence of being “baptized in the spirit.”

The second wave is called Charismatic Renewal. They are usually mainline denominations as well as Catholics that have had an encounter with the Holy Spirit (renewed or baptized by the Holy Spirit) resulting in spiritual gifts. Speaking in tongues is one of them. The beginning of the charismatic movement is usually dated to Sunday, April 3, 1960, when Dennis J. Bennett, rector of St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Van Nuys, California recounted his Pentecostal experience to his parish, doing it again on the next two Sundays, including Easter (April 17), during which many of his congregation shared his experience which later forced him to resign.

The movement grew to embrace other mainline churches, where clergy began receiving and publicly announcing their Pentecostal experiences. These clergy began holding meetings for seekers and healing services which included praying over and anointing of the sick. In Singapore, it began with the Anglican Church led by the late Bishop Joshua Chiu Chu Ban. The Catholic Charismatic Renewal began in 1967 at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It spread to other mainline churches.

The third wave is called Neo-Charismatic Renewal or the new apostolic movement which describes a twentieth century renewal in the 1960s to the 1990s who do not align themselves with either the Pentecostals or Charismatics where they encountered the Holy Spirit and experienced spiritual gifts. Tongue speaking is considered as one of the gifts and not necessarily initial evidence of being baptized with the Spirit.

The Vineyard Movement is rooted in the charismatic renewal and historic evangelicalism. Instead of the mainstream charismatic label, however, the movement has preferred the term Empowered Evangelicals (a term coined by Rich Nathan and Ken Wilson in their book of the same name) to reflect their roots in traditional evangelicalism as opposed to Classical Pentecostalism. Members also sometimes describe themselves as the “radical middle” between evangelicals and Pentecostals, which is a reference to the book The Quest for the Radical Middle, a historical survey of the Vineyard by Bill Jackson. It has been associated with the “Signs and Wonders” movement, the Toronto Blessing, the Kansas City Prophets, and a particular style of Christian worship music.

Could there be a fourth wave in the twenty-first century? Why not, since the Spirit is Sovereign. What will it be and how it will look like? My answer: only the Triune God knows. But, it will be exciting to see what the fourth wave of the Holy Spirit is.