Week #2 of a Life in the Spirit held Sep-Oct 2022. Speaker Patti Brunner of Patriarch Ministries shares “Equipping the People with God’s Gifts and Charisms” on this Truth of the Spirit series. Prayer by Dale Johnson, Introduction by Rick Brunner. Presented Oct 6, 2022, at Patriarch House, Rogers, AR. For audio player, video link or script please continue reading.
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[Dale:] I welcome everybody to come here. I feel that what they talk about here is critical to our faith. And we really need this. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Dear Lord, bless this group of wonderful people that are here this evening. Help us to find the wisdom in the words that are given. And find a little piece of goodness that will help us all out. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Thank you.
[Rick:] Welcome, to Life in the Spirit, week 2. In our first session we heard from Deacon Ronnie who shared with us about experiencing God’s love how it changed his life. He shared how some young people came to know God’s love by coming forth to seek God, even reluctantly at first, but the effect it had on them also. After we realize how much God loves us, God gives us the prompting to help others realize He loves them also. To do this God supernaturally equips His people with gifts and charisms.
Like Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 12:verse 1 “1 Now in regard to spiritual gifts, brothers, I do not want you to be unaware.” NAB Are you fully aware? What does the phrase spiritual gifts or “Gifts of the Spirit” mean to you? Our first speaker tonight is Patti Brunner.
[Patti] When we are baptized and confirmed we are filled with the Holy Spirit. I personally have come to know that the Holy Spirit allows God’s love to manifest within us. Like Deacon Ronnie, I also had a spiritual awakening of God’s Love at a Cursillo.
Unlike him, I was actively seeking the Lord. My husband had attended Cursillo a couple of months before me. He had received a healing from life-long depression. He felt God’s love for the first time and he knew that he knew that he was saved. So when I went, I went with expectant faith. I was ready for all that the Lord wanted to do for me. I was ready.
The day I was scheduled I twisted my knee. I went anyway. I actively surrendered to whatever the Lord wanted to do. Something I wasn’t expecting was that the Lord stirred up the Holy Spirit and his gifts within me. I didn’t know anything about them! He manifested in me before I could name the gifts He gave me. I actively surrendered to whatever He wanted to do for me.
The first gift I experienced was the gift of forgiveness. I went to Reconciliation. That’s a gift we can all accept. We can do it every week. Praise God! The next gift was a little different. I heard his voice. I heard Him call my name. It wasn’t the first time I had heard Him call my name. But I actually opened the door to my room to see who was standing outside. It was that audible.
As I spent time reading scripture in my room in quiet time, the Psalm I was reading—which I never liked the Psalms—all of a sudden, they burned in my ears. They meant something special to me.
The next gift I experienced was something about my knee. We said a rosary. They had knell down on hard concrete. But as I surrendered to whatever the Lord wanted, all of a sudden I felt like I was kneeling on rose petals. And when I stood up, when that rosary was finished, my knee was healed. Praise God! Next, when we were praying in a small group, our table group, all of a sudden, I felt this overwhelming love for the women as we stood there together. I had never felt an overwhelming love for people standing together like that before.
And then, later on, in a group healing service the Lord gave me recognition that some of the people were receiving healing. I swear if they had turned out the lights I would have seen electricity arc between me and them. The connection was so strong. It was like, “O thank You, Lord, You just healed them. Thank You Lord, You healed them of something else! And as the prayers went forth I could, I knew, I knew that I knew that they were receiving healing.
And when it was my turn, I thought, “Woo! This is going to be good!” But I felt they had put a warm blanket over my shoulders. And I said, “Thank You, Lord for that.” I accept whatever You want to give me. And I sat down. And then as I sat down, all of a sudden, I felt a fire within my heart like a tornado. It was…it took my breath. It was the stirring of the flame of the Holy Spirit within—I didn’t know the Holy Spirit—but that’s what it was! And then I felt like the Lord was just showering me with His love. I was overwhelmed by His love.
When I returned home, I reached out to several people, because I assumed everyone who had gone that week-end had the same experience. But they didn’t have an idea what I was talking about. And so, I became confused, bewildered. I couldn’t find anyone to explain to me what had happened to me. My sponsor didn’t, the priest didn’t; the deacon didn’t. But Rick and I started feeling an overwhelming desire to share what we had with others, I went to pray with people who were dying, and I was surprised when they received physical or a spiritual healing.
We shared our new love for scripture by having bible studies in our home. And in a few months later, one of the young women who had come to our bible study, invited us to a prayer group meeting. And it was there, for the first time, I could put the name of what was going on in my life and in my heart. It was there that I began to learn about God’s gifts to me.
Eventually I learned more and more about gifts that were manifestation gifts that are described in 1 Corinthians 12, Chapter 12 verses 7-10:
“7 To each individual the manifestation of the Spirit is given for some benefit. 8 To one is given the expression of wisdom; to another the expression of knowledge according to the same Spirit; 9 to another faith by the same Spirit; to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit; 10 to another mighty deeds; to another prophecy; to another discernment of spirits; to another varieties of tongues; to another interpretation of tongues. 11 But one and the same Spirit produces all of these, distributing them individually to each person as he wishes.” NAB
Now, some of you have already been prompted by these gifts. And some of you are desiring to be receiving some of these gifts. Others of you have gone through life without a clue to what these gifts are about. God has ready for you manifestation gifts! They have been sitting on a shelf like a Christmas gift waiting to be opened. They have been hidden from your sight. Partly because no one has ever told you about them.
Life in the Spirit offers to help you find and unwrap these wonderful gifts and activate their use. Those who do not manifest God’s gifts are not lost but they are not seeking, or they stop seeking. The Lord reminds us, “Those who seek me will find me.”
I share my witness, because it is a witness of seeking the Lord. And in doing so, the Lord has given me charisms, to help others to find him.
The Catechism quoting the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church says: “There are furthermore special graces, also called charisms after the Greek term used by St. Paul meaning “favor,” “gratuitous gift,” “benefit.”53
In your handout [see below] there are several things the Catechism of the Catholic Church says about charisms[i], I’m not going to read the book to you but I do want you to look at that. And I will post them later. There is also various other gifts listed in that handout[ii]: Sanctifying gifts, which are the traditional gifts from Isaiah; Motivational gifts; Ministry gifts. Our God is a generous giver of gifts! But I want to share with you tonight what I have learned in the last 25 years about the extraordinary manifestation gifts of the Holy Spirit.
First I am going to talk about: Prophecy, Tongues, and Discernment of Spirits—because these are daily gifts of grace! They develop by our use.
The gift of Prophecy—when I heard the Lord’s voice call my name—that was a charism of Prophecy. It is basically having a supernatural conversation with the Lord. You hear his voice. The Lord can tell you He loves you. He can direct you on the path. He can teach you his ways so you can teach others. His words always line up with scripture [and the teachings of the Church.] He can comfort you and help you examine your conscience. He can speak to you through scripture. You can hear his voice in the words He has already spoken and written down. The gift of Prophecy is available, individually, to all who would seek His face.
This gift is also used in ministry to others. Prophecy can speak-forth God’s “mind and heart to His people. And they can manifest through vision, through words, and thoughts.”
St. Paul in 1 Corinthians Chapter 14 [iii] says, “1 Pursue love, but strive eagerly for the spiritual gifts, above all that you may prophesy”.
So, Paul has picked that one out. He said that’s the gift he wants everyone to have.
The “3b one who prophesies does speak to human beings, for their building up, encouragement, and solace”; “4b whoever prophesies builds up the church.”
It’s using God’s voice, His heart, His mind to speak forth His word. Paul also makes the point that it’s more desirable than praying in Tongues. Now he is not saying that praying in tongues is not desirable, he says, “I pray in Tongues more than any of you.” But it is because the gift of Prophecy is so efficacious for others.
Now, the gift of Tongues—I did a podcast about it called that “Weird Charism”. It weirds out some people who hear about the gift of Tongues or hear it prayed. But it is a surrender of control of your voice, the words that come out of your mouth. You are in charge of starting or stopping but the Lord is in charge of words that come forth once you start speaking. God chooses the language. I have found that the faith it takes to pray in Tongues, as you pray in Tongues, it releases other charisms. Because it takes faith to pray in a language you don’t understand. The best thing I like about it is that it is a perfect prayer, because God is choosing the words. God is choosing the words when you pray in Tongues. When I don’t know how to pray for someone, I always use my Tongues.
Discernment of Spirits—the Lord says that’s another daily gift of grace. So, when we hear Discernment of Spirits a lot of the times, we think that it allows us to see evil spirits. Well, that’s part of it. But the Discernment of Spirits also lets us discern God’s presence! When we have the charism of Discernment of Spirits, we can recognize God in everything, in everyone, and then we can also recognize evil. And, we can avoid that. The Lord will give us an “icky” feeling. Or He will help us identify the needs of someone who needs healing—if they need spiritual healing, if they need physical healing or if they need the healing from evil, if they need to be set free from something. This gift, it clears the way for binding and loosing “In the Name of Jesus” and evil spirits are overcome and can be cast down.
The gifts of Healing, Interpretation of Tongues, and Words of Knowledge—now, these combine with our daily gifts to minister to the Lord’s people. After the gift of Prophecy, the gift of Healing was the second gift [charism] to manifest in my life. I was given the awareness that healing had taken place: my own knee, and of the people that were receiving prayer. I was given a yearning to pray for healing for people and to lead people towards forgiveness.
The “Gifts of Healing –are supernatural outpourings of God’s power. It can be
“physical, psychological, emotional, spiritual or relational. When we pray for healing, some type of healing comes; it’s up to the Lord which type of healing comes. I have seen all of those happen. I have seen people get better, I’ve seen people healed instantaneously, I have seen people feel the presence of God and find a joy in their heart—all those types of healing. And in that charism the Lord will help me be open to His other charisms to identify what people need as I pray for them.
The Interpretation of Tongues is, when as a ministry, someone has a word to declare in Tongues and someone else tells everyone what was said. It is sort of like a prophecy except it comes from perfect prayer and a surrender of the person speaking in Tongues partnering with a person that has the interpretation. Sometimes it can be a ‘word for word’; sometimes it can be a ‘sense’ of what is said; sometimes it will be as if someone is speaking to you. We had the gift of Interpretation at one of our sessions, one time. There were a couple of people that did not understand English and they understood everything that was said that night that was taught. So, the Lord gave them that gift, that gift manifests in our group.
The Interpretation of Tongues builds up the community and accepts that the word is specifically for them. An unbeliever, when they hear the Tongues they are attracted sometimes to that and when they hear the Interpretation then they see the power of God, the love of God; it comes forth in that and they are built up.
Word of Knowledge—that’s when the Lord tells a person something about another person that they are in prayer for.
An example: I prayed for Dale the first time and I got the word “unforgiveness”, right? I didn’t know anything about Dale, but he said ‘yes’, he had a lot of unforgiveness in his heart. The Lord gave me a Word of Knowledge, something about his past that He (the Lord) wanted to bring healing to. But it was going to be a process. So He gave me a Word of Knowledge so I knew how to pray for Dale and how to minister to him. And that is the same way the Lord can give many information. I may be praying, someone may be asking for a certain thing, then the Lord tells me a word about them that is totally different. And so we pray for both things.
A Word of Knowledge, when the Lord wants to open up a “festered” area that is hidden deep inside sometimes, or something someone is not even aware of, perhaps a physical condition. I remember praying for my brother one time because he had a headache and the Lord wanted to heal his shoulder. And he said, “Oh, when I was younger, I jumped out of a two-story window at college and my shoulder has been bothering me ever since. It is so chronic I don’t ever even bring it up; I don’t tell anyone about it. And the Lord healed that. It was something I didn’t know; I didn’t know my brother had jumped out of a two-story window when he was in college. It was a ‘prank’ thing he did. But that’s the goodness of the Lord! He reveals His knowledge to us, so it is a Word of Knowledge.
The next three are Wisdom, Faith, Mighty Deeds [these witness to the world truth.]
Now, Word of Wisdom is similar to a Word of Knowledge but it is something about not the past, not the now, but what is to be. So the Lord reveals what He wants to happen. He gives us a revelation about ‘how’ to pray, or He gives us a word to be, so we can have confidence in it. I prayed with a young girl one time who was worried about what she was going to do in college. She wanted to do God’s perfect will. And the Lord showed me, He said, “Tell her: these are her choices. And He showed me, I held up my hand and pointed at the different fingers, to say, “These are your choices. And then He said that they all run into His hand. And that no matter what she chooses He has her in His hand. So that was a Word of Wisdom for her. So she would not have the anxiety that she had to pick just the right perfect thing to be in the Will of God. He wanted her to know that whichever thing she chose He would always love her; He would always have her in His hand. That is a Word of Wisdom for us—for her.
Faith, the gift of Faith, now, there are, there are other gifts of wisdom and faith. There is the sanctifying gift of Wisdom. There’s the faith that we get when westudy and when we believe and we say the Creed. These gifts are supernatural gifts. They are of a different caliber. When we have the gift, the charism of Faith that means we have the faith to move a mountain. We have the faith to step out of the boat and walk on water. We have the faith to know that we know that we know. And when you have a prayer partner that has faith, then we see that faith magnify and whatever we pray for happens. God listens to our prayer when we can pray with that kind of faith. It’s the mustard seed growing in our hearts. It’s the tree that came from the mustard seed.
Mighty Deeds and Miracles, Mighty Deeds/Miracles—that is when something happens (clap) like that! It’s a healing that happens instantaneously. It’s the hand that was shriveled that is not shriveled anymore. It is something that is beyond the medical community.
My small claim to a miracle happened when the Lord realigned our car for us, when we were driving down the road going to a Life in the Spirit in the middle of the state.
It overrides natural laws, such as turning water into wine, like replacing an organ that is not there, that sort of thing. I love the story that Monsignor Mancini told one time that he had no cartilage between his bones. And the Lord healed him but did not replace the cartilage. And the doctor told him, “There’s no way you can walk.” He said, “You’ve got bone on bone. I’m looking at the x-rays,” he said. But he was healed. And that was a miraculous healing. It was something beyond medical.
Now, the ministry of these gifts, they can manifest for everyone but they are not always used the same by everyone. One person might be called to heal in the home. One person might be called to heal in a market, some person might be called to heal at a ballfield. Some may heal hundreds or thousands; some may heal just one. The Lord does his—He gives the charisms to build up the Church but everyone can have uniqueness to that charism. And you don’t have to be a saint to be used by God.
So, don’t fear the ‘asking’ and ‘seeking’ the Lord for His gifts. He desires to give them to us. It’s like the Christmas present; it’s just waiting there for you.
And you don’t have to fear praying and asking for Healing. You don’t have to fear praying in Tongues. You don’t have to fear Discerning of Spirits. God only gives good things to His children—good things. And He wants us to share them with each other.
So, after 25 years the Lord has manifested all these things in my life one time or another, some more than others. He has called me into a ministry of some of them. But whatever their characters they are all oriented toward sanctifying grace. They are all oriented towards the Holy Spirit’s presence in our lives. And they are all intended for the good of the Church and to build it up.
So, with gifts of grace, we begin to realize that the Lord doesn’t always call the equipped, but He equips the called. And so, I invite you to, as Paul tells us, strive eagerly for the spiritual gifts. Amen.
Questions and references:
Questions for Session 2 of Life in the Spirit Seminar
Equipping the People Using God’s Gifts & Charisms
- How do the gifts of the Holy Spirit share God’s love with us and others?
- On the handout there are listings of traditional, manifestation, ministry and motivational gifts. Which gift of the Holy Spirit still seems confusing? How did Jesus or the early church use this gift?
- Share a time you experienced the presence of the Holy Spirit.
- What did you hear in the talks that impressed or surprised you the most? Why?
Supernatural Manifestation Gifts of the Holy Spirit
- Prophecy, Tongues, Discernment of Spirit—these are daily gifts of grace
- Gift of Prophecy—supernatural gift of divine utterance in the simplest form—given for edification, comfort, or upliftment of the person being prayed for—possession of this gift does not make a person a prophet
- Gift of Tongues—gifting of the Holy Spirit that gives the receiver the power to speak supernaturally in a language not known to the person possessing the gift—used for personal and community spiritual upliftment
- Discernment of Spirits—divine insight into the spiritual realm—what is of God, self, or satan
- Healing, Interpretation, Words of Knowledge—these combine with daily gifts to minister to the Lord’s people.
- Gift of Healing—supernatural manifestation of the Holy Spirit given to the church, (we, the people are the church,) for the purpose of removing sickness, infirmity, and disease
- Gift of Interpretation of Tongues—the supernatural ability to translate into a known tongue what has been spoken in an unknown tongue—may not be literal word for word, as that is sometimes impossible from one language to another
- Word of Knowledge—supernatural revelation about a person or situation and is usually immediately validated—reveals a fact
- Wisdom, Faith, Mighty Deeds—these witness to the world truth.
- Word of Wisdom—a supernatural revelation of the mind and purpose of God, having to do with the future
- Gift of Faith—supernatural operation of the Holy Spirit in the experience of the possessor which enables him/her to sustain an unwavering trust in God for personal protection or provision of needs in times of danger
- Gift of Miracles—supernatural demonstration of the power of God in which the laws of nature are altered, suspended, or controlled
Scriptures
Acts 1:8
Acts Chapter 11: 15-17
Acts Chapter 19: 6
I Corinthians Chapter 12: 8-10
I Corinthians Chapter 13: 1
I Corinthians Chapter 14: 1
[i] List of Catechism of the Catholic Church paragraphs
767
768
798
799
800
801
951
2003
2004
2702
2703
[ii] List of gifts:
Gifts of the Holy Spirit, by Father Stephen Barham:
Sanctifying Gifts / Traditional Gifts Isaiah 11: 1-3
- Wisdom –to judge divine things
- Understanding – to penetrate divine truth
- Knowledge— to judge the creature
- Counsel—To direct our act
- Fortitude [Courage & Perseverance]
- Piety [Humility]
- Fear of the Lord [Respect]
Manifestation Gifts I Corinthians 12: 8-10
Gifts Of Insight Or Revelation – Word Gifts that reveal the mind of God
- Word of Knowledge – The Lord gives us facts unknown to us to benefit
- Word of Wisdom – a perception of the mind of God and how we should act or say.
- Discernment of Spirits – Recognizing when it is the Holy Spirit, Recognizing genuine manifestations of the Spirit, Recognizing if presence of demons causing problems
Dynamic / Power Gifts – Hand of God
- Faith – not just intellectual faith, but faith to believe supernaturally when every thing else would go the other way.
- Miracles – works of power including exorcism. Beyond the type of healing that could have happened naturally: replacement of limbs
- Healing – “Know”, “See”, or “Feel” the healing
Gifts Of Communication Or Utterance – Voice of God
- Prophecy – verbal gift
- Interpretation of Tongues – renders what has been said in tongues
- Tongues – prayer for private worship
Ministries in the Church 1 Corinthians 12: 5, 28
Apostles, Prophets, Teachers, Miracles, Gifts of Healing, Helps, Government, Tongues
Motivational Gifts Romans 12:6-8
Prophecy; Serving; Teaching; Exhortation; Giving; Organizing; Mercy
[iii] 1 Corinthians 14: 1-6
