His Perfect Love

Matt VanderVen: There's a great deal of confusion surrounding the gift of prophecy. We aim to clear some of that up today on His Perfect Love. We know prophetically what will be, and Jesus is the author of that. We no longer look to an Elijah. We no longer look to a John the Baptist, a forerunner that was to prepare the way for the one that would come: Messiah.

There's a lot of confusion in the church today about prophecy and the office of a prophet. I'm not saying there's not prophets and prophetesses—I'm not saying that people don't walk around and are prophets and prophetesses—but that's more forth-telling, not foretelling.

Do you love giving gifts to your kids and watching them light up? God does, too. What a potential that exists! But sadly, many never put those gifts to use. Welcome to His Perfect Love, where we're making our way through the book of Romans with Pastor Matt VanderVen. We've come to chapter 12 and the section on spiritual gifts. We'll start off with the gift of prophecy. Pastor Matt first recalls an MIT professor's application of the science of probability that proves Jesus and Bible prophecy are true.

When you look at the canon of Scripture and exactly what's prophesied, and you look at the 1,300 different prophecies—27%—and you begin to go through it, he starts talking about whether you carbon date and however you do that. He says it's impossible for this not to be accurate. 800 years prior, he starts quoting MIT mathematicians on statistical and regression analysis that they've done.

Some of you know the saying that came out of that. Remember the idea of a quarter being marked with red and then dropped in the state of Texas four or five feet deep, and then picking it out? That came from an actual formula by an MIT professor who was a non-believer. He was asked to do a regression on the statistical probability of all the promises you see in the Word of God and if they were true—those that have come to pass historically proven.

That was the model he came out with. He did a qualitative and quantitative mixed methodology. He took the qualitative, solved the regression, and points it back to a qualitative statement with a 95% to 99% confidence interval. As he delivers this, he says, "I'll make it simple." That was the description he gave—that it would be like filling up the state of Texas. It is so improbable or impossible for anyone to think Jesus was not who He says He was in the Bible and that He was not Messiah.

Everyone was given a measure of faith. It's not a blind faith, either. Faith is always as good as what you place your faith in, and when you place your faith in Jesus Christ, you can rest assured. More and more as we're learning from archaeology and through science, all it's doing is confirming exactly what the Bible's already told us over and over again.

As we look here, he says, "For as we have many members in one body, but all the members do not have the same function." He's going to talk about gifting here. "So we, being many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one another. Having then gifts"—you can circle that—"differing according to the grace." It's not something that we receive these gifts because of who we are. It's not a haughty nature or pride. I'm not any better or worse than anybody else. The gift that God gives you is for His service. He gives you what you need. That is given to us; let us use them for prophecy.

You can look at a more exhaustive list in 1 Corinthians 12, Ephesians 4, and 1 Corinthians 14:3. We'll turn there in a minute, but when he says prophecy, what is this? It's the spirit of truth. That's what real prophecy is. It's comparing and contrasting two things that today people struggle with: forth-telling and foretelling.

Forth-telling is to tell forth or publish abroad. That's what we see this term "prophecy" meaning as a spiritual gift. I think of Peter as he would forth-tell of Jesus Christ. He would tell people and broadcast who Jesus Christ was. It was an encouragement. It exhorted. People would be lifted up.

Foretelling is to provide, define, or to tell someone the future. Do you understand the difference? One's a broadcast. What about the office of a prophet? What does the Bible describe about the office of a prophet? Clearly, who was the last prophet that we see to have walked the earth that way? John the Baptist. When you look at an office of a prophet, it was John the Baptist. They were not only mouthpieces of God, but they were to foretell.

But then came Jesus. Why do you need the office of a prophet that way? Because Jesus came and He's already declared through the Word of God. The canon is sealed. There is no more Scripture. That's why the office of an apostle is also a closed office. It was to lay the foundation of the church.

Can you use the term to say that it means a messenger or sent one? Sure, if you're using apostle that way, but not as an office. The Bible's very clear on what an apostle was, too—one that had to walk or be with Jesus Christ. There were about three different things in the Book of Acts we read that if you're going to have the office of an apostle, you had to fulfill.

When that office closed—Paul really being the last of that—what happened? We also know that we don't expect somebody else tomorrow to say, "I've got a new book of the Bible," because everything's been given to us already. It's all through Jesus Christ, even Revelation. John gave us direct revelation of Jesus Christ. We know prophetically what will be, and Jesus is the author of that. We no longer look to an Elijah. We no longer look to a John the Baptist, a forerunner that was to prepare the way for the one that would come: Messiah.

But if that wasn't enough, turn in your Bibles to 1 Corinthians 14:3. There's a lot of confusion in the church today about prophecy and the office of a prophet. I'm not saying there's not prophets and prophetesses, but not in the foretelling. I'm glad you asked. Turn to 1 Corinthians chapter 14 and let's look at verse 3.

It tells us what someone who prophesies does. This is all in 1 Corinthians 12 if you want to read about the spiritual gifts. Even if you backed up to verse 7 of chapter 12, he says, "But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all: for to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, to another the word of knowledge through the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healings by the same Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another discerning of spirits, to another different kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. But one and the same Spirit works in all."

Then if you go down to verse 28 of chapter 12, "And God has appointed these in the church: first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, varieties of tongues."

Then we turn around and we're in chapter 14. Paul's talking about maybe in the church somebody rose and said, "I speak in tongues, therefore I have a more superior gift than you." He says the gift of prophecy is a more superior gift than the gift of tongues as an example. He goes out and speaks about that.

Even in chapter 13, he says even before that, what is the greatest gift of all? It's love. Then he goes into chapter 14. Verse 1: "Pursue love, and desire spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy. For he who speaks in a tongue does not speak to men but to God." Do you catch that? There's a lot of confusion around the gift of tongues today. "For no one understands him."

Have you ever heard someone speak in tongues? Unless you have the gift of interpretation, you don't understand what they're saying. However, in the spirit he speaks mysteries. He's speaking to God; it's our prayer language. There are times you can go in your prayer closet—I have—and the Lord's given me a tongue and I can speak in a tongue. Great. But it's not something I manifest. It's not something I turn around and broadcast.

You've heard of these schools and these places where they send people and they tell them, "Jump, jump, jump," like you're going to start. That's emotionism. That's a whole lot of things, but that's not the Spirit of God. The Spirit of God, when He invokes that gift, it's very peaceable, and it's your prayer language because he says that the gift of tongues does not speak to men but to God.

"But he who prophesies"—or uses the gift of prophecy—"speaks edification and exhortation and comfort to men." Have you ever had somebody come up to you? If you've been a Christian long enough, you've probably had somebody come up to you in the faith. "Brother, don't get on that plane. It's going down. The Lord gave me a dream on this whole thing."

If that's you, I apologize. That is not encouraging. That is in no way edifying me. That in no way is building me up. That makes me not want to get on the plane. That does not encourage me, edify me, or build me up. It's not comforting me. I'm scared out of my mind. I already hate flying. Now I'm really like, "Oh." What happened? You had bad pepperoni. You had a bad pizza or bad pepperoni. I don't know what to tell you.

Prophecy speaks edification, exhortation, and comfort to men. I've had that. I've had it here. In the last few years, a couple of people came up to me and said, "We had a dream or something like that, and things were getting worse and worse in the world, evil was waxing on, and the Lord was encouraging us because people were needing help and they were coming in and they were getting the Word of God. I saw you in the dream and you were teaching and the Word was going forward to reach and to help those in the community that they were coming to Christ or they were fleeing."

I think of 9/11. How filled were the churches after 9/11? Jam-packed! People were coming in because they were afraid and they needed the Word. They needed truth, and they wanted that truth so desperately. I had two different people that came in six months apart, and I wrote them down. I said, "Okay, we'll find out if it's prophetic or not. Does it come to pass?" That's the witness of a false prophet: do these things come to pass in time? If not, you have to declare that false prophecy. If it's true, then you declare it—you're a prophet or the Lord used you as a prophet or prophetess in this particular case.

That's what we see in the gift of prophecy. I received that, and it's something that I could see would be encouraging: people coming in here hearing the Word of God, being encouraged by that, being comforted. Praise the Lord for that. It's beautiful.

Somebody might come up and say, "I just felt like the Lord wanted me to tell you that I know you may be going through some difficulty, but He promises He'll never leave you nor forsake you." What a word! That's a great encouragement. Isn't that a great comfort? Maybe God put it on that person's heart when they were praying for you at home. I know a lot of times God has done that with different ones of you. He'll put it on my heart and I'll be praying and all of a sudden He'll give me something. I'll just start praying, "Okay, Lord." Then maybe when I see you, I may not come up and go, "The Lord told me," but I just may ask, "How are you doing? How are you feeling?" That's what we see in prophecy.

Back to Romans. All these gifts are others-focused. Notice that. They're not to draw people to you, and they're not about you. All these gifts are others-focused. He says, "Let us prophesy in proportion to our faith." What about ministry? This is a beautiful gift. "Let us use it in our ministering." What is this? This is the same word we see that's off the root of deacon or deaconess. There really is no word "deaconess" in the Greek; it's really "deacon," and it means both male and female servant.

The idea behind that is what it's speaking to: someone who is there to serve. That's their calling. That's their office—they have an office of serving, to wait tables, to help people. I think of people that come in the church during the week and maybe they'll take the vacuum and start cleaning the church and they'll dust things. You all don't know who they are, and I don't broadcast it because that's their gift unto the Father in heaven. The Lord does that.

There's different folks in this flock that during the week, the Lord brings them in and they put on the music and they might listen to Christian music and they're bopping around. They never come up and go, "I've been serving at this church for weeks now, not even a simple thank you? How about a thank you?" Wait a minute. Who are you doing that gift for? Are you ministering unto the Lord? Are you serving God, or are you expecting something yourself like that?

I love that gift. I love when people come in and the Lord put it on their heart, "I'm going up and do this or I'm going to clean the bathroom," whatever. Praise the Lord for that. It's beautiful. "He who teaches, in teaching." This isn't necessarily speaking of a pastor here. We know that a pastor and teacher is one office. *Kai* in the Greek, we read it over in Ephesians 4.

Some people call that the five-fold ministry in Ephesians 4. Well, that's just flat-out wrong because there's only four there, not five. If you look at the Greek, it's four and it's got a *kai* in between: some, some, some, some, four times. By the way, pastor and teacher—because someone who is a teacher that isn't an undershepherd, that's a problem. What are you doing if you're not exhorting through the Word of God? It goes both ways.

But he who teaches in teaching—look at all those that teach in children's ministry. They're all utilizing this gift. God's given them the gift. They teach in children's ministry, teen ministry, men's ministry—all the different ministries around the church that require a teaching gift. God gives this gift.

"He who exhorts, in exhortation." That's a great gift. He who is an encourager—think of somebody in Scripture we read in the book of Acts that was given this gift. We call him the son of encouragement: Barnabas.

A lot of times in church, when a guy hears about a need or a lady hears about a need for somebody, maybe they go back to one of the pastors or one of the elders and say, "I heard this person lost their job. We want to help them out with their mortgage or something like that, but we don't want anybody to know. Can you just make sure that person gets what they need? We want to bless them." That's an encourager. We call that the gift of Barnabas or the son of encouragement. A lot of times they'll write a Barnabas card and they'll just say, "From Barnabas." People know in the faith what they're talking about. That was meant to be an encouragement. It's beautiful. They don't want any credit; it's all unto the Lord.

"He who gives"—look at that, there's a ministry for giving. There's people on their heart that they want to give, and they're not giving because they have to give. It's cheerful giving. God has given them an increase; they give of that increase, and God has put it on their heart to do that. It says "with liberality." It's not begrudgingly. It's not being forced. The Lord comes up and says there's a need here—and not just at the church. This could be used anywhere. You're at the checkout line and somebody's short a few dollars. "I got their groceries. Just go ahead. Have a beautiful day. God bless you. Jesus loves you." That's the gift of giving. That's what we see here.

"He who leads." There are some that have this gift, and there's some that clearly don't. There's some that come up and go, "We need to start a ministry for this." I love those conversations when you come in and say, "Pastor, the Lord's finding me. We need to do this ministry." Great. Are you going to lead that ministry? "Oh, yeah."

And you know they can't lead that ministry, but you're like, "Okay, well who's going to be the one that's going to lead? Who has the gift of leads? Who's the one that has that gift of administration?" You'll see that. That doesn't mean that God didn't give them a word or God didn't give them something to lead a ministry that way, but maybe they're not the one to be the lead of that ministry.

It says "with diligence." This is good. I especially pay attention to this as pastors and elders. This is a big passage: who leads. That's speaking right to our hearts. "He who shows mercy." Have you ever met people like that? You just talk to them. There's a lot of you in here like that. You should say yes, you've met people like that. I come up to you and I just talk to you and I'm like, "I could spend all day with you." You're just full of mercy, you're full of love, and I just enjoy our conversations. I'm wrecked when I walk away from you because I know you spent time with Jesus and we spent time with Jesus just talking together.

There's a lot of you like that, and you know I'm talking to people of mercy. They just have this desire and they're so merciful. They just want to constantly give and they give of their heart. They're not like, "I'm too tired." I love this gift: the gift of mercy. It says "with cheerfulness." He just made sure there nobody's going to come in and be like, "Yeah, I'll be merciful, but boy, I'm going to be angry and bitter afterwards. I'll treat you nice, but you're going to pay tomorrow."

My wife shows this gift of mercy to me. A lot of times I'm a whiner. I don't get sick that often. Sometimes I'll get plagues here or there. I don't get sick that often, but when I do get sick, I am a whiner, like with a head cold. You all know that. I'll be like, "I don't feel good today. Can you rub my hand?" I'm a baby when it comes that way.

The other day I got this prostate thing going on as I'm getting older—infection or whatever. My wife turns around and she's just laying at my feet and she's sort of just comforting me, just having mercy on me. I just immediately was peaced out. Your symptoms start to go away a little bit. It's just such beautiful mercy. My wife didn't have a mean bone in her body like, "Well, I spent all morning with you, so don't expect dinner tonight." That wasn't the conversation. It was real beautiful mercy. If you ask my wife, "Do you have mercy?" she'd say, "Absolutely not." That's why you know mercy goes with meekness. It's beautiful.

And says "with cheerfulness." We'll pick up on verse 9 next week. Our reading will be in Luke chapter 22 this morning. But isn't it beautiful when we get to see mercy and really all the gifts—the gifts of exhortation and gifts like that—displayed? Those gifts are for service one to another, for ministering to the bride of Christ, to the body. And not one gift is better than another gift that way.

We've been exploring some of the spiritual gifts laid out for us in Romans chapter 12 today on His Perfect Love. Were you able to identify one or more in your own life? Pastor Matt VanderVen is our Bible teacher, and all of his studies in Romans are archived for you at hisperfectlove.org and 1place.com, and look for us wherever you get your podcasts.

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Those of you that are in the Mechanicsburg, PA area or will be visiting the area, we want to invite you to join us for a worship service here at Calvary Chapel Harrisburg West Shore. Sunday morning services begin at 8:30 and 10:30. We have a midweek service on Wednesdays at 7:00 PM. We're located at 28 North Locust Point Road in Mechanicsburg, PA. Go to ccharrisburg.org for more information.

Men, mark your calendars for the Men of Calvary Conference 2026 at Calvary Chapel Harrisburg West Shore. Join us on Saturday, September 19, for a powerful day centered on the theme "Unity in Faith," based on Ephesians 4:12-13. Connect with other men through worship, biblical teaching, prayer, fellowship, and encouragement as we grow stronger together in Christ. The conference will be held at Calvary Chapel Harrisburg West Shore, 28 North Locust Point Road in Mechanicsburg. Registration is just $20 and includes breakfast and lunch. Register today at ccharrisburg.org. Men of Calvary Conference 2026: United in Faith, Strong in Christ.

There is much more to come in Romans. Don't miss a moment of the journey with Pastor Matt here on His Perfect Love. His Perfect Love is brought to you by Calvary Chapel Harrisburg West Shore. Let the word go out; the perfect love of Christ to shine. Our lives will shout: I am my Beloved's and He is mine. Every heart is in His hands; we'll never stop reaching out. This is His perfect love.