4.4. Persons, Gifts, and “Office”
4.4. Persons, Gifts, and “Office”
One of the difficulties in the Pauline letters is to determine the relationship between certain gifts, especially prophecy and teaching (in, e.g., 1 Cor 14:6, 26), and people who are designated as prophets and teachers. The clear implication of 1 Cor 14:6 and 26-33 is that teaching, for example, is a gift that might be exercised by anyone in the community; yet in 12:28 he sets prophets and teachers after apostles as God’s gifts to the community. Most likely both of these phenomena existed side by side; that is, prophesying and teaching, as well as other gifts, were regularly exercised in a more spontaneous way by any and all within the community, whereas some who exercised these gifts on a regular basis were recognized as “prophets” and “teachers.” The former would be ministry for the upbuilding of the community; the latter would naturally emerge in roles of spiritual leadership within the community.