My attempt at a laconic response to your last answer followed up with my next question:
-I'm arguing that the Kingdom of God will be manifested in power, but that doesn't mean I'm saying that is the only way it is revealed. The snapshot of my view is in my introduction...here...about a thousand words down:)
-We're in agreement that Acts 2 and the epistles you mentioned provide us pictures and instructions of what Kingdom life should look like in the church.
But it also seems to me that you're giving the alleged silence of these passages a lot more weight to your view than the clarity of other passages against your view.
For example, if the gifts are apostolic in nature and for apostles only as you suggest; and the daily life of the church far more ordinary in your view as allegedly evidenced by Paul's other epistles, what then do you do when you find in one of his letters to the Corinthian church, Paul commanding the ordinary believers to eagerly desire these so called "for apostles only" gifts?
In light of this, could it not be that built in to Paul's "ordinary" or "normal", is the assumption that the Holy Spirit is present and continuing to give these gifts to the church as He wills?
What I do with 1 Cor 11-14 is what Paul does with it: I expect good order and activity for the edification of the church. When I have asked you how I will know whether this is done or not, you have accused me of unsavory motives and provided me with a post-Biblical (to avoid saying unbiblical) explanation of the use of Apostolic gifts.
What worries me is that your second question assumes that I think the Holy Spirit is absent from the local church and the believer, or that the only way we can know He is present is that if the most spectacular effects of his presence are regularly manifest. I think the bulk of the NT actually says otherwise.
Before outlining that, let's be clear about something: arguing from silence is not an effective tactic. Arguing from what is actually said -- saying the things Paul and Jesus actually said -- is the effective way to use God's word. If the Holy Spirit is saying anything today (and He is) it starts with what the Bible actually says and not what we think is suggested in the silences.
So, for example, the presence of the Holy Spirit is demonstrated by being taught all the things Jesus taught and bringing to remembrance all that he has said, and also keeping all his commandments (John 14); speaking the word of God in boldness (Acts 4); people will be converted to Christ (Acts 9); God's love will be evident (Rom 5); there will be righteousness, peace and joy (Rom 14); there will be purity, patience, kindness, goodness and love (2 Cor 6). That is: the Holy Spirit is primarily working in the ordinary life of the church and the believer by conforming them to righteousness and their new birth in Christ.
You may want to go back to Acts and show all the miracles taking place there -- and I grant them all. But I grant them pointing out that these are the "Acts of the Apostles," not the "Acts of every believer always."
My view of it -- and this is important to see that this is the view that the vast majority of believers prior to the 20th century -- is that there is an office of Apostle, they have a special place in the history of God's church and revelation, they have gifts we do not, and we ought to be concerned with the ordinary things the Holy Spirit ought to be doing in our lives rather than hoping for things which, in the history of faith which the Bible describes, are both rare and extraordinary.
