The gift of discernment

The passage names the discerning of spirits and does not explain it. Of prophets speaking in church Paul writes, “let the others discern” (1 Corinthians 14:29), and John writes, “test the spirits, whether they are of God” (1 John 4:1). These statements ask whether you look into what you are told before you accept it, and what has happened when you weighed something taught about God or said to be from Him.

They say nothing about how you knew, and they are not about first impressions of people. Nor do they ask about telling what is moving your own thoughts and desires, which many Christians also call the discernment of spirits and take to a confessor or spiritual father. Paul names this in the same sentence as healing, miracles and tongues (1 Corinthians 12:8-10), and Christians disagree about which of the gifts in that sentence God still gives today.

In an ordinary week it is the person who reads the book everybody is quoting and comes back with the chapter that does not hold. It is whoever notices that a visiting speaker’s stories keep improving. It is the question asked in a meeting that changes the decision, and the person asking it is often not the most senior one in the room.

People notice it in themselves as a reflex. You look into where an idea came from before you accept it. You have stopped reading a writer you liked because of what they taught about God. The worries you raise turn out, often enough, to have been worth raising.

The gift it is most often confused with is suspicion, and the difference is where each of them starts. Suspicion begins with distrust and goes looking for evidence. Paul’s word begins with a test that can come out either way, and the instruction attached to it is to keep whatever passes: “Test all things, and hold firmly that which is good” (1 Thessalonians 5:21).