I’ve been a little disappointed with your winters here so far. I was hoping that we would have more snow. Not because I’m a big fan of snow, but I never got around to raking my leaves this fall and I was hoping that there’d be snow to cover that fact up. All my neighbors had their leaves nicely raked or blown and there sat mine right where nature had laid them. I thought about doing them, once, but a better offer came along and I took it. I’ve had a thing about leaves since I was a kid. I grew up with a perfectionist father. That was a plus in some way, but when it came to yard work and house work, it made life miserable. I can remember spending perfectly good Saturday afternoons with a rake in my hand and my father wanted every single leaf up, no stragglers, no exceptions. I remember one Saturday when all of the neighborhood guys were going to play football and there I stood, looking out over our ¾ of an acre with a rake in hand. The task was seemingly impossible. Then something happened. My friends took pity on me and about 10 guys showed up with rakes and an hour later I was done and playing football with the guys. When each of us played a role instead of one guy trying to do it all, the job was easy and we accomplished in a short time what would have taken me 2 afternoons to finish.
Israel faced a task like this, something that looked huge and impossible. God had delivered them from Egypt and in Exodus 25-30 (it takes 5 whole chapters!) he lays out in great detail for them through Moses the kind of tabernacle that he wants them to build. He gives dimensions, kinds of wood, what kind of metals to use, how to make the walls and ceiling and furniture, right down to how to make the clothes for the priests, no detail is left out. But when God was building that first church, he let Moses in on a little secret. He had already sent his spirit ahead to gift the right people for the right jobs so that the task could be accomplished quickly and exactly the way it was commanded by God to be done.
Read Exodus 31:1-11
What a great picture this gives us of the church today. God wants to build his church, his Body and he tells us in Scripture what that church should look like, it is to be loving, it is to be accepting, it is to preach the word and change the world. In great detail, he lays out his vision of His body on Earth. And then he says: Also I have given skill to all the craftsmen to make everything I have commanded you:
Who are the craftsmen, we are, the church, those who have placed their faith in Christ. What are the skills, His spiritual gifts that the Spirit has given to al who believe. Just like that first tabernacle was built by those that the Spirit gifted, His church today is built in the same way.
So, we’ve looked at most of the individual spiritual gifts and how they function practically with in the Body of Christ. Hopefully, you have a better grasp on what those gifts are and what they entail and you’ve started to get a feel for how God has gifted you and where you can plug into this work here in this church. This morning, I want to conclude this series by looking at some ways that we can discover God’s gifts in our lives, but before we do that, there are a few things I want to make sure that you understand about the way that we were created and where ministry fits into the overall purpose of the life of every believer.
I think that we need to understand, not just the concept of gifts and how God has gifted us, but we need to understand as well, why discovering and utilizing our gifts is essential to our growth, personally, and to the growth of God’s kingdom. There are seven truths about ministry and service in our lives that I want you to know. These 7 things give a pretty complete picture of what the Bible teaches about service and its place in our lives. Some of these are going to be review but each of these truths is something that I want to make sure that you understand and can see how it translates into your life before we move away from this topic of gifts and ministry.
These truths apply to the life of every believer.
Every Christian is:
1) Created for Ministry
One of my favorite characters in the Star Wars movies is C3PO. If you’re not familiar with the movies, I have all 6 if you’d like to borrow them. C3PO is a robot, a droid, and throughout the movies he tries his best to be adventurous and brave but it simply is not the way that he was programmed. He’s a translator droid, he knows every language in the galaxy and wherever his adventures take him, he can’t get away from how he was made and what he was made to do. In the middle of a battle, with guns going off all around him, he can be heard reminded those around him that he is fluent in over six million forms of communication in a snooty voice that drives others nuts. You can take him away from where he’s comfortable, you can place him in a very different environment, with different people and ask him to do different things, but you can’t change what he was created to do, it’s always going to rise to the top.
It’s the same for Christians, we can try to fill our lives with this or that and wander from where we should be, but we can’t get away from the core truth that we were created to minister. God created us to serve Him and His church, that’s the way that we’re wired.
Eph 2:10 For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
We are created to serve, spiritual gifts are how God uniquely shapes us to do what He created us to do.
2) Called into Ministry
It’s easy to look at a pastor or a missionary and say that they are called into ministry and that’s definitely true. I am called to full time Christian ministry, but so are you. The difference is that I am called to be a pastor, to minister in a setting like this. Others are called to be missionaries and to minister in a foreign land. Still others are called to be nurses and carpenters and engineers and teachers, but that doesn’t diminish their call to ministry. I remember a professor in college having a conversation with another student during class and the student informed him that he wanted to go into part time ministry. Oh, the professor replied, are you a part time Christian? His point was, there is no such thing as part time ministry in the life of a Christian. If its how what we were created to do, it is to be displayed in every aspect of our lives.
1 Peter 2:10
But you are not like that (talking about those who don’t know God) for you are a chosen people. You are a kingdom of Priests. God’s Holy nation, his very own possession. This is so that you can show others the goodness of God, for He has called you out of the darkness and into his wonderful light.
Do you understand that? As a Christian, you are a part of a nation of priests, you are a minister, it’s your calling. The priests role was to be God’s representative to the people and that’s exactly the role that each Christian is called to play today. How do we do that? By living a life of service, Jesus says that whoever wants to be great in God’s eyes must be a servant. He calls us all to serve, he calls us all to ministry.
3) Gifted for Ministry
This goes against Satan’s greatest lie in our lives, that we have nothing to offer the Kingdom of God. But, if we are created to minister, and we are called to minister, it follows logically that the one who creates and the one who calls will also gift us to accomplish what he asks of us. This is where your spiritual gifts will be used, in the place that God has put you to minister and serve.
1 Peter 4:10
God has given gifts to each of you from his great variety of spiritual gifts. Manage them well so that God’s generosity can flow through you.
God has given them to each of us, not to some of us. These gifts empower us and free us to minister in ways that we never could on our own.
4) Authorized for Ministry
Have you ever worked someplace where you have to go through so many different layers of permission and authorization before you can do anything that you feel like you never get anything accomplished? I can remember at the nursing home that I worked at, my youth group wanted to come in and sing some Christmas carols to the residents. I had to go from person to person and get this form signed by this person and then that form signed by that person and then get those signatures approved and what should have been a simple task and a joyous experience almost didn’t happen because of all the paperwork and road blocks. That’s not how God intended for ministry to be for us. He has authorized us to do ministry, on most things, we don’t need to constantly ask his permission or wait for his confirmation to move ahead. If we have an opportunity to share his love, that’s not something we have to pray and seek direction on, he’s made his will clear and he had freed us to do His work.
Matthew 28:18 Then Jesus came to them and said, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."
Jesus says here, in the great commission, God has given me all authority, all power is mine. With that authority, I am releasing you to serve. Go, teach, baptize, love, do all these in my name and by my authority. The paperwork has already been signed, the permission has already been granted, now it’s time to move ahead in ministry and take God’s word to those who need to hear it and to fill this place with those that we can serve and teach them to serve others.
This next truth is the most compelling reason of all for a lifestyle of service.
5) Commanded to Minister
Matthew 20:26 Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, 27 and whoever wants to be first must be your slave-- 28 just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many."
Following Christ means serving in ministry. He commands it, he says just as I came to serve, I expect no less from you. He uses words like serve, go, teach, care for and never puts them in the context of: if you feel like it. No, they are commands, they are expectations but for many too Christians we view them as optional.
Remember when you were growing up, in our house, Saturday morning was cleaning day. We had specific jobs that had to be accomplished, there was no discussion, there were no excuses. My parents commanded that the job get done. At times, we did it happily, at times we pouted and put up a fight, but the end result was the same. The job got done, obedience was expected.
In the same way, God expects us to obey. God commands us minister, to accomplish the task of building his kingdom. We can do it joyfully and serve with a glad heart or we can complain and kick and scream and neglect our responsibilities; but the fact remains that there is a job to do and God commands us to do it. Each of us, not just pastors, not just mature Christians, there is no trial period in Christianity. When we accept His love and sacrifice, it comes with a command to serve.
Why? Because of the next truth. We are all
6) Needed for Ministry
Just like cleaning the house, if one person didn’t do their job, the rest of us had to pick up the slack and things usually didn’t get done well. In ministry, when one part takes off and decides that they aren’t needed, the rest of the Body must step up and it thrusts people into roles that they aren’t comfortable in and aren’t necessarily gifted to serve in and the whole ministry suffers. Using Paul’s analogy of the Body, a hand can only do the work of a foot for so long before it gives up and the work of the foot goes undone. If you’ve learned anything in these last few weeks I hope that you understand that all of you are vital to God’s work here at Beartown Road church. I am not saying that with any selfish motive, I’m not trying to trick you or guilt you into serving. I am teaching what the Bible teaches and that is that no matter what your excuse, no matter what your circumstances are, if you are not serving God in some capacity in the Body, the church that He built and ordained as the way that His word would spread, if you are not serving than you are not following what God has commanded and are not fulfilling a big part of His purpose for your life. Some of you may not like to hear that but it’s all in here!
1 Corinthians 12:27 says:
Now all of you together (speaking of the believers) are Christ’s body and each of you is a separate and necessary part of it.
The Greek word that’s translated in the NIV and the NLT as a part is the word merous and it means a vital part of the whole. It’s used to describe pieces of something that are vital to its functioning properly. If you remove a belt from a car, it’s a small, seemingly insignifigant piece, but it’s a vital part of the whole, without it, the car won’t run. The same is true of your role in the Body. You are a vital and necessary part of a much larger whole and your role needs to be filled. You are needed for ministry. And when you accept that and plug in, scripture says that we will all be:
7) Rewarded for Ministry
Heaven awaits all who have made a decision to follow Christ, but Scripture teaches that the rewards upon our arrival there will be different according to how we served and used what God entrusted to us. I used to tell my youth leaders when things were particularly frustrating, you’re working on your reward. It became kind of a joke, but it’s also an incredible truth. Some of them had done youth ministry for over 20 years, you work with teens that long and your crown is going to be huge! Ministry may be tough, service may be tough, but you’re storing up treasures in heaven to be enjoyed for all of eternity.
Col 3:23 Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, 24 since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving.
Matthew 16:27 For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what he has done.
Please don’t misunderstand me, ministry and service in no way earns you salvation,that is a free gift of God. But ministry and service is our response to God’s gift and it will be rewarded for eternity in heaven.
These 7 truths help to put the theology of gifts into perspective. We’ve talked about all of these gifts and I believe there are even more than Scripture mentions, but you need to understand the Biblical teaching on service and ministry, and see that these gifts are the unique equipping of the Holy Spirit to empower us for ministry and then you can truly appreciate the beauty of these gifts that God has given us to accomplish what we were created to do.
So, how do you know what your gifts are? Different people are going to discover their gifts in different ways. For some, it’s going to be very obvious. For others, they may need to try many different things before they find where God has gifted them to serve. There are no hard and fast rules or 3 easy steps to finding your gifts, but I want to wrap up this series with some practical advice on ways to begin to discover your unique place in the Body of Christ and how God has gifted you to serve.
1) Experiment
You’ve all heard the phrase, “You never know until you try.” That can apply to spiritual gifts. You may feel that teaching is definitely not your gift, but if you’re willing to try it, you might be surprised. We had a guy that served in our youth ministry, he was great with the kids and they all loved him, he was just a fun guy to be around. I had asked him to teach on several occasions and he always declined and said that it wasn’t his thing. He was in banking and we were talking about tithing and he finally agreed to teach. He presented the best lesson on tithing and giving that I have ever heard in my life. The kids understood it and asked all sorts of questions and you could tell by the look on his face that he had just found a gif the never knew he had. Afterwards, he asked me when he could teach again, he couldn’t wait to develop a gift that ended up being natural once he got past the fear of giving it a try.
We’ve got to be willing to throw ourselves into different ministry situation and see where we shine, see where God can use us. Not knowing your spiritual gift should not be used as an excuse for avoiding ministry, instead, it should be an excuse for trying many different types of ministry with in the church.
2) Evaluate –
Once we try a ministry and exercise a potential gift, we need to step back and evaluate how things went. This is the time to be honest with ourselves and look at how things went and see if this may be where we need to be serving. If you try a gift and you feel very awkward and uncomfortable or if you feel embarrassed and out of place, then maybe that gift is not something that God has chosen to give you and maybe that ministry is not quite the right fit for you. However, if you try something and find that it energizes you and you find fulfillment and a sense of excitement for ministry, that’s a pretty good indication that this is an area that you’re gifted in. That being said, when we evaluate things, we can’t evaluate them based solely on emotion and feelings. You need to take that into account but our emotions can be a tricky thing and for some of us, Satan uses our emotions to confuse us and to keep us ineffective. So, emotions are only a part of what we should evaluate. We also need to evaluate:
a. Our Effectiveness
If God gifts you and calls you to minister in a certain way, He is going to bring about results. He is going to cause you to be effective in ministry. Step back and ask, “Is God using me, Is this ministry effective, am I seeing any results.” God gives gifts that will be effective for ministry. The Bible doesn’t say that gifts are given so that the Body of Christ can spin its wheels, it tells us that gifts are given so that the Body of Christ will be built up. Sometimes in ministry, effectiveness is hard to gauge and results are slow in coming. But if you balance your evaluation and look at both what God is doing in you through the ministry and what God is doing in others through your ministry, you will get a good picture of if you are serving with your spiritual gift or if you need to plug into another area of ministry.
The third thing we can use to measure if we are serving within our area of giftedness is that we should:
3) Expect Affirmation
Other Christians can be a great help in finding our gifts. If you are being used by God, others are going to notice. This is important for all of us to know, if you’re sitting here and you are certain of your gifts, you still have a role to play in the process of helping others to find their gifts. If you see someone that is serving well, if you are impacted by someone’s words or someone has ministered to you, tell them, let them know that you can see the way that God is using them and has gifted them. The first time I preached in public, I had a lady come up to me and say just a few words. She told me God had spoken to her through the message. Her affirmation that day helped to solidify God’s call on my life to be a pastor and a teacher. Simple words can point people in the right direction to find their gifts. Paul shows this with members of the church in Thessalonica.
1 thes 5:11 Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.
He saw that they were doing something well and he affirmed them in it and we need to do the same. Listen to others, the affirmation you receive or the lack of it can help you to know if you are gifted in a certain area.
And Finally,
4) Expect the Unexpected
Do not say, God here are the gifts I want, you can pick from these ones. Be open to the leading of the Spirit, He may surprise you with a gift that you never would have considered. Your giftedness may also change over the course of your life, so never get too comfortable in any one ministry, expect the unexpected and be ready to follow where you feel God is leading you and be ready to go in the direction He takes you.
Each one of you is gifted. Each one of you is a necessary part of the whole that is this ministry. As a church, our job is to help you discover your ministry sweet spot, that place where you are uniquely qualified and gifted to serve. We are to encourage you and build you up in ministry. We want to see each of you grow, we want to see each of you experience the incredible joy of serving and impacting the lives of others for the building up of God’s Kingdom. But it takes a willing heart, it takes a humble Spirit, and it takes individuals who can see the big picture of what God can accomplish through this ministry and are willing to lay down individual agendas and individual wants and needs to see that big picture become a reality in this place. May it be so.
