How to Discover your Spiritual Gifts—Part 2
Last time we looked at what
spiritual gifts are and then defined the specific gifts.
A spiritual gift is an
ability, a talent, or a skill that is given to a person for the first time ever
by the Holy Spirit so that the person might be a vital, useful, and necessary
member of the Body of Christ. This means that only Christians can have these
spiritual gifts.
We saw that spiritual gifts
are:
1)
Only given to Christians since
only Christians have the Holy Spirit
2)
Given freely from God through His
Holy Spirit
3)
Something that every Christian has
at least one of from the moment that they got saved
4)
Many people can have more than one
5)
Cannot be lost
6)
It is different from natural
talents
7)
It is different from the fruit of
the Spirit
8)
Makes every Christian necessary to
the body of Christ
9)
Enables every Christian to be a
blessing to others
10)
Means that every Christian can
bring glory to God
We also looked at the four
passages in Scripture that lists spiritual gifts.
Romans 12:6-8
1)
Prophesying
2)
Serving
3)
Teaching
4)
Exhortation
5)
Giving
6)
Leadership
7)
Mercy
1 Corinthians 12
8)
Word of wisdom
9)
Word of knowledge
10)
Faith
11)
Healing
12)
Effecting of miracles
13)
Distinguishing of spirits
14)
Tongues
15)
Interpretation of tongues
16)
Apostles
17)
Helps
18)
Administration
Ephesians 4:11
19)
Evangelism
20)
Pastor
1 Peter 3:9-11
21)
Hospitality
For a total of 21 gifts.
The question may come up, “If
someone exhibits a characteristic of one of these gifts occasionally does that
mean that he or she has that gift?”
Not necessarily. God wants
all of us to evangelize. So just because we share the Gospel with someone and
they get saved that doesn’t necessarily mean that we have the gift of
evangelism.
We may run a ministry and do
it well but that doesn’t mean that we necessarily have the gift of leadership
or administration.
Many of these gifts we will
exhibit some characteristics of sometimes in our lives. God wants us to serve,
He wants us to be hospitable, He wants us to exhort, He wants us to give.
So based on the
characteristics that we talked about last time in conjunction with the
questionnaire that we will do today, you will, hopefully, discover your
spiritual gift with confidence.
So how might some of these
gifts fit together to further God’s will in the world?
·
Someone in the congregation who
has the gift of faith sees clearly God’s plan to establish a sister church in
another, perhaps distant, place.
·
One with the gift of
administration puts together a plan involving finances, people, building
materials, schedules, and so forth to accomplish this vision.
·
One with the gift of exhortation
is able to encourage people to pray about and then volunteer to help with this
project.
·
One with the gift of leadership is
able gather these volunteers and assign them to tasks so that they are the most
efficient.
·
Those with the gift of serving
will gather the necessary materials before leaving and doing a lot of the
menial and necessary tasks once everyone is there.
·
Once there, someone with the gift
of pastoring will take over shepherding the new church.
·
Someone with the gift of
distinguishing of spirits will be able to keep away those who want to come in
and do harm to the new church.
·
Someone with the gift of miracles
or healing can demonstrate great signs to prove to the locals that this is
indeed a work of the true God.
·
One with the gift of teaching may
lead Bible studies to grow those newcomers in the church.
And so on. EVERY gift would
ultimately have a very important and critical function in starting and growing
this church.
As you can see, it takes a
lot of different talents to build a church. Imagine if everyone who was
involved had only the gift of pastoring or the gift of administration or the
gift of faith. The work would never get done. Also, imagine if the person who
had the gift of teaching decided to bag it. Someone else who would be less
skilled would have to take over. The church needs EVERYONE. And EVERYONE has
something very crucial to add. And if you bag it, then there WILL be a gap,
there will be a place in the church that is not as efficient as it should be.
Ø
Pass out the questionnaire.
Explain the questionnaire.
Don’t answer the questions
with the answer that you know you SHOULD give. No one else is going to see your
sheet. Just be honest.
If you aren’t sure about a
question such as “I love to lead people in accomplishing group goals” because
you’ve never that and don’t know if you would like it, then either answer this
as to how you think you would enjoy doing this or put down either “Never” or
“Rarely.”
Each gift has five questions
associated with it so don’t sweat any one question; it probably won’t make that
huge of a difference.
Do the questionnaire.
Ø
Pass out the scoring sheet.
Score the questionnaire.
These results aren’t
absolute.
Remember that your gift will
only be something that you acquired after you became a Christian. So you may
have scored the highest on mercy but if you were always merciful, even before
becoming a Christian, then that is more likely to be a natural ability or
character quality that God gave to you rather than a spiritual gift. You can
probably cross that one off as being a gift although it still may be something
that God would like you to continue using.
What you discover your gift
to be should make sense because it is something that God has given you a desire
for and it should be something that you are good at.
Now that you may know what
your spiritual gift or gifts are, what does this NOT mean?
Not having a particular gift
is not an excuse to not do something. For example, if you don’t have the gift
of giving and you see someone in need you can’t say, “I don’t have the gift of
giving so God doesn’t expect me to respond to that need.” Or, “I don’t have the
gift of evangelism so God will understand why I never share the Gospel.”
Just because you have a spiritual
gift in an area that does not mean that you are always right. The person with
the gift of a Word of Knowledge will not always understand a Biblical doctrine
correctly and must still be humble to correction. For example, if you have the
gift of Distinguishing of Spirits you shouldn’t smugly say, “That guy on TV is
a fake. I just know it because God has given me that gift.” Maybe you are right
and he is a fake but you should always use your gift humbly.
Your gift was given to you so
that you can serve others and glorify God. It was not given to you so that you
may feel superior to others in general or even in the area that your gift is
in. Remember the passage in 1 Corinthians 12 where it said, “the eye cannot say
to the foot, ‘I have no need of you.’”
What DOES it mean?
It means that you can now
more confidently concentrate on this area of ministry.
1) It means that you should
expect greater things from God in this area.
·
If you have the gift of healing
then prayer for healing greater illnesses.
·
If you have the gift of knowledge
then study your Bible longer and with more depth.
·
If you have the gift of serving
then look for more opportunities to serve.
·
If you have the gift of
exhortation then possibly think about counseling more.
2) Get involved in a ministry
that utilizes your gift.
·
If you have the gift of evangelism
then signup to help at the outreaches.
·
If you have the gift of helps then
talk to some of the leaders at your church to see how you can free them up.
·
If you have the gift of
distinguishing of spirits then get involved in a cult ministry.
3) If you don’t think that
there are any ministries utilizing your gift then think about starting your own
ministry.
·
If you have the gift of giving
then possibly start a ministry on providing for the needs of the hungry or
destitute.
·
If you have the gift of teaching
then start up a Bible study at your job or starting a home group in your
church.
·
If you have the gift of mercy then
think about a ministry helping the oppressed in other countries or starting a
hospital or nursing home ministry.
4) Buy books related to your
gift and study how to deepen your gift.
·
For leadership: Spiritual
Leadership by J. Oswald Sanders
·
For evangelism: Winning Ways: the
adventure of sharing Christ by Leroy Eims
·
For word of knowledge: How to
study the Bible for all it’s worth by Gordon Fee
5) Seek out people who have
your gift and talk to them. Maybe several of you can get together once a month
and discuss how to serve others and glorify God with you gift.
6) Make a list of what you
can practically do in order to use your gift and then do those things.
7) Do a Bible study on your
gift.
·
Look up any references to your
gift.
·
Study the word in the Greek.
·
Study the lives of anyone in the
Bible who had that gift.
8) Get biographies about
Christians who seem to display your gift.
·
Maybe read about Hudson Taylor for
apostleship
·
Billy Graham or D.L Moody for
evangelism
·
C.S. Lewis for word of wisdom
·
Mother Theresa for mercy
·
George Muller for faith or
miracles
When I discovered around ten-years
ago what my gifts were, it gave me a greater focus and direction in how I
should be ministering in the church.
Ask for a show of hands for
each gift.
1)
Prophesying
2)
Serving
3)
Teaching
4)
Exhortation
5)
Giving
6)
Leadership
7)
Mercy
8)
Word of wisdom
9)
Word of knowledge
10)
Faith
11)
Healing
12)
Effecting of miracles
13)
Distinguishing of spirits
14)
Tongues
15)
Interpretation of tongues
16)
Apostles
17)
Helps
18)
Administration
19)
Evangelism
20)
Pastor
21)
Hospitality
God has given you these gifts
·
Use them
·
Focus on them
·
Expand them
·
Challenge yourself with them
·
Find your place in the body of
Christ with them
·
Serve others with them
·
Glorify God with them
Discussion Questions
Read part A) to begin the
discussion time. If there is time left then ask each of the questions under B)
one at a time.
A) Open this time up to
anyone who would like to discuss their spiritual gift. Each person may discuss
the following questions.
·
What is your gift or gifts?
·
Is this the first time that you
feel that you know it?
·
How will this affect your ministry
or direction?
·
Now that you know your gift, does
it make sense to you that this is your gift?
B) Some general group
questions:
Do you feel that it would be
good to talk to other people who share the same gift as you?
Why would this be beneficial?
Why is it important for you
know what your spiritual gift is?
Why is it important that your gift should feel “natural”
to you: I.e., why should you feel comfortable with what your gift is?