Gifts of the Spirit

A message from Rom12 & 1 Cor 12 by Phil Rogers 29/06/08

Phil's message was not recorded.

Did any one see Britain’s Got Talent? Talent comes from the parable of the talents, Mt 25:14-30, a huge sum of money, but c.1430, it was first used to mean "special natural ability, aptitude." In Jesus’ parable each servant is given varying amounts of money. The two with the most invest it and are commended by their master, but the servant given a single talent, buries it in the ground and does not invest it or make it work for him. His master calls him a wicked and lazy servant and has him thrown into darkness where there is weeping an gnashing of teeth. This is the third of a series of parables dealing with proper attitudes and behaviour in the light of the coming of the Son of Man. The lazy servant refers to the Jews who would not respond to the gift of life Jesus offered them, who end up being thrown into outer darkness. This parable is not about our natural abilites, aptitude or giftedness, nor is it a moralistic challenge to lazy believers who don’t use their god-given natural talents, as is sometimes preached.

What it does show us is how the Lord expects us to live while we are waiting for the coming of the Lord Jesus, our Master. The Lord has distributed all his wealth amongst us; not material riches but immense spiritual rescources which he gives us, not for us to use for ourselves but to invest and utilise for the sake of his Kingdom. Which does lead in to the subject of Spiritual gifts. (Read passages.) We can’t delve deeply into these passages so let me just make a few relevant observations.
Every believer has a share in God’s abundance, a land flowing with milk and honey. Dave shared last week we each have a spiritual inheritance to step into, which includes spiritual gifts. Yet many of us struggle in this is an area for various reasons.

A. How do we know what gifts God has for us?
1) Spiritual gifts are not the same as our natural abilities. Yet there is often an overlap. e.g. teaching. But a spiritual gift is SPIRITUAL. It is motivated and energised by the Holy Spirit and can only be sustained by faith and prayer, not by natural effort.
2) God distributes gifts as he chooses, e.g. one servant was given five talents and another two. We don’t get to chose what gifts we want. We are each given different gifts for which we are responsible wherever we live or go. We learn how to invest our gifts wisely, and they grow and develop as we use them. Some gifts are practical and some are vocal. (cf 1 Pet 4:10-11) Some listed in the scripture include helping, showing mercy, administration, generosity, hospitality, encouraging, shepherding, evangelising, prophecy, teaching,l eading, healing, doing works of power, and apostleship.
3) The only way to find out what gifts God has given us is by trying things out. If we find we can actually do it and enjoy it, it is probably our gifting. If it is just ‘not us’, then step back and try something else. Questionnaires only show us what we know already they do not help us to discover new gifts we have never tried before.
4) We use gifts in proportion to our faith. Some of us will developed a high level of faith in our area of gifting, others have less faith, but it is still our gift.
Two points made by Bill Hybels from his experience:5) In our gift-mix our #1 gift gives us energy, our #2 gifts are pretty neutral and our #3 gifts use up energy. I have found this to be true and a very helpful insight. Our main gift sets us alight and we love doing it and afterwards we feel invigorated rather than feeling depleted.
6) Our gifts work best with other gifts around us. Gifted leaders have moved churches and not had the same success after leaving behind others with different gifts that worked well together with theirs.

B. We must make a clear distinction between gifts and manifestations.
Our personal gifts are not the same as manifestations of the Spirit. These are like tools of the trade. Hammer, screwdriver etc. We all need these tools to get the job done. A plummer or a carpenter have different ‘gifts’, skills, and expertise and operate in different areas, but they use the same general tools. The Spirit distributes these ‘as he chooses’ whicih is more immediate than the gifts God distributes as he chooses. The Spirit manifests his presence and power according to the circumstances. So if we need a word of knowledge or faith or a gift of healing he can give it to us, if we are available to him manifesting such a thing through us

Just as there is an overlap with natural abilities and spiritual gifts, so there is an overlap with gifts and manifestations. Prophecy can be a gift and a person with such a gift may be recognised as a prophet, but propecy is also a manifestation of the Spirit that we can all do - one by one! We will all need at times God to give us a prophetic word or a gift of healing for someone. We can all receive such manifestations if we make ourselves available, open and expectant.

C. Spiritual gifts are for the common good, not just to build up members of the local church. We are a charity but when we register after October 2008 we will need to demonstrate that what we do is for public benefit. This is no threat as some see it. If what we do is only for the benefit and consumption of insiders we are not a NT church! Go and make disciples was Jesus’ commision which is obligatory for every follower of Christ. Taking the Gospel to the public who do not know the Lord and making them his fully devoted disciples is the best benefit that we can ever give them. In the UK the advancement of religion is considered beneficial to the public as it positively affects social attitudes and behaviour. The law allows and encourages us to ‘make converts’ as long as we don’t coerce or force them in any way. So we have a mandate from God and the support of our government to advance the gospel and make converts and so help to improve society.

To do this we need to use our spiritual gifts and manifestations, not just in church gatherings but out there in the world. Healing and miracles are great tools to make the Lord known to others, so we all need to know how to use them. Some of us are gifted as evangelists but we can only advancing the gospel in conjunction with those with different gifts. Alpha is a useful tool for advancing the gospel today. But to run Alpha we need a whole range of gifted people: we need those who can administrate, lead, teach, pray encourage, evangelise, help and serve in practical ways such as catering. We will all need to be inviting people along! We begin at the end of September. What part will you play in making Alpha happen in three months time? Think about it, pray about it, talk about it.