Gifts
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in your sight Oh Lord, my strength and my redeemer. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen
I have been thinking about families this week. I suppose it makes sense since yesterday we attended a family reunion for my wife’s family up at Lake Anna and it was interesting seeing the brothers and sisters, cousins, 2nd cousins, 3rd cousins and so on all playing and laughing together.
The benefit of being an observer at one of these functions is that I can see how the different family relationships come together…
There are the energetic idea people, who come up with the idea for these gatherings so that the family and extended family keep in touch with one another. There are the guides, who make sure people can reach the destination. There are the organizers who make certain that the idea of the reunion becomes a reality by making sleeping arrangements, food arrangements, et cetera. Then there are the worker bees who follow the arrangements made by the organizers. There is always one leader who directs all the others and manages to get the entire thing to come together.
This reminded me of a test that my wife, Tammi, had me take when she got home from a religious retreat. It was a test about spiritual gifts. It was a simple test that basically told you very generally how you best serve the church with the natural abilities that God gives you. Some people will be leaders, but won’t be able to comfort someone when their problems get in the way of the ‘goal’. Some people will be idea people but not so good at putting ideas to practice because they lose track. Some people are wonderful at putting things to practice, but have to be told what to do because they aren’t self starters. Some people are the emotional center…the ones who make the process complete by reminding us that the reason we do this is for love…but they aren’t necessarily going to be good at organizing an event or working out the details of what might be missing.
Today’s epistle really brought this to my heart…when Paul tells the Corinthians, “Wherefore I give you to understand, that no man speaking by the Spirit of God calleth Jesus accursed: and that no man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost. Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all.” I can hear him telling me that you can’t expect a horse to be a cat…because it is a horse. That is how God created it and it can only do what God put it here for. If you try to make the horse catch mice, it will make the horse miserable and you miserable and you are still going to have mice because that isn’t what the horse is here to do.
We are the same way. God has blessed each of us with gifts that He has a plan for us to use. He brings experiences into our lives that hone those gifts so that we might BEST serve God with them. He blesses some of us with the gift of wisdom. That isn’t their wisdom, it is God’s wisdom manifesting to us THROUGH them. And the person blessed with God’s wisdom shouldn’t be jealous of the person blessed with knowledge because we are supposed to depend upon one another, working together. We are each only a part of the whole and it is in working together that we truly fulfill our calling to Christ. No one person can nor should do everything. We should do what God has blessed us with the ability to do and give others the opportunity to use their gifts that God has blessed them with.
So now back to the “family.” Each person in a family has certain things that they are good at … Some one might be good with art and someone might be good with reading, but each of us has something that we are good at. The question is will we use what we are good at for the good of us all or are we going to squander what we have been given and keep it hidden. As with the parable of the talents each servant has been given a specific number of them to use and expand upon. Now we know that two of the servants used and expanded upon their talents; However, that one servant went to the back yard and dug a hole and buried his talent and never developed it. The two who did were blessed by the Master and the one who didn’t was cast out. Now I guess that question is which one will you be? Will you be the one who develops his or her talent or the one who is scared to try? Think of what kind of story it would have been if Peter decided not to step out of the boat and walk to Jesus. Peter had a gift of faith and when he started to fear he took his eyes off of the Lord and started to sink. Yes, there are going to be times when we all seem to turn from God and our faith wavers, but if we keep using our talents, our spiritual gifts, and keep trudging along that path towards God our faith will increase and our talents will become stronger.
Remember that each of our talents work together with others talents and God uses each of us to complete the bigger picture. The different spiritual gifts given to us by the Lord are not just given to one person to figure everything out. God gave each of us a gift. If even one person isn’t using their gift then God compensates and provides for another, but what a wonderful world we would live in if everyone was using their gifts as the Lord would will us to. Each one of us is like a single puzzle piece and our gifts help complete the work that God has prepared for us here on earth. Imagine a puzzle with pieces missing and you can see how the beauty of God’s creation is even evident in the management of his plans for us.
When we were out yesterday, I was looking at how beautiful the lake and trees and sunset were and thinking about how the sun reflected just right on the trees and through the clouds and how the breeze was coming across the water and simply admiring the beauty of God’s creation and that each of those things were just themselves. The water didn’t give off light and we didn’t go swimming in the trees, and the sun didn’t blow to cool us off. Each part does what God created it to do and that is what makes it so beautiful. God created you and me with SPIRITUAL gifts and we ALL have them, no matter how few or how small our gifts might seem, there is a purpose for them and that purpose is that they be used for God’s plan, not our plans. That way the puzzle of God’s plan is a complete picture without pieces missing.
God bless you all.
I have been thinking about families this week. I suppose it makes sense since yesterday we attended a family reunion for my wife’s family up at Lake Anna and it was interesting seeing the brothers and sisters, cousins, 2nd cousins, 3rd cousins and so on all playing and laughing together.
The benefit of being an observer at one of these functions is that I can see how the different family relationships come together…
There are the energetic idea people, who come up with the idea for these gatherings so that the family and extended family keep in touch with one another. There are the guides, who make sure people can reach the destination. There are the organizers who make certain that the idea of the reunion becomes a reality by making sleeping arrangements, food arrangements, et cetera. Then there are the worker bees who follow the arrangements made by the organizers. There is always one leader who directs all the others and manages to get the entire thing to come together.
This reminded me of a test that my wife, Tammi, had me take when she got home from a religious retreat. It was a test about spiritual gifts. It was a simple test that basically told you very generally how you best serve the church with the natural abilities that God gives you. Some people will be leaders, but won’t be able to comfort someone when their problems get in the way of the ‘goal’. Some people will be idea people but not so good at putting ideas to practice because they lose track. Some people are wonderful at putting things to practice, but have to be told what to do because they aren’t self starters. Some people are the emotional center…the ones who make the process complete by reminding us that the reason we do this is for love…but they aren’t necessarily going to be good at organizing an event or working out the details of what might be missing.
Today’s epistle really brought this to my heart…when Paul tells the Corinthians, “Wherefore I give you to understand, that no man speaking by the Spirit of God calleth Jesus accursed: and that no man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost. Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all.” I can hear him telling me that you can’t expect a horse to be a cat…because it is a horse. That is how God created it and it can only do what God put it here for. If you try to make the horse catch mice, it will make the horse miserable and you miserable and you are still going to have mice because that isn’t what the horse is here to do.
We are the same way. God has blessed each of us with gifts that He has a plan for us to use. He brings experiences into our lives that hone those gifts so that we might BEST serve God with them. He blesses some of us with the gift of wisdom. That isn’t their wisdom, it is God’s wisdom manifesting to us THROUGH them. And the person blessed with God’s wisdom shouldn’t be jealous of the person blessed with knowledge because we are supposed to depend upon one another, working together. We are each only a part of the whole and it is in working together that we truly fulfill our calling to Christ. No one person can nor should do everything. We should do what God has blessed us with the ability to do and give others the opportunity to use their gifts that God has blessed them with.
So now back to the “family.” Each person in a family has certain things that they are good at … Some one might be good with art and someone might be good with reading, but each of us has something that we are good at. The question is will we use what we are good at for the good of us all or are we going to squander what we have been given and keep it hidden. As with the parable of the talents each servant has been given a specific number of them to use and expand upon. Now we know that two of the servants used and expanded upon their talents; However, that one servant went to the back yard and dug a hole and buried his talent and never developed it. The two who did were blessed by the Master and the one who didn’t was cast out. Now I guess that question is which one will you be? Will you be the one who develops his or her talent or the one who is scared to try? Think of what kind of story it would have been if Peter decided not to step out of the boat and walk to Jesus. Peter had a gift of faith and when he started to fear he took his eyes off of the Lord and started to sink. Yes, there are going to be times when we all seem to turn from God and our faith wavers, but if we keep using our talents, our spiritual gifts, and keep trudging along that path towards God our faith will increase and our talents will become stronger.
Remember that each of our talents work together with others talents and God uses each of us to complete the bigger picture. The different spiritual gifts given to us by the Lord are not just given to one person to figure everything out. God gave each of us a gift. If even one person isn’t using their gift then God compensates and provides for another, but what a wonderful world we would live in if everyone was using their gifts as the Lord would will us to. Each one of us is like a single puzzle piece and our gifts help complete the work that God has prepared for us here on earth. Imagine a puzzle with pieces missing and you can see how the beauty of God’s creation is even evident in the management of his plans for us.
When we were out yesterday, I was looking at how beautiful the lake and trees and sunset were and thinking about how the sun reflected just right on the trees and through the clouds and how the breeze was coming across the water and simply admiring the beauty of God’s creation and that each of those things were just themselves. The water didn’t give off light and we didn’t go swimming in the trees, and the sun didn’t blow to cool us off. Each part does what God created it to do and that is what makes it so beautiful. God created you and me with SPIRITUAL gifts and we ALL have them, no matter how few or how small our gifts might seem, there is a purpose for them and that purpose is that they be used for God’s plan, not our plans. That way the puzzle of God’s plan is a complete picture without pieces missing.
God bless you all.
posted by Jon+ | 10:46 PM
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