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Will There Be a Test? Sermon · Beyond the Sermon

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You're listening to Beyond the Sermon, the podcast of First
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Methodist Church in Collingswood, NJ.
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On our podcast, the goal is not just to share the sermons we've
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preached, but to go beyond the sermon and talk about what we're
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learning and what God is doing in US and in our community.
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You can find more information about our church at
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fumccollingswood.org. Thanks for listening.
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This morning Scripture comes from the book of Romans, all of
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chapter 12. Therefore, I urge you, brothers
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and sisters, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as a
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living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God.
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This is your true and proper worship.
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Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed
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by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test
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and approve what God's will is, His good, pleasing, and perfect
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will. For by the grace given me, I say
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to everyone of you, do not think of yourself more highly than you
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ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment in
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accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you.
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For just as each of us has one body with many members, and
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these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ
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we though many form 1 body, and each member belongs to all the
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others. We have different gifts
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according to the grace given to each of us.
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If your gift is prophesying, then prophecy, prophecy in
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accordance with your faith. If it is serving, then serve.
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If it is teaching, then teach. If it is to encourage, then give
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encouragement. If it is giving, then give
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generously. If it is to lead, do it
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diligently. If it is to show mercy, do it
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cheerfully. Love must be sincere.
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Hate what is evil, cling to what is good.
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Be devoted to one another and love honour one another above
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yourselves. Never be lacking in zeal, but
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keep your spiritual fervor serving the Lord.
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Be joyful in hope, patient and affliction, Faithful in prayer.
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Share with the Lord's people who are in need.
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Practice hospitality. Bless those who persecute you.
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Bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice.
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Mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one
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another. Do not be proud, but be willing
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to associate with people of low position.
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Do not be conceited. Do not repay an anyone evil for
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evil. Be careful to do what is right
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in the eyes of everyone if it is possible.
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As far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.
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Do not take revenge, my dear friends, but leave room for
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God's wrath, for it is written, it is mine to avenge.
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I will repay, says the Lord. On the contrary, if your enemy
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is hungry, feed him. If he is thirsty, give him
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something to drink, and doing this you will keep burning coals
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on his head. Do not be overcome by evil, but
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overcome evil with good. This is the word of God for the
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people of God. Thanks be to God.
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Amen. Back in my college days at
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Asbury, I took Western Civil. Wanted to anybody else take
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Western Civil somewhere along the way?
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Yeah. I took it from the same
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professor both semesters. Dr. Span.
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Now, Doctor Span was the kind of kind of professor that you
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either loved or you didn't, right?
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I, I love to study history and I loved learning from Doctor
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Spann. Meg, not so much.
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That's OK. One thing that you did not want
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to ask Doctor Spann was whether or not something was going to be
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on the test. He didn't appreciate that
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question. He, he felt that everything in
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his class was worth learning, whether it was on the test or
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not. And, and, and The thing is,
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Doctor Spann's tests were a bit notorious.
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They were primarily multiple choice questions, which is
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great. Sounds good.
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But I remember at least once that the multiple choice options
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went through letter Q, which if you're already starting to count
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in your head, is the 17th letter of the alphabet.
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And that doesn't mean that there were 17 distinct options, right?
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17 different things. Choose the right one.
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No, no, no, no, no. There were probably about 6
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answers in there, A through F and then the rest of the options
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were things like letters A through C or BC and E or B
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through F but not D You didn't have to choose the right answer,
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you had to choose the best answer or try to anyway.
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Now, for many people within the church, much of their
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familiarity with spiritual gifts revolves around the idea of of
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taking some kind of assessment. Right?
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A spiritual gifts test. You answer a bunch of questions,
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you tally up the scores, you see which scores are the highest,
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and boom, there's your spiritual gifts.
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Anyone ever take a test like that?
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I have. I have a version of it sitting
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on a shelf in my office. What usually happens after a
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test like that? What usually happens?
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All right, I can't hear your answers.
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Chances are, unfortunately, not much, right?
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A lot of times we take those tests, we we try to identify
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spiritual gifts and then we don't really talk about it much
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after that. Here's the thing about spiritual
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gifts tests, though. They can't actually tell you
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where you're spiritually gifted. OK, these spiritual gifts tests,
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they can't actually tell you where you're spiritually gifted.
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That's because even the best of these tests, they can't
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distinguish between spiritual gifts and the other things we've
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talked about, natural abilities, acquired skills.
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A test can only judge what you have experienced with, not where
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you're supernaturally empowered for ministry to the church.
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So for me, shepherding often comes up on a spiritual gifts
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test if I were to take it. That's largely because of the
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role I I've been called to as a pastor, right?
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And when I'm asked a question like this is a real question
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from a spiritual gifts test, I feel a responsibility to nurture
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others in Christian discipleship.
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Yeah, it kind of comes with the territory, right?
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Of course I feel that. Does that mean I'm spiritually
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gifted as a shepherd? Not necessarily, but it can
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point me to things that are worth exploring.
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But here's another thing about spiritual gifts test They only
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can take into account our own experiences, right?
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Which means that they can only ever reflect on things that we
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have already experienced. How could you know, for
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instance, if you have the spiritual gift of interpreting
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tongues, if you've never been in a context where someone was
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speaking in tongues? How do you know if you have the
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gift of healing if you've grown up and been formed in a church
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that believes the power gifts stopped with the 12 apostles,
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right? That's a doctrine called
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cessationism. I don't believe that.
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How can you know you have maybe the gifts of helps or mercy if
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you've never been told that those are gifts given by the
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Holy Spirit and empowered by the Spirit for building up the
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church? The short answer is, you can't.
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That's why we're taking this time through this series and
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into the summer to teach on the gifts of the Spirit, to begin to
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build some, some common language around these ideas to be able to
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begin to identify the gifts we and others have been given.
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So that we can begin to exercise the gifts we've been given and,
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and grow in our cooperation with the Holy Spirit to, to define
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some, some house rules right, for how those gifts are going to
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be used here in this congregation of the church.
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Last thing I'll say about spiritual gifts test, at least
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for the next 3 minutes, is that when you go online, you find a
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random spiritual gifts test and, and be honest.
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How many of you have already done that since we started this
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sermon series? Anybody, couple people.
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OK, all right. No judgement there.
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But when you found that random gifts test online, how do you
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know you agree with the theology that underlies that test?
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Do you even know what the theology is?
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Do do you know what your theology of spiritual gifts is?
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Do you know what the, the, what gifts the author of that online
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test believes are gifts and therefore are even possible to
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get as a result on the test, right?
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Not all spiritual gifts tests are created equal.
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There's underlying presumptions, assumptions underneath all of
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them. And we've been talking a lot
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about spiritual gifts over the past month here in our Sunday
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morning services, in our sermon series, in in our Wednesday
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night study of supernatural, in our Sunday school classes.
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You all are talking about some of these things, and I'm sure at
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least a few of you are probably wondering how do we discover
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what gifts we have? If it's true that the Holy
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Spirit gives every believer at least one spiritual gift, how do
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I know what mine is? Especially if we're not supposed
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to go take a test. Well, I want to answer that
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question this more. Give some practical things that
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can help us discover what spiritual gifts the Holy Spirit
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has given to us. But not before we take a look at
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that scripture passage that Jeremy read for us from Romans
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chapter 12. This is one of the key passages
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in the New Testament when it comes on comes to teaching on
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the spiritual gifts, right? We've got this one, We've got
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First Corinthians 12 through 14. We've been spending a lot of
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time there. There's Ephesians 4, a couple
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other small places, but this is one of the main ones.
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And so I just want to walk for a couple minutes through the
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structure of Romans 12 and kind of give an interpretation,
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highlight some things that go into discovering our spiritual
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gifts, right? This is Paul teaching the the
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Roman Church, and by extension US today.
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So this chapter begins with Paul calling the Christians in Rome
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to surrender, right? To to offer themselves as a
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living sacrifice. You can't offer yourself as a
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sacrifice without a deep level of surrender.
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Because you know what happens with a sacrifice, right?
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It gets burnt up on the altar, right?
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There's surrender involved there.
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That's the first step, surrendering to what God might
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have for us. Then Paul says that we need to
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have our minds renewed, our thinking, how we think about the
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world and what God's doing. We need to have our minds
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renewed, which leads then to transformed lives, because it's
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only then that we'll be able to know what God's will is, which I
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believe includes the spiritual gifts he gives his children.
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This whole conversation about spiritual gifts has to be
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approached in a deep level of humility, right?
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We're we're discovering, we're learning.
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That's going to involve some trial and error, right?
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We're not always going to get it right as we learn to operate
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within these spiritual gifts. There's a humility there, and
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there's a humility because we have to remember that none of
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the gifts of God are given because we're worthy.
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Even the faith we have has been given as a gift from God because
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of who He is, not because of who we are.
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And then, just as we saw in First Corinthians 12, Paul again
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says that there are different gifts for different people,
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right? This is clear teaching.
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We don't all have the same gifts, and these gifts are given
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in accordance with the grace that's given to each one of us.
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This is in accordance. Oh, sorry, I just said that
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there. But there's a fun little word
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play going on here in the Greek here in verse 6.
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Let's pull up that verse. It says we have different gifts
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according to the grace given to each of us.
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And what it says there is that we have different charisma
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according to the chorus given to each of us.
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Grace and gifts are intimately linked.
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You can't talk about gifts without talking about grace.
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It's, it's only by God's grace that these gifts are given.
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Paul then give some encouragement to use your gifts.
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Well, no matter what they are, no matter whether you think you
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have a really important gift or or maybe you think you have a
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not so important gift, I, I promise you they're all
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important and they're all given for the purpose of building up
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the church. So use your gift.
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Well. Paul says if, if your gift is to
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prophecy, then prophecy. Well, if it's to give, give
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generously. If it's to serve or to, to offer
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mercy, then do it cheerfully. Use your gift well.
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And then there's a whole section that we're not going to get into
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this morning on the character that needs to be formed in us as
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the people of God, right? Just like First Corinthians 13
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sandwiched right in that conversation about spiritual
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gifts. And, and it begins with love.
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Love must be sincere. And then Paul goes on to
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describe exactly what that love looks like in contrast to good
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and evil, and what it looks like to operate as a person of
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goodness who follows a God who's good.
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But what Paul doesn't tell us here in Romans 12, what Paul
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doesn't tell us in in First Corinthians 13 or 1212 or 13 or
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14, what Paul doesn't tell, what the New Testament doesn't tell
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us, is how we determine what gifts we've been given.
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It's not there. In fact, nowhere in the New
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Testament does it give a prescription for how we come to
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know what gifts we've been given.
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So what do we do? I'm glad you asked.
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With our remaining time, I want to give you 6 tools, 6
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principles, 6 things to keep in mind to help you discover where
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you are spiritually gifted. Things that I think have been
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proven over time and across a wide swath of people.
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And these aren't necessarily tools that I've identified.
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Much of this comes from John Thompson's teaching at Sanctus
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Church, his teaching on spiritual gifts.
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But it's been confirmed in my own experience, and I've seen it
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confirmed in the lives of others.
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So here we go, 6 tools to help you discover your spiritual
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gifts #1 Connect the dots. Connect the dots.
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You remember doing Connect the dots when you were a kid.
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There are numbered dots on a blank part of a picture, and as
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you drew a straight line from each dot, you'd see, you know
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the number the dots were numbered, and then as you
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connected them, you'd see a picture start to come together
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and you eventually drew the outline of of that image onto
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the picture. Same principle applies to
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gifting, right? If if you're serving the church
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and something happens once, well, that might be an exception
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or a coincidence. If something starts to happen
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twice, well, now that's, that's an interesting coincidence.
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If something happens 345 times, that's when you really need to
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start paying attention and connecting the dots, right?
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If a potential gift shows up repeatedly across different
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situations over time, that may be a sign that you've been
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gifted in that area. Emphasis on the maybe, right?
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We still need to do some more digging, some more praying
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there. So that's, that's tool #1 though
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connect the dots, tool #2 points of frustration, points of
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frustration. We're talking about those places
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where you consistently feel frustrated with the church that
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may point to your spiritual gifts.
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Now, I'm not talking about the things that rub up against your
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personal preferences, right? Like whether we sing from the
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hymnal or we sing from the screen.
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Now, I'm not talking about other people in the church who
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frustrate us, right? Not that anybody here has
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identified those people. I mean things when I'm talking
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about points of frustration. I mean things that when you look
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around the church, you're frustrated that it's not being
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done more or or it's not being done well enough.
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For example, you might walk around saying we just don't pray
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enough in this church. That may be true, but it also
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may indicate that you've been given a gift of intercession.
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You might listen to conversations around the church
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and think, wow, we've got a lot of of really big ideas.
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We've got a lot of good ideas, how come no one ever makes them
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happen? Might point to a gift of
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administration, right? Those places of frustration are
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an indicator that that maybe we should dig in a little deeper to
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what's going on there. 3rd tool, we're going to keep moving this
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morning, so keep up. The third tool is the power tool
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principle, right? Anybody remember home
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improvement from the 90s? Yeah, a few of you not, not
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talking about Tim Taylor kind of power tool principles, but but
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this principle gets into the question of whether we're doing
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a task out of gifting or out of discipline.
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Are we doing it because we're gifted or are we doing it
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because it's a good thing and as Christians we should be doing
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it? They're both good.
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But if you think about cutting down a tree, if you think about
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cutting down a tree, there are multiple tools that you can use
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to do that job. But cutting down a tree is going
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to be far easier if I can do it with a chainsaw rather than an
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axe, right? Both are going to cut down the
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tree, but the chainsaw does it with far more ease.
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A spiritual gift that God's given, that the Holy Spirit
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empowers, it comes with a sense of spirit enabled ease and
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effectiveness. Ease and effectiveness that go
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beyond what discipline alone can achieve.
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Some of you hear about opportunities to go serve the
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homeless, maybe with Seeds of Hope or something like that, or
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to work with teen moms like we did at Christmas time with Young
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Lives. And you're like, sign me up, of
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course I'll sign up. Why would anybody not sign up to
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do that? You might have a gift of mercy.
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I do not. I have to choose to do those
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things. It doesn't come naturally or
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even super naturally for me. That kind of ministry is a
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discipline, not a gift. But for you, you might have a
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gift of mercy. And you think everybody should
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have a gift of mercy. I get it.
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Power tools. Next, the lost sheep principle.
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You all know that that parable that Jesus told 1 sheep who
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wanders off and what does Jesus do?
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He leaves the 99 to go find that one sheep.
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How many of you, if you were the shepherd in that parable, are
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going to go after the 1 sheep? Three of you.
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OK, how many of you are going to stay with the 99 sheep?
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All right, a few more of you. I'm going to ask it the first
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one again, how many of you are going after the 1 sheep?
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You see that one sheep on or off?
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You're like, man, I got to go get that sheep before he gets
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hurt. All right.
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It can be helpful to recognize whether you naturally focus more
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on the group or on the individual, because some
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spiritual gifts that the Spirit gives are oriented towards
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serving large groups, while others are geared more towards
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ministering to a single person, and some can have different
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expressions that aim at both. For instance, if you have the
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gift of leadership, you're probably focused on the 99.
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You're probably not going to leave the 99 just for the sake
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of the wand because leaders lead groups.
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But if you have a gift of mercy, gift of compassion, you might
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feel pulled toward either 1. You might be pulled toward the
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group, but you might say, well, what about Martha?
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We got to go after poor Martha, before something happens to her,
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before she gets lost, she's sick at home.
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We got to go and we got to serve for Martha.
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Got to pay attention to whether you're oriented to the one or
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the many, because it might help direct or interpret how you
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experience the gifts you've been given #5 I think we're up to
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where is good fruit produced, right?
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This is the good fruit test. When you engage in that
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ministry, whatever that ministry happens to be, what comes up
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inside of you, right? Is this ministry that you're
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involved in something that brings you joy?
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When you're doing this ministry, do you sense that God is close
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to you, His nearness, His delight in you when you're doing
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that thing, do those on the receiving end of the ministry
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you're offering, do they feel loved?
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Do they feel ministered too? Jesus said we would know false
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teachers by their fruit, but I think the same is true of
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spiritual gifts. I'm sure at some point you've
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seen someone stand up and preach a message and at the end of it
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you're like, well, that was that was something.
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Thanks for teaching. Maybe don't do it again, right?
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We've all heard it. Maybe there's been a time when
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someone has come to share something with you and you
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received it, you appreciated it. But then you're like, wait a
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minute. That kind of stung a little bit.
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It's like they they hugged you, then they slapped you, then they
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hugged you again, right? That's the gift of exhortation.
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It's an encouragement that comes a little strong sometimes, but
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it can help to look at the fruit it's produced in you, produced
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in other people, when you're doing that ministry last 1.
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And in a way, this principle underlies everything I've said
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up to this point. All the other things we want to
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look at, all the other considerations we want to make,
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this one underlies everything I've said to this point.
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And that is that community is key.
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Community is key, and it's key because it is almost impossible
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to discover your spiritual gifts in isolation.
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It's almost impossible to discover how the Spirit has
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gifted you in isolation because sometimes others can see in you
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what you can't see in yourself. Sometimes we need to call out
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the gifts that we see operating in others because they don't
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recognize it. They they either don't know that
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it's a gift or they just think this is the way everybody is and
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should be. They think they're just doing
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what a good Christian does. And doesn't everybody do it that
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way or see it that way? And besides, the whole point of
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the spiritual gifts is to build up the church, right?
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Which implies that other people will be a part of you using your
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gifts. Community is key because we need
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the balance of all the gifts that we don't have, especially
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balance across those categories of love gifts, word gifts, power
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gifts that we talked about a few weeks ago.
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None of us are given all of the gifts, and none of us can do all
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the church is called to do on our own.
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We need one another, and we need one another's gifts.
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It's the only way the body of Christ will be healthy.
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So you want to know where you're spiritually gifted?
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Don't take a test you find online.
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Start a conversation with a trusted friend.
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Ask them, what do you see in me that I might not see in myself?
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When when I'm doing ministry, where do you see me come alive,
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right? Pay attention to what brings you
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joy and the fruit that's produced.
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Connect the dots. Oh, this kind of this keeps
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happening. Maybe there's something there
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and another one that that didn't even make it onto the list.
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Ask God. Ask God what your spiritual,
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what He's given you as, as your spiritual gifts and listen for
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an answer, right? He's given me so much helpful
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clarity in this area, even over the past few months.
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Ask Him what are my spiritual gifts and ask Him what are not
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my spiritual gifts. What what are gifts?
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I think maybe I have that you haven't given me, or you've
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given as a natural ability, or I've learned to do it as an
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acquired skill. Ask him, ask him and be open
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because there might be things that that you've never even
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considered and he wants to use you to build up his church, our
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congregation, through the gifts he's given you.
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Here you go, 6-7 things to pay attention to as you're trying to
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figure out how God has gifted you.
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Let's pray together father, we come to you today and we're so
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grateful that you are a giver of good gifts.
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James says every good and perfect gift comes from you.
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Father of Lights and Jesus said that if we as sinful, evil
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people know to give our children a fish when they ask for a fish,
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how much more will you, Father, give the Holy Spirit to those
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who ask? So we're asking God, would you
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pour out your Spirit on us? Would you help us to discover
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the ways you've uniquely gifted each of us to serve your Church
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and to advance your Kingdom purposes in the world we want to
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live like Jesus lived, surrendered to you Father, and
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empowered by you, Holy Spirit. So would you help us as we
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discover? Would you help us be open to
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listen, to trust, to look to you, and to trust you in that
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gifting? Would you speak clearly to us
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about you, about how you've gifted us and how you've not
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gifted us so we can cooperate with what you want to do in the
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world around us? We love you, we give you
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ourselves, and we pray this Jesus in your name, Amen.