Ep #20: Listening to God about using your gifts for the church

Episode Transcript

Spencer
My wife, Emily, builds amazing relationships with internationals. She is musically gifted and picks up languages quickly and she really prefer the pace of slowing down in relationships. Now she also has this sense of humor that really enjoys seeing people put in kind of odd situations as they cross cultures. And so one of her unique gifts is being able to build those relationships with international students, scholars, folks that come to the United States.

Austin
So today we're going to start off picking up where we finish our last episode. So if you haven't listened to the last episode, feel free to go back and listen to episode 19 about abiding with Christ. But today we're going to say once our worth is settled, once we know that we are loved by Jesus and that He's set good works for us, it frees us then to be able to listen to God about the gifts and the passions that He's given us.
If we go back to Ephesians 2:10 from the last episode, God has created us for good words, which He has prepared for us before Him. We have been given unique gifts and talents. We've been given experiences that have shaped us, and formed us into a people and the people of God. And so we want to use those. We want to spend time with God in silence and solitude to hear from Him who he says we are.
But it's also really important to spend time with brothers and sisters in the faith so they can encourage and exhort us to use our gifts that God has given us. Again, we are conduits of the gifts that God has given to then bless the world around us. So then say God, what aspect of the kingdom do you want me to bring forth today?
And it's simply an open handed posture where we say, God, I want to use all of these things that you've given me for the benefit of the world around me. So we move from being self-centered to Christ and we move from looking at the temporal what's in front of me today to the eternal. We say, God, I want to serve you with everything that you've given.
So how does that contrast with maybe what our culture says about our gifts and talents?

Spencer
Well, culture would really focus again on what those gifts are. But they would be, as you were talking about, centered on how do I get my basically how do I make sure that I get glory, I get praise, I get to do the things that I dictate that I'm good at.
So it would even be this sense of a right that if I am good at activities A, B, and C, well, I better be able to do those, especially if those bring me a level of fulfillment or satisfaction. I need to be able to define that. That is going to be what I'm going to be doing. Whereas when we are obedient, our posture is different to the Lord.
We're not looking at that as a right. We're looking at that as part of what he's given us and then laying that for him. So Austin, where are we headed today with our main scripture.

Austin
we’re looking at Romans 12:1-8. And in the context of Romans, we have walked through Paul's deep theological exploration of Christ, work in the cross for our salvation, and we get to Chapter 12 and we are reminded over and over Jesus has brought us into relationship with himself and is sending us into the world and we're reminded we can't do any of this alone.
We are only empowered through the Holy Spirit, through the Spirit of God, to then go to the world, to serve the world, as Christ has called us to. And then we're reminded as well that we are a communal people. The people have got our communal work to work to bring people collaboratively to the face of Jesus. So they may see him and experience him.
But again, it's all through the empowering work to the spirit. We look back to the last episode. It is through grace, it's not through our work. So we have to be relying on Christ, his finished work, to be able to live out this this life that he's called us to. So in this text, Paul is exhorting us to live into God's unique design.
Spencer, do you want to go ahead and read it through the text for us.

Spencer
Paul says, “1 I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. 2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

3 For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. 4 For as in one body we have many members, and the members do not all have the same function, so we, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another. 6 Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them: if prophecy, in proportion to our faith; if service, in our serving; the one who teaches, in his teaching; the one who exhorts, in his exhortation; the one who contributes, in generosity; the one who leads, with zeal; the one who does acts of mercy, with cheerfulness.”

Austin
Yeah. So Paul begins these verses by telling us that we need to present our bodies, our present ourselves, to lay ourselves, to give ourselves to God as a sacrifice.
He has given it to us. So we start in anything that we are by laying it before Jesus. Because if we don't lay it back down before God, then we move from being open handed with the Lord to being closed. What's mine is mine. I get to use it myself, but I start by presenting myself back to God in worshipful obedience, and it allows me to then be used by God in these gifts and experience that have the gifts and the talents that I have are not just for me.
And I think, again, we go back to what culture says. Culture is going to be pulling him, pressing it. Use your gifts for you. Get ahead. But here, God says, no lay it back before me. Paul is exhorting us later. Just put the word lay your body before it was his gift to you in the first place. And then we need to be transformed by Christ to serve the body of Christ.
If we are one body, then we serve the body of Christ. And then as the body of Christ, we serve the broader world around us. You know, we've talked about this a couple of times before, but this idea from Acts 4 that there was not a needy person among them. I think it's a really challenging thing because it means that we are using our gifts to serve the church, and they're not primarily meant for me.
It's for the church, for the world around. And we must regularly present ourselves before Christ and ask that He searches our hearts. I love Psalm 139 It starts off with, Oh Lord, you have searched me and known me, you know, and I sit down when I rise up to serve my thoughts from afar. It's this call and it's a reminder of God.
You do search. But at the very end he finishes the song is Finish it, search me. You got to know my heart. Try me and know my thoughts. See if there is any grievous way in and lead me into the way of lasting. It's this duality of God searches us and He knows us. And we also ask Him to search us and know us.
It's both He does it but also we are open handed to say, God, I don't know what's best and I need you to search me and root out any of those things that are bitter or that are self-centered and self-seeking. As I think about using my gifts, what are some other things that you see in this passage?

Spencer
Well, I think we come back to if we don't have our identity secure in Jesus and his work in his movement to us, then we can feel an insecurity and we can try to wrap up even what we do for the church in trying to justify our existence out there so we can work for God rather than walking with God. I think that is a real danger because then we start to say, Well, I really need to be able to do A, B, and C because that's where my gifts are, that's where I'm going to have the most impact. Sometimes what the church needs, somebody that's willing to scrub the floor. I may not be gifted in that. I may not be gifted in that. Sometimes we need somebody to take out the trash. Sometimes we need someone who's willing to go change diapers. You know, in the nursery there's a lot of different needs.
And sometimes those line up perfectly and we can use them and God can speak into that through brothers and sisters. And sometimes the use as a weakness. You know, I think of 2 Corinthians 12:9-10. Paul says that when he is weak, that God uses that as a strength. And so we have to be careful as we think about these these things and always come back to that first verse, I think, which basically says, I'm a living sacrifice.
You know, I want to to, to be that which is used in whatever way the Lord sees fit.

Austin
And you know, that middle part that says we are one body and our talents and the gifts that are bestowed upon us by God. You know, I think about I've been listening to this podcast that is called Jesus Speaks Farsi, and it's put on by Elam Ministries that their sole purpose is to serve the church in Iran and empower the church in Iran.
If you know anything about Iran, the church is not supposed to be there. At least by the government. They're not supposed to be there. But the beautiful thing that I that I have been so impacted by as I've listened to this is I hear stories about how these believers are experiencing Jesus, how their faith is being challenged and shaped, how they are being pressed to go share their faith and a country that sharing their faith can get you killed.
A lot of them have been in prison once, if not multiple times. And it just is this reminder that they are encouraging me to love and to trust Jesus and to be more bold in my faith around other nonbelievers and maybe even around other Christians that don't want to be bold, like listening to stories of believers around the world transforms me to be part of the body of Christ.
And I think that's the beauty of being part of this global body. Believers in Nigeria, China, Chile, Iran. They can transform us and change the way that we see God. I remember the title of this one book that I read, “Misreading Scripture with Western Eyes.” If I've just got my blinders on to this is what is true.
Well, I guarantee you, my brothers and sisters in Iran, they don't have the same blinders that I do. Their cultural lenses are different. And so just like I need people that are next to me, that people that are close to me physically in proximity, I also need the global church to be shaping me and transforming.

Spencer
What I think about that conversation with a Chinese pastor many, many years ago am saying we are so grateful for people, missionaries from the West who have come and shared the gospel with us at the same time, we pray that the economic prosperity that you've seen in the West does not come and extend to us because it has been in the tribulation, it's been persecution that we have seen our faith grow and our church multiply here.
So just a very different slant on how to use those things that God has given and even the difficult things that God allows that he would prefer rather than what we would consider gifts of peace and prosperity.

Austin
You know, Spencer, as I think, about the ten years on staff that I spent with our missions organization and my trajectory there.
I had just graduated college when my wife and I moved to Denver to serve the Lord with Destino, a ministry reaching out to let the students. And it was so exciting. We were in a new place where this was a new season and the Lord is moving in a lot of ways. Our team prayed regularly together and we really saw God do some incredible things.
Now I will be totally forthright. I am an introvert and the idea of spending 8 hours a day talking to people kind of scares me, but I was able to lay that before the Lord and say, God, this is a amazing opportunity to serve you with these people. And a lot of the days I ended up tired.
But as time wore on and I continue to live outside of my gifts, I started seeing myself close my hands a little bit more frustrated and bitter that I wasn't using my gifts. And as I got on campus, I felt frustrated that I was on campus. And it was a time that I really wanted to push back and be like, God, I don't like this because this is not what I'm good at.
And thankfully, there were some other circumstances that happened that God was opening doors for us. And thankfully in the last couple of years that I was on staff with this organization was able to come back to Knoxville and serve in roles that, again, God allowed me to live out my gifts. And I finished my time with the missions organization in a really positive place where I was enjoying my coworkers, enjoying the work that I was doing.
But I had to move through those joy, excitement, but also the bitterness and realizing like, I want what I want, not always what I didn't always want, what God wanted. When I was able to release that back, he allowed me to to serve him in ways that he is gifted and designed me. What are maybe some ways that you've seen your gifts and talents be used by the Lord?

Spencer
Well, I think about laying things before the Lord, just like you were talking about. One of the images that came to mind. My family and I have been watching The Chosen. And so in season three, you see the disciples and Jesus make the decision of who's going to have the money bag. And initially, they all look to Matthew because of his experience.
But Matthew says, even those I'm gifted there, I don't feel like I can do that faithfully. It would not be good for me because of how I've used those gift things in the past. So he declines. And it's just this reminder that sometimes, even though we have those gift things, even though we have a capability, it doesn't necessarily mean that we're supposed to use those.
The Lord may be calling us to something that's entirely different. And so I think I kind of go back and forth sometimes with this idea of, okay, I do want to be able to use those gifts for the Lord. I want to lay them before the Lord and my mind, the way it works, typically quite good at mental math, quite good at strategy and these kinds of different things.
But I've also seen plenty of different scenarios where either a nonprofit or church has welcomed a business titan onto the board of directors or onto the Church Finance Committee or what have you. And the way that they've historically used their gifts and talents have not been aligned to first listening to God. They may be able to clean up the balance sheet, may make the PNL look better, may make some strategic decisions.
But when we think back of our biblical stories about strategy, the strategy is put it before the Lord listen and obey. Nobody would know. Military general would say that what Joshua did around Jericho and marching around seven times and blowing a trumpet made any strategic sense. You know what Gideon did, you know, and sending away almost everybody didn't make any sense.
I think we have to be really careful as we as we lay those gifts again before the Lord, because there have been plenty of times that that gifting that I've had, I've used strategy in a way that I wasn't listening, you know, to God. And so I'm I'm quite careful. I want to be quite careful as I go that direction, that there's time that's built in to actually listen and kind of move forward in a more deliberate pace rather than just say, okay, this is a slam dunk strategically, we need to do this.
If we listen to the Lord, if we have multiple different voices and different angles, then sometimes we protect each other. I think in ways that are really, really important and protect the overall body. Because if the foot is really good at running, the foot might have you just, you know, run a marathon, but the rest of the body might not be there, you know?

And I think that sometimes, you know, if we only focus on maybe what one group of people is really good at, sometimes they can take us in a direction that we just need those other brothers and sisters speaking in to that circumstance. We need to be really good listeners in that place too.

Austin
As we close out, you know, couple of things we want to say as stewards how do we move forward? And really it comes back to let's listen to the Lord, not just by myself, let's listen to the Lord together. You know, it's been really helpful for me to sit with groups of friends at different seasons because different people see me differently and we change over time. The spiritual gift assessment that I took when I was 18 probably is not the same because I had just come to Christ versus now almost 36.
So we need to regularly be before the Lord and say, God, how have you gifted me? How are you changing me in shaping me and designing me and then asking your friends to do that together with us and saying, how then can we serve the church? How can we serve our neighbors? How how can we serve the world around us?
So listening to God individually and listening to God collectively and I think then just asking, what are you sensing your gifts are? What are you sensing as you listen to the Lord of what he is gifted you with and then maybe even ask yourself, like, I had to ask myself a hard question Am I resisting the Lord? Have I allowed a root of bitterness to spring up to where I'm saying I don't want to use those gifts or the things that you've called me to I don't want to do.
You know, we have to constantly be willing to go to those places and say, Search me. Oh, God in my heart, See if there be any for you this way and lead me into the way everlasting.

Spencer
And it's that posture of coming back to the Lord each day and saying, How will you lose? How will you use it? Please use me. Please give me opportunities to honor you and responding there that you know, whether it's or reflecting on a way that maybe we've been resisting him or maybe a way that we haven't even asked him if we can use our gifts. We've been so timid that we haven't said, you know, this is what I actually love to do, Lord would you set this up? And maybe he won't do it that day or that month. Maybe he puts things in place where it's a longer term peace. But if we don't even ask him, then there's so much that we may miss.

Austin
Absolutely. Well, we hope you enjoyed this episode and feel free to share with friend. Talk about a friend. Spencer and I really enjoy talking about all this stuff together before we the cameras on but the audio on whoever wherever you're listening but share with friend talk about it with a friend take some time to listen to the Lord and see where he's guiding you. We'll see you next time.