"God-Powered Appliances"
Oct.31/04 Eph.3:20-4:16 (1Pet.4:10f) NCD "Gift-Oriented Ministry"
Now We're Really Moving
This week some of us had a very moving experience. In fact it was so moving we had to get in our vehicles and drive somewhere! Our fellowship helped an individual move their worldly possessions from one spot to another.(other comments) What would have been an overwhelming project for just one person with one vehicle became very manageable 1when we all pitched in together with our menagerie of trucks, vans, and trailers.
The Natural Church Development quality characteristic called "Gift-Oriented Ministry" is something like that: it's about many believers bringing their God-given talents to bear on Kingdom work as God leads. Christian Schwarz, the German researcher behind NCD, uses the analogy of people pulling and pushing a cart with square wheels (graphic). Whump, whump, whump - you can imagine it'd be hard work to try to move along something like that! Meanwhile, what's inside the cart? A bunch of perfectly good round wheels. But they're not being used. The obvious solution that would make things much easier is to take off the square wheels and use round ones instead - wheels that are already provided.
When Schwarz surveyed Christians in German-speaking Europe, some 80% could not even identify their gifts. The square wheels, then, represent a person who assumes a ministry that is outside his or her giftedness. Trying to serve on our own power, without God's help, is hard. The many unused round wheels in the cart represent Christians who haven't discovered their gifts or aren't using them for the Kingdom.
When we make a point to discover the spiritual gifts God gives individuals, and encourage people to apply their talents, the overall ministry of the church goes more easily, with God's strength - and He is glorified as a result.
Gifts from Grace
Eph.4:7-8 says, “But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it. This is why it says: "When he ascended on high, he led captives in his train and gave gifts to men."” Earlier, v4 emphasized that those who believe in Christ are one body, filled by one Spirit: but just as you can't hear with your finger or tell the temperature by your hair, there's a great variety amongst the members of a church 'body'. Paul insists grace has been given to each one of us "as Christ apportioned it". The expression or form this grace takes is your particular gift, that's what encapsulates Jesus' grace for you and shows it to the world.
Everybody in the church has a part to play. In 4:12 the role of the leaders is "to prepare God's people for works of service" - literally, "works of ministry". A church may have only one or a few pastors, but there are always MANY 'ministers' - everybody that serves. A more literal translation of the phrase "prepare God's people" is "for the mending [repair] of the saints". You folks are the axes and hoes, the combine cylinders and mower blades out doing your work all week; on Sundays we gather to be honed and sharpened and welded up again so we're all renewed for another week's service.
1Peter 4:10 also highlights the importance of Christ's followers discovering and employing their unique gifts. It says, “Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s grace in its various forms.” Hear those words, "faithfully administering" - the term is that of being a steward, someone entrusted with a responsibility. Putting our gift into practice is an obligation, our obedient response to God trusting a particular talent to our care. The 'gifts' are described as "God's grace in its various forms": again, the form your spiritual gift takes is actually an expression of divine grace.
Patricia Brown, author of SpiritGifts, identifies 18 different spiritual gifts listed in Rom.12(3-8), 1Cor.12(4-11,27-31) and Eph.4(7-16) (CHART/ bulletin p.3): prophecy pastoring teaching encouragement giving compassion wisdom knowledge faith healing miracles discernment tongues interpretation apostleship assisting leadership & evangelism. This isn't exhaustive: Peter Wagner's questionnaire adds others - hospitality, administration, voluntary poverty, celibacy, intercession, & exorcism.
How can you discover what your spiritual gifts actually are? A place to start is with a free inventory which can be done on the internet (see links in bulletin; these range from 35 to 125 questions, and 7 to 25 gifts). Another way is to reflect on your previous experience serving in various capacities. Bob Logan & Tom Clegg offer these questions: Joy - What ministry activities bring you personal satisfaction and fulfillment? Insight - Do you spot special needs and/or problems in some situations that go beyond the perceptions of ordinary Christians? In what ways? Results - Where have you been particularly effective? What ministry activities are easy for you to do? What behaviours do you seem to do repeatedly? Confirmation - How have others in the Body of Christ affirmed and/or encouraged you in ministry? Passion is another important factor - a strong emotional stirring you may have focused on a particular target group or need related to God's Kingdom work.
Another way to find out your gift is by trial and error. Get involved in different kinds of serving in the church; it's not just a matter of what drains or energizes you, but whether you sense the Spirit amplifying and rewarding even the demanding jobs. Offering people exposure to various tasks also helps the church "cover the bases" of what's needed, from Nursery to Praise Band. Sometimes you don't know your gift until you venture into something you weren't sure that you'd like.
If you already think you know what your gift is, don't let that restrict you too narrowly in service. In the book Experiencing God, Henry Blackaby says God
calls you to a relationship where He is Lord -- where you are willing to do and be anything He chooses.If you will respond to Him as Lord, He may lead you to do and be things you would have never dreamed of.If you don't follow Him as Lord, you may lock yourself into a job or an assignment and miss something God wants to do through you.I've heard people say things like: 'God called me to be a...., so this other thing couldn't possibly be His will.' Or 'My spiritual gift is..., so this ministry couldn't be God's will for me.' God will never give you an assignment that He will not, at the same time, enable you to complete.That is what a spiritual gift is -- a supernatural empowering to accomplish the assignment God gives you.Don't, however, focus on your talents, abilities, and interests in determining God's will.I have heard so many people say, 'I would really like to do that; therefore, it must be God's will.' That kind of response is self-centred.We need to become God-centred instead.When He is Lord, your response should be something like this: 'Lord, I will do anything that Your kingdom requires of me.Wherever You want me to be, I'll go.Whatever the circumstances, I'm willing to follow.If You want to meet a need through my life, I am Your servant; and I will do whatever is required.
Supernatural Strength for Service
Our green minivan has character. Sometimes, just to be cute, for no reason it will keep the brake lights on when you leave it. No way can I figure out how to get them off! This quirk hasn't been a problem before now, but on Wednesday while I was at the hospital, the brake lights stayed on and drained the battery to the point the starter wouldn't turn the engine over. I plugged our (older-type) cell phone into the cigarette lighter to call Yvonne and tell her I'd be late; it rang twice, then even the cell phone died! The battery was really down.
Some people I knew who could have given me a boost were driving out of the parking lot just as I was making this discovery -- too late to catch them. It was an automatic transmission so I couldn't even start it manually by pushing it down John Street from the water tower. I raised the hood and attached the booster cables. The parking lot was lifeless except for a fellow with a backpack walking through who observed drily, "Not a happy sight." I decided to see if there was anyone at the radio station who might give me a boost, or at least let me use a phone. As I was walking over, another car turned into the parking lot; I raced back, and a lady in a newish Toyota graciously agreed to give me the boost I needed. The van didn't start right away, it took a fair bit of cranking - probably something to do with the electronics under the circumstances. But soon I could disconnect the cables, thank her appreciatively, and be on my way.
The point of the story is this: the van, sitting there dead in the parking lot, is like our spiritual gift when not hooked up with God's power. A fine thing, well designed, fully functional under normal circumstances - but without that initial zap of energy, it's going nowhere; absolutely useless. So, even if we have a spiritual gift, we still need to connect to God for His strength to exercise it. Eph.3:20 says: “Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us...” The Greek word for power is the root for our English term "dynamite": when God's 'dynamite' is being released inside us, we're able to do immeasurably more - 'abundantly far more', NRSV puts it - than all we ask or imagine. Wow! When we're functioning in our area of spiritual giftedness rather than mere human ability, we can even sense God's strength flowing through us. Eric Liddell, Olympic runner in Chariots of Fire, said, "God made me fast.When I run, I feel God's pleasure." He gave credit to God and sensed that partnership with the Almighty.
1Peter 4:11 echoes this principle, saying: “If anyone speaks, he should do it as one speaking the very words of God.If anyone serves, he should do it with the strength God provides...” When it comes to Christian service, unless your booster cables are hooked up to God's power source, the van's not going to get out of the driveway.
Christian Schwarz says, "When you live according to your spiritual giftedness you are no longer working in your own strength, but the Holy Spirit works in you. Thus even though you are 'just an ordinary person' you can accomplish, in the true sense of the word, extraordinary things...No factor influences the sense of joy in living the Christian life more than if we are living it according to our spiritual gifts.I can only support this conclusion from my own life.Ever since I tried to shape my ministry in harmony with my giftedness I have experienced three effects: first, I am happier; second, I am more effective; and third, I am more misunderstood by other Christians than ever before.Maybe this is a necessary price to pay for wanting to follow God's calling."
Glory to God
We really are God-powered appliances. A toaster or egg beater or blender on the kitchen counter won't do a thing unless it's plugged in. We have to be connected through the Holy Spirit. Neither should the iron be envious of the toaster and try to toast a slice of bread: it'll squish it! And the egg beaters shouldn't take it upon themselves to cut the turkey - better leave that to the electric knife, or you'll have turkey bits flying all over the place! Each appliance is designed for a different assignment. Things go much better in the church when you have individuals with the right giftings matched with the right task.
When the appliances stick to their tasks, the kitchen stays cleaner and the meal gets onto the table. When our spiritual gifts are employed properly, God gets honour and praise. 1Pet.4:11 concludes, “If anyone serves, he should do it with the strength God provides, so that in all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ.To him be the glory and the power for ever and ever.Amen.” Eph.3:21 implies that our letting God's power work in us, to do so much more than what we can ask or imagine, results in glory to God in the church and in Christ Jesus. Because it's obvious that we don't deserve the credit, for the results are far beyond what our solely human effort could account for.
Spiritual gifts, exercised in supernatural strength, bring glory to God. "Glory" is kind of a foreign concept these days. The lexicon defines it as "the kingly majesty which belongs to God as supreme ruler, majesty in the sense of the absolute perfection of deity...magnificence, excellence, preeminence, dignity, grace." On a humbler plane the word is related to "opinion, judgment, view"; perhaps along the lines of having a high estimation of something, to be held in high esteem. Our culture today places great value on self-fulfilment and self-esteem. A Biblical worldview, by contrast, begins with giving God the esteem or glory He is due, then locating our worth as an outgrowth of His by means of His grace multiplied in our gifting.
Faith is definitely required to start running a church on a gift-oriented basis. You can't just plug people into positions any more as a result of being 'guilted' into agreeing. Logan and Clegg explain: "Rather than attempting to fill positions to 'get the job done', you must first see people and their giftedness and then help them use their gifts to build God's Kingdom." Unfortunately, that's not usually how nominating committees work! Are we committed to a gift-based approach so much that we'll tolerate some empty positions in our church organizational chart? God's glory and mysterious working don't always fit our tidy human plans.
Ordinary People, Extraordinary Effects
God's power, unleashed through our gifts, can do "immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine," says the apostle Paul. From that, Schwarz concludes, "even though you are 'just an ordinary person' you can accomplish...extraordinary things." Gary Garrison and Paul Vanderham are two ordinary guys in Edmonton; one's a part-time college English teacher, the other is a management consultant. [photo] Can you tell which is which from this picture? Which one's the consultant -- the one holding the basketball or the guitar? Can't tell? That's because their ministry gifts differ from the skills they use at their regular job. (hint: TKUC stands for The King's University College, where Emily went) Gary (left) works as staff with Community Justice Ministries when he's not teaching; that's part of Mennonite Central Committee. He visits the maximum security prison in Edmonton every Tuesday, and coordinates a monthly visit with 20 volunteers. He says, "Christ Himself associated with criminals and He loved them. That's all the more reason why we should try to love them." This summer Gary recruited men from the community to form two teams for monthly softball, basketball, soccer and volleyball games at the prison. He says, "If you're on a team with somebody, you develop a rapport in some way.It's a good way to break down barriers between the inmates and the community." Are you starting to get a sense of what Gary's passion and gifts might be?
In March this year, Paul the consultant, a former prison schoolteacher from BC, instigated jam sessions with interested inmates. Once a month he holds two sessions from 6 to 9 pm. The few musical instruments at the prison tend to be cheap because of the threat posed against personal property. So Paul and Gary bring in with them song sheets, a couple of guitars and two sets of drums, so inmates can take turns playing. Can you guess which hymn might be the men's favourite request? Paul comments, "Amazing Grace is a powerful song, and it does seem to resonate with most of the prisoners. This is because it's an expression of God's love for us, and our ability to find rest in Him."
Amazing Grace - and wonderful gifts expressing that grace. Where the Holy Spirit's at work, there will be fruit. The prisoners are experiencing what it means to be believed in, that someone cares about them and can be trusted with the secrets they've had to bottle up inside. One inmate made a decision to follow Jesus and was baptized in June.
Gary and Paul are just ordinary guys, simply sharing their spiritual gifts with God's help. The Lord promises to do 'immeasurably more' than we ask as we discover our spiritual gifts and share His grace with others. Let's pray.