Naming Spiritual Gifts Comes after Using Them

Over the last few weeks, I’ve been preaching about ministry.  Every Christian is called to serve God and man, and every Christian is uniquely gifted for service.  I like the sentiment of this Christian lady who felt really uncomfortable doing the announcements in her church Sunday.  It was probably out of her spiritual gift-set if the truth was known, but she was willing.  She said in her blog:

So the next time your church asks for volunteers don’t think “Oh, I can’t do that, I’ll let someone more gifted do it.” Be willing. Serve. You don’t have to be perfect, God’s got that covered already.

I think she’s absolutely right.  Nevertheless I have also warned folks about Christians not paying enough attention to their spiritual gifts and working primarily within it.  Yet, I think I now have a more balanced approach.  John Piper helped me with this in a sermon called “Spiritual Gifts,” delivered March 15, 1981 available at www.desiringgod.org that said:

We must not get hung up on naming our gifts.  The thing to get hung up on is, “Are we doing what we can do to strenthen the faith of the people around us?”

In other words, don’t bother labeling your spiritual gifts, if you aren’t already putting them to use in some way.

 

 

Four Elements to the Definition of Ministry

Warren Wiersbe defines ministry with this sentence:

Ministry takes place when divine resources meet human needs through loving channels to the glory of God.

My take on this is that ministry occurs when God answers a need through your loving service, and God gets the credit. If we break that down, we’ll see that there are four elements to that definition:

1. God…His power, His authority, His resources initiate true ministry.
2. Need…Human physical and emotional needs are inumerable, but the greatest need is salvation.
3. Loving service…This is where the believer gets involved to put the hands and feet of God in action to meet the need.
4. Glory…And finally, ministry isn’t complete unless God gets the glory.

This week I’ll be preaching from Acts 3:1-9 where a lame man is healed. This is a good example of ministry because each of the four elements can be seen clearly. Thus, ministry is when the power of God meets human need through the love of the people of God, and ultimately God is glorified.