Stir Up Your Gifts
This past weekend we hosted Walter and Ida Cowart for our Activate, Ignite seminar. It was a wonderful time of worship, teaching and most importantly activating our spiritual gifts, especially the gift of prophecy. In reflecting on the weekend I was reminded of Paul’s instruction to Timothy “to kindle afresh the gift that is within you.” He goes on to write “for God has not given us a spirit of timidity but power and love and discipline” (2 Timothy 1:6-7). Together the Scripture and the practical experience of the weekend confirmed the importance of staying engaged with ministry in general and using our gifts in particular. Throughout the weekend we listened to God’s voice and heard what He wanted to say to others through us to bring encouragement to their lives. With each activation exercise, people’s confidence rose as they received feedback on what they had shared. And with that confidence, there was a desire to share more often. The result was even those who were prophesying for the first time, found they overcame their initial fears and apprehensions and were enjoying the experience of being used by God in this way. The more often we do it the more we are going to want to do it, with the opposite being true as well.
While it was relatively easy to do all of that in the context of an activation seminar it becomes much harder once we return to our normal routines. As a response to this natural tendency we all have to disengage, I challenged our ministry team to stay engaged with their gift. I suggested one way to do this would be intentional about picking one person, praying for them and then sharing either in person or by audio text file what they heard God say. It can be done as a part of our normal devotional life or we can dedicate a special time. Either way works, the important part is that we do it. And I would not limit our intentionality to the gift of prophecy. If your gift is to teach, look for opportunities to teach. If serving is your gift, look for opportunities to serve, and so on. For a fuller study of all the gifts take a look at I Corinthians chapters 12 and 14, along with Romans chapter 12. It will be a rich time of study.
We are in a season where God is mobilizing the church and wants every follower of Jesus to be operating in their gifts. We each have a very important part to play in what God wants to do at this time in history. Do you know what your gifts are? Are you allowing God to minister to others through you and the spiritual gifts He has given you? We are missing out on the abundant life that Jesus died to give us if our answers are not yes to both of those questions. Kindle afresh the gift that was placed within you and experience the joy of being used by the Holy Spirit to bless, heal and restore others.
Author
Pastor Bruce is the Executive Director of God's Living Stones. He lives in Omaha, NE, with his wife Barb. They have two adult children.
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