“According to the grace given to us, we have different gifts: If prophecy, use it according to the proportion of one’s faith; if service, use it in service; if teaching, in teaching; if exhorting, in exhortation; giving, with generosity; leading, with diligence; showing mercy, with cheerfulness.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

The church is a complicated organization. Yes, I know it should be as simple as it can be. Unnecessary complexity tends to diminish the amount of actual Gospel-advancing work it does. But if a church is accomplishing all the things God has designed it to accomplish, even a small church has a whole lot of moving parts and critical pieces. Now, some churches, by sheer virtue of size are able to do a lot more than others, but God equips all of them to do all the things He has called them to do. Paul here is talking about one of the ways He does that. Let’s join him.

I was in college when studying spiritual gifts became cool. All of a sudden there were all kinds of resources that all became really popular promising to help users learn what their spiritual gifts were and how to use them. Churches were offered whole programs that were guaranteed, if they were implemented faithfully, to get more people serving more effectively than ever before. And many churches put these kinds of programs to work to great effect. There really is something powerful about helping someone come to a better understanding of the work God created them to do, and giving them a specific pathway to start doing it.

Over the years I have taken spiritual gift inventories maybe a dozen times or more. Teaching and knowledge and service usually come up at the top for me. Mercy and compassion usually wind up at the bottom, along with gifts that are typically associated with church planting. So, naturally, God called me to be a pastor. Go figure.

What helped to motivate and inform all of these various spiritual gift studies and inventories were passages like this one. Here Paul lists out eight distinct gifts that Jesus gives to His followers to be used in the advancement of God’s kingdom. There are other lists in other places in Paul’s various writings. Scholars have identified as many as twenty-four distinct spiritual gifts that are either mentioned explicitly or at least referenced tacitly but with enough clarity for them to be positively identified. These gifts cover pretty much the whole range of work that happens in and through the church.

The idea is that by helping people to understand how they have been equipped by God in Christ by the Holy Spirit for the advancement of His kingdom, they will be able to be more effective in their personal ministry. It’s better to have someone who is gifted and passionate about a particular program leading the way in its implementation than just grabbing a random volunteer out of the pews to do it. Some of the most popular and most effective spiritual gift programs went beyond just spiritual gifts themselves to help people consider how their unique talents, personality, life experiences, and passions were altogether being used by God to prepare them for an essential role in His church.

Spiritual gifts are not like regular talents we have. I have a talent for writing, and have always been drawn to it. You may have a talent for woodworking or a particular sport or a knack for organizing things really well. Those are things that are born into us, somehow coded into our very DNA. Everyone is good at something without really having to try very hard. Those talents are not spiritual gifts.

Spiritual gifts are abilities that go above and beyond our regular talents and which are given to us by God in Christ through the Spirit when we give our lives to Christ and start following Him as Lord. These gifts are given specifically to be used in the church’s mission of advancing the Gospel of God’s kingdom on earth. They are to be used specifically for the work of building up the body so that it can accomplish its mission more effectively and efficiently.

As I said a second ago, Paul lists out eight unique gifts here. This is not an exhaustive list, but it is a helpful one. There is prophecy. We often think about prophecy in terms of Old Testament prophets predicting future doom. That’s understandable, but correct only in a very limited sense. Prophecy is the act of delivering the words of God to His people for their inspiration, edification, encouragement, and rebuke if necessary. While this kind of work is often associated with the preacher today, it is not limited to that role. God can deliver a word for the church through any one of its members.

Another gift is service. Every member of the church should be serving in some capacity, but some people have a special gifting of service that empowers them to consistently go above and beyond. These are the folks who are willing to do pretty much anything any time it is needed. They don’t look for or care much about credit, they take joy simply in doing what needs to be done and knowing they helped make it possible. By observation over the years, this is one of the more commonly given gifts.

Paul mentions teaching. Teaching and prophecy can often go hand-in-hand with each other, but they don’t necessarily do. The spiritual gift of teaching manifests as a special ability to help other people come to a better, deeper, fuller understanding of the word of God. When these folks explain the Scriptures for others, they come alive and make sense in ways they didn’t previously.

Next is the gift of exhortation. Exhortation is one of those words we either use without really understanding what it means, or else try to avoid it. It is often used interchangeably with encouragement. This is understandable as their definitions overlap a bit, but while encouragement is more about lifting someone up with they are down or struggling, exhortation is about calling others to do something they need to be doing. Exhorters are the ones who will help get others involved doing the ministry God has called them to do.

Giving is fairly self-explanatory. Like with service, practicing the spiritual discipline of sacrificial generosity is something that every single believer is called to do as a demonstration of their faith in God as well as to help resource the church to do all the ministry God has called her to do since ministry takes money in this world. People with the spiritual gift of giving go above and beyond that. They take the lead in generosity efforts in ways that not only powerfully resource the church, but also motivate and encourage others to join in the efforts themselves. These folks are the first to give not just treasure, but time and talent as well to the ministry of the Gospel.

No one goes anywhere on purpose unless they are being led. The church is not going to advance God’s kingdom with intentionality and effectiveness unless there are people who are leading the way. To this end, God gifts some of His people with the spiritual gift of leadership. These are folks who have a special knack for motivating others to accomplish a particular task together. There’s some overlap with exhortation here, but the gift of leadership does more than that. These folks are able to see not only where to go, but how to get there, the individual steps that will be necessary to take to get from point A to point B.

The last gift Paul mentions in this list is mercy. That’s the gift I don’t have. At all. But thankfully other folks do. People with the spiritual gift of mercy have the special ability to show compassion to those who are hurting. Their hearts break the most quickly for people in hard situations. They are particularly comforting and encouraging in times of loss. These are the kind of people churches want to have involved in member care and in receiving visitors who are struggling under the weight of the brokenness of sin in some way. Everyone should be able to show some compassion for the hurting, but these folks go above and beyond in ways that allow them to experience the peace and joy of God’s kingdom.

Now, you may not see yourself on that list anywhere. That’s okay. As I said before, this isn’t an exhaustive list. There are plenty of resources available – including many that are free online – that will help you identify what your spiritual gifts are. If you are a follower of Jesus, your learning how God has equipped you for the working of advancing His kingdom is not a luxury to take when you have the extra time. It is an essential element of your being an effective member of a church. God gifted you in a certain way to help a certain church do all that He has designed her to do. If you aren’t doing that, both you and the church will be worse off for it.

Too many folks lean into the idea that something is “someone else’s job,” or that “I’ve done my time.” The idea of spiritual gifts puts the lie to that kind of thinking. Those ideas and others like them have no place in a healthy church or in a healthy follower of Jesus. If you are a member of God’s kingdom through a local church, there is no expiration date on your ministry there. There is no concept of retirement in advancing God’s kingdom. We do the work God has called us to do faithfully and well until He calls us home.

If you are doing nothing more than showing up and filling a seat on occasion or even regularly, you’re not in line with God’s plan for you in that church. You are not keeping Paul’s command that started this whole section that we are to be presenting our bodies to God as living sacrifices in light of all He has done for us in Christ. It is time for you to begin intentionally exploring how God has created you to fit into His church and to get to work playing that role. There is glory to be given to Him and joy to be experienced by you in the effort. So, what are you waiting for? Get to work!