SPIRITUAL GIFTS (continued)

Determining which gift(s) you have takes time and experience. You can discover your gift(s) by learning what the gifts are ... by being involved in ministry ... and by evaluating what God is doing through you. Make an educated spiritual guess as to which gift may be yours ... get involved in that type of ministry ... give it some time ... and then evaluate what God has done. Your gift(s) will become obvious as you minister.

Spiritual gifts are described in the Bible in two major references, Romans 12 and 1 Corinthians 12-14. Knowing our natural tendency for divisiveness, the Holy Spirit put the great chapter on love, 1 Corinthians 13, in the middle of His teaching on gifts. Let the Bible define spiritual gifts. Pray and study the Bible to form your beliefs about gifts. Don't decide by osmosis ... absorbing your beliefs from your spiritual environment. Let the Bible invade your experience. Don't let your experience invade the Bible. Each believer has been given one or more spiritual gifts. These special abilities are listed below in general alphabetical order ... not in any order of significance. Each believer does not have all of the gifts. However, all believers have responsibilities in each of these areas.

1. Discerning of Spirits. Some have a special ability to distinguish between good and evil ... between that which is of God or of the world, the flesh, and the devil. All believers should be discerning, Hebrews 5:14,    1 John 4:1.

2. Exhortation. This is a special ability to incite, urge, or encourage others. It could be called the gift of encouragement. Some have this gift ... but all believers should encourage one another, Hebrews 3:13, 10:25.

3. Faith. This is an extra ability to trust God steadfastly for the humanly improbable or impossible. It might be seen when someone holds on when others let go ... or lets go when others hold on. This faith is not forming an image of something in your mind that obligates God to give it to you. This faith is not naming something that obligates God to give it to you because you have spoken the words. This faith is whole-hearted trust in Him to do what He chooses. Some have this gift ... but all should have faith, 2 Corinthians 5:7.

4. Giving. This is the special ability to give back to God, through others, what He has given to us. This is a special ability to know what to give ... to whom to give it ... and when to give. It has more to do with the quality of the giving than it does with the quantity of the gift. Sometimes God combines the gift of giving with extra material resources ... an awesome opportunity and responsibility for the person with the gift. Some have this gift ... but all should give, 2 Corinthians 9:7.

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Disciplemaking 1, copyright 2003, is available free from www.MyDisciplemaker.org where you can study online or print free copies. You may copy this course, any any part of it, for free or at-cost distribution ... without change to the content ... and with this copyright policy attached. Published by www.ActsOneEight.org. Bible Quotations are from the NASB unless noted.