Spiritual Gift Assessment

 

    When you are marked by the Holy Spirit's seal as a Christian, you receive at least one gift from him.  You have the gift inside you, but you may not know what it is for some time.  Taking a spiritual gift assessment can help you learn what your gift(s) are.  At that point you can figure out how to use the gift(s) for the church.

    The assessment will indicate what it is, but you still need to pray through it.  Sometimes God given skills or personality poke through.  Pray discernment over the assessment.  No matter what you discover, you know you have it because God loves you.  

    The assessment also reveals where you may need to put a little more work because you are not gifted in certain areas.  An example is evangelism.  You may not be gifted there, but you can learn how to evangelize.  It may be good to partner with someone that is gifted where you are not to share your faith and have a more powerful ministry.  You can help each other grow, confirm your gifts, and be accountability partners.

    The spiritual gift of administration is a special attribute given to steer people into effective channels of service.  You are able to understand the resources needed to accomplish a goal, plan, or fulfill a need.  Discernment is confidence in knowing the truth about people, teachings, and motives.  Evangelism is the special gift of being able to share Jesus with non-Christians.  You are able to create a desire in people to know Jesus and become a Christian.

    Exhortation is the gift of encourage and console people in the church when they need it.  You provide positive output to a situation and steps to make things better.  Faith is what you have to have to become a Christian, but the gift of faith is the ability to believe in God's promises and act on that faith with unwavering confidence.  You carry out God's will without hesitation.  You are able to pray with power (prayer warrior).  Service is the gift of identify, assist, and support others in their ministry.  The supporting role is important for ministries to accomplish results.

    Giving is the gift of give without hesitation or doubt.  You give possessions and money beyond your normal tithe with a cheerful disposition and spirit.  The helper is gifted with being able to help other people more effectively.  You see a need and you fill it.  Hospitality is the gift of being able to give cheer and make people comfortable wherever you are: food, lodgings, or presence.  Mercy is the gift of empathy.  You feel the hurt of other people and express genuine sympathy to comfort those that hurt. 

    Knowledge is the gift of acquiring deep insights into God's Word.  You are able to illuminate other people with your insights that are beyond human reason.  Teaching is the gift of communicating the Bible in a manner that other people will understand and learn.  Wisdom is the gift of understanding God's Word and discern the truths in a way to help others apply them.  You live out the truth of faith.

    Leadership is the gift of providing direction and goals to the church.  You bring together resources and people to work together to accomplish something for God.  Pastoring and shepherding are the same gift.  You are able to guide, protect, nurture, and feed the church to grow.  Prophecy is the gift to proclaim the truth of God's Word boldly.  There are more gifts too: miracles, healing, languages, interpretations, and more.

Matthew 16:21-23, 20:29-34, Mark 9:39-41, 12:41-44, 15:40-41, Luke 10:33-35, 14:28-30, John 10:1-18, Acts 5:1-11, 6:1-7, 8:26-40, 9:36-38, 11:22-24, 14:21-25, 15:32-35, 16:13-18, 18:24-28, 21:7-9, 27:21-25, Romans 4:18-25, 12:6-13, 16:1-23, 1 Corinthians 2, 12:7-28, 2 Corinthians 9:1-8, 11:5-6, Galatians 6:1-10, Ephesians 4:11-16, Colossians 3:1-4, 1 Timothy 5:17-18, 2 Timothy 4:5, Titus 1:5-7, Hebrews 10:23-25, 13:17, & 1 Peter 4:7-9, 5:1-4

Personality Profile

 

    Learning your personality profile will help you in all aspects of life.  A profile test will group similar personalities together, but who you are is more complex than that.  It also entails your relationship with God (spiritual gifts), attributes, abilities, passions, and experience.  The personality profile consist of beliefs, values, attitudes ,actions, and behaviors.

    Your characteristic helps you understand why you or someone else think and act a certain way.  Trying to understand a personality began with Hippocrates around 370 BC.  He characterized personality in terms of body fluid: choleric, melancholy, phlegmatic, and sanguine.  Since the 1900s it has become a bigger study.  Personalities have been given dozens of names, but always seems go back to what Hippocrates started.

    Everyone should take a personality test, even if it doesn't change anything for them.  It could be helpful in other relationships.  A personality assessment does not account for the Holy Spirit which is a huge aspect of who a Christian is.  He does change some aspect of your personality.  If you have not taken one since becoming a Christian, then now may be a good time to take one again.  

    As you grow older, emotional maturity can also influence your personality test.  Training and development change people as much as life experiences.  Who you are to the core is who you are, but life does shape how you view and handle situations.  It can change how much you can handle people in different times in life.  

1 Samuel 16:7, Psalm139:1-6,  Proverbs 2:1-8, Matthew 22:15-22, John 15:9-17, Romans 12:1-2, 15:7-13, 1 Corinthians 15:58, Galatians 5:22-23, 1 Peter 2:13-17, & 1 John 1:1-10

Evaluate Experiences

 

    When you go back and remember past life experiences, how do you feel?  Are you proud or ashamed of the experience?  How does it affect the way you live today?  Did it help you become more successful?  Was it rewarding?  Would you change anything? 

    The how and why matter in shaping how you think and view the world around you today.  The band or unpleasant experiences can still be rewarding if they brought you closer to God.  Anything that helps you see God more clearly and draws you closer to Him is a rewarding experience.

    Look at your experiences honestly and objectively.  Acknowledge who you were and where you were at that point in your life.  Write down the lessons you learns, so that they can be seen and organized more clearly.  Then you can write down your story with a healthy and honest perspective.  You don't have to write your story as long as you know it truthfully and able to set goals on how you want to see things moving forward.

    We are not to just hear God's Word, but we are to apply it our lives.  This is how Jesus defines our lives: he is in it with you or he is not in it at all.  How is living life with Jesus impacting your life today?  

    Not everything that happens in life is good, but God will use them for good.  If you allow God to use the pain, disappointment, and fear, then He can shape your life into something strong and useful.  The process takes time.  Life is a journey, but God will finish what He has begun in you.  

    When you understand who you are (personality, spiritual gifts, abilities, and passions), then you can see your experiences more clearly.  They help you formulate what your life is today.  It can help you plan how you want to see your life in the future.  As long as your plans align with God's plans for your life, then you can trust that it will happen.

Matthew 16:24-28, Romans 8:26-30, Ephesians 4:31-32, Colossians 3:22-25, James 1:22-25, & 2 Peter 1:16-21

Life Experiences Part 2

 

    Life is full of experiences.  Sometimes you succeed, win, lose, or fail.  How does it feel in each of those circumstances?  Do you allow your feelings to decide what you will do or the truth?  Think about the experiences that have most impacted your life.  Why do they stick out over other experiences?  These are the experiences that shape how you think and drive you in how you live now.

    Experiences are different from abilities, but they tend to hold hands.  What you succeed in tends to determine the direction you take in life.  Your abilities are the catalyst that produces an outcome from experience.  

    Life experiences have five aspects to your life: spiritual, religion, pain, failure, and victory.  All aspects are important in shaping your life.  The spiritual is what happens in your heart, mind, and spirit.   It is personal and intimate.  It factors how you view scripture and your response to it.  Samuel and Paul are great examples in how to react to encountering God.

    Religious education is seen in Paul.  You allow opportunities to influence your religious views.  It can provide credibility with your knowledge base, but it means nothing without salvation.  It can take years to become a Biblical scholar, but it can be time well invested too.  

    We all experience pain in life.  No one dealt with as much as Jesus.  Pain can be used to help you relate to other people.  It can enable you to comfort them because you have experienced it too.  At the same time pain can block you from seeing your purpose because what you are going through consumes everything.  Jesus is the only one that can help you see past the pain.

    Peter shows us how to handle failure.  Failure normally accompanies fear.  If you can get past your fear, then God will use the experience for something wonderful.  Failure is not defeat.  It can be a new beginning.  It can help you change direction in life.  Humility can be gained in failure

    Victory can be seen in Jacob.  He shows how victory is not always an enjoyable experience.  As long as it glorifies God, then it is good.  Your personal victories may be insignificant to other people, but worth celebrating for you.  Do not let other people's perspectives influence how you handle your victories.  A victory may not be rewarding in the traditional sense or even enjoyable, but it has purpose.  Victories are meant to motivate you in the future, so take the time to accept them as they happen.

Genesis 32:27-29, 1 Samuel 3:1-21, Matthew 26:69-75, Acts 2:36-37, 9:1-18, 17:16-34, 26:4-8, 2 Corinthians 1:3-7, & Hebrews 2:16-18, 5:7-10

Life Experiences Part 1

 

    God is everything that is good and right in this world.  When life happens or something horrible it is not God's fault.  He made everything perfect.  It is people that allowed sin in the world.  Satan tempts, but he never forced people to do evil.  We do that naturally.  Our actions have consequences: death, cursed earth, and evil in the world.

    God still loves us no matter how much evil we may have in our hearts.  He sacrificed His son to display the extent of His love.  He cares when you are humiliated, heart broken, or overwhelmed with life.  He may allow people to be destructive, but it does not mean that He doesn't care.  He is pursuing everyone.  He knows how empty people are without Him.  He wants to fulfill us all.

    When your life is empty, turn to God.  He can be trusted.  Your spirit will no longer go hungry.  You can find peace in all circumstances.  He can heal emotional scars that come with life.  He will open your eyes to the truth and show you how to use it all to serve Him and the church.  He loves you and wants the best for you, but He will also use your sin to serve a purpose.  

    There are all sorts of life experiences: religious, work, home, social, and more.  Each person's life is different.  We are all driven by different things in life.  Some experiences cause pain, but others cause happiness and excitement.  Life will never be all good or bad.  We all lose loved ones.  Some people experience abuse, rumors, lies about them, addictions, rejection, persecution, or embarrassment.  

    Our lifestyles have a big impact on our life experiences.  If you want change, then you have to start living the change you want.  Spent time in God's Word.  Put in the work to change the aspects of your life you do not like.  Pray over your experiences and open your heart for God to use them.  It is not the end.  Today is the beginning of what can be.  You can start today to make small steps toward the life you want.

Genesis 32:27-29, 1 Samuel 3:1-21, Matthew 26:69-75, Acts 26:4-8, Romans 8:26-30, & 2 Corinthians 1:3-7

Understand Your Passion

 

    What are your passions in life?  Do they bring you closer to God or further away?  Do you use them for the church or yourself?  To find fulfillment in life, you need to find a way to utilize everything God has given you to serve Him in the church and bring people to Him.

    Passion also applies to people.  There are people that energize and you want to be around.  Then then there are people that you struggle to have a relationship with or want to be around.  God put both types in your life for a reason.  Demonstrate your passion in what you do to work with different personalities, spiritual gifts, and abilities.  It will require flexibility and an open heart to adapt.  

    How do you demonstrate your passion?  How does your passion come out?  Does it drive you to do good or evil?  There is the law of attraction which states what you like from what you do not like.  Your passion will drive you toward what you like creating more passion.  In ministry, that is good, but remember things are not always passionate.  Sometimes you have to get comfortable in the mundane too.

    Why have you gotten involved in ministries before?  Was it because you were passionate about it?  Were filling a void?  Did you do it because someone you respect ask you to?  Your motivation matters.  You will not endure in a ministry that you don't discover a passion for.  It is okay if your passions move you in a different direction as long as it is being led by Jesus.  

    What do you desire to pursue?  Are you looking for your place in the church?  Are you applying your personality type, spiritual gift(s), abilities, and passion to discover your ministry?  When you understand these, what ministry comes to mind?  Understand your passion and pray over it?  Maybe talk to your pastor to see if he can help you mold it into something for the church.  

    Your walk with God and ministry is a journey.  It does not happen over night.   You can pick up where someone else left off.  You can support someone that needs help.  You can start something new.  Your journey is not going to look like anyone else's journey.  That is good.  It is proof that your relationship with God is unique.  The most important thing is that your passion follows Him.

Psalm 37:1-4, Proverbs 16:3, Matthew 6:31-34, Mark 12:29-31, Romans 12:9-13, & Colossians 3:18-25

Passion in Ministry

 

    Once you understand your personality, spiritual gifts, abilities, and passion the real work comes into focus.  You are starting to develop what your ministry will be, but you have to deal with people that have very different focuses than you.  How do you deal with people in the church that almost seem like they are opposing your vision will define how successful you will be.

    There are five types of people that will help or be a hinderance in your ministry.  The CRPs are the very resourceful people their passion is for things to get done in a timely manner and correctly.  They can get tunnel vision focused, but they get things done.  

    VIPs are the very important people.  Some people may think they are more important than they are.  Some need to feel important.  Some are important for your ministry to success.

    VRPS are the very trainable people.  Most people like these because you can mold them.  Just be careful not to take away from their passions or make them so structured that they can't contribute anything new to the project.

    VNP are the very nice people.  They are always enjoyable in a ministry.  However, it is more important to be kind than nice.  Nice people don't always speak things that need to be said because they don't want to hurt people, rock the boat, or just want to be liked.  Kind people will tell you hard truths in love.

    VDP are the very drainable people.  You will deal with these if you are passionate about your ministry.  They are everywhere.  It could just be a personality difference that they drain you.  It could be the eternal pessimism.  Maybe they can never be happy.  It doesn't matter what it is, you will have to learn how to deal with these people.

    Do not forget that you will fit into one if not all of these categories for other people.  That is why the church is called to overlook things.  I believe it is talking about personality, perspective, and mental differences.  We have to learn how to love each other even if we struggle to like each other.  It is the only way the church will be able to be run the way God wants it run.  Do all things in the power of the Spirit, love, and self-discipline.     

Matthew 6:19-21, Romans 12:9-13, Colossians 3:22-25, 2 Timothy 1:5-7, Titus 2:11-15, & Revelations 2:4-6