Holy Spirit Gifts

Sermon by Lead Pastor, Nate Levering

Transcript

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Hello and thank you for joining us on the Sierra Bible Church Sermon of the Week. We hope you enjoy this message by Pastor Nate Levering.

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I'm excited. We're gonna have some fun. Um as Em said, we are um kind of ending this focus series on the Holy Spirit, uh, which of course for some of us has just been a springboard into uh being open to what God is doing in our lives. And I hope that there's just incredible fruit born in your life and your family in our church, community, and world as well. Uh, and we've spent the last number of weeks together uh teaching from Jesus' words in the upper room. And so as he's getting ready to pin his human flesh to a cross as a sacrifice for yours and my sin, he spends a few minutes with his disciples saying, Hey, get ready. This is what's to come. I'm gonna give my life for you. I will be raised again, you'll see me again, he says, but then I'm gonna be gone. It's gonna be better for you, as they're kind of getting worried, because when I go to be with the Father, I'm going to unleash the Spirit of God into your life. I'm gonna dwell in you, he says. The Father's gonna dwell in you by way of the Spirit. They have no idea what he's talking about. Jesus dies, he's raised again. Number of days later comes Pentecost Sunday. Does anybody know when Pentecost Sunday celebrated? Worldwide church, come on today. It's awesome. Some of you are like, I have no idea what you're talking about. What is Pentecost? Pentecost is the time when Jesus had left. He said, wait for the Spirit. He's coming. Flames, fire. They proclaim in boldness the message of the gospel, and thousands are saved. We celebrate that day today, some 50 days after Easter Sunday. And so we're going to kind of leave Jesus' words and dive in this morning to the disciples' words as they teach the early church about how to make sense of life with the spirit. I want to start with a story, though. It's a story about a dad. I made it up. It's a story about a dad who had triplets, three girls. Dad owned a car dealership, fancy cars. These girls were raised in this family, and part of what their afternoon job was was to knock the pollen and dust off the cars. The first of his daughters dreamed about which car upon her 16th birthday God, sorry, her dad, would give her. Sure enough, their 16th birthday comes, and the first daughter, so excited to receive this gift from her father, unwraps this car, and she's like, Her dad had actually given her one of the very nice cars, about 100,000 miles on it, lots of tread left. But it was a used car that had been traded in for one of the nicer cars, the car she really desired to drive, the kind of car that it when she pulled it onto the high school parking lot, her friends would say, Don't you wish you had her dad? And specifically the favor that she seems to have with her dad. And so she was a little bit bummed, a little bit grumpy, a little bit like, What am I supposed to do with this, dad? The second daughter, though, didn't respond kind of grumpily, but she unwrapped her very much used trade-in version of a nicer brand new car on the lot and was kind of indifferent. And to be honest, the second daughter didn't even really want to drive. In fact, she was pretty happy letting everybody else that had cars drive her around. What's the point of me spending my time, my gas money, my insurance money? I'll just let others drive. And so she wasn't bummed. She was just kind of indifferent. The third daughter unwrapped her car, overwhelmed with the generosity of her father. She found her father, gave him this big old hug, and said, Dad, thank you so much for this gift. She would go on, not just to take great care of that car, but she actually found ways to use that car to be a blessing to people who didn't have a car. She actually developed a ministry in the afternoon where she would drive elderly people around that could no longer drive to appointments or to shopping, and she used her car for the better. Today we're talking about the gifts that we've been given by God and asking ourselves the question: what are we doing with them? How do I respond to what God's given me? We're gonna dive into God's word uh in quite a bit at the very beginning here this morning, and then we'll uh tease a bit of it out. Uh, but Paul says this in um in probably the longest section in the scripture that talks about these gifts given to us uh by the Father through the Holy Spirit. First Corinthians chapter 12, 13, and 14. We'll look at these a little bit. Is Paul saying, hey, the Holy Spirit's giving gifts? Pay attention. He has some instruction, he has some warning, he has some perspective. We'll look at that in a minute. Here's how he starts this section. Paul leans into the church. They had a lot of confusion about this. We can tell. Paul says, What I want to talk about now is the various ways that God's Spirit gets worked into our lives. He goes on. He says, This is complex. It's often misunderstood. Some of us might say, Amen. But he says this, but I want you to be informed and knowledgeable. I want you to be informed. I want you to be knowledgeable. It doesn't have to be sort of chaos and confusion. Paul says there's hope. Let's look at what the apostle Peter has to say first. Uh if you have your Bible open, flip it over to 1 Peter. It's at the very, very back. It's not quite the last book of the Bible, but really close. And if you flip it over there and you find 1 Peter chapter 4, Peter's going to speak to the big C church about this idea of God in his grace giving gifts to his church. So 1 Peter chapter 4, verse 10. Some of you are familiar with this uh text already. Here's what Peter has to say. Verse 10. And this, in some ways, this first verse kind of captures and we'll play it out all throughout the morning. Paul says this each of you. That's every one of us. Each of you, he says. Who's he talking to? Okay, so we're clear there. We'll get this. Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to what? To serve others. As faithful stewards, this word steward isn't a word that we really toss around all that much, and really has this idea that as a steward, you would have something valuable or of high worth, but you're not actually an owner. It's not yours, it's been given to you to kind of manage, to oversee for a particular time or a season. Looking at Stephen, if he were my investor, which he's an investor, uh what do you call yourself? Money manager or something like that. Great guy. Helped me take second place in the putt-putt golf tournament this week. But if I entrusted Stephen with my finances, some of you may, he would steward that. He would have to give it back to me, but for a season, he would take care of it and get me what, 12, 15% on today's market? No problem. Thumbs up. So each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others as faithful stewards, not owners, of God's grace in its wildly various forms. Then he's gonna use kind of two categories that we can put many of the gifts that the Holy Spirit gives us into. If anyone speaks, they should do it as one who speaks the very words of God. If anyone serves, there's gonna be speaking kinds of gifts, there's gonna be serving kinds of gifts. If anyone serves, they should do it with the strength that God provides, so that in all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ. To him be the glory and the power forever and ever. Okay, that's what Peter has to say. Let's flip over to uh the words of Paul in Romans. Um Romans chapter 12. Romans chapter 12. So if you have your Bible open, find Romans chapter 12. Paul's going to, in a few verses here, kind of give a um summary of his teaching in other places about the gifts. Now, as we jump into these first two verses, I need to plant a word into your head and we're gonna come back to it later, okay? The word is or not or, but paddle or okay? The word is or, right? What kind of or? Show me you got it. Give me the paddle signal in church. Come on, what do you got? Okay, Scott's got it. Or so we're gonna come back to this, and and it's gonna bring our minds back later in this beautiful illustration that Thomas Aquinas is gonna help us with to this particular section from chapter 12. Paul says this word's familiar to many of us. Therefore, Paul says, What's our word? Or okay, good, we got it. Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God's mercy, taking a look at what God has done for us. Offer your bodies, he says, as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God. This, he says, is your true and proper worship. Do not conform, he gives us a lot of instruction here. Do not conform to the pattern of the world, but be moment by moment, daily, yearly, be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is, his good and pleasing and perfect will. Starting in verse 3, he's going to sort of give us the summary of how we can understand as a church these gifts. He says, For by the grace given me, I say to every one of you, do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith that God has distributed to each of you. What is he saying? He's saying, if we're going to begin to sort of with humility as stewards, use what God's given us, we need a healthy sense of self-awareness. It's ultimately from God for his purposes. Verse 4, for just as, and he's going to build out this in other areas, this imagery of the church as a physical body, just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. We have different gifts, he says, according to the grace given to each of us. If your gift, he's going to name some of them, this certainly isn't all that he lists in other places. If your gift is prophesying, again, prophecy isn't as much sort of foretelling. Biblically, it's much more grounded in this idea of forthelling. It's taking the word of God and inviting it to bear truth on my life today. That's the primary use of prophecy in the scripture. But he says, if your gift is prophecy, then prophesy in accordance with your faith. If it is serving, then help me out. Serve. If it is teaching, then teach. If it is to encourage, then give encouragement. If it is giving, give generously. If it is to lead, do it diligently. If it is to show mercy, do it cheerfully. Paul then uh to the church in Corinth uses these sort of three longer chapters, 12, 13, and 14, to sort of give us some more context around this idea of the gifts that God gives us in and through the Holy Spirit. And so what I want to do is just kind of we'll overview these uh kind of quickly. He gives an instruction, and then in chapter 13, a bit of perspective, and then in chapter 14, a warning, excuse me, to the church. So a bit of instruction. This is chapter 12. If we were to sum up chapter 12, we're not going to read through all three of these, uh, but I'd invite you to if you don't already know them. Paul says this. He says the Holy Spirit's going to give diverse abilities, experiences, insights, and power to every believer for the common good. That the church, this is why he's gifting us, may be strengthened in love, matured in Christ, and equipped for God's mission. He's giving gifts so that we would be strengthened in love, matured in Christ, and equipped for God's mission. It's why I've been given a gift or some gifts. It's why you've been given a gift or some gifts. Okay, I'm gonna illustrate this real quickly. I'm gonna use Jude. Hop on up. Okay, everyone, quick round of applause. He's like, I got off. I didn't have to do it. Okay, this is Jude. Awesome. Thank you, Mr. York. Here's all you have to do run to the other dark line and run back. On your market set, go. We'll count. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Okay, great. Hand round of applause. Jude did it. He looked pretty awesome. No, you're not done yet. Not even close. Come on. You don't get off that easy. He looked whole. He looked healthy. Like that's the way a young man should run across a gym, right? Okay, now what I want you to do is take your right hand, pin your foot on your mark. Get set. Go. One, two. All right. Give Jude a little encouragement. His thigh's burning at this point, but he's doing awesome. Thank you. It's like, oh, my parents were in first service if they could have only seen me in glory. Okay, he did great. Give him a round of applause. Thank you, Jude. You're awesome. Okay, here's what I want you to do. Take your right hand, pin your right foot. Take your left hand, pin your left foot, and go. Okay, you can sit down. Obviously, you couldn't do it. What's Peter saying? He says, each of you should use whatever gift you've been given. We take two members. And he can't even hobble down and back. Each of you should use whatever gift you've been given to serve others. He's not trying to shame us into thinking, oh look, the church is faltering because you're not involved. But he's trying to give us a vision for what the church might look like if none of us had our gifts pinned behind our back. Living with a sense of indifference. I didn't even really want to be a part anyway. It's a pretty good show. Or even a sense of, man, I I would let my gift go if I could sing like fill in the blank. If I could serve fill in the blank. If I had a lot of money, then I could really give. Each of you should use whatever gift you have been given. All of us, the Holy Spirit, gives a diverse uh ability, experiences, insights, and power that the church may be strengthened, matured in Christ, and equipped for God's mission. How does he say this then? He gives us a couple of sections. He says, now each one of you, uh, each one, to each one, the manifestation, the manifestation is this idea of something's hidden and it all of a sudden starts growing. It's like that thing in spring when you're like, ah, it's growing. And it just sort of showing up, that the Spirit of God is showing up in our lives. Use what God is doing, how he's showing up in your life for the common good. Later in chapter 14, I think so. He says this everything must be done so that the church may be built up. He gives us this focus that our gift is essential for the mission of God through the church. So we have some instruction. This is chapter 12. Uh, chapter 13, we'll get to in a minute. Chapter 14 is a warning. It's a warning from a lot of what was taking place in their church. Paul says this. He says, Don't allow the use of the gifts, that is, God sort of manifesting himself in your life. Don't allow the use of the gifts to be a point of pride. Remember, you're a steward, a point of chaos, things are kind of getting out of control, or self-centeredness. This really isn't about you. A couple of verses that he uses to uh point this out in 12 and then also in 14. He says this the I, the I cannot say to the hand, I have no need of you. In other words, everybody has, it's not about you, it's not about your gift, it's about the gifts being used in harmony. I will pray, Paul says in chapter 14, I will pray with my spirit. Paul uh alludes to the fact that he has the gift of tongues. Uh that, and he's praying in the spirit, and Paul's like all about it. But he says this, but I will pray with my mind also. He says, I don't just check my mind and just let the spirit go nuts. They work together. God is not a God of confusion, but of peace. Let all things be done decently and in order. And in my experience, those are two hard things to hold together. Because on the one side, we say, okay, decent and in order, and on the other side, all things. Sometimes we we lean in too far to the decently and in order, and we lose what God wants to do, the all things. And so through discernment and maturity, all things are to work together. All things work together. So he gives us some instruction, he gives us then some warning, and one theologian said, well, I think, that in between chapter 12 and chapter 14, chapter 13 is that like delicious icing between the two cookies of the Oreo. Now you thought maybe that God wrote chapter 13 of 1 Corinthians for your marriage. He didn't. Although it's great for your marriage. I quote it oftentimes in marriages. He wrote it for our church. So between chapter 12, instructions about the spirit, and chapter 14, which is some warnings about how the spirit gifts should be worked out in our community, he layers in between chapter 13. So if you're in Corinthians with me, uh and you look at the end, even the end of chapter 12. I mean, it's kind of fun. He's just kind of building. Paul's getting excited about all these gifts playing a part and all of us having a role and God getting the glory. He says, Man, there's all kinds of gifts. He's like, We got prophets and teachers, apostles, miracle workers, healers, helps, guidance. He makes this whole list. He says, Now eagerly desire the greater gifts. Lean in. And then look what he says right before verse chapter 13. He says, and I will show you all of that's great. Lean in. Don't miss this. This is the frosting, this is what holds it together. And yet I will show you the most excellent way. And then Paul kind of changes his tone and starts in chapter 13. He says, This if I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy, I can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge. And if I have faith that can move a mountain, but do not have love, I'm nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor. I give my body over to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing. And then here's the section we quote in weddings, and it's great there. It's essential here. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. He's talking about the gifts of the Holy Spirit being used in our community. It is not self-seeking and is not easily angered. It keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. It becomes guardrails for the gifts. Love never fails, he says, but where there are prophecies, they will cease. Where there are tongues, they will be stilled, where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part. We prophesy in part. And when completeness comes, what is in part now will disappear. The perspective he gives us is this that the true mark of the spirit-filled life is what? What? Help me out. Love. It's love. Tell if somebody has the spirit of God alive in them, filling them, you can watch the way they love. He goes on then to say this is there's the proof or the evidence that someone is operating in the spirit of Jesus is whether or not he or she is demonstrating the love of Jesus. John Piper, he said it this way. He said, Don't make it your aim to find your gift, make it your aim to love people. And when that's your aim, you're going to need some things. If your aim is to love your children, if your aim is to love those that don't yet know Jesus, if your aim is to love those that are hurting and suffering, you're going to need some stuff you don't have. But the Holy Spirit gives gifts to God's children. So make it your aim. I think what um Piper's really saying is it's sort of really just kind of two different sides of the same coin. That in some ways, absolutely, my aim is to love. But also in some ways, I've got to, at least if you kind of, you know, haven't thought about this before, you haven't really looked at what the scriptures teach about gifts. Like I want to find my gift. I want to know what God has given me for the opportunities, the needs that are in front of me. How do you wire me? What abilities or or strengths or experiences or power has God given me? Does he desire to be used by me? Paul actually tells uh his young disciple Timothy a couple of different times in letters that he writes to Timothy, these uh I think very pertinent words. He says this to Timothy in 1 Timothy as he writes in this letter, he says, Hey, I know you may be getting distracted, there may be a lot going on, lots of flashy things, lots of things drawing your attention, but Timothy, do not, what word does he use? Do not neglect the gift you have. In other words, there's a lot of good things you can do, but if it's a gift thing, don't miss it, Timothy. That's like a higher thing. Use God's gonna use you in that. What does he say at the end of Paul's life? Maybe is some of the last words he uttered. He says, This, I remind you, Timothy, fanned into flame the gift of God. Fan into flame the gift that God has given you. Okay, uh, if the person next to you is kind of like out of it, wake him up. But this next part's gonna be brilliant. I had nothing to do with it, but it's it's phenomenal, I think. It's been so helpful for me as I thought this through. Some of you know uh a philosopher, theologian by the name you didn't know him personally, Thomas Aquinas. He was in the 1200s, wrote a lot of different things. In one of the things that he wrote, he talks about this idea of accessing or opening ourselves up to the movement of the Spirit of God. And I think the way he speaks of it is just really, really helpful. At least it has been for me as I've been processing this. And what he says is this he says, as you can think about uh sort of aligning your life with the movement of the Holy Spirit, and then he gives this picture. I think it's here. He gives us this picture, and he says, you can imagine your life kind of like this like sea-faring vessel. And this particular vessel has out its side what? And it has up on this mast a sail. And here's what Aquinas says, and I think this is brilliant. What he says, and to me, this aligns with what Paul's teaching us in Romans chapter 12. He says, this what all of us can do, whether the wind is blowing or not, is grab our oar and stick it in the water and start paddling. What Aquinas is talking about here is what he calls virtues. This is inner character. This is the hard work at one level. This is paying attention to what's going on in here. This is being quick to repent, quick to confess. This is saying, how do I, what is it that is required of me? How do I do the next thing as hard as it could be? How do I wake up in the morning and start paddling? This moves us and positions us in such a way that it opens us to the movement of the Spirit of God. And so what we do in the morning before the wind ever blows, in that calm moment, right? You see those in the morning, is you grab your what? Or your virtues, you stick those things in the water and you paddle in the name of Jesus with all the love you've been given, paddle. And then he says this. He says, Some of us flip back. You do that too early, David. That's like my moment. It has to come. Scratch that from your memory. What he says is lots of us will hang a sail or not hang a sail, right? And so we're like praying that the Spirit of God will move. And he's blowing the wind around saying, Hey, I want you to go in that direction. I want you to do this. Here's I've gifted you. And we got our our sail all wrapped up. What Aquinas says is grab the oar, put it in the water, and hang the sail. Hang the sail. Be ready. Position yourself so that when God moves, this we are not in charge of. We haven't figured this out yet. It's he that blows, it's he that moves. But we, in the still of the morning, pay attention to our virtues, we pay attention to our character. And in our preparations, we hang the sail. So that when the Spirit of God moves, when the ripple comes across the water, our lives, man, that's the moment, right? Some of you have been there. Man, you just pull the oar up, you kick back in the sun, and you say, Look what God's doing. I had no idea he could do this through me. I'm a steward of this crazy gift that God's showing off in various ways. Who would have thought? But we got to hang the sail. And then this next picture, which David's just gonna throw up there at perfect timing. I love this. I was looking for a sailing ship. I'm like, dude, that's like the Holy Spirit boat right there. Like, that's what I want my life to look like. Let's hang all the sails, amen. Like, like, why not? Why put one up and hope it blows? Hang them all up. Let's get ready. We don't know what God's gonna do. I mean, he even says some of my greatest work's gonna be done in your weakness. You may think, I can't imagine God would ever use me like this. Hang the sail. He might blow you away. We don't know what God wants to do. But we won't know if we don't pay attention hanging the sail. The wind will blow, people like me, and people like you will miss it. I love that illustration. Peter says, use whatever gift you've received to serve others. Here's what I'm gonna do in the remainder of our time together. I want to uh help us think a little bit about how do we find our gift or gifts, and how do we fan into flame the gifts that God's given us? Um, none of these is the full answer, but I think as we begin to kind of walk through these, they can become helpful tools so that we will be people who are hanging the sail, finding what God wants to do by way of his spirit's movement in our life, and then fanning that flame by like what Paul tells Timothy hey, put some air on that sucker, see what God wants to do. Okay, here we go. Whole list, find them. Okay, first off, ask. Ask. Don't ask for another class, don't ask for another whatever. Ask the Holy Spirit. Hang this out. God, what do you want to do? What do you want to do through me? Jesus himself, he didn't mince words when he taught in Luke chapter 13. In fact, he says this, even you bum dads, calls you evil, me evil. You even give good gifts to your kids. How much more, Jesus says, will your father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who what? Who what? Ah, so we start by asking. Part of what the Holy Spirit will say, and you can know you're listening when you hear this. Have you started reading what I've already said? Okay? He'll often start with the ancient word and bring it into our current lives. So have you asked? Are you reading? Second question What do you aspire to do that blesses others? Maybe it sounds too soon. What do you want to do? What do you aspire to do? What do you love? What gets you energized? What is it that when you're thinking about it, researching it, doing it, time just disappears. You don't have enough time in your day to one of the things I absolutely love is the idea of community development. Like I love good communities. You know, I have some friends over here. We love, right, Matt, driving into Bend, Oregon, driving downtown, if you've ever been by the river. Like they made this place for community, for people to hang out, for people to enjoy each other, for people to ride bikes, for people to surf the way, for people to listen to music, people to drink beer, on and on. It's a beautiful place. We're gonna go to Mammoth in a few minutes with our family. Same thing, trails everywhere. Before you even get to the stoplight, there's like three tunnels that bikers are going under. It's like this place is made for community. But I was made for Sonora. We'll get a bike trail eventually. Maybe it costs us six million dollars, but maybe we might get one. But my question is, what can I do while I'm here? Which hopefully is a long time. And a number of years ago, I was down in Modesto and we passed all these love Modesto signs. I'm like, what is that? Started researching. Grabbed another friend of mine, so we should start this up here. And maybe you see the signs. Love to like we can do things. We're not gonna turn into bend, okay? Unfortunately, right, Matt and Steph. But we can do things out of our wiring, what we aspire to do that blesses others. And so we started Love Tuology, and it continues to be something that uh stirs and moves. I love adventure and travel, it's just I love it. I mean, I can look at pictures and 10-minute YouTube things of all around the world and think there's not going to be enough time in this life for me to whatever. When we uh adopted our two little boys, we got them passports as fast as we could, not an easy process. And uh about a week after they had passports, here's a picture of us. We're in northern Tanzania on a safari. I remember sitting there and Kathy's like, where are the windows? Like, heck no, we don't need windows. We're on safari. What could possibly go wrong? What went wrong was that about 20 African elephants found us at one point. One of them had his big long nose, also known as a trunk, smashed up against the window. Another one was reaching in, literally, had its arm, its trunk, around my daughter. My wife is screaming. I thought she was gonna sacrifice herself to the no kidding, like this is our first evening, like two minutes after this. We're just up the hill, and there's three beautiful lions hanging out in this tree. Like, man, I love this. This is so cool, so fun. On and on. About a week after we were on safari, we ended up sailing with some missionary friends down to a small village. That this is one of the two first white kids that's ever been in this village that that the elders of the village ever knew. It's my boy. He didn't need, he had the gift, the Holy Spirit gift of being a young white boy. That was it. Spirit gave him that gift. And he gave him a couple crazy parents that flew him across the world, sat them down. And so for us, like what do we desire to do? We love travel. Okay, we're gonna just take our kids around the world on mission then. I don't need to see another cathedral. I don't need to, but if I can get my kids where God can use them, if I can get my gifts where God can use them, maybe it's the coming together of how he's wired me. Maybe it's that which will let loose the spirit's movement in my life. In a few weeks, we'll be with about 20, some of us from Sierra Bible Church, we'll be heading down to Brazil. This kid is now 14-year-old. He'll be leading small groups of Brazilian kids, teaching them about the gospel of Jesus Christ. And I can't wait to eat Brazilian barbecue. I love to travel. But I love to travel and give away the gospel. Give away any gift or skill that I have. Let's just share it. Let's bless others in any way. So, what is it that you aspire to do? That can be a step in moving in that direction. Where is, this is another question, where is a need or an opportunity? Some of us are like, no, that's not my thing. No, that's not. No, where's a need? Where's an opportunity? This is like my biggest illustration for this one. I'm on that same trip when many years ago, and we just gotten our boys, uh, we took the six in our family over there. And prior to teaching in the Bible college, I was teaching in this pastor's um training time. I'm doing some leadership stuff and and teaching high up in the mountains where they grow the Tanzanian coffee you drink at Starbucks. And so we're way up there, it's cold, and I'm teaching these pastors, and it's a lunch I'll never forget. I sit down with a couple other pastors and said, Hey, I want to hear your story. A couple of them share, and then one gentleman, and he was sort of quiet. Uh, and I said, No, I want to. Why are you here? Why are you a pastor? He said, Nate, about two months ago, there were 22 men in my village lived up in Rwanda. He'd hiked about 45 miles to come to this pastor training. But the Conganese rebels came over and killed 21 of them. Here's what he said to me. He said, That makes me the pastor. And he smiled by the grace of God. It wasn't, it wasn't like this whole thing, it was like, this is our life here. But guess what? I'm the pastor now. And he looked at me and said, I don't know what that means. So I'm here. There's a need, there's an opportunity, there's something I can step through. I don't know what that's gonna mean. But this is the place I think about this with grandparents, with uh with parents. I mean, the need's right in front of you. Figure out what it looks like to be spiritually gifted and loving those kids in the gospel. That's what it looks like. There is a need. What unique experiences have I had? What um, you know, what are the things I felt? What are the things I've been a part of? These will oftentimes kind of shape opportunities for us. Maybe you played a sport when you were younger. Maybe God wants you to use your gift by coaching. Uh, maybe you're at a job where you're by yourself a lot. Like, how do I use my gift in this? But maybe you just say, God, I want to hoist that sale. I want to be a prayer warrior for you. I don't even know who needs prayer right now, but I want to, I mean, I can always pray for our country, I can always pray for our world, I can always pray for our schools, I can always just begin to ask God for the spiritual gift of prayer. Maybe you're surrounded by those that don't know Jesus. Like, I'm not really an evangelist. Fine. Pray that God would give you the gift of evangelism, that he would loosen up your tongue. He does that work anyway, he fills the sail. We put it up. How can I help others in their suffering? So this moves beyond sort of the where's the need question, but how can I help others in their suffering? And one of the things, I'm just trying to share some stories from my own kind of circle. One of the things I do on Fridays, I just show up down at the cancer center and they let me talk to people about Jesus that are like literally stuck in the arm or in the port. They can't move. Sometimes they hide from me, but they can't move. And I just get to love them. And let me tell you, I'm good at talking to other people about cancer. I'm like a pastor that knows a lot about cancer by the grace of God and a lot of experience. And so I go in. There's a need, people are suffering. I, by God's design, somehow have had a few runs with cancer. I don't know what your experience is, but I think God wants to use it to step into a place where there's a need, fill it up with the Holy Spirit, and get some glory. Some of us are familiar with small group assessments or small groups, excuse me, S G I saw small groups, um, spiritual gifts assessments. And what you can do is you can go online. I'd encourage you if you haven't done this, it's a great way to kind of see a number of gifts. You can kind of it'll ask you some questions about your personality, your experiences, some of the things we've been talking about. Uh, and and it, depending on what test you take, we'll spit out a number of kind of places that you might lean into. You might say, okay, I should experiment here, I should try here. Maybe this is a gift that needs a little flame fanning, and we'll see what God wants to do. Two quick cautions. One is that different gift assessments kind of can prioritize one gift over another. The other thing is you want to be really open when you take these because it can feel a little bit like when you're junior high and you took a like, what are you gonna do for the rest of your life test? And you're like, I don't want to be a vet. I hate pets, but I guess I have to be a vet because that's what I check. Like, so it's just an openness and an awareness. So we must find our gifts. Lastly, let's go quickly through this list of fanning them. How do we fan into flame the gifts God's given us? The first thing is we experiment with humility. Experiment with humility. None of the gifts are finished. You're not an expert. You know, one of the things we've been learning in our small group is like, hey, I'm sensing this. May I pray for you? I'm sensing maybe God's at work here. Would it be okay if I a deep sense of humility? I mean, I love what Paul says. Man, if you're gonna speak, speak the words of God. But come on, let's be honest. And with humility, we want to share some things, right? Let God intercede in there, but but don't pin your gift behind your back. Be willing, if God moves, hoist the sail, find the wind, and step in. Act. Second thing we got to do is evaluate honestly. Evaluate honestly. There's a very good reason I'm not on the worship team. Not only would my gifts overshadow Brian, and I want him. No, I told Paul this morning we were laughing. The sound guy said, Hey, can you turn mine on and just stick it in Brian's ear and see if he can still sing? I'm completely tone deaf. It's awesome. I'm colorblind too. Like, I have no idea. But that's not my gift. It's Brian's. And if I get up there and sing, someone needs to say, Nate, you're terrible. Stop. Stop. Evaluate honestly. We can engage with someone who's mature in that gift. Warning here. Since you have a gift, don't just go find the expert online. You need discernment. That can be helpful. There was a season in my life where God really spoke about justice and works of justice in the world. And I didn't know anything about that. I didn't know what justice looked like. I read everything. Go to my office, there's like, I mean, I read everything. Perkins, Mother Teresa, there's a hole in your gospel. I don't know. But I'm gonna find experts that are doing this, that are smart, that love Jesus, and I'm gonna download that. There's people in our church using a gift you may sense. Talk to the staff. Put on your I need, I would love to talk to somebody that's further down the track and using this gift to give me some discernment, to give me some help, and to give me a kick when I need it. Check for an anchor. Check for an anchor. This I think is is worth your admission this morning. Check for an anchor. Back to Aquinas' picture. Ore in the water, sail set, ready for the Spirit of God to move. Check. For an anchor. Some of us have got an oar in the water, we've got sails high, and we've got anchors stuck at the bottom of the sea. It's crazy. Check, cut the anchors off, blow them up if you have to, figure it out. And they're not easy. Some of us, we we talked about this incredible building that God's blessed us with. And we said, hey, this is gonna be an all-in. Like, we need people to give generously. Like, we gotta see what God wants to do. I talked to so many people that were like, I would love to give generously. What I hear them saying, I think I have the gift of generosity. I just have a lot of debt. You got an anchor in the ground. You can't live out the gift of generosity and be in debt. My kids, and this is not a cut on any other family, will not be able to play weekend sports. It doesn't work with our gift mix. Do I trust their ability? Or do I trust this is the gift God gave you? These are the guardrails. I talked to some friends yesterday, we were at the lake. One of them said this to me. He said, We'll see you after the summer. I said, Okay, that's fair enough. Church is great, but you don't have to world in. But if you have a gift that's weekend centered and you are not present, you have an anchor in the ground. You have the gift to serve, but your life is so busy. You have an anchor in the ground. Friends, check for an anchor. If it's there. I mean, I remember, and I wanted to be generous. My dad was generous. He could get up here, talk about his generosity, and I'm like, man, I hope nobody ever asked me. He said, I gotta get rid of all the debt, and I gotta get some margin. If I'm ever going to let the wind of the Holy Spirit move as He desires, check for an anchor. Let's pray. God, thank you. Thank you that you do move. Thank you that you invite us, God, to grab an oar, to in the stillness of the morning, uh, in the stillness of our lives, to just begin to pay attention to our virtues, our character, that we bring those things before you, that we would offer our lives as a living sacrifice, ready, willing. God, may we be the kind of people that hoist sails in our lives. We're in relationship with people, waiting for you, God, to move, to fill those sails that we might better love, better accomplish your mission in and for the world. God, thank you for these friends, so many of whom inspire me daily by the way their lives are so filled by a Jesus-loving spirit as they love in the midst of all kinds of need and opportunity. God, build us into your kind of church. We might love with your love. Keep us sensitive and aware. Help us find, God, the gifts that you generously give. Help us fan them into flame, that you would use us in increasing ways. God, we love you. We pray these things in your amazing name. Amen. Amen.

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