I tell you, there's such a joy in celebrating with people as they declare their faith in Jesus Christ. It really is powerful and I couldn't be happier for all of them. I want to encourage you that if you have made the decision to follow Christ and you've never been water baptized, that it's really a powerful step in your spiritual journey. The Lord really gave us two sacraments taking communion, uh, declaring the death and resurrection of Christ, as well as water baptism.
And both, I think, are significant steps in our spiritual journey. And so, uh, if you've not yet been water baptized, I just want to put that on your screen for you to pray and think about. So, hey, all Easter's two weeks away, okay? And, uh, we're really excited to create a great experience for you to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ for you, your family, your friends. But also, I want to encourage you that the best Easter experience is sitting next to a friend that you brought with you from work, or a neighbor, or an extended family member who might not normally attend and get to hear about the hope and the love and the power of Jesus, and how he can really make a difference in our lives. And so I want to encourage you, we we use a little phrase, everyone to invite one. And it's a great opportunity between now and Easter to invite somebody. The the most comfortable way to come to church is to to come to church with a friend. And when someone invites you, hey, would you like to come with me to Easter service at Grace church? It's really powerful. And so I want to encourage you. We're the team. I couldn't be more proud of the team. They're working hard to prepare again, just a great celebration of Jesus and I. We're going to have a great time. So, hey, we're in this series right now called Make a Difference. Last week we talked about this, how we're called to make a difference together. We're doing four weeks on this and last week here was the emphasis that what we can do together is far more than what we could ever do alone. And we kind of rolled out one of the applications is what we do together as a church throughout the whole year. We do what we call our above and beyond projects to advance the kingdom, and we come up with this incredible list of projects to accomplish over the next 12 months. In fact, we have a booklet for you in the seat in front of you that lists all the projects above and beyond what we normally do week in and week out, and we call our advance the Kingdom offering. We call it our Kingdom Mutual Fund because when you give to the advance the Kingdom offering, you're impacting all these areas locally, next generation around the world. And so what I want to do is just take a moment and highlight three of these from we've got kind of three big buckets. One is our local outreach.
One of our local ministry partners is Durham Rescue Mission, and we've been a significant partner with them because they're doing an incredible job serving those in need in our community. We love Durham Rescue Mission. They do it in a very Christ centered way, um, helping people. Um, take a step. Equipping them practically and spiritually. And so with love, we're going to continue to support them. Next generation will continue to support Young Life. We love Young Life and have had a really strong partnership with them. They're doing an incredible job befriending students and helping present Jesus to them. And I want to highlight one more globally. World. Serve international. Uh, good friend of mine, John Bongiorno, leads this organization. And they've got a big vision to, over the next several years, start, uh, impact a thousand communities and bring this is the four things. Bring clean, safe drinking water to that community. Um. Build the church. Build a home for the pastor and then a garden to help, um, with, you know, sort of provision, sustenance, uh, uh, income for the family. And so, um, it's $75,000 to. Isn't this amazing to impact a community where we can help dig it well and bring clean, safe drinking water. We can build a church, build a home for the pastor, and then create a source of income for the family. And so, by God's grace, we're going to do that over the next three years. Impact three communities. Come on, y'all, put your hands together.
I think it's super exciting. So what we ask is this for those who are regular attenders and members of Grace, for your guest here, just sit back and watch and enjoy. But if you're if this is your home, your spiritual family, all I ask is this is for you to ask God, hey Lord, would you like me to participate? How could I participate in giving? Because the big idea is this is as we give. We're helping the poor, the needy, Dean Wells, planting churches, impacting our community, impacting the next generation, helping fulfill the Great Commission. I think part of the portfolio of our lives needs to be to the poor, the needy. And how do you do that practically and as a spiritual family, this is how we do it. And so we have a faith commitment card that over the next 12 months, what might you have faith for and what? Here's a simple question What's God putting in your heart on how you could contribute helps us plan and prepare, but it also helps your faith to pray and say, Lord, I want to help advance the Kingdom. Be part of the Great Commission over the next 12 months with this above and beyond, um, offering. And so thank you for your generosity in all that. And I know the Lord's going to help us by God's grace. Knock out our to do list for 2026. So today we're going to continue our in our series Make a Difference. We've been talking about how we're made to make a difference. And here's our question today is this.
How is God uniquely designed me to make a difference? Remember last week we talked about together? This week I'm talking about you. Me individually. How is God uniquely made me to make a difference? How? And I want you to think for a moment. Can you imagine a church full of people that every person knew how God had uniquely made them, gifted them, created them in the image of God? And then each person was walking in and fulfilling and functioning in their gifts and fulfilling their calling.
Do you know what the result would be? The Bible tells us the body builds itself up in love. It's super powerful. It's a beautiful thing. How the body functions together. It's a beautiful thing.
Now here's the beauty. There's. There's approximately 8.3 billion people on planet Earth.
It's a lot of people. But you know what? There's only one you like. You're completely unique.
And that's a lot of people. You think at some point there'd be a duplicate, right? Hey, Bill. Hey, Bill. You know, like, is that same guy? You know, uh, and even cute twins. Like we saw today with Ella and Reagan are completely different. Made in the image of God. And every thumbprint for every 8.3 billion times can be uniquely identified. Because God made us all that differently. We have a different DNA, and there's something powerful about that. Let me ask you this question. Have you ever felt like you're different, maybe like you didn't fit in? Well, let me tell you something. You are different, and there's no one else like you. I think that's the beauty of the body of Christ. It's the tapestry. It's. We all fit together beautifully. And there's no cookie cutter. There's no two people the same 8.3 billion people. And everyone's different. And in that, God's put inside of each one of us a desire to make a difference, to be significant, to have something in our life outlast our life and do something of eternal consequence. You are not created by God just to make a living, but to make a difference.
And here's our big idea today. You were shaped by God to make a difference. That is so true. You were shaped by God. To make a difference. You were made on purpose, for a purpose. God formed you before the foundation of the world. He designed you, created you, made you in his image and shaped you. You have a unique shape which is perfectly matched by God for the good works that he ordained before the foundation of the world, that you might walk in them. Now, today, y'all, we're going to do something unique. For those of you who are regular attenders members at Grace, we usually have notes and we have a message.
Today we have a worksheet, the the the teacher. I was a teacher back in the day, y'all. The teacher's coming out. And this is a working session with a worksheet, not a message with notes. All right. And so normally when you come in you get to kind of grab notes. And some people do and some people don't. And I'll say I said I said let's give everybody one today because we got a working session with a worksheet. All right. So on your seat as you came in, there's this worksheet. And if you'd be so kind as to take out your worksheet and grab a pen in front of you. We're going to actually it's going to be interactive today. Y'all a little bit different. Buckle up okay. We're throwing a curveball in there today. And we're going to draft off a well-known and very helpful framework created by Rick Warren called Shape. It's an acronym. We're going to walk through this acronym. And let me tell you my prayer today. Here's my prayer is that today, by God's grace, that God Himself, through the presence of His Holy Spirit, would give you a little bit of spiritual sight, insight, aha! Moment to a degree that you're an incredible gift from God. You're 1 in 8 point 3 billion. You're made uniquely by God for his kingdom purpose. You're amazing. I've got a good friend by the name of Phil Olson. Uh, he's a former NFL football player. He's claim to fame as the only time where three brothers all played in the NFL together. Um, and Phil's a great guy. He's actually a consultant to businesses, and he comes in and this is what he does. He helps teams, um, each person on the team discover their talent in order to match it to their task. Have you ever been doing a task that you didn't think you were very gifted for? Well, this is really what he's really good at is coming in and helping you discover your unique talent and then helping match your task to it. So, um, often when we have a potential employer, someone's new on the team. I'll have them take this tool called Pro Scan that he uses. And then I'll say, after you do your Pro Scan, I want you to spend an hour with Phil on the phone. And I said, now here's a spoiler alert. Let me tell you what. After one hour with Phil on the phone, I promise you this is going to be your experience. You're going to hang up your phone and you're going to go. I am God's gift to the body of Christ. Because it doesn't matter what your profession is, how you uniquely shaped by God. He has an incredible gift to help you to see how significant you are, how you compliment what you bring to the table, how you can work in team together really well. And it's so affirming. It's so encouraging. Every single person that talks to Phil for an hour gets done and go, I'm amazing. And let me just tell you this, I think he's anointed by God. And it's a spiritual gift because that's God's heart. That's God's heart for you. It's really my prayer for you today is that you would get a glimpse of, oh my goodness, I'm 1 in 8 point 3 billion. And what I bring to the table is unique and powerful and helpful. It complements other gifts.
And I love the way that God made me. And so that's what I'm praying for today. And that ultimately you would discover your talent, your shape. We're going to call it today, and it would match your your talent and your task. Your shape would match what God's called you to do because God's created you to do good work. So here we go. Let's walk through this acronym together. Here's the first one on your sheet. S for shape spiritual gifts. What God has given you, spiritual gifts or what God has given you. When you become a follower of Jesus Christ, God adopts you into his family. He forgives your sin. He gives you the Holy Spirit. But I don't know if you've ever thought of this before, but you also get when you are a follower of Jesus. He gives every follower of Jesus Christ spiritual gifts. I don't if you've made a decision to follow Christ, and Christ lives inside of you, I don't have to go. Huh?
I wonder if you have any spiritual gifts. That's not even a question. The only question is, have you discovered the spiritual gifts that God has given you? It's not. Some people have them. Some people. Everyone's got them. Who's a follower of Christ now? You can't earn them. You can't work for them. You can desire them. You can develop them. But you can't choose them or create them. You discover them now. There are four lists in Scripture of spiritual gifts, and we're not going to go through all four. But I wanted to go through one of them, because we're going to see some of the spiritual gifts that come out of there. Um, and we see some principles about them. So here we go. Romans 12 verse three says this. Paul says, for by the grace given to me, I say to some of you who happen to have ask? No, no, it didn't say that. Hold on. Was it?
I say that everyone among you. Y'all catch that. Everyone among you that you now think more highly of yourself than you ought to think, but to think with sober judgment. See, when it comes to giftings and how God made you, you can think too highly of yourself, but you can think too lowly of yourself. Think with sober judgment. Have good understanding of how God made you. And this is this context is teeing up spiritual gifts and and how God made us, uh, each according to the measure of faith that God is assigned for as in one body, the body of Christ, but also then the body of believers like Grace church that you're part of. We have many members, and the members do not all have the same function. We have different functions. There's different things that we do. So we though were many were one body in Christ and individually members of one another. We need each other. We complement one another. No one has all the gifts. Everyone has gifts, but no one's got them all. We need each other.
We're interdependent, not independent. Now next verse. Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us. Let us use them. Let us function in them. We're going to come back to that. We often end up discovering our gifts by using them, functioning them, trying them. And then it gives them examples if prophecy in proportion to our faith.
By the way, that's one of the gifts that Paul says we should all earnestly desire to prophesy. And if I may just sort of make this practical down to earth, I think when we think about prophecy, we think about like Elijah and the Old Testament are called on fire or something, you know? Uh, but but let me just explain. When Paul was saying that prophecy is hearing from God and then speaking for God, God speaking through you. And let me give you an example. You had this experience where you talk to a friend and they were sharing maybe what they were going through.
And in the moment you felt something for them, like you cared. You had empathy. Your heart was moved and then you gave them some encouragement. You challenged them. You encouraged them. You supported them. You empathize with them. And the person went, oh, thank you.
That meant a lot. Let me tell you what was going on. God was speaking to you and through you to that person. That's prophecy. Hearing from God, speaking for God, let me just say it's way more down to earth than some picture we may have in our head. I think we should earnestly desire that we would be a conduit of God's encouragement, of God's heart, of God's life through us. I think that's what Paul was talking about. Okay. Um, next one, if service in our serving. Let me say this.
We're all called to be served servants, right? We're all called to serve. But some people have a spiritual gift of serving. They're just really good at it. It comes natural to them. They get in a situation, they go, oh, let me help. Like, it just it just flows out of them. Some of us have to try to become better at serving. You know what I'm saying? Like, we have to think about it. I can, like, take off and lead or organize, but, like, you know what I'm saying? Like, some of you have the spiritual gift of serving. Um, to the one who teaches and is teaching to the one who exhorts in his exhortation, if you're if you're just encourager, you like to exhort, encourage, strengthen people to the one who contributes in generosity. It's kind of like serving. We're all called to give. We're all called to be generous. You might not have thought of this before. Do you know there's a spiritual gift of giving that some people have that others don't?
And some people go like, well, I just feel like I got a special gift to give.
Doesn't have to do with zeroes and numbers. But like, generosity just flows out of you. In a situation like, I want to help, I want to make a difference. And again, that can be developed in our lives. The one who leads with zeal. The one who does acts of mercy. Some of you have a spiritual gift of mercy and compassion. Again, we all y'all catching this. We all should be compassionate. We should all show mercy. But some of you like it just flows out of you. You go into a room and you can feel the person who's going through it. You just have this spiritual gift. You're tuned in. Now there's other places. First Corinthians 12 has a list of nine, um, um, gifts. And there's two other places. Um, God has given us spiritual gifts. Now grab your notes.
Um, here, uh, you'll see we've listed from those four lists, compiled some of these.
And here's my encouragement to you. Um, this is not a task. You don't have to get this perfectly right.
Okay. I would like you to circle a couple of these that you think you have, that you might have, that you think, like, kind of jumps out at you. I think that's the way, a good way of thinking. Like hospitality, I love hospitality. Did you know that the Bible lists hospitality as a spiritual gift? Some of you have a special gift of hospitality. And by the way, it's how wonderful gift for connecting with people. It's not Leadership, mercy. Pastoring. Caring. Shepherding people. Teaching. Gift, faith. You might be like, I have a spiritual gift of faith. I just, I get around, I got faith for people like I see them going through and you're like, no, no, God's got you and you carry that. Let me tell you this it's important for you to discover your spiritual gifts, because then you can develop them and use them like you might. You might never have known, like, oh, that thing where I get around people and I can just believe for them that's a spiritual gift. Yeah. And you can actually develop it. Think about it, pray it, utilize it, activate it in your life. So circle a couple of these. Um, and if you're not sure, just make something up, okay. All right. Number two, here's the second thing. In our in our shape is our heart. What you care about, what you care about. Nothing.
This is interesting, y'all. God gives us his heart into our heart. But it's not all the same. We care about different things, and that's beautiful. That's the body of Christ in action. Your heart, the Bible describes as your desires, your hopes, your interests, your ambitions, your dreams, your affections, your passions. Okay. In Psalm 37, verse four. This is interesting. Delight yourself in the Lord. Follow Jesus. Put them first. Put God first in your life and he will give you the desires of your heart. I think it comes in two ways one. Sometimes God gives you the desires of your heart because he gives you what you wanted and he blesses you. But I think there's another meaning where God gives you the desires of his heart and he puts them into your heart. God gives you the desires in your heart that the desires.
What you care about comes from him. He deposits that into you. And that will happen in your life where all suddenly you realize, like, whoa, I really care about that differently than like like we can. You just can't care about everything. Everyone, every issue the same. And God's uniquely shaped you to care about things differently. I want to give you three ways to maybe think about this, that can maybe help you discover what is my heart. What do I care about?
For example, you may have a passion for specific people whom you'd like to help. Alright, so for you may have a heart for kids and you realize like, gosh, kids need to get a good start. I want to invest in kids while they're young. I want to help build their life. Maybe you think in my life what I went through, I would really like to see. I'd like to give away what I didn't get.
By the way. Oh, that's powerful thought. I want to give away what I didn't get. I'm going to help someone else. And maybe you just love kids. Maybe you don't like kids. And we don't want you at Grace. Kids. Okay. We. We find people that love kids. Okay? Not everyone does. Okay, maybe you love students and you love middle school. High school students. You go like that's a rocky time and hormones are raging. I care about high school students. I want to help them stay on track and make good decisions and build in their life or college students. And you care about that. Or young adults. Or maybe it's marriages where you go like, oh my goodness, our marriage went through it and we it was got rocky and we were hanging on by a thread and the Lord helped us and I know what it's like. Or I went through a divorce and it was painful. I want to help someone else. Maybe it's parenting and you just, like, love parents and you want to help parents do well and raise their kids well. And you have a heart for parents. Maybe it's 50 plus. You go like, hey, if people get older, I've got a heart for them to not just retire and fade away into the sunset, but to use those years to advance the kingdom in their most significant, fruitful season of their life. But let me say this maybe it's not an age demographic or a season of life. Maybe you have a real heart for the homeless. I drive by and I just like, see someone homeless and it moves me, touches my heart. I love Durham Rescue Mission. Maybe it's the poor. Maybe it's single. Moms just love single moms. I want to be there for them kids without a home. Maybe you care about adoption, fostering. You go. I just have a heart for kids that need to be adopted or fostered. Maybe it's people in prison. People who struggle to learn to read. It's a big deal, y'all. Literacy. Anyway. That's a whole nother issue. Moms with unplanned pregnancies. Someone in our church caught a big heart for that. She's helping facilitate significant ministry to moms with unplanned pregnancies. Maybe it's. You really care about people who struggle with anxiety mental health. Maybe it's people from a certain nation or ethnicity. You know, maybe you have a passion for Muslims or unreached people groups. What specific people will you go? I like to help them.
Here's another one. A passion for a cause. What you'd like to see change. And interestingly, I think when you get a passion for a cause, it often comes through. Not a positive, but kind of an a negative emotion or experience. You go, oh, that burdens me. Like, we love to ask this question. What breaks your heart? What what injustice are wrong in the world moves you that you care about that cause I've shared the story years ago is probably about 20 years ago. Nana sent me a video of an from an organization called Charity water. It was their first anniversary and Scott Harrison did this video where he's explaining the world water crisis and a billion people without clean, safe drinking water. And it's less than that now. Um, but, uh, you know, talking about women, children having to go get water, waterborne diseases and all the effect of that, you know, um, downstream, so to speak. Sorry.
Um, and I'm watching this video and just really moved my heart. I'm like, whoa, you know? And in the video, they ended up interviewing a doctor in a hospital. I can remember it so vividly.
They're interviewing this doctor and there's this white sink, and he goes over to the white sink and he turns on the water. And the discrepancy between the white sink and the brown water flowing out. I didn't see it coming, but all of a sudden I just uncorked and I sat there and I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, you have to have clean water in a hospital. And I just, I, I didn't see it, but tears just started flowing down my eyes. I'm like and I'm like, I got through that video barely. I'm like, we're gonna do something about this. It's like God gives you the desires of your heart. Like he he put within me. Like. And by God's grace, every single year we've been digging wells and bringing clean, safe drinking water to communities. We're committed to it. Like, we've done it a lot because it's it's a big deal. Let me tell you this. God will do that for you.
What breaks your heart? What burdens you? Another way to think about it is what? Are you tempted to post some nasty thing on Facebook that you shouldn't have? But anyway, okay, that's another way you might want to think about it. And it's a divine discontentment. This couldn't be. This shouldn't be okay. A passion for a cause. Here's the next one. A passion for a role. What you like to do. What do you love doing? What comes. Maybe you go like, boy, I. I just love doing this and I'm good at it. And I'll do it. Whatever door opens up, I'm glad to help out. Uh, so what? I want you to take just a moment and again. You don't have to get this, all right? Take this home with you. But if you could think of a specific people like you, go. And it might not be, like, super fresh, but maybe, like, if you kind of think for a moment Like all I care about students or I care about this people that struggling and needs grace and help. And like, what would you write down? Write something down. A passion for a cause. If you could pick a cause. What cause moves you or cause speaks to you? Again, this is not a comprehensive thing of your whole life, but write something down. Or maybe there's two things. Okay. And then thirdly, a passion for a role. What do you like to do. And you can maybe write something down there. Okay. Next one is a abilities. What you're good at, what you're good at.
These are natural abilities that you have that maybe you've developed in a workplace, at school, or just whatever you do over your life. You've developed some natural abilities. It's a little bit like that thumbprint. You're just good at this. There's abilities that you have. Ephesians 210 is this. We are God's workmanship.
Now that word workmanship is actually poema, where we get our English word poem.
But in the Greek at the time it actually meant like not just a poem, but creative work. You're his handiwork. You're his. Not just creative, but you're like. You're like his creative expression. Like, we kind of talk in our creative department about the creatives, like. Like it's just create. You're a creative expression of God's creativity and design. Is that amazing? You're his masterpiece. You're a poem written. God crafted you. He made it. You created in Christ Jesus for good works. Hey, y'all see this talent task? yours. Workmanship shaped by God. Yours. Poem. Yours. You're this creative design created for God works.
Let me tell you this. God wants to perfectly match the beautiful creation that you are with what you do. The good works which God prepared before the foundation of the world, that we should walk in them. And your abilities are not random. I think sometimes we end up with this sacred, secular kind of you got work life. I'm good at this at work. And then I come to church and I'm like, I don't know. I don't know what my spiritual gifts are. Well, let me give you a little hint. You've got some natural abilities that God can really use.
And sometimes I don't think we see our natural abilities that God can use them supernaturally. They can use them spiritually in our lives. And what's interesting is this I think sometimes we have a hard time really knowing what we're good at, because what we're good at comes so easily for us. And we think everyone's good at it, you know, like you're just good at it and you think everyone's good at it. Well, everyone can look at a spreadsheet that's super obvious and see how this no, everybody can't look at a spreadsheet and be like, you know, everybody else can just, you know, organize or strategize or be details or be big picture, or everyone else can have a creative eye and see how that should be. No, everyone doesn't have a creative eye like you do. You're amazing. You got a gift. Okay, so, um, we have a list here, and this is just a really a warm up list. Um, but I love for you to like any of these that jump out to you, that you think you have some natural ability in, circle them, however many. Do you enjoy entertaining? Maybe you're good at recruiting and do that at work.
Interviewing? Research. Are you artistic? Are you good at graphic design or video editing?
Evaluating. Planning? Managing? Maybe you're good at counseling. Encouraging, athletic teaching, writing, linguistic editing, promoting, repairing hobbies, cooking, recall, whatever, whatever, whatever. And let me just I love telling the story. Um, in a neighborhood we used to live in, I used one of my spiritual gifts of basketball to connect with some of the guys in the neighborhood, and we would hang out, and I was building relationships. And one day Dan and I were having a talk, and she was like, sweetheart. Like, you know, like you hang out with the guy. She goes, I just don't feel like I've got any, like, way to connect or any gifts. And I'm an introvert and you're more extroverted. And I said, well, sweetheart, I said, just pray and think about, like, what are you like naturally good at what you like to do. And she thought about it, prayed about it, and she came up with this idea of making fudge for all the neighbors. So she made fudge and made a little plate and brought it around to the neighbors and, you know, bring along a cute little kid, and you can't go wrong with that, you know? And one of the guys in particular that I hung out with his, his, his house was like the hub where he always hung out. And, um, he actually showed up at my house, knocked on the door, and he goes, can I use. How'd you know? How'd you know? No, I said, know what? He goes, how'd you know to give me fudge? I mean, from Nana. And like, I was, like, totally perplexed. I thought, you tell me. He goes, well, he goes, here's the situation. Every single Christmas since I was born, as long as I can remember. My grandma brings me fudge every year. And she passed away this year. And I realized it was going to be the first year I wasn't going to get fudge. I've been working on this guy building relationship. Logging hours after hours, after hours. And in one plate of fudge, he gives us life to Christ. His wife has left and he ends up meeting this gal. I got to do the marriage counseling and marriage. It was amazing what God did. And it was all from the fudge. Okay. And, uh, it was Nana's spiritual gifts.
Y'all, let me just say this. Your natural gifts God can use supernaturally. And I think it's good for you to to see them that way. It's not two different things. Okay. So, um, right down circle, think about what are your abilities. Next one is personality. How God wired you. Your personality is you've got a unique wiring internally. How you see the world, how you respond, your personality is different. Now there's a bunch of personality profiles that are out there that I think can be helpful tools. There's not one good one or whatever. I kind of like them.
They're kind of fun. You can use, you know, any of them. Maybe you've done the disc profile before disc. You know, um, Myers-Briggs is another Enneagram Pro Scan strengths finder. There's one with, like, animals and otters and lions or something. I don't know, you know, whatever. Um, but these these personality profiles can help you discover how did God wire me differently? Because sometimes in relationships and family, at work, with friends, when we kind of miss each other, it's it's we're we're wired differently. And we see the world differently when you realize like, oh, that's how you're motivated. That's how you're wired. And sometimes we wish that we were something that were not. You know, I wish I was more of a seven instead of a two, or I wish I was more of an extrovert instead of an introvert. You know, I was a little more outgoing or whatever. And sometimes, you know, you know, introverts will say like, I wish I was better at, like, connecting with people. I'm just an introvert. I said, hey, hey, hey, hey, you have an advantage. Do y'all know 70% of the people are introverts? Let me ask you this question who do introverts like? Connecting with introverts. They really do. You have an advantage to connect one on one with people. Here's here's what I'm getting to. This is my prayer for you. That is, you discover your shape, your wiring, your abilities, your spiritual gifts. You go, whoa, I'm pretty amazing.
Because, listen, this is what David said. You created my inmost being, my hardwire, my personality, my motivation, what I care about my heart. You knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I'm fearfully and wonderfully made. Let me ask you this. When you get up in the morning, look in the mirror. You go, dang! You're wonderful.
You're fearfully made. God got that one right. Look at. That's what he says here. Your works are wonderful. What was he? What work was he referring to? Your works are wonderful. What is he referencing? How you made me. I'm fearfully and wonderfully made. And look at this. This is powerful. I know that for I know that. Or one versus says I know it full well. This is what I'm asking you. This is a little challenging question. Do you know full well how fearfully and wonderfully you're made? That's not pride, that's sober judgment. That's having a healthy understanding that you're made in the image of God fearfully and wonderfully. It's you discovering your shape and and celebrating. Let me just say this. If you're down on how God made you, you're not down on yourself. You're down on God. I just made that up. That wasn't even in my notes.
If you're down on how God made you, you're not down on yourself. You're down on God the Creator, not happy with how he made you. You're awesome. You're fearfully and wonderfully made in the image of God. This is what Jeremiah said before I formed you in the womb. I knew you before you were born. I set you apart. I got purposed for you. You were made on purpose, for I appointed you as a prophet to the nations. God set you apart. So under personality, write down something like are you an introvert or an extrovert? Write that down if you know your dis profile. Like I'm an I'd if you know your Enneagram. I'm a Seven wing eight. If you know your Myers-Briggs, I'm a f ING s Alabama and I don't even know I don't got that one so straight. Um, how is God wired? You all right? Let's look at the last part of our acronym E experiences. What you've been through. what you've been through, the story of your life has shaped you uniquely. God created you. There are certain things hardwired into you, but with that hard wiring, it's it's it's also the environment, the experiences, what you've learned, what's been poured into you in the positive and the negative that has created a special story in your life. Romans 828 and we know that for those who love God, all things that we experience through that little part, because it's a subset of all things that we experience work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose, he works all things together for good. All your experiences and God can redeem anything your pain, your mistakes, your victories, your losses. Nothing is wasted when you go through a hard season. For example, you can help someone else, you can be there for someone else. God can redeem even the pain of the difficulties that we go through. Look at what Paul says in Second Corinthians. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the father of mercies and the God of all comforts, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that. Look at this. Here's so that here's the purpose. We may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. So part of God's purpose when we go through something and God strengthens you, and God helps you, and he comforts you so that you can help someone, you can't help but have a heart for other people. Now, sometimes we bury it, we stuff it. We ignore it. We try to move on. Let me tell you this. God wants to redeem even your pain. And where he. Where he helped you. You can help someone else. I got a phone call this week from a good friend. It's a tough phone call, said Kendrick. I found out I've got cancer in my appendix that spread getting apart. Starting chemo this week.
My having gone through my battle with cancer. I tell you what gives you a lot of empathy. I sat and listened. I was moved.
Brokenhearted. I'll listen. I'll care. I'm going to pray.
I'm going to support. I'm going to stand with you. Honestly, it's a little bit like if I had to go through all that garbage. go. That's Italian for garbage.
I want some. I want to help kick the the devil and the teeth and bring some good and help and support and strength to somebody else. And let me tell you this. What? You've gone through your experiences and we've listed some of these years, some of your experiences are like spiritual experiences. Maybe you've have a situation where God really helped you through a tough season. And spiritually God showed up and he supernaturally helped you. Maybe it's where, like, God really answered your prayer, where God met you in a powerful way. Like I, I've had people, you see, when you go through something, maybe you've been through an experience with divorce. You know, I'm going to help somebody with broken marriage. Maybe you've been through addiction. I'm going to help somebody with recovery. I'm going to point them in the right direction. They're going to have to take the steps. But I'm going to stand, pray, believe whatever it might be. See those spiritual experiences where God met you. You can help somebody else. So maybe write down what what have you been through spiritually that's been part of your story that shaped who you are? What painful things have you been through? Maybe write down a painful, tough season, health battle, relational thing, family upbringing, education, training. What's been poured into you? Something you learn grew professionally developed in you work, professional, um, things that you maybe have been equipped with, you've experienced, you've learned on the job. What ministry things have you done in terms of leading a small group prayer?
You've, you've you've served you've gone on a missions trip understanding how God will use these experiences, what you've been through to make an impact. Now that's our shape I want to give you this thought. You might say, okay, I got some ideas. I've got some thoughts. I circled some things I feel like I. I see a little bit, but, Lord, boy, I'd like to really get more. Let me give you a piece of advice. Is this. Often we really discover our shape as we do something with and for God, not just.
I think it's good to close your eyes, think and pray, circle, study, you know? But but often the real discovery is in the doing, not in just the thinking. See what I'm saying? Like if I had just been thinking and not doing, trust me, I never would have been a pastor. I mean, I didn't see myself at all as a leader, much less a communicator, and definitely not a pastor. But in the doing, you discover you kind of got to step out to find out what God's really called you to do and to be. And I want to encourage some of you that, that, that maybe it's a season to step out and to start doing a little bit. And in the doing, you really start discovering.
Here's my two thoughts for you. I want to encourage you. Number one, I'm going to pray for you in just a minute, but I want to cover. Number one, discover your shape. The key word is discover.
And and I want to invite you to to maybe go deeper, even in this right where you go, like what is my shape? We actually step one. Step two in our growth track. We have such a heart for this. Like for me, for us as a team, the idea that we feel like a significant part of what we're called to do reaching people, building lives. Part of the a big piece of the building lies is helping you discover your God given design, your shape, and helping you walk in it. Because this is what happens. The body just starts building itself out. The love and stuff start happening, grow. The lives are changed and and discover your shape. We do that. Step one we share our vision. Values get planted in the house, Lord. But listen. Step two is all about discovery of your shape. I want to give you one more tool also, um, today we kind of gave you the two page version. You know, you can take with you work on this. There's also a 24 page version. And if this, you know, kind of interests you, if you'd like to dive in a little more deeply, go through like a, a process of wrestling with it a little bit more. We've got a QR code here for you. You can just whip out your phone, take a photo, um, click on that link and get it in your history, whatever, and maybe pull it up later, print it out if you would like. Um, and, and it's just a great tool that some of you might really enjoy digging in a little bit more. Number one, Discover your shape. And again, that I think you'd find that tool very helpful. Two.
Step into mission. Step into mission. Some of you have been intending enjoying Grace, and I want to say this. Maybe today there's a little knock on your heart that God's called you to use your shape, your God given talents, for a task for the Lord in his body, building the body all up in love.
And you can use it in your family, in your workplace. The part of the part of it is it is in the spiritual community. Someone has something you need and you have something someone else needs or interdependent. It's beautiful and I want to encourage you. Step into mission. Step into mission. Before I pray for you, I want to give you one more thought. Maybe today you're sitting here and something inside of you goes like, I want to know God's purpose for my life. I want to know God's plan. I want to discover who he made me to be. And I want to discover what I could do for him. Let me say this.
You can't do that. Well, let me. I'll say it in the positive. The first step in doing that is you have to surrender your life to Jesus and say, not my purpose, but your purpose. Not my plan, but your plan. Not my path, but your path. And you have to decide to become a follower of Jesus and go all in. That's the first step and the most important step. And maybe today God brought you here to hear this message about purpose. And it resonates within you because God put that there inside of you. But the first and most important step is to say, I'm going to lay down my plan for his plan. And I want to pray with you and for you today. So, Lord, thank you today for our each and every person here. 1 in 8 point 3 billion made by God for God made on purpose, for a purpose. And I want to pray a blessing of spiritual eyes to see and discover, like David said, how fearfully and wonderfully each person is made that you would help us discover our spiritual gifts, that we know him. We'd be clear on them that we would use them, function in them, that we'd use them to build up the body and love that we tap into our heart, our passion, what burdens us, the people, the cause, the the function that we're good at that we enjoy. Lord, you'd help us discover our natural abilities, and we'd use our natural abilities not just for natural things, but for spiritual things to supernatural things and, Lord, our personality. I pray that we would love and know how you formed our inmost being and our experiences, Lord, that we would redeem them. Use them, the positive and the difficult, both for your glory. Lord, may grace church be a place where people know, discover their gifts and callings, that we would flow together as a community that builds itself up, and that each person unique would fit into the beautiful tapestry of the Kingdom of God. As we love and serve and honor you, in Jesus name we pray.
Amen.