Your Giftedness and Your Calling

If you tell me you're a non-gifted Christian, you're telling me one of two things. One, you're not a Christian. Or two, you're a Christian who just doesn't know their spiritual endowment yet. Dr. Tony Evans says you can't fulfill your calling until you figure out your gift. When you discover your gift and when you merge it with your calling, it is to show up in the marketplace of the kingdom.

Celebrating 40 years of faithfulness, this is The Alternative with Dr. Tony Evans, author, speaker, senior pastor of Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship in Dallas, Texas, and president of the Urban Alternative. The Bible tells us every believer is spiritually gifted, but identifying those gifts and figuring out how to use them is another story. Today, Dr. Evans explains how what makes you special can make you effective.

Let's join him. Today we want to look at your giftedness and your calling. If you are a Christian, God has equipped you with the skills necessary to fulfill the purpose for which He has called you.

Let me say that again. If you are a Christian, you have been gifted, supernaturally endowed with an ability that has as its goal the equipment necessary to fulfill the calling for which God has called you. Or to put it even another way, God never calls that which He does not equally equip for.

He doesn't call you to do something you can't do. Ephesians chapter 4 will be our central passage. We'll look at a few others, but Ephesians 4 is our central passage. A talent is a human ability all people are born with, whether they're saint or sinner, all people have varying abilities or talents to benefit mankind in general. In other words, you don't have to be a Christian to be talented. There are some talented non-Christian singers.

There are some atheists who are talented in science or mathematics or in building or in philanthropy. So you don't have to have a Christian to be talented, you just have to be human to be talented. A gift is different than that. A gift is an ability given by God to believers as opposed to mankind in general that is specifically designed to service His people for the expansion of His kingdom. It's called a spiritual gift because guess what? It's given by the Holy Spirit and it is used by the Holy Spirit to accomplish God's spiritual purposes.

Therefore, if you're not in tune with the Holy Spirit, then it may be unclear what the Spirit has given you, or if you're not using it spiritually, then there won't be any power in its use. What Satan did with the fall of man was take the gifts that God had intended to use for the propagation of His kingdom, and what Satan did is he stole them. Satan takes talents of men and he uses them to promote hell.

On the cross, Jesus Christ conquered Satan. One by one, God has been bringing men and women into His kingdom. Once you become converted, the gifting that you may have used for hell, including if you only used it for yourself, same thing, has now been confiscated into the kingdom of God. We will take gifts that we may not even know are gifts, we may still look at them as talents, because that's the non-Christian world view, and we'll use those talents and develop those talents to make money.

We'll go to school, we'll get our MBAs, we'll do all this, we'll go to seminars and workshops, and we will develop that thing to generally be beneficial to all men. That's a talent. Not recognizing its spiritual implication. In other words, that talent that really is a gift that God wants to sanctify and use, but you don't see it as a gift, so it never has any spirituality tied to it, and when you stand before Jesus Christ, He's going to want to know all that you call talent, He called gift, and I never saw a thing from it. Your gift is to service the kingdom, which means that when you discover your gift and when you merge it with your calling, it is to show up in the marketplace of the kingdom. If you are gifted as a teacher, you may strengthen the church through your teaching ministry, but it may also be your career in a public school. But if it is your career in a public school, the public school is in God's kingdom. You're not gifted in something you don't like to do.

Nor are you gifted in something you don't have the ability to do. That's why you don't have to worry about God calling you to something outside of who you are, because your spiritual DNA already had that coded. God wants to use your experiences, good, bad, and ugly, for your calling.

This leads him further now. Verse 11. He gave some apostles, prophets, some evangelists, and some as pastor-teachers. This is the leadership in the church. For the equipping of the saints for the work of service to the building up of the body of Christ. Gifts are to empower the church, and the church's job is to infiltrate the kingdom on behalf of Christ. Gifts are to empower the church. It's okay if you use your gift to make money.

That's okay. But it is not functioning as a gift if all it does is make money. It functions as a gift when it is used to empower the people of God. He says in verse 12, it's to equip the saints for the work of service. It is to equip the saints to work. Now, evidently, some have not discovered yet that there is a job to do here. The work of service.

Many Christians have the idea, I come to church, sing to me, preach to me, counsel me, encourage me, give me money from the deacons fund. Me, me, me, me, me. Do it for me. They want all the benefit. They don't do none of the work. That's a leech. That is a person who does not understand. God did not save you to sit, soak, and sour. He saved you for the work of service. That's why we require every member to have a ministry, because there is a job God wants you to do. It is the job internally to the church and then externally to the world using your gift. It is the job of the leadership to give you the biblical orientation.

Watch this. So you turn your calling through the use of your gift into a ministry and not just a job. Some of us have the idea, God did not call me to the ministry.

If you saved, you've been called to the ministry. No, you have not been called in the traditional use of the word ministry, meaning professional church ministry. But some of you were called to be doctors. Were called to be lawyers. Were called to be business people. Were called to be teachers.

You were called. That is the burning passion God has given you, and then He equipped you to do it, but it is still a job. It hasn't yet transferred to a ministry.

How do you know it? Because you're not using it to build up anybody in the church, and you haven't sought to turn it into a ministry out in the marketplace. So He says it is for the building up of the body of Christ until we all attain the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God to aim it to a man in the measure of the statute which belongs to the fullness of Christ. He says that the reason your work of service is needed is God is trying to get His whole family somewhere, not just you.

It's not just about you. You're not an only child, and that's why we often say if you are a cul-de-sac Christian and not a conduit Christian, then you are blocking your own blessing because if God can't work through you, He won't work to you. If you want to be blessed but don't ever want to be a blessing, then what you've done is cut short your blessing because you want to be a blessee and not a blessor. You're only concerned about what God is going to do for you. Well, why should He show you your purpose so you can find your purpose and be more selfish with it? Why should He show you your gift if He knows that gift will never come back to His kingdom? It will never bless His church. It'll only be used for you. And don't get me wrong.

It's not wrong to use it for you. And we're going to have another sermon on your calling and your career. He wants there to be a unified, like a football team, different players playing different positions, but they all function on the same play, different roles, but they are going in the same direction. They are headed toward the same goal line.

They are moving in harmony together. First Corinthians chapter 12 has a whole chapter on the gifts, and it says every member of the body is critical. And then he uses the human body because that's his illustration. He says, if the eye were the ear, where would the seeing be?

If the ear were the eye, where would the hearing be? God has placed each member in the body as He so willed for the common good. In fact, he goes on to say, some of the most important parts are hidden. So everybody's not going to be up front.

Everybody's not going to have a public, well-known name. But everybody is critical, and your gift will match your calling. So watch this. You will be content. That's why it says in Romans chapter 12, verse 3, when you find God showing you your gift, don't think too highly of yourself more than you ought to think. Don't think you missed the big stuff now, because you found out God had blessed you.

You can do some things other folk can't do. Remember, it's a grace gift. The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh. Blessed be the name of the Lord.

Don't get the big head. You are here for the common good. You are here to benefit the group.

And you're just one cog in the wheel. Dr. Evans will have more for us in just a moment about finding the right balance of how we see ourselves in light of the giftedness God has blessed us with. First, though, I'd like to let you know that you can get a copy of this entire current audio series as well as a companion book that perfectly complements the material we've been learning. Called for a Purpose, a two-volume, 12-message audio collection on CD and digital download, Antoni's book, Discover Your Destiny, Let God Use You Like He Made You. It doesn't matter what other people have told you that you can or can't do. It doesn't matter whether you feel you have anything worthwhile to contribute.

What matters is God's purpose for putting you on this planet, and nothing can stand in the way of that, if you're ready. For a limited time, we're able to offer this package to you as our gift when you come alongside the ministry and make a contribution to help continue Tony's work here on the air. We depend completely on your support to keep this program going, and this is one way we can show our appreciation for your faithfulness. Contact us today for more information on Called for a Purpose and Discover Your Destiny. All the details are waiting for you online at TonyEvans.org, or call us at 1-800-800-3222, and let one of our team members help you.

I'll have those contact details for you again after part two of today's message and this. God has big plans for you, bigger than you've ever imagined. You're a man of influence, strength, and great purpose.

Are you ready to live up to your highest potential? Dr. Evans' brand-new book, Kingdom Men Rising, a follow-up to his bestseller, Kingdom Man, which sold over 400,000 copies, challenges men to sharpen their spiritual and relational skills to intentionally live with an influencer mindset. Get Kingdom Men Rising today for yourself or for someone you love. Join the journey of men rising up to impact culture for Christ.

Visit TonyEvans.org or your nearest bookstore or online retailer, Kingdom Men Rising. Moses went to two extremes. One time Moses said he was going to deliver the whole nation himself because he thought he could deliver them. Now, I don't know what he was thinking.

Were you going to kill Egyptians one by one? I don't know what he was thinking. But then, after 40 years in the wilderness, he was humble. He got too humble. God said, come on, let Israel go.

I can't do that. The Bible says God got mad at him. One minute he overvalued himself.

I'm going to do it by myself. Last minute he undervalued himself. I can't do a thing. I'm nobody.

I'm nothing. Well, let me tell you, first of all, if you overvalue yourself, a wilderness awaits you. If you undervalue yourself, then God is going to have to shake you up.

He says, think soberly. That is, put a right value on you. You are significant.

You are valuable. You're just not God, nor are you indispensable. He says, you ought to do this with the result that you're no longer children, tossed to and fro, carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness and deceitful scheming. This is very important, because what he's saying is, the reason why you do this in the context of the local church is so that you have the right biblical, theological, and spiritual foundation so when you take this out into the marketplace, you're not tripped up by sinful people who have sinful or wrong theology who are going to trip you up when you try to turn your career into a ministry.

So you go to college today to become a teacher, you're not going to be taught the evolutionary theory, you're going to be taught the evolutionary fact. But if you've been grounded in ministry by other teachers who can teach you the biblical worldview, then you won't get tripped up out there in DISD or whatever part of the kingdom God has called you to serve. That we are a body to work together to become one man that is all pulling to the same degree, verse 15, speaking the truth in love. It's got to be two things, truth and love. In other words, we minister caring for people. We don't just minister facts, truth. We minister facts in a context of relationship. Truth in love. Speaking the truth in love ought to grow up in all aspects unto Him who is the head, even Christ.

We're growing up in the Christ, in the church, we're fanning out into the world to represent the kingdom. Then look at verse 16, the results of your useful spiritual gifts, from whom the whole body, the church, being fitted and held together by that which every joint supplies. How many joints are making a supply? Every joint supply.

Most churches, 10% of the people do 90% of the work, which means most of the work doesn't get done in the 10 quit because they burnt out. But when everybody does what they're gifted to do, it says the whole body is working properly. I walk down the street, I stomp my toe. My toe hurts. But the only reason I know my toe is hurting is because there's a signal sent from the nerves that are tied into the muscles in my toe that sends a signal up to my brain. And my brain is told by my toe to tell my mouth to let everybody else know we hurt. So my brain kicks into gear based on the signal from my toe and alerts my mouth to declare it to be so. My brain then tells my left arm to get ready to reach down and grab my right toe. Then it tells my left foot, get ready because all this weight is coming your way. In a split second without thinking, all my body parts go into action because it functions by that which every joint supplies. And that's when he calls the church a body.

And it's a tragedy. But believe it's not to understand it. Now let me explain something to you. If you're not serving, let me say that again. If you're not serving, tell somebody else. Look at your name and say, if you're not serving. Hey man, look at somebody else and say, if you're not serving. Alright. Guess what?

You get this. If you're not serving, you will never find your gift because God only hits a moving target. You can't sit so consoled and say, when you show me, I'll then serve. God said, not when you serve, then I will show you.

Folks been sitting around for 25 years waiting on God to bang. Oh, that's my gift. It is while you move and you will discover you will like it. You will have the ability to do it. Some people have found out their abilities that they didn't know. Why? Because they were never stirred.

So they've been just sitting resting as they sat and rested. The other problem with gifts is that they apply it too narrowly. People apply it to only the stuff, the traditional church stuff, and that's why our view of ministry here is so broad. That's why it includes tutoring and fathering and mothering and education and all manner of things because the kingdom is broad. The kingdom involves everything that's used to have dominion over the earth, and that's why your gift can go in so many different directions. So it's not this narrow thing. It's a very broad thing. That which ever joins and plies, and here we come to a conclusion, according to the proper working of each individual part, I want to emphasize the word proper, not sloppy working, not leftover working, not shucking and jiving working, proper working.

If you are an employer, you want your employees to work properly, effectively, enthusiastically, energetically, timely, excellently. I know a lot of pastors who live on Saturday night specials. They prepare their sermons on Saturday night, and to cover themselves, they say, well, the Holy Spirit gave me a word.

They had to wait for the Holy Spirit to give a word because they weren't in the word. No, you want it properly working. You want excellence about your calling and your giftedness. You want to be the best in your field that you can be. The proper working of each individual part, that's you, individual, that's you, causes the growth of the body, the whole, because you are excellent, because God is worthy, and you know it's a grace gift that he didn't have to give you, and he didn't even give you the privilege to make money using it if your gift is also used in your career, and you say, wow, look at this gift! It causes the growth of the body, and look at this phrase, for the building up of itself in love.

Now, remember, he's using a body illustration, and he says when a body's working right, it builds itself up. Many of you do not know this, but many of you have already had cancer. You don't know this, but you've already had cancer.

But here's what happens. You know what cancer is? Cancer is basically renegade cells. Cancer are cells that decide they don't want to go along with the program anymore. So this cell decides, let me split off and do my own thing, which would be fine if it would leave your body to do it. But no, it wants to do its own thing in your body. Not only that, but these renegade cells want company, so they reproduce after their own kind, and now you've got a lump, a renegade cell that doesn't want to be by itself, so it now reduplicates, and they hang tight.

And they grow, now you've got a lump. Well, that would be okay if they would stay still. But no, do you think they want to stay still?

No, they want to investigate the rest of the body. So now they metastasize, and now they spread out because they want to take a tour of the rest of you. Now, let me tell you the goal of cancer. It only has one goal, to shut you down.

That's it. Many of us have already had cancer. That is, cells that decided we're going to do our own thing. However, because our immune system was strong enough and vibrant enough and alive enough, the immune system said, hey, white blood cells, we got a fool.

We got a fool over there who's trying to do his own thing. Get it. White blood cells, go over there, race over there to that independent cell and destroy it before you ever knew you had a problem.

Why? Because a healthy body heals itself. When believers are using their gifts under the power of the Spirit of God, you ain't seen power then. That's power, because now stuff gets solved by itself. It doesn't even get up to the pastor's office because believers have hunted that thing down for it ever got that far. You are gifted. You have been supremely gifted for the purpose of God and for His calling. And if you are willing to serve your calling and build up the body with the gift, God will show it to you. Dr. Tony Evans, encouraging you to take what God has given and put it to work, part of his powerful series, Called for a Purpose.

And if that sounds like something you'd like to do, but you don't know where to start, Dr. Evans would love to introduce you to the Lord. Just visit tonyevans.org and follow the link that says Jesus. There, Tony will share how to accept God's life-changing offer, what it means to have a real relationship with Christ, and how to be 100% sure about your eternal future. Drop by tonyevans.org to find out more.

And while you're there, don't forget to ask about that limited-time offer I mentioned earlier. You can get all 12 full-length messages in the powerful Called for a Purpose collection as our gift to you. Just visit tonyevans.org, make a contribution in support of this ministry, and we'll send the audio series to you on CD and digital download, along with a special bonus of Tony's popular and life-changing book, Discover Your Destiny.

Let God use you like He made you, our way of saying thank you. All the details are waiting for you online at tonyevans.org. That's tonyevans.org. Or call our 24-hour resource request line at 1-800-800-3222. Again, 1-800-800-3222. Worship is designed to be something we give to God. But tomorrow, Dr. Evans explains how we receive from it, too. Be sure to join us. The alternative with Dr. Tony Evans is brought to you by the Urban Alternative and is celebrating 40 years of faithfulness thanks to the generous contributions of listeners like you.