Unwrapping Your Gift Part 2

Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith.

If people aren't serving where God wants them to serve in the local church, the whole ministry is shortchanged. Today we'll learn what spiritual gifts are and why it's so vital that we find out which gift we have. From the Moody Church in Chicago, this is Running to Win with Dr. Erwin Lutzer, whose clear teaching helps us make it across the finish line. Pastor Lutzer, is it possible for a believer to have more than one spiritual gift? Well Dave, I think the answer is yes. I mean, God gifts people and sometimes we're in positions of leadership where we need to exercise various spiritual gifts, but at the same time it's very important to emphasize that no one has all the gifts and that's why the body of Jesus Christ is needed. I hope that this series of messages is an encouragement to all those who are listening and know that there is a place where they fit within the body.

Let me ask you a different question. Was COVID-19 the judgment of God? And what is his relationship to natural disasters, to diseases, to pandemics? I've written a new book entitled Pandemics, Plagues and Natural Disasters. What is God saying to us?

And I discuss these kinds of questions. More importantly, I show how that the Bible gives us hope, not just when things go well, but when things fall apart. For a gift of any amount this book can be yours, here's what you do. Go to rtwoffer.com.

That's rtwoffer.com or call us at 1-888-218-9337. And now let us open our Bibles as we continue our discussion of spiritual gifts, very important for our walk with God. There is a lot of overlap here in the gifts, just like wisdom and knowledge have overlapped, so gifts of healing and the effecting of miracles. Prophecy. In the early church there were those who would foretell the future. Prophecy is also preaching and sharing the word of God. And I don't mean standing behind a pulpit and preaching, it may be being able to give that word of exhortation. Prophets are always very hard on sin.

They have a great hatred for hypocrisy and therefore prophets are often not well liked. Distinguishing of spirits. Jesus said that someday there may be those who would come before him and say, Lord have we not prophesied in your name and in your name we have done many wonderful works. And Jesus will say to them, I never knew you. You are workers of iniquity. The distinguishing of spirits. How desperately that is needed today. Because within the church today you have those who think that everything that is supernatural is of God as long as it is done in the name of Jesus. Not so. The miracles in the seventh chapter of Matthew done in the name of Christ.

Christ will say, I never knew you. So that is a gift. And then tongues and the interpretation of tongues. There are also two other gifts that are listed a little later in the chapter and we can pick those up in verse 28 near the end of the verse.

It says helps and administration. Two other gifts. Now if you take Romans chapter 12, which you should do sometime, and also Ephesians 4, when you take those passages you find that there may be 19 or 20 different gifts. And because the list does not seem to be exhaustive in any particular passage, it may be that Paul says these are the kinds of ways that God gifts people for the body.

For example, music is not listed and yet we know that there are those who have special musical gifts. The apostle Paul would not be opposed to that. He would encourage that.

It is that these are the ways by which gifting takes place that the church might be edified. Now we're all very different and we like to be the same. We'd like to have everybody, the teachers would like to have everybody teach.

The administrators would like to have everybody administrate. Those with the gifts of helps would like to have everybody have that eye for a need as those who have the gift of helps have. Exhorters would like everybody to be exhorters.

The fact is that the body is more diverse than that. There is a story which one of our pastors gave me which he used once and I asked him for a copy. He says once upon a time long ago all the animals decided to form a school. I'm sure it was probably homeschooling but anyway they established a well-rounded curriculum of swimming, running, climbing, and flying.

Now to make it easier to monitor the program all the animals took all the courses. The duck was excellent at swimming. In fact he was better than his instructor but he only made passing grades in climbing and was very poor in running. In fact he was so slow he had to stay after school to practice his running. Now this caused his webbed feet to become so badly worn he became only average in swimming but average was quite acceptable so no one worried about it except the duck. Now the rabbit started out at the top of her class in running but after a while she developed this twitch in her leg from all of the time spent in the water trying to improve her swimming.

At the end of the semester she received a D plus in running. The squirrel was a peak performer when climbing but experienced constant frustration when trying to fly. His body became so badly worn from all the landings that he could only get a C in climbing and a D in running. Now the eagle was a problem student. He was severely disciplined for being a non-conformist. In climbing class he would always beat everyone else to the top of the tree but insisted rather in using his way to get there so he got an incomplete.

The eagle was a problem child. Well you get the point. Each creature has been created with a specific area of expertise. We have been given spiritual gifts or areas of which we will excel unless of course we're spending all of our time doing things that God never created us to do. Let's help focus on what this text has to say by three concluding but very very important statements.

Number one. Each person has a gift. Notice in verse seven, but to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit. Now he or she may have more than one gift but one for sure.

One for sure. That is your hard wiring. That doesn't mean that you can't do other gifts. You can't say well you know I can't clean up after we have a dinner at the church because I don't have the gift of helps.

No no no that's not the way it works. It doesn't mean that we can't function in other areas. You can't say to yourself well I can't endure this trial because I don't have the gift of faith. No, you find that the gifts overlap. You find that there is growth in gifts. There is such a thing as exercising those gifts that aren't really your best form of ministry but everyone has one kind of a gift where they excel and where they are fulfilled and if properly trained they can serve effectively. To each one is given the gift of the Spirit. I feel sorry for people who don't know what their gifts are. People who have never unwrapped their gift.

They have never taken the time to figure out who they really are and which of the gifts suits them the best and next week we're going to give you the opportunity to find some help in doing that but I want you to notice that everyone has a gift. In all of the listings of gifts in the New Testament whether in Romans or in Ephesians or in this passage nowhere is there nowhere is there a distinction made between the gifts that men have and the gifts that women have. I take it from the New Testament that women can exercise all of the gifts that are listed as many different gifts as men themselves are able to exercise.

God makes no distinction within the body. Now we do believe that when it comes to the offices of the church, when it comes to the responsibility for example of elders that in the Bible there is therefore male leadership in those categories but so far as gifting is concerned, so far as service is concerned, God makes no such distinction. Now I want you to notice that there are three different kinds of gifts. There are speaking gifts which sometimes are exalted, the gift of teaching, the gift of being an apostle or the gift of sharing as an exaltor. There are speaking gifts, there are sign gifts and they are the ones that cause the controversy today because even in the early church, after the early church as you look at church history, many of these miraculous gifts somehow died away and even during periods of revival they never took place because the apostles were able to do some very special gifts they received. 2 Corinthians 12, 12 the apostle Paul says I was able to do the signs of an apostle but you have speaking gifts, you then have sign gifts and you have the service gifts, administration, helps, etc. Now what the apostle Paul is trying to help us to see today is that we matter and we fit somewhere and the body of Jesus Christ is made weaker if we're not serving and it is made stronger if we serve but some place somewhere we fit. God created us to be a part of the body, to each one is given the manifestation of the spirit. It's interesting that the apostle Paul calls the more ordinary gifts such as administrating or helping or or words of wisdom and knowledge, he considered those also to be the manifestation of the spirit just as much as the miraculous gifts that are listed in the passage, so everyone has a gift. Secondly, if you're dissatisfied with your gift, if you're dissatisfied with your gift, you are dissatisfied with your God. Notice what it says very clearly in verse 11, but one and the same spirit works all these things distributing to each one individually.

I love that. This is not just a coat off the rack, this is tailor-made. This is a gift that suits you exactly because God knows exactly how you were put together. He was there when you were formed in your mother's womb and he gave you all of your hearts wiring as it were. Now we can change the software, but there's nothing that we can do with the basic raw way God made us, but notice this was not happenstance.

Distributing to each one individually just as he wills. Do you realize that God was there when you were created? Some of us look into the mirror and we wonder where he was when we were put together, but I want you to know today that you can be satisfied with the way you look.

Now there are things that you can do to improve it. There are new year's resolutions that you can make that will bear fruit if you're consistent for 365 days, but fundamentally we've been created by God. Our appearance and our giftedness is a part of who we are and if we are dissatisfied we argue with God.

In next week's message I'm going to emphasize the great need in the church of the lifting up of the encouragement of the unseen gifts because there are some gifts that get all the attention, but it's the unseen ones. It's the ones that we don't think are important that Paul is going to say later on are very important to the body. Are you happy with the way God created you?

Are you happy with the way in which you fit within the body? And then finally and most importantly it seems to me that giftedness involves givingness. That is to say that when you read this passage the reason that the spirit of God has poured out gifts upon the church is that we might do service for the common good and that means that we extend ourselves, that we commit ourselves, that we become involved, that we sacrifice for the body.

That's the whole point of giftedness. Now Moody Church is a big church and sometimes we have people come to us who are hurting and they've maybe had a bad experience in another church. Recently I heard about some folks like that and they they come and they may sit in the back and they may leave at the time of the and they may leave at the time of the benediction and they're here to heal and they're here to rethink and to regroup and that's perfectly fine. We welcome you. We welcome all who come to the church for whatever reason obviously, but there does come a time even in the lives of people like that over a period of perhaps six months or a year when they decide that this is going to be their congregation. This is where God has led them and it is time at that point to commit and to say if this is where God led us this is now where we serve and we pray and we work and where we exercise our gifts within this body and I want to speak to some of you who've been around a while and you've never committed to this church.

I want to speak to you for a moment. I don't believe that it's just a mistake. I don't believe that it's just an oversight. I don't believe that it's just a bad idea, but I believe that it is an actual sin. A sin before God to have people who benefit from the body but who refuse to contribute to the body. It is a sin for some people to say preach to me, sing to me, keep the church warm for me.

When I'm sick visit me and when I'm distressed counsel me and publish your bulletin for me, but just see if I'll give my time, my talents, my energies, and my money to the church. That is a sin. A sin and that accounts for the weakness of many a local church and a weakness in the body of Jesus Christ. Read verse 11 again. To one and the same spirit he works all these things distributing to each one individually as he wills.

Why? Verse 7, for the common good. God has gifted you that you might serve the body and strengthen it that we might have a better witness to the world. You realize that the Lord Jesus is never going to say to you, well done thou good and faithful servant for thou has listened to 2,647 messages and twice that number of choir numbers enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.

It's not going to happen that way. You read the context of those words it is where God says I am gifting you and I am giving you the talents and I am giving you money and I am giving you the ability to serve and I am giving you the body and you had better serve within it or else you will miss out. If you go into our own lobby area there you can see a list of those who served in World War II I believe it is and most churches have a list of people like that and one day there is this story which some of you perhaps have heard of a little boy who looked up and saw this list and he said mommy who are these people and she said well she said son those are the ones who died in the service. He said oh really?

He said which one the morning or the evening? Today I'm talking to some of you who for all practical purposes have died in the service but I'm also asking you before God to ask him a question and the question is Lord what will thou have me to do? Where do I fit? To help us accomplish the goal of being known in the city of Chicago is a caring culturally diverse community that seeks to see lives changed by the gospel message and we need every single one of you every one of you to be on board and to say here are my gifts here are my talents and and there are times when we are laid aside and God gives us a different gift. You remember what the Apostle Paul says? Ye helping together by prayer. There is always something you can do until you're dead then we make no more requirements and we add no more burden upon you but until then until then we contribute toward the body and now a footnote. There are some of you who who for whom this message is is far too far along in your own spiritual development. You have to go back a step and you go back a step and realize that you have not received the supreme gift yet and that is the gift of salvation which is a free gift it is given to those who believe in Christ and when you receive that free gift you become a member of the body of Jesus Christ.

God will work in your life to help you see what your gift is and then you'll begin to contribute but to receive Christ and the gift of salvation is the first thing that you must do and if you do not know that you have done that you probably haven't and even today you can believe in him. Let us pray. Our Father we want to thank you today that Jesus Christ has gifted his people. We read this and Lord we are astounded at your word which says so clearly so clearly that individually individually you have gifted us according to the way you will make us satisfied but Father we think of those who because of fear have never unwrapped their gift. Those who because of misunderstanding and bitterness in their lives that they have never confessed have alienated themselves from the body.

They've cut themselves off from the very source of strength that could help them. Oh Father bring them to repentance today that there may be no schism in the body but that there might be the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. May no one no one in these weeks before us leave Moody Church without knowing where he or she fits both within the walls and outside the walls of this church and grant to those who have never believed the wonderful gift of eternal life. We pray in Jesus name. Amen. Well this is Pastor Luther and I need to tell you that when you receive that gift of eternal life you are spared from the wrath to come. One of the points I make in my new book entitled pandemics plagues and natural disasters is the fact that what is happening in the world today is a preview of what is to come and it is a preview of the coming judgment of God during the tribulation period and Jesus Christ is our refuge. This is a book that is not only an encouragement to Christians but I deeply believe that it should be given to those who are unbelievers, skeptics, atheists because in it I also discuss how to respond to those who are angry with God as a result of what is happening in his world. For a gift of any amount this book can be yours.

Here's what you do. Go to rtwoffer.com. That's rtwoffer.com or call us at 1-888-218-9337.

The title of the book is pandemics plagues and natural disasters. What is God saying to us? As I've mentioned connect with us rtwoffer.com or if you prefer call us at 1-888-218-9337. You can write to us at running to win 1635 North LaSalle Boulevard Chicago Illinois 60614. Christians are blessed to be part of an invisible assembly the body of Christ worldwide that transcends denominational barriers. Next time on running to win why it's so vital that we understand the body of Christ and our part in it. We'll turn again to first Corinthians chapter 12 and learn about finding your place. Running to win is all about helping you to find your place. Finding your place. Running to win is all about helping you understand God's roadmap for your race of life. Thanks for listening. This is Dave McAllister. Running to win is sponsored by the Moody Church.