Find Your MissionSample

Yesterday we dealt with the general vocation of all Christians. And with the question, which need of this world moves you to action? Today we want to talk about your strengths. Do you know them? Your strengths are God's gift for your mission. It may be difficult for you to give a confident answer to this question. You may immediately think of things you can't do. Likewise, you may think of things that your friend can do very well. Why is that? You don't notice your strengths because they have been part of your life for a long time and you accept them as normal. Many of them have already developed in your childhood. It may even be that you perceive some strengths as something negative. For example, if you were repeatedly criticized for them as a child.

You and your abilities are unique. What you dismiss as normal is actually special. In order for you to realize how special your strengths are, it is important that you come to terms with yourself and your abilities. Not condescendingly or with arrogance, but honestly and gratefully. Always with the view to serve others with it. You must know what makes you so special. Only then can you use your strengths for your mission. God has given you these talents and strengths. Some of them you have probably already developed. Others are still waiting to be discovered by you.

At the same time, God has no problem with your weaknesses. You can't do everything. And you don't have to. In 1 Corinthians 12, Paul writes about how every body is made up of different parts that have their own function. A body is healthy when each piece fulfills its mission. Your weaknesses serve you in understanding that you need others just as they need you. Paul takes this image to show that we depend on each other as parts of the church.

How much understanding God has of our inabilities is shown in the calling of Moses. God saw in him the future leader and deliverer for his people Israel. But Moses was only fixated on his inadequacies. Forty years in the desert had turned the former prince into a humbled shepherd. That he would ever leave this place again was beyond his imagination. Yet God had had a plan for him all these years. In solitude, He had prepared him for his very personal mission. While Moses passed one day after another, God was always working in the background. When He met him in the burning bush at Horeb, Moses had no idea that only a little later, he would receive the "ten commandments" right here for an entire people. This time in the desert changed Moses' character, attitude, and knowledge. God thus prepared the most incredible rescue operation for His people.