Refuel, Reframe, Recalibrate: A 7-Day Devotional for Business ExecutivesSample

Multiplying Our Talents

All of us have been given unique giftings and strengths by God. Some of us are spreadsheet wizards, some of us can make inspiring speeches, and others can make anyone at ease with just a smile. We each have a mix of personality and talents (our superpowers, if you will) that contribute to office life in a unique way.

Although we are born with raw talent, we must develop it with training and practice. What we have is in seed form. It takes nourishment and pruning to see the full potential. It is up to us (not our organization) to invest in ourselves and multiply what God has given us.

But that is just the start. We must also invest what we have been given into others. There are two ways in which we can approach the use of our superpowers:

1. We can use them for our selfish gain. We can use them as the means to excel above our peers and become the coveted high-performers in our organization.
2. Or we can use them to help others to excel as well. This paradigm embraces the notion that we can all be high-performers, if we help each other. Revolutionary, I know.

We can all be high-performers? This is not how corporations think. We play a zero-sum game. Somebody must be at the top (we invest in these people) and somebody must be at the bottom (we eject or ignore these people). This is not a fun game to play, and it is not based on a Kingdom value system.

In the Kingdom, we can all win. Even Jesus empowered His disciples to exceed the great works that He had done. As Kingdom executives, we operate from a place of abundance (our Father created the universe from nothing after all). We are called to multiply our talents, to invest in others what we have been freely given by God, so that it multiplies. We are not hoarders. We are investors.

Mighty Creator, the earth and all its fullness are Yours! Father, You have freely given me so much. Make me generous like You. Show me the opportunities to invest in myself and in others lavishly. Cleanse my heart of selfish motives of self-promotion and of any ill-will toward my fellow men. Purify my heart, oh Lord, so that I am a free-flowing conduit of Your goodness and abundance. Amen.