What Are Spiritual Gifts?Намуна

What Spiritual Gifts Are and Why We Have Them

The topic of spiritual gifts is very broad, and because of that, we won’t address every aspect of it in this Bible Plan. Instead, we’ll answer the basic questions that are often asked when it comes to spiritual gifts so that you can discover what yours are and how God wants to use you.

What are spiritual gifts?
The Bible doesn’t give an exact definition of what a spiritual gift is. Pastor Chris Hodges gives a thorough one that will help us. He says a spiritual gift is “a special, supernatural ability that God gives to each of His children, so that together they can advance His purposes in this world.” 

How do we get them?
Spiritual gifts are distributed by the Holy Spirit as He determines. Every Christ follower has at least one gift. However, we shouldn’t put God in a box and think He can’t give whatever He wants to us when He so chooses. These gifts are from Him to us as He determines. 

The nature of a gift is to give it away. Spiritual gifts are no different. We receive spiritual gifts in order to share them with others. The Bible says that spiritual gifts are given to us by the Spirit for the purpose of building others up and strengthening their faith. 

Why do we need to strengthen others’ faith? Because things go wrong, and we struggle every day. The purpose of receiving a spiritual gift is to give it away, not hoard it. This doesn’t mean that we won’t benefit from them. We will. But spiritual gifts are for the benefit of those whom God places in our paths. And others’ gifts will be used to strengthen us.

Ephesians 4 says that Christ gave us pastors and teachers “to equip His people for works of service.” For so long, people have assumed that pastors, teachers, leaders, and staff members of churches are supposed to do everything. And they do plenty — they just aren’t supposed to do our part. Church leaders will play their role in equipping us, but we also have a role to play in building up the body of Christ!

Just like the human body works beautifully with all of its parts, so does the body of Christ — the people who are His followers. We were all created with unique gifts. We teach, show mercy, encourage, exhibit faith, pastor, serve, give, and so on. Stay tuned in to the next three days in this Plan so that you can learn more about the gifts and how to discover yours.

Reflect

• Have you ever seen someone doing something in the church or in someone else’s life that just seemed so amazing and unexplainable? Share about that experience.
• Spend time praying that God will help you discover what your spiritual gifts are.