Spiritual Gifts Reimagined

It’s time to reimagine spiritual gifts.

We’ve examined each gift over and over. We’ve tested ourselves every which way to figure out our gifts. And we’ve argued with each other about which gifts are okay. What are we missing?

Let’s try on a different set of glasses. The Scriptures present an amazing story, revealing to us the journey we’re invited to by our Maker. And that focus isn’t suspended when we turn to the scriptures about spiritual gifts.

We became too utilitarian, too mechanistic, too modern about it. Scripture invites us to engage our imaginations as we learn about gifting. If we accept that invitation, we’ll learn about the beauty of God’s grace spectrum, the battles in the journey of developing our gifts, the wisdom of the cross that is essential to display our gifted diversity, and the loving relationships that form an environment for recognizing our gifts.

You see, your gifting by God is not something separate from your growth as a human being and a Christian. Your gifting has everything to do with taking up your cross and following Jesus. And our gifting together is not only about staffing church roles, but about displaying the creatively variegated wisdom of God both in the church and to the world. We’ll find that the journey of gifting involves truth-in-love relationships with other believers, and relationships of witness to unbelievers.

It’s time to reimagine spiritual gifts. It’s time to dive into our journeys of gift development, individually and together. It’s time to be amazed … at God’s spectrum of grace that we are.