Gifting: Blessing or Curse

We often get trapped by our gifts I think. Churches are often rolling out 'gifting appraisal' courses amongst their members to find out what gifts the congregation has. We are always told that if we figure out what we are good at then that is probably what God will get us to do. There is truth in this but it is vital to realise that God doesn't call the qualified, He qualifies the called.

Look at Paul and Peter. Galatians 2:7 shows us that Paul's ministry was to preach to the Gentiles whilst Peter went to the Jews, but to my limited wordly vision and understanding this doesn't make sense. Paul was a zealous Jew. He knew all the teachings and history, he understood the culture of the day and would know therefore how best to minister to the Jews. If anyone was best qualified to preach to the Jews it would have been Paul! Instead God sent him to the Gentiles and gave Peter (a simple fishermen who, because of Jewish culture, was essentially a school drop out!) the task of speaking to the Jews.

To God's mind though...

It doesn't matter what we are called to. It doesn't matter what we are good at or where we think we will be called because of that. Romans 12:3 expands this a little bit.

"As God's messenger, I give each of you this warning: Be honest in your estimate of yourselves, measuring your value by how much faith God has given you"

The only qualification we need to do something for God is FAITH! That's it. It's not our training or upbringing, it's not how sensitive we are to the Spirit and it is not our Gifting. It is not the size of our church, or even the size of our calling. It's the size of our faith.