Rick Warren - Unwrapping Your Spiritual Gifts—Part Two

Hello, everybody, this is Pastor Rick's Daily Hope. Thank you so much

for joining us today, and if you're brand new, welcome to the Daily

Hope family. We hope you'll enjoy the teachings of Pastor Rick Warren right here.

I'm so excited for all of you to learn about your shape. It

might not be the shape you're thinking of right now. Rick loves to use

acrostics and this one is shape your shape, your spiritual gifts, heart,

abilities, personality and experiences. And one of the reasons I love this series

and have shared it with so many friends is because Rick talks about the way

God wired you and why you need not just know your shape, but how

to use it to do the things that God designed you to do. So

let's jump right in. Here's Rick with the final part of a message called

Unwrapping your Spiritual Gifts. Now there are no little people in the Family of

God. Part every role is important. How can you say, well,

you know, fingernail is not important on a body. Ever lost a fingernail?

Hurts? Okay, every part is necessary. Do you know what the

most important light is in my house? It's not the big chandelier in the

dining room. It's that little dinky light I turn on every night so that

when I get up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night,

I don't stub my toe. You know what, it doesn't you know?

When I always say the most important light is that little night light.

Tom always says, Rick, you're lyon because the most important light in the

house to use the one that when you open the refrigerator door, it comes.

Yeah. Okay, look at this verse up here on the screen.

The Bible says this. Each of us finds our meaning. You need to

know the meaning of your life. Each of us finds our meaning and function

in life as a part of his body. Other words, you're only gonna

find it when you get connected to others in his family, God's family.

But as a chopped off finger or cut off toe, we wouldn't amount too

much, would we. So since we find ourselves fashion that's shaped into these

excellently formed or shaped and marvelously functioning parts of Christ's body, let's just go

ahead and be what we're made to be, without enviously or pridefully comparing ourselves

with each other, trying to be something we aren't. It's just gonna give

up the charade, give up the faking, and give up the phoniness.

Stop pretending. Just be what God made you to be. Why Because God

says when you do that, it shapes your work and it shows your worth.

There's a third thing why you need to know your spiritual gifts because they

share your worship. They share your worship. What I mean by that when

you do you use the gifts that God has given you, it is actually

an act of worship. What is it that makes God smile? Some people

think God only smiles when you're praying or singing or going to church. God

smiles when you use the gifts that He's given you. And when you're doing

what you were wired to do and shape to do, and you're good at

it and it feels good, God goes, that's so cool. I made

them to do that. Remember in Chariot's a Fire, that guy Eric Little,

the Runner, said I was made by God to run, and he

said, when I run, I feel God's pleasure. God shaped some guys

to surf. They're just good at it. And I think when God looks

at me, he's going, that is so cool. I made the waves.

I made the surfer. Look at this this is cool. You don't

have to always be doing something spiritual. Quote. But God says, I'm

going to take the gifts that I've given you, and when you use them,

it is actually an active worship. I look down and going, they're

doing it. He's doing it. He's doing it. He's being what I

made him to be. And that's exactly what It's an act of worship,

and that gives God glory. The Bible says this next verse, when you

produce much fruit, this is Jesus talking, My Father is honored and glorified.

Now, when you use your gifts correctly, God gets glory. When

you don't use them, God doesn't, and you certainly can't please God with

gifts you don't have. God doesn't expect you to be talented or gifted at

everything. He just wants you to use what he's given you. You know

that in the word in the Bible, the word joy and the word gift

actually come from the same Greek words. It's car it's from chorus. It's

the word for grace because joy and giftedness goes together. When you use your

spiritual gifts, it brings joy to God and it brings joy to you.

God goes, They're doing what I made him to do, and you go,

this feels good. The greatest feeling in the world is to use your

gifts for God's purpose because it works and you know it and you enjoy it.

It is the greatest thrill in the world being used by God. It's

greater than sex. And if you haven't ever felt that, I pity you.

You need to develop the spiritual gifts that are in you so you can

enjoy what. There's no feeling in the world like being used by God.

Knowing what He made me to be. I'm being, I'm doing. There's

a fourth reason why you need to know your gifts because they shine your witness.

What do you mean by that, Rick Well, Jesus said this in

Matthew five sixteen. Let your light shine in front of people. Then they'll

see the good that you do, that's the stuff you're shaped to do,

and they will praise your Father in heaven. You see when you use your

spiritual gift and not only makes God happy, makes you happy. It's a

witness to other people. It's a testimony to other people. Sometimes you think,

well, this thing called evangelism, what is evangelism? You've heard that

word. Evangelism just means sharing good news. It's a Greek word. It

means to share the good news. And sometimes people say evangelism that means I

got to be an evangelist. It means I got to go out and,

you know, do something that doesn't feel good to me to do. And

sometimes you hear about these people. It seems like everywhere they go they're introducing

people to Jesus. Every time they sit down on a plane. By the

time the plane lands, the whole planes accepted the Lord, you know,

and you go. That never happens to me. I never lead anybody to

Christ. Why because you're not using your shape. There are as many ways

to tell the good news to people, to share Jesus with others as there

are shapes in the world, spiritual gifts and abilities and heart and personality experiences.

There are a million different ways to share the good news. You don't

have to do it all in the same way. Mark used to be on

staff at Willow Creek Community Church. And don't hold him against him that his

best friend has least struggle, but give him a warm welcome thanks suck Well.

I love the theme of the service because I think one of the greatest

dangers in the church is that we take on an attitude that says one shape

fits all. And I think if there's any area in which that is dangerous,

it's this area of fitness or personal evangelism, because we tend to have

a stereotypical image in our minds of what that would look like, and it's

usually a very hard, bold, you know, hard hitting, confrontational style,

sometimes even a little bit obnoxious, and we think, well, that's

not me. And just let you know I can relate to that concern.

Let me just tell you a story. I went a number of years ago

over to England. I signed up kind of naively for a summer tour of

duty, without quite knowing what I was getting into. And I showed up.

I was all green, I was all enthusiastic and boy, what are

we gonna do? And I met the team captain and this guy was just

a little bit too enthusiastic, because I said what are we gonna do?

He said, I'm glad you asked, oh, okay, well what are

we gonna do? And he said, We're gonna go out every morning early,

We're gonna knock on doors, We're gonna tell people about Jesus. I

said all day. He said it's gonna be great. That, oh boy,

sounds great. And I was just wrestling with this because I knew this

is not my sheep, this is not what God meane this. I don't

have the temperament for knocking on doors of strangers. In fact, let me

just tell you something. Maybe you're not aware of this, but Americans fresh

out of Heathrow Airport in London, England, knocking on doors of strangers to

tell them about Jesus is not a real popular thing in British culture. They

didn't swing the door open and say, ah, Americans, Jesus great,

tell me you know. They didn't do that. It wasn't like that.

It was more like, what are you doing here? Oh you're from America?

When are you going back? They did not want to talk to us

in most cases, and it was tough. And I got through the first

day and I said, got through that. You know, what are we

doing tomorrow? He said, I'm glad you asked. We're going out again?

And it's like, shut up, you know, But we did this,

and we did it day after day for count them eight weeks. That

was my response too. And when it was over, I went home and

I said, that's it. It's over. I'm done with this evangelism thing.

This is not me. It does not fit who I am. It's

not what God designed me to do. And so next time someone gets all

fired up and tries to recruit someone for an evangelistic tour of duty or adventure

somewhere, I'm just going to look him in the eye and say, look,

I've done my time. I already did that. So you know,

look, i'll pray for you when you go, I'll support you, you

know all write a check to help meet the expenses. But don't ask me

to do this. This is not my deal. Now, you may find

it funny as I did, and I think God did that. A year

after deciding this is not my deal, I was hired as the director of

evangelism at this large church in Chicago full time. This is what I'm going

to do. And the question is what happened? You know what in your

thinking, And let me tell you what it was. I went to a

church service at that church and heard the pastor get up and teach from the

Bible. And what he taught was, you know, one shape does not

fit all when it comes to sharing your faith, that you don't have to

force yourself in a mold that doesn't fit you. In fact, he held

up the Bible and he said, I got good news. Even in the

pages of the scriptures, there's a diversity of approaches. And that was good

news to me that day. And then he went on to teach, and

I want to just click through the examples he gave, and I hope that

this would be liberating to you the way it was to me, Because if

you're a follower of Christ, you like I, are called to share your

faith. The question is how are you going to do it? So let

me give you some examples. See if you don't relate to some of these,

let me give you the first one. I'm going to come over here

to Jerusalem, and this is Acts chapter two, the Day of Pentecost,

and the person here is Peter. And he stood up and he took the

confrontational approach to evangelism, which means very direct, very bold. Here's what

he did. He said, look, God sent his Messiah, you killed

him, and you're in big trouble capital ce confrontation. I'm very bold and

direct, but God used it and if you know the story, three thousand

people were cut to the quick and that day became followers of Christ. And

the point is Peter was being Peter. He was being who God shaped him

to be, and God used it. And here's the other point. Some

of you are like Peter. You're very direct, you're hard hitting, you

like to make a point, and God can use you in a powerful way.

Now this is not my style, but it is the one God used

to reach me when I was nineteen years old. And I'd just like to

unleash those of you with this style to reach people for Christ. Now,

don't hurt people, but spread the message. Now let me give you a

second example. I'll come over here to Athens, Greece, to the philosophers

and the crowd, and now I'm Paul, and now we're in Act seventeen.

And Paul took the intellectual style. He reasoned with them, He presented

lodg in evidence to show them, to prove to them that Christianity is true.

And that was natural to Paul. That was his shape. And God

used that and a bunch of those philosophers ended up becoming followers of Jesus as

a result of that. Intellectual style, and some of you, like Paul,

can reason and use logic to show people that Christianity is true. And

I hope there's a bunch of you, because really, out of the six

styles, this is the most important of all the styles. Really, this

is the most godly of all the styles. Really, this is my style

too. So all right, maybe it's not the most important style, but

it is a very important one. We live in a secular culture that wants

to know why we believe what we believe. And some of you can reach

people with answers, and that's your style, that's your shape. I love

the third one. It's the testimonial, and it's the man who was blind.

That Jesus healed the blind man in John chapter nine, and here he

is, all of a sudden on trial for his faith. And I love

what he did. He didn't want to give a bunch of logic or confront

He just did what was natural to him. He said, look, here's

what I know. I used to be blind. Now I can see deal

with it, right, What are you gonna argue with my experience? You

know, God healed me, and Jesus did it, and you got to

look into him as well, by the way, this is really Lee Strobel's

main style. Look. I used to be an atheist, a newspaper reporter.

I was skeptical. Now I've been changed and I know what's true.

Deal with it. It's a powerful approach, and some of you, many

of you, can use your stories in the same way. The third example

is Matthew the tax collector. I love what he did because you know,

he's thinking, you know, I can't do what those other guys do.

How can I reach my friends? Oh? I know how to do is

throw a good party. And then he said, wait a minute, I'll

throw a different kind of a party, a party with a purpose. Luke

five point twenty nine says that he invited his tax collecting buddies along with Jesus

and the disciples, and it was an inner personal approach to evangelism. It

deepened relationships and God uses that and a lot of you can throw good parties

and have people over for a meal and get together and warm it up and

then share in an interpersonal way, and that's a powerful approach. The fifth

example is the Samaritan woman. This is John chapter four. Jesus comes in.

You know, he draws the water talks about living water, has her

draw the water, starts sharing with her, tells her he's the Messiah,

and then she runs up the hill to her town in Samaria and grabs everyone

she knows. And if you know the story, she knew pretty much everyone.

And she grabs them and she brings them down. She says, there's

a secret service happening down at the well. Jesus is speaking this week.

Come on down, and they all come, and a bunch of those people

her friends from Samaria become Christians. And history tells us that's how the church

in Samaria began was through her invitational approach. Some of you have that style,

and I just want to say all of you can use that one.

The sixth example was a woman named Tabitha, Acts Chapter nine. She made

articles of clothing as acts of loving service done in the name of Christ,

kind of a first century mother Teresa. And she just loved and served people

in ways that made people look to Heaven and say, there must be a

God to express love like he does through her. And God used that serving

to reach people. In fact, it was so important that when that woman

died, Dorcas ser Tabitha, as she was called when she died, God

sent an apostle to pray over her and raise her back to life and put

her back into service. So you see there are advantages to having this style.

It's a pretty cool deal. And some of you have that approach,

and through your acts of service, God uses you to pull people toward the

Savior. Well, let me just sum this up and say, you know,

one shape does not fit all, and if you could just relax and

find your own shape and learn to communicate your faith to family and friends in

a way that fits you, there's no telling how God would use it.

And let me just sum it up with a story real quick. A friend

of mine named Julie. She's really my hero and evangelism more than some of

the famous names that you can think of, Billy Graham or Greg Laurie.

I love those guys. But Julie one of the quietest, shyest, most

introverted people I've ever met. And when she first asked me how to share

her faith and how she could reach her husband, you know, I would

tell her, and she was so shy, she'd barely look me in the

eye, and then she just looked down and take notes. But I kept

cheering, you know, trying to encourage her, trying to coach her,

and she got bolder. She found her shape, She found that she was

the interpersonal style, and she began to reach out in natural ways to her

husband and family. And it wasn't too long before her husband came to Christ,

and then her two teenage daughters made commitments, and then some of her

nephews and neighbors. And get this, in one year, shy, quiet

and shy and introverted Julie in one year helped lead sixteen people to become followers

of Jesus Christ. Isn't that great? And I just want to tell you,

I just want to say, if God can use Julie, he can

use you to make an eternal impact on the people around you. If you'll

discover your shape and work through the design God gave you, He'll use you

beyond your imagination. So go for it, God bless He's ready for it.

So how do you start using the gifts to God put inside of you?

Four things? Write them down real quick. Number one, you got

to discover them. You got to know what they are for you can use

them. You got to stop neglecting the fact that inside of you are some

dormant gifts that you're not even using. The Bible says in one Timothy four

fourteen, do not neglect the spiritual gift that is inside you. That's in

you. You got to figure out what God has put in you. Now,

how do you discover your spiritual gifts? Things you examine, evaluate and

experiment. Examine, evaluate, and experiment. This is how you decide and

discover what you're good at. First, you examine. That means you study

spiritual gifts. We're going to do that during this next five six weeks in

Shape. If you're not in a small group, you need to get in

a small group because this material is not being shared on Sunday morning. It's

material on how to understand your Shape's curriculum and Bible study. You need to

get in a small group. The second thing you do is you evaluate what

you're good at. And here's how you do that. You ask other people,

what do you think I'm good at? Yeah, ask other people what

do you think I'm good at? Because other people will recognize your giftedness before

you do. There are certain things you do well you don't even know you're

good at them because you think you're naturally, you think, it's naturally that

everybody thinks that way, acts that way, feels the way they don't.

Other people will recognize your spiritual gifts before you do. It is in their

affirmation that you learn your spiritual gifts. Would I could have gone one hundred

years of my life and never known that I was gifted at teaching because I'd

never done it. And you know, I had to go out and I

had to the only way I could do is evaluate. And when one time,

years and years ago, I was invited to speak at my small group

and there were like five six people in the room and we sat in the

room and I spoke in nice too. They said that was pretty good,

Rick. And then later I got invited again to speak to our small group

to lead the group, and I go, hey, that was good.

That helped me. And then a little while later I got invited to speak

to about fifteen guys and this little we were going on this backpacking thing,

camping thing together, and I spoke to them and people start saying, you

know, Rick, when you speak, God blesses it. Now, I

would have never known that I had the spiritual gift the teaching because I had

never done it. If you're not involved in anything, you don't know what

you're good at because you've never tried it. And so you evaluate and you

say, what is God blessed in my life? What do other people say

God bless us? What do I feel good at when I do it?

And I'm good at it when I do it? Now, as I said,

if you're not involved in anything, you're not going to know. That's

why the third thing is experiment. You just have to go out and try

stuff. I don't think you're ever going to learn your spiritual gift just by

taking a test. There are all kinds of tests you can go out there

and take, And actually I took one when I was a teenager on trying

to discover what my giftedness was spiritual gift, And the only thing the test

came up with is that I had the gift of martyrdom. Oh great martyrdom.

That's the gift you get to use one time in your life, but

it's over, okay, and you only get to use your spiritual gift the

last second of your life. The only thing I came up was I was

willing to die for my faith. Okay, big deal. It wasn't until

I start trying stuff and just try different things. That's not me, that's

not me. Oh I really like doing that, and I'm good at it.

And then you know where you're gifted. You know, when I first

start feeling that God was calling me to serve him full time, I actually

started out not as a pastor a preacher. I started out leading worship.

Yeah, I was the skinny guy with long hair and guitar. And because

I led worship and probably oh about fifty churches, oh, different places,

you know, on one shot here, one shot there. And I love

to sing. I really have a heart for singing. The only problem was

nobody liked to hear me. Now, if you're you got a heart for

something and you think you're good at it, but nobody else thinks you're good

at it, it's not your gift. Okay, just be honest and realize

you're not gifted at that. And if three people tell you you're a duck,

you're a duck. Okay, doesn't matter how good you think you are,

that's not your gift. And so you just need to be brutally honest,

have a sane evaluation, not less of yourself, not more of yourself.

This is what God wired me to be. And so you evaluate,

you examine your experiment, and you try all different kinds of things. Some

of you are sitting here one I'm waiting for God to tell me what he

wants me to do with my life. It ain't gonna happen. You cannot

steer a parked car. Write that one down. You know, our brilliant

pastor said, you cannot steer a parked car. No, you got to

be moving, and if you're moving, God can steer you. So just

get out there, volunteer for something, anything, Just start using your life

to help other people, and God will steer you in the right. And

you're actually just don't wait because it's not going to fall on you like that.

So you discover them. The second thing you do is you dedicate them.

You dedicate your gifts back to God. The Bible says this in Romans

six. Give yourselves completely to God since you've been given new life. In

other words, he gave you all these gifts, and use your whole body

as a tool to do what is right for the glory of God. Now

some of you you already know what you're good at. It's no big surprise.

You know what you're good at. You're just not using it for the

Lord. You're using it for yourself. And what you need to do is

want you to know what you're good at, you need to dedicate it to

God. God. I'm good at this. I'm dedicating it to you.

God, I'm good at that. I'm dedicating that to you. And the

reason and why you're not using for God is you're too busy, or you're

lazy, or you're making excuses or you have a fear of failure. Push

all those excuses out of the way, and to say, God, I

dedicate what you gave to me back to you. Third thing you do is

you develop your gifts. You discover them and then you dedicate them and then

you develop them. Now, gifts are like muscles. The more you use

it, the bigger it gets, and the more the more it develops,

you can strengthen and develop and you can grow what God has given you.

Any gift that God gives you should can and should be developed. And you

have a gift of teaching. It doesn't. No gift comes fully developed.

It comes into your life in a certain way, and the more you use

it, like a muscle. The more it develops, you get better at

it and better at it and better at it how by practice, by learning,

by studying, by learning from other people who have the same gift,

and as you practice it you get better and better. Let me give you

a little secret. I've learned this personally. When God gives you something,

if you use it well, he gives you more of it, more talent,

more money, more fame, more relationships, more responsibility. When you

use what God gives you and you use it well, he says, ah,

I could trust that person. I'm going to give you more and more

and more. Discover, dedicate, develop. The fourth thing you do is

you deploy. You deploy your spiritual gifts. And you know what deploy is.

We live near Pendleton, guys are being deployed all the time to Iraq

and everywhere else. It means you put it into service, you get out

onto the field, and you actually start doing something. Romans twelve says this

verse six, we are to use our different gifts in accordance with the grace

that God has given us. For instance, if our gift is to speak

God's message, we should do it according to the faith that we have now

what's the best place to practice and develop and deploy and dedicate and discover your

gifts in a small group. In a small group, it's the safest place.

It's the testing ground. It's where I got started. It's where you

need to get started. Now you see how brilliant this plan is that God

thought up God's plan for the churches. Here's what I'll do. I'll give

every single person in the church a different gift, and then everybody has a

place, everybody has a role, everybody gets involved, everybody can contribute,

and everybody gets rewarded, not just the pastor or somebody else. Imagine what

would happen if everybody in our church, I mean, we had no spectators.

What if we had no space dictators in our church? Look, you

lose. What if we had everybody said I know my gift and I'm using

my gift. What kind of power? What kind of impact would we have

on this world? We would be unstoppable, unstoppable if everybody discovered, dedicated,

developed, and deployed their gifts. Now let's close this, let's review,

turn it back over and on the front side, look at these four

gifts again that God's given you the gift of forgiveness, the gift of eternal

life, the gift of his spirit, and the gift of special abilities.

He gives those to you the moment you step across the line. Which of

these gifts are still unwrapped by you? Which of these gifts do you need

to unwrap? If you had bought an expensive gift for a friend and you

took it over to them, and a year latery you went over their house

and they hadn't even bothered on wrap it, you'd be hurt. In fact,

you'd be offended. God has put some gifts in your life, and

he says, I want you to unwrap each of these. And he says,

when you accept my greatest gift, God so loved the world that he

gave his only begotten son, he said, you get all these other gifts,

and there's not a better time to receive than right now. Let's bow

our heads. Would you pray this prayer? Dear God, today I accept

your free gift of forgiveness. Thank you for forgiving everything I've ever done wrong.

I'm putting my trust in your grace. Dear God, today I accept

your free gift of eternal life. In Jesus Christ because of what he did

for me, I know I can't earn my way to heaven. Dear God,

I accept the free gift of your spirit into my life. Live through

me and fill me with your love and joy and peace and patience. And

God, I accept the gift of special abilities that you've put in my life.

Help me to develop them, to discover them, to dedicate them,

to use them, to be the person you made me to be. If

you've never invited Christ in your life, said Jesus Christ, today, I

invite you into my life and I accept your gifts in your name. I

pray Amen. Hi everybody, this is Rick and I hope you enjoyed today's

broadcast. You know, if you just prayed that prayer for the very first

time, or you just recommitted your life to Jesus again today, would you

let me know about it. There's something real about sharing your commitment. So

write me Rick at pass dot com and say, Rick, I prayed that

prayer of commitment. I gave my life to Christ. And I'll send you

some material that'll help you on your journey with Jesus. And I'll also pray

for you. God bless you. What a great message from Pastor Rick,

I hope it touched you just like it touched me today. And now let's

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