How Important Is This?

Alright, we are continuing our series / / E2E: Encouraged to Encourage. And last week, or I guess a couple weeks ago we started talking about what we call the Spiritual Gifts. Two weeks ago we looked at just the gift of Prophecy - and I want to ask you the question I asked you last week, and honestly, as I was thinking this week, I feel like this is a question I need to ask myself, not just on a weekly basis, but on a daily basis - If Paul says we should desire this gift more than any other gift that the Holy Spirit gives, then the question is, / / How have you been doing with the gift of prophecy this past week?

Did you see, or find, or even ask God where the opportunities are to speak life?

Remember, I want to, in the best of ways, demystify this word, prophecy, from this idea that for it to be prophecy you have to have heard God speak to you right in that moment. When Paul says very clearly in 1 Corinthians 14:3, / / …[the] one who prophesies strengthens others, encourages them, and comforts them.

I am seeing more and more that if we take every opportunity to speak positive, life giving, strengthening, encouraging and comforting words to people, that we will begin to feel the encouragement of the Holy Spirit in and through our lives toward people.

I personally believe the most encouraging thing you can possibly hear is the heart of God for you. First, from his direct voice to you personally, and second, through someone else. It’s incredibly powerful. And sometimes that comes in the form of speaking truth that I already know, and sometimes that comes in the form of speaking something I’ve felt or heard, or seen in the moment from God.

So, if you didn’t this past week, let me encourage you for today, before you even leave this building, encourage someone. Ask God for opportunities to speak life. Listen, those opportunities are everywhere, but we have to be paying attention to notice them, and courageous enough to speak into them. So, ask God for greater awareness, and courage to speak!

And then last week we did a bit of an introduction to the spiritual gifts in general, and walked away with a list of 21 various gifts that scripture talks about.

If you weren’t here last week, or didn’t catch it online afterwards, I want to read a few verses again that we read last week and then we’re going to ask a question about these gifts, and then we’ll start talking through some of them.

First, let’s read what Peter and Paul say about these gifts.

1 Peter 4:10-11 says, / / God has given each of you a gift from his great variety of spiritual gifts. Use them well to serve one another.

Romans 12:6 says, / / In his grace, God has given us different gifts for doing certain things well...

And 1 Corinthians 12:4,7 Paul says, / / There are different kinds of spiritual gifts, but the same Spirit is the source of them all… A spiritual gift is given to each of us so we can help each other...

Ok, And those aren’t the only ones, but I think in those three verses we see a very clear and directly… / / It is God who gives the spiritual gifts, and each of us has been given something.

This is incredibly important to note and incredibly important to remember, because honestly, the church at large does not operate out of this belief. Our church has not operated out of this belief, even though I 100% believe it to be true.

But here’s the thing. George Washington made an interesting statement on January 9th, 1790 that I want to reflect on for a moment, he said, / / “The establishment of our new Government seemed to be the last great experiment for promoting human happiness.”

Well, I’m not so sure about that, but I do think the same thing when it comes to the state of the church at the moment and an invitation I believe God is giving the church. / / Are you willing to be the great spiritual experiment of the body of Christ?

Why do I say that, or what do I mean by that? Well, the definition of / / Experiment is this - A scientific procedure undertaken to make a discovery, test a hypothesis, or demonstrate a known fact.

That SHOULD be our life as the body of Christ. To discover new things, to test what we have heard and what we believe, and to demonstrate what we know to be true.

It’s the great spiritual experiment.

This is the promise Jesus gave to his disciples in John 16:13, / / When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth.

That word guide literally means to be shown the way.

We are meant to be on a journey. A journey of discovering the truth, of applying that truth to our lives, and having that truth transform us as we apply it!

So, I say all of that because I am seeing two things in the church at large right now. First, that people aren’t invested in that way. Church has unfortunately become a bit of a spectator sport. You show up, get a nice little encouraging message, and head out on your way for 6 days on your own until we wall meet again and get another little encouraging message.

Not saying our church is like that or that you are like that. Obviously we do things at different times, getting together for food distributions, or family dinner nights, and whatever else. But by and large, at least in the church of the western world, people show up for a short service and then live their lives.

Even from a church attendance perspective. See, when I was growing up there was no way we missed church. There was no reason on this earth that was good enough to miss church on Sunday morning. Or Wednesday evening for that matter, or any other church service or event. And let me tell you, that was a LOT. In 1994, I was 12 years old, and this world-wide revival at this little church in Toronto - millions of people came over the next few years. Well, Toronto was only 4 hours away from where I grew up, and the thing that marked this “revival” as different was that what God was doing in Toronto, when people went home, it was happening there too. The presence of God was really special in those meetings. But that meant meetings. meetings meetings meetings. When I was a kid we were having these revival meetings night after night after night. And still by the time I moved to Toronto in 2001 and went to school and then started working at that church, they were still having meetings 6 nights a week, plus Sunday morning. As a kid, we didn’t miss any of those. It was constant.

Sure, that’s 20 and 30 years ago, I know, but by 2023 the statistics of church attendance are drastically different. Only 20% of Americans attend church every week. And I’m not always a big stats person, but I think it’s something between 40-50% of people who do go to church go once a month.

And sure, we have digital access now, which is great. And I don’t think I would change that, It’s especially great for those who simply cannot make it, either not feeling well or any other reason. And of course we do have people who join us from all over the world sometimes, and I value the ability to be able to minister to people in any way.

And hear me when I say this, this is not a slam on anyone here or not here, on the church in general or locally, just simply an observation and some thoughts.

When asked how often they attend church, in 2022 a study showed 68% of people asked were in the category of never, seldom or once a month, and once a month was the least. The majority were seldom and never. And I would suggest seldom for most people answering is Christmas & Easter.

That brings me back to this experiment. This is a journey. Holy Spirit is wanting to guide us into all truth. This is the great spiritual experiment where we are meant to discover, test hypothesis and demonstrate and declare truths!

Now, a question I want to ask this morning, in relation to the Spiritual Gifts is this:

/ / How important are the spiritual gifts? First thing we read this morning was Peter who said, God has given each of you a gift from his great variety of spiritual gifts...

The ESV says it very simply. As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another.

There’s really no room for anyone being left out. The word each there means exactly that. every (man, one, woman). But an interesting thing to note here is that the word / / received also means to take, or to catch. In the definition it says, to take (in very many applications, literally and figuratively… to get ahold of)

So, there is a sense of offer and acceptance here. God gives gifts, but we must accept gives.

That makes sense. We read this a couple weeks ago, Paul says in 1 Corinthians 14:1, / / Let love be your highest goal! But you should also desire the special abilities the Spirit gives...

And I would say there’s a real invitation there for the gifts we have been given, not the gifts we wish we had. There’s can sometimes be a tension between what God has made us, and what God has not made us to be.

I’ve shared some of this before, having leaders in my life that wanted to lead me to become like they were rather than lead me to become who I am. Always a challenge in leadership. Leaders need to give way to the leading of the Holy Spirit for those who they lead to become all that God has created them to be. I don’t get to say what or who you are. But I do get to speak into who God has created you to be, just as we are all meant to encourage and strengthen each other. It’s a great opportunity and privilege to have that place in someone’s life, speaking into who God has made them to be, speaking into their gifts, encouraging their abilities and strengths.

So, is this important? Are these spiritual gifts important?

Again, going to list some stats here, and these are a bit shocking, but also understandable. There’s a company called the Barna Group, probably the most well known Christian polling and statistics company. They took 3 different groups of people, over a number of years, asking them about spiritual gifts and found some interesting results.

Now, let’s remember here, both Peter and Paul, arguably the most influential people of the early church, establishing the church, defining what it means to be the church, what it means to be Christian, BOTH said that God has given each person a spiritual gift.

So, Barna finds this in their results:

/ / 28% of the Christians they asked believed they did NOT have a spiritual gift. More than 1 out of 4, almost 1 out of 3 people don’t believe they got something that the bible clearly says they did. And I would suggest that if they don’t think they got one, and I don’t think they asked this question, but they probably don’t believe everyone else got a gift either.

So, that’s an interesting and revealing statistic based on what people think about the spiritual gifts, that a lot of people don’t actually believe they are included. And to put that into perspective for a moment - back in 1995 the percentage of Christian adults who did not think they had a spiritual gift was only 4%. That’s not alarming, but nearly 1 in 3 is.

Next one, and this one is maybe even more revealing.

/ / 20% of people they asked said they had spiritual gifts that aren’t actually listed in scripture. 1 in 5 people listed things that the bible doesn’t say are spiritual gifts. To me that simply says the church hasn’t been talking about spiritual gifts enough.

And honestly, some of the answers weren’t even close. When asked, 1 in 5 people responded with the spiritual gifts of: sense of humor, singing, health, life, happiness, patience, a job, a house, compromise, premonition, creativity, and clairvoyance. Peter Wagner says in one of his books that people had said they thought going to church, or having a good personality, writing poetry, or the ability to survive or even just friendliness were biblically based spiritual gifts.

Now, I did mention last week that for some, especially Peter Wagner, who did extensive teaching on the Spiritual Gifts, does believe that we can’t just contain what we see in Scripture because the Spirit can do as he wishes, and he, through observation and experience listed 7 other spiritual gifts on top of the 21 we are going through. BUT, none of those are even in this list that this 20% answered. This is just simply people not knowing what the gifts are and answering to the best of their ability.

15% of people responded that they didn’t know their spiritual gift. Not that they didn’t believe they had any, but that they just didn’t know what it was. Which means they simply didn’t care enough to go searching for it. Which is worse? Not knowing you have one, or knowing you do but deciding it’s not worth checking out? Again, Paul says, earnestly desire the gifts the spirit gives. To me that is directed MORE at pursue the ones He has given you, rather than just pursuing in general.

Again, this part of this series is about looking at how God has encouraged us so that we can be an encouragement to others. And the Spiritual Gifts are an incredible way to do this because this is the very reason God has given them to the church.

Peter says, / / Use them well to serve one another...

Paul says, A spiritual gift is given to each of us so we can help each other...

The sad part of these surveys was that / / 63% of people simply didn’t know how to apply the biblical understanding of spiritual gifts to their lives.

Now, there has to be ownership taken in this. The church isn’t talking about it enough. That’s on leadership, that’s on system, that’s on how we do things. That’s why I brought up this idea of the great spiritual experiment, because I think there has to be an element of that brought back to the church. Sure, the church is 2000 years old. But I think one of the best things the church today could do, and I mean this for churches of our size to churches of 20,000 people, is to say honestly, “We haven’t figured it out yet… let this be a great spiritual experiment where we discover truth, practice that truth, and declare that truth.”

This is why Paul says in Philippians 2:12 (NASB), / / …work out your salvation with fear and trembling. The NLT says, / / Work hard to show the results of your salvation, obeying God with deep reverence and fear.

Ok, so with all of that in mind, let’s get into some of the spiritual gifts. And over the next few weeks we’re going to break up that list of 21 into different categories. Not because the bible says there are categories, although it does lend itself to different types of gifts, but more that as we look at them we notice some different categories that help us understand them a bit better.

And I want to remind you of a few of the things we said last week about the spiritual gifts.

/ / No list of Spiritual Gifts in scripture is complete

/ / Different Gifts have different uses, yet some seem similar

/ / Some lean to be more natural, some lean to be more supernatural, but all are spiritual.

/ / Gifted doesn’t mean capable, just because you’re naturally gifted in an area still means you gotta learn to work with what God gave you - and the more you do, the better you become.

And most importantly, / / there is no hierarchy to the gifts, in that there is no gift greater, or better than the other. There is no gift more important or that makes a person more important. No gift elevates anyone to a status level above anyone else. That’s not the point of the gifts, and it’s something we always need to keep in mind. Because naturally some of the gifts lend themselves more to direction, management, delegation, and positions of leadership can sometimes become positions of power and dominance when they are meant to be positions of service and humility.

So, before we get into looking at some specific gifts for today, let’s recap on the 21 gifts we are going to talk through:

/ / Administration / Leadership

Apostle

Discernment

Evangelism

Exhortation / Encouragement

Faith

Giving

Healing

Helps / Ministering

Hospitality

Knowledge

Leadership / Ruling

Mercy / Kindness

Miracles

Pastor

Prophecy

Serving

Teaching

Unknown Languages, Speaking

Unknown Languages, Interpreting

Wisdom

And so we’re going to take those 21 gifts and over the next few weeks we are going to look at the different gifts broken down to five different categories:

/ / Inspiration / Insight gifts

Leadership / Organizational gifts

Power / Demonstration gifts

Serving / Helps gifts

Speaking / Communicating gifts

Notice those are simply just in alphabetical order, not in any order of importance or even how we will go through them. And, remember that there are no biblical categories, we are using this to help separate the gifts into manageable chunks, and in a bit of a thematic approach.

And to clarify, I didn’t just make these up. In doing my own study and reading there are multiple ways people have categorized the spiritual gifts, some break them down to 3 categories, some 4, one I looked at was 6, but for the purposes of this series I’m using five different categories.

Today, we’re going to look at the / / Leadership / Organizational gifts, which means looking at four different gifts this morning.

Administration

Apostle

Leadership

Pastor

I want to start off by saying this. This is a big topic, and certainly isn’t just a one time topic. Which is why I’m bringing up this idea of the great spiritual experiment today because like I said, we are on a journey. We are learning to be led by the Spirit of Truth, the Holy Spirit. We are becoming MORE Christlike, but aren’t perfect at anything yet, are we? So this is about growing and learning, about engaging and experimenting so we can become fully like Christ. And because that is what this is, the Christian life, we have to be ok with the slow journey sometimes. We aren’t going to get it all right away, and we certainly aren’t going to get it right 100% of the time.

Eugene Peterson says that discipleship, or this life of following Christ, is a long obedience in the same direction.

Working to get it more right than wrong over and over again as we learn what it means to be more like Christ, and apply that to our lives so that we do actually become more like Christ.

Learning, Application, Transformation!

And a second note: If any of these gifts, over the next few weeks begin to resonate in you, you think, “wow, that sounds like me, I feel like that’s something God has done in me..” it’s worth learning more about on your own time. It’s worth having the conversation about. It’s worth you earnestly desiring that spiritual gift or gifts and using them to help and serve the body of Christ. That is ultimately the point here!

/ / Administration

1 Corinthians 12:28, the NLT says, / / those with the gift of leadership, while the ESV says, And God has appointed in the church… administrating...

It’s the greek word / / kubernesis, and it’s a unique term that refers to someone who would be steering a ship. Think of a shipmaster or a captain. It literally means “to steer” or “to rule or govern”.

Now, I love how this term means both. To steer, and to govern. Because in our warped western 2023 idea of “governing” we can easily think of power and dominance. But think of the gentle approach a good captain uses to steer a ship. It’s not brash, it’s not harsh, it’s calculated and precise.

Unfortunately, the Titanic has been back in the news this past week because of the horrible tragedy of the Titan submersible that was lost to the sea. Five lives added to the number of those lost in pursuit of the idea of the Titanic.

But think about it. A ship that big, so many lives at stake, all down to the control of the captain: how fast you’re going, what course you’ve plotted and how you steer when it matters most.

It’s such a powerful metaphor for so many things, not the least of which is the leadership of a church. How important is it to have someone that can say, “If we want to go there, we need to turn now!” The spiritual gift of administration is absolutely necessary and critical for a group of people who want to reach any particular goal or destination.

This is the Holy Spirit working in and through certain Christians / / to help organize, direct, and implement plans to lead others in the various ministries of the church.

Administration is the ability to understand clearly the immediate and long-range goals of a particular unit of the body and to devise and execute effective plans for the accomplishment of those goals.

Peter Wagner references Luke 14:28-30, Jesus says, / / “But don’t begin until you count the cost. For who would begin construction of a building without first calculating the cost to see if there is enough money to finish it?

Or in the book of Acts, the early church is growing and there are a lot of people. And there are those who need help with food, but some aren’t getting fed properly. So, some people come to the apostles and say, “Hey, there’s people not getting fed” and their response is this, / / “We apostles should spend our time teaching the word of God, not running a food program. And so, brothers, select seven men who are well respected and are full of the Spirit and wisdom. We will give them this responsibility....”

That responsibility was organization and structuring the correct daily distribution of food. They needed someone with the gift of administration to say, “Ya, we can sort this out!” And look at what the apostles say, “Find someone full of the Spirit!”

This isn’t just a talent or ability to organize, this is God given, Holy Spirit working in and through believers for the purpose of bringing order and structure that is needed in the church. And it is invaluable!

/ / Apostle

While we’re talking about the apostles! Let’s look at that one.

Remember a couple weeks ago when we were talking about prophecy I made a distinction between what many believe is the Office of the prophet, and the ability to prophecy. The gift to not only speak encouraging words to people, or even to speak in great depth and revelation, as Paul would say, knowing the very mysteries and secrets of God, but really, in the ability to train, equip, and release people into the gift.

I believe we all have the ability to prophecy, by definition, to speak to someone words of encouragement, to strengthen, build up and comfort. And I also believe there are people who are seriously gifted in that area.

Ok, so this idea of the office of and the gift or ability to do something… I would highly suggest this is very true of this gift, Apostle.

First, Jesus worked with 12 people very closely, right, the twelve disciples. But everyone who followed Jesus was considered a disciple. We are disciples of Jesus. Disciple simply means one who is learning, a student, a follower. Apostle on the other hand is the greek word / / apostolos, which means a messenger, someone who is sent out with orders.

And the first mention of that word is in Luke 6:13, it says, / / At daybreak he called together all of his disciples and chose twelve of them to be apostles...

Two different words.

Disciples [mathetes] - a learner, pupil, disciple, of which we all are...

Apostles [apostolos] - a messenger, someone who is sent with orders - you have been chosen to be sent on a mission.

Then of course, if you know the story, one of those twelve, Judas, betrays Jesus and ends up killing himself after realizing what he’s done. And in Acts 1:12-26 After Jesus ascends into heaven, the disciples return to Jerusalem, and wait for the promised Holy Spirit, we just went through that in the last series, right? But while they are waiting Peter says, “We need to pick someone to replace Judas.” But watch what he puts as the prerequisite for the position. Acts 1:21-22, / / “So now we must choose a replacement for Judas from among the men who were with us the entire time we were traveling with the Lord Jesus - from the time he was baptized by John until the day he was taken from us. Whoever is chosen will join us as a witness of Jesus’ resurrection.”

This person, whoever it was going, ended up being a man by the name of Matthias, had to have been with them from the time Jesus was baptized by John, before he even started his ministry, until the moment he was taken from them. This position of replacing the Apostle Judas was a big deal. And some believe Paul to be the only other person to really hold this position as we would call it the “Office of the Apostle”.

There are some who believe that the office is closed, that no one holds that position any longer simply because the prerequisites were having seen the baptism, ministry, death of Jesus and the resurrected Jesus, and being called by Jesus himself.

Paul says in Galatians 1:1, / / I was not appointed by any group of people or any human authority, but by Jesus Christ himself and by God the Father, who raised Jesus from the dead.

And he also says in 1 Corinthians 9:1, / / Am I not an apostle? Haven’t I seen Jesus our Lord with my own eyes?

The story of Paul’s conversion from Acts 9 is amazing, where he encounters Jesus on the road to Damascus.

Now, here’s what I will say to that. Two things.

First, I would be cautious who we call an Apostle. It’s all too easy to think of this title as a term of authority when it’s the very first of these that wrote most of the New Testament Scripture, started the church, established local churches, raised up the first leaders and gave us most of what we call the doctrine of Christianity. What we believe and why we believe it.

Second, regardless of the qualifications for a New Testament Apostle, the gift of the apostolic, one who is sent and the role that they played in the early church is very much alive and well. And if we begin to look at theses gifts without the loftiness of a title, and begin to look at them as the function of the body through the power of the Holy Spirit, we will stay both humble, and purposeful.

You don’t need to be called an Apostle to be apostolic. And it’s important to make that distinction, what we see biblically as the first Apostles of the church, and what we consider to be apostolic in nature and gifting.

Here’s how Peter Wagner defines the spiritual gift of apostle - …the special ability God gives to certain members of the Body of Christ to assume and to exercise divinely imparted authority in order to establish the foundational government of an assigned sphere of ministry within the Church. An apostle hears from the Holy Spirit and sets things in order accordingly for the Church’s health, growth, maturity and outreach. *note* “Church” refers to the believers who gather weekly and also to the believers scattered in the workplace.

Jeff Carver, a pastor out of southern California, who wrote a book called Gifted by Grace: An Introduction to the Holy Spirit and Spiritual Gifts says that the spiritual gift of apostle is different because the foundation has already been set, by those who Jesus appointed. But that the message of those with the gift of apostleship is the gospel and their mission is to plant new ministries and churches, go into places where the gospel is not preached, reach across cultures to establish churches in new environments, raise up and develop leaders, call out and lead pastors and shepherds and more. They are what would be called leaders of leaders, or ministers to ministers. Influential in the lives of those who minister to the body of Christ.

My experience with the apostolic has been in the lives of those I would consider having this gift. People like Rick Oldland in the UK, Cameron Wright up in Michigan. These are two men who are influential in my life, I don’t call them Apostle. They don’t put that on their name badge, but they have been instrumental in giving us direction and helping us see the bigger picture.

The great thing about apostolic leaders is that they see what many others do not because they see from an elevated viewpoint. Again, not speaking in hierarchy, but in what they are gifted to see.

Remember the story from Acts, the people come to the apostles and say, “Hey, people are getting missed when it comes to food...” Now, on one hand it can look like they’re just passing it off to someone else, but if you look closely there’s a very strategic work at play.

We know our role and if we solve this problem it would take us away from that, so:

Find this specific type of person.

This is what to look for in them.

They are then going to do this, lay out a plan...

Problem solved.

Last year in February Kelley and I went away to South Carolina for a pastors retreat with our network of churches, Harvest Alliance. And those two people I mentioned, Rick & Cameron, along with others that were there laid hands on Kelley and I and prayed a blessing over us, and spoke into our lives for the leadership of this church. It was incredibly powerful. Leaders who care about how things are going but aren’t personally working in it themselves. We need these levels of vision and oversight.

/ / Leadership

Just by looking at the definition of the greek word used in scripture for the gift of leadership, you’ll see how closely connected it is with some of the other gifts.

Romans 12:8 says, / / If God has given you leadership ability, take the responsibility seriously.

leadership, or to lead or the one who leads, is the greek word / / proistemi and it means to lead, to assist, to protect and to care for others.

Wow, talk about a job description.

Carver says that it’s sandwiched between the two gifts of Mercy and Giving in Romans 12 because it is so closely associated with caring for others. And often times it is connected with the gift of pastor, and is one of the ways it is different from administration, which is also sometimes translated leadership.

There’s a difference between leading people to get a job done, leading a group of people toward a particular goal, which would be the gift of administration and leading a person or group of people in their lives, toward Christ, to the care and spiritual leadership of someone. I don’t want to talk in absolutes, but the gift of administration would be more concerned with getting the job done, and the gift of leadership would be more concerned with a person’s spiritual walk with Jesus.

It’s interesting. The ESV says, / / ...the one who leads, with zeal. it caries this eagerness and business type feeling to it. The gift of leadership can also have a sense of an entrepreneurial nature and a willingness to take risks, but it’s for the purpose of seeing the Kingdom of God advanced through the local church.

That desire to see the church expand and grow, but also with a deep care and would go great lengths to protect the people they lead and serve. There’s also, and I just love this about these leadership words, they always have an element of serving. It’s almost like it’s got a built in humility meter. Don’t think you’re just here to be served, that’s not leadership. Leadership is to serve those you’re called to lead.

Peter Wagner says this gift is the special ability / / to set goals in accordance with God’s purpose for the future and to communicate these goals to others in such a way that they voluntarily and harmoniously work together to accomplish those goals for the glory of God.

So, I hope you’re beginning to see how we need these various people within the church under this category of Leadership / Organization. Things just don’t get done when there’s no one saying, “Hey, if we want this, we need to do this...” And as the church, when our primary purpose is to love God and love people, there’s got to be people around that say, “Ya, but not for the sake of just getting it done, but for the sake of encountering God and becoming closer to Him and closer to each other. Don’t trample the people for the sake of the goal!”

This is why we can’t get frustrated when it looks like people’s motives are different than ours. They probably are. If you have someone with a high gift of administration, without the people around who have a pastoral or caring attitude, it can look like they are running people over. In fact, I’ve seen it happen. It can easily become that. This is why we are all gifted to work together! We need the various gifts. The ones who are concerned with moving forward, and the ones who are concerned with making sure we don’t leave anyone behind!

And this leadership gift is often closely associated with the last gift we’ll look at today, the gift of:

/ / Pastor / Shepherd

Ephesians 4:11 says, / / Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers.

The ESV says, / / and he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers.

Everything else is the same except pastor, which is also translated shepherd.

I like how the Amplified version says it, it says, / / …and some as pastors and teachers [to shepherd and guide and instruct]…

And I think these two gifts are connected in that way, that they are meant to aid people in their journey of following Christ.

One thing I really want to clarify is that this might be one of the greatest gifts the spirit gives, but it’s only directly mentioned once, and the church over the last 2000 years has made it into something it is not.

One of the problems we have is that the word pastor is often, or I would say pretty close to always used to describe the leader of a local congregation. And I’ve met a bunch of people that try to change culture and put on their business card, “Senior Leader” or something of the sort, but that’s not actually the point. A lot of times, even though the person is called “Pastor” they operate out of various gifts, and just happen to be the one who is primarily leading a congregation of people.

I know people who I would say their primary gifting is prophecy, lead a church.

I know people who their primary gifting would be apostolic in nature, yet they led a church for many years.

And a good leader within the church will recognize that if they don’t have the spiritual gift of pastor / shepherd, that they will find those who do have it because it is absolutely necessary for the church to function properly.

But let’s just clarify, the title and the gifting are separate. And I wish the waters had never got muddied with the title because the title never matters. Sure, I’m pastor, just like someone else is doctor or lawyer or cashier or waitress, and sometimes you introduce yourself by what you do and sometimes you just say, “Hi, I’m Rob”… what matters more is that the person in that position is being led by the Holy Spirit, regardless of primary gifting, to the benefit of the body of believers.

Another reason I wish this hadn’t got complicated in this way. Because there are people who are incredibly pastoral, but because the word pastor has been associated with leading a church, they shy away from it because they think, “Oh, I’m not meant to lead a church” or “I don’t want to lead a church”… That’s ok. Gosh, we need people operating in their spiritual gifts no matter what they are.

Now, I say all of that, but then need to add this, Pastor is a leadership gift, but I think sometimes it is the leadership gift that is hardest to get to actually lead - And I would say that’s mostly because they are so concerned with the well being of the people that there is no possibly way they can not be lifted into a position of leadership. Not power. But Leadership.

Mixed with other gifts, Pastoral people are incredible.

Let’s take the word shepherd for a moment. Peter Wagner says this is a special ability that God gives to certain Christians to assume / / a long-term personal responsibility for the spiritual welfare of a group of believers.

Carver says, In the Biblical context, shepherds had several different responsibilities to their sheep and ultimately to the owner of the sheep. They kept a lookout for predators and protected the sheep from attackers. They cared for wounded and sick sheep, nursing them back to health. They rescued them if they became lost or trapped. They spent enormous amounts of time with them guiding them to the places of nourishment and rest. The result was a trust and relationship that kept the sheep following the shepherd… / / Pastors are called shepherds because their calling and gifting are much like those who care for sheep. They are called and gifted to care for the spiritual well-being of a local body of God’s people. Pastors are first and foremost servants. They are servants of God and servants of His church.

This is a great explanation. The first thing he says is they serve the owner of the sheep. And like I said, just simply by the very nature of caring for people as much as they do, people begin to turn to them for direction. This is the way of the shepherd, the spiritual gifting of a pastor. To be so concerned with serving God by caring for people in life, in time of trouble, in question and doubt that people know this person can be trusted. Trusted to lead them, or give them an answer, or guide them, help them, counsel them toward healing.

And often that happens through various other gifts. Teaching, prophecy, leadership, wisdom, mercy.... but when paired with the heart of a shepherd, the people are cared for really well. And again, that doesn’t have to mean you’re leading a church, it can mean you care so deeply for people that you seek God, learn his ways and his heart so that you can help others do the same. And don’t even be put off by thinking of it from a large group perspective. That is another downfall we have in the western Church, that things have become so “size” oriented that there seems to be no room for those who could pastor 3, 5, 10, 25…

And I think that is true of all of these gifts. / / Don’t let what the western church has become deter you from passionately pursuing the spiritual gifts that could help you serve the 1… or the people in the row next to you, or our local church, among the other who help and serve. We are truly in this together, and we need each other.

And I think there are the gifts that we have to have, we need these gifts, and then there is church leadership, which is something different, and matters less about the primary gifting of a person. I’ve seen great evangelists lead churches. I’ve seen great pastors lead churches. But the greatest church leaders I’ve seen are those who recognize their gifts and their gaps, and learn to fill in those gaps with people who have what they don’t have, while understanding no one person can be everything and shouldn’t try to be. And as, oh great, here’s the title…but as the Pastor of this church I want to say that Kelley and I are committed to learning what this means. To working this out. To, yes, making mistakes along the way so that we can continue to become more like Christ as we continue to grow as the body of Christ.

Because here’s the honest truth, I have not seen a perfect example of this. And that’s ok. I was talking to my friend Mike yesterday and we both concluded there are no perfect people, perfection can only be found on the other side of the grave, and we aren’t there yet.

And like I said, my heart, and my hope for this church is that we can be ok with what Peterson says is the long obedience in the same direction, a life of discipleship to Jesus, committed to learning, growing and developing together as the Body of Christ. This great spiritual experiment where we commit to discovery, application and transformation, and declaration of what God has done for us, who He is and what He wants to do in those around us!