Text: Romans 12:1-8
THE SERVICE GIFTS
You will remember the path we have taken during these last number of weeks in our study together. We have been examining the Spiritual Gifts, and we have learned that God has gifted each one of us, with a talent, an ability, a spiritual gift that He calls us to use for the building up of the church for His glory. These gifts we have discovered are many and varied - but all are given by God and each one of us has been given at least one. Our teaching this morning brings us to Romans 12:1-8 and our focus on what scholars generally call the service gifts. This really is a poor name for these gifts because as we have discovered all the gifts are for service - each one has been given for the building up of the body of Christ. Now the book of Romans is Paul's great letter on the Christian faith. It is his great statement of the gospel of which he is not ashamed, for it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes. For the first 11 chapters Paul beautifully describes the substance of this gospel, he speaks of humanity's rebellion, God's judgment, God's grace our response of faith and our new life in the Spirit of God. Then beginning in chapter 12 the tone of the letter changes as Paul now seeks to apply to life the wonderful truths that he has just written about. What follows is the practical application of the gospel. So he begins in chapter 12 by saying,
What Paul is saying is "in view of the fact you have been touched by the grace of God through the sacrifice of Christ; you have received Him in faith and by faith; and He has now equipped you to live the Christian life by placing the Holy Spirit within you; and He has given you gifts to use for His kingdom. This is how you should live in view of all this, this how you should live, this is how you should use your gifts.” And he will immediately speak of living the spiritual gifted life in relation to God, in relation to yourself and in relation to the rest of the body.
First in relation to God he writes,
So, how should we live this spiritually gifted life in relation to God? Scripture says the proper attitude should be one of self sacrifice. You have been equipped with a spiritual gift, some of you don't know what your gift is. And one of the first steps in discovering that gift is to come to God in prayer and worship and say to Him, "Lord here I am, Here is my soul, here is my will, here is my heart, here is my mind, here I am I give myself totally to You. I give myself to You as a living sacrifice. Show me where you want me to go and I will go. Show me what you want me to do and I will do it. For I am totally yours.” And this isn't a one time prayer, this needs to be a daily prayer - because we forget who we belong to and who has bought us and who our King is - and we need to devote ourselves to Him daily. The truth is that God did not give us the Spiritual gifts for ourselves. But has gifted us for His kingdom. When you became a Christian you enrolled in the greatest movement the world has ever known but it was not so that you could be saved and go to heaven, although that's part of it - it was so that you could totally live WITH God FOR God and hand in hand with God build His kingdom. So we are to offer ourselves to Him as living sacrifices. Holy - that is completely given to God and this is pleasing to God, an act of worship. As one commentator put it, "Like the burnt offering given wholly to God, the Christian is to be a total sacrifice to God, and that sacrifice is to consist of the whole life." In verse 2 he says that we are no longer to be conformed to the world. That does not mean that we cash out of society and become monks. No, we are to be salt and light in the world. It does mean that we are not to conform to the world’s standards, we are not to bend to the world’s values, we are not to submit to the world’s views, because we are under a new rule, the rule of God. Someone has said, 'The church is against the world, for the world." That is what Paul is saying here. And this can be hard to do - not to conform to the world - because we bombarded by the worlds messages and ways of thinking. That is why it is so important for us to worship together, to hear and study God's word, to pray, to have a quiet time with God. We have to constantly remind ourselves to whom we belong, under whose authority we now live our lives, that we are new creations with a new set of values, a new way of looking at the world, and now are citizens of a new kingdom, the kingdom of God. We no longer conform to the world because we have torn up our visa and have been issued new citizenship in the kingdom of God. And Paul says as you are transformed by God, God will make his will plain to you - He will show you what is good acceptable and perfect. So when thinking about our spiritual gifts our proper attitude toward God should be one of sacrifice. Then Paul goes on in verses 3 and 4 to point to the proper attitude toward our selves.
So we are to think of ourselves with sober judgment. Two dangers have historically existed among Christians when they seek to put their spiritual gifts into practice. The first is that as we begin to serve with our talents and gifts we fall into the trap of thinking we are superior to those around us. We get to thinking we are pretty good and the world would be a better place if everyone was as good as me in this particular gift. We become conceited and arrogant. The story is told of a preacher who preached a great sermon, a wonderful sermon in his mind. He asked some of his friends in the congregation what they thought of if, and they all agreed it was a wonderful sermon. He was thinking pretty highly of himself so much so that on the way home in the car with his wife, he said half out loud and half to himself, "I wonder how many truly great preachers there are in this world." To which the wife replied, "One less than you think, dear." I'm going to tell that story one day and someone is going to congratulate Janet for her keen insight. We need to think of ourselves with sober judgment. Realize that no gift is better than another, in fact we have discovered that God has given greater honour to those parts that are often considered inferior (I Corinthians 12:24). But we need to avoid the opposite pitfall - that is thinking of ourselves as worthless and unimportant with nothing to contribute. Please don't tell me that God has not gifted you because you are too young, or too old or have, in your mind, led such a sinful life that God can't possibly use you. That is hogwash. God has redeemed you, He has made you a new creation in Christ and He has enabled you to participate in some way for the building up of His body for His glory. Every member is important in the body and every member is enabled, gifted to participate in the work of the body. How should we think of our spiritual giftedness? In relation to God we need to sacrifice ourselves to Him. In relation to ourselves we need to think with sober judgment and in relation to the body we need to offer support.
I know I am repeating myself but let me again say, what this text is saying, we each have a part to play in the body of Christ and each one is needed to perform their gift within the body if it is to function for the glory of God. John Gladstone has said that there are three temptations that regularly visit every pastor - the temptation to whine, the temptation to shine and the temptation to recline. And so it is with every Christian. There is the desire to shine - to say, "Hey look at me, aren't I great?" OR the temptation to whine, "Why didn't I get a different gift?" OR the temptation to recline - "This is a big church, my contribution is not needed, someone else will do the work, I'm not going to do anything." They are three sins that destroy the body of Christ and disable it from doing anything effective in the Kingdom of God. So, three "S"s, sacrifice to God, sober judgement and support to the body. Which brings us to the service gifts. In this passage Paul lists two support gifts, prophecy and teaching which we have studied already and then he mentions five service gifts. Again I don't think this is a complete list, Paul is giving us a sample. First, in verse 7 - serving, or in our text ministering. In I Corinthians 12 this is all called the gift of helps. This is the ability to "help and support others in practical and behind the scenes ways that cause public ministries to run smoothly and effortlessly."1 Like many of the spiritual gifts there is an overlap between what Christ calls us all to do and what the Holy Spirit especially enables individual Christians to do. We are all called to serve one another (Galatians 5:13), but there are people within the body of Christ who seem to be especially gifted in the area of service - they have the ability to serve behind the scenes, to see needs and meet them often without being asked, they don't like to be up front or singled out, but they are often the backbone of the church. Ray Ortland says that those with this gift join the glorious company of the stretcher bearers. He is referring to the story in Mark 2:1-1 where four men lower a man on a stretcher, through the roof to Jesus. You never are told who those stretcher bearers are - yet they perform an enormous ministry of service by bringing this man to Christ. Biblical examples include Onesiphorus (2 Timothy 1:16); Dorcas (Acts 9:36-39) and Phoebe (Romans 16:1). In our age you'll find people with the gift of service working among us in the kitchen, maintaining the facilities, setting up chairs, working in the sound booth, providing nursery facilities, driving the elderly to worship and the sick to doctors’ appointments. They do so much more and much of what they do goes unnoticed and sometimes even unrecognized. Like all the members of the church their contribution is essential and vital to the life of the body. In verse 8 - there is the gift of exhorting. That is a word we don't use too much in our day. It may be because it sounds too much like commanding, or scolding but that is not the case here. The word comes from the same Greek word used to describe the Holy Spirit as a helper, counselor and comforter. So the person who has the gift of exhortation is able to encourage, give insightful counsel, and is able to comfort. Such a person is able to correct another without criticizing and belittling the other, but they draw alongside another and help others to be more like Christ. Also mentioned in this verse is the gift of giving. The person with this gift is able to "give to the work of God with generosity, frequency and cheerfulness".2 To be sure we are all called to be a generous people. We all need to realize that nothing we have belongs to us, we all need to realize that the true question is not how much money will I give to God, but how much of God's money will I keep for myself. All that we have belongs to Him and we are called to give. But a person gifted in this area is characterized by their ability to give without drawing attention to themselves, they don't need to be coerced into giving, and they don't grumble when they have the opportunity to give and often they give way more than what is needed. Then there is the gift of leading. This describes one who is able to lead others with diligence, creativity and common sense. They are able to organize projects and see them through to the end, they are not bombastic but are able to cast a vision and enable the body to fulfill that vision. The last gift listed here is compassion or showing mercy. Those with this gift have the ability to sense people's needs and give comfort, encouragement, and hope. People who are in pain or in the midst of heartbreak are drawn to them and search them out because their help is so vital when walking through a dark time. What do these service gifts mean to the church today? They are vital to the life of the church. What would the church be without those who exercised this series of gifts? The work of the church would come to a grinding halt. We would be a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal, all words and no action. They are absolutely vital. As I described the gifts this morning - different names came to your mind. People you know in our church who exercise these gifts. Give thanks to God for them, and speak a word of encouragement and appreciation to them they need it. And then ask God where he would have you serve and exercise your gift. Perhaps it is in service, or exhorting, or showing mercy or giving, wherever it is step out in faith and begin to exercise your spiritual gift for the building up of the body for the glory of God. Copyright MBC and Tom Cullen - November 2002
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