5th Sept 2010
Romans 12:1-8
In the first eight verses of Romans 12, Paul is dealing with the second most important issue for every Christian to settle.
The First issue is our personal commitment to Christ
The second is our commitment to the Body of Christ or the Church.
So in these verses Paul focus on how to find our place in the Body of Christ. Last time we looked at the 1st four steps (Review) vs. 1
1. Step 1. Dedicate My Body to God
“Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God – this is your spiritual act of worship.” vs. 1.
Christianity is very practical – ‘Lord these hands, this mind, this mouth I dedicate to you and your purposes – for your glory’.
2. Step 2. Eliminate Competing Distractions
“Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind”. vs. 2
As Christians we take on a new identity and we are going to have to look at our life style and our priorities in order to have the time to, ‘seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness’.
I cannot imagine anything worse than standing before God and seeing everything with crystal clarity and knowing that we missed the most important thing of all.
“God I am so sorry I just didn’t have any time for you or your kingdom”.
How are you going to explain to God that you didn’t have any time Him?
3. Step 3. Evaluating My Strengths
“By the grace given to me I say to everyone of you: do not think of yourself as more highly than you ought…”
Paul says be realistic.
Our tendency, in your evaluating ourselves, is towards one of two extremes i.e. to think that we are indispensable or to think we are worthless. Neither of which are true.
4. Step 4. To Cooperate With Other Believers
“Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.” vs. 4 & 5.
Paul’s gives us an anatomy lesson in which he says every believer has a part to play, each of which fulfils a different function. Everyone is important but everyone must cooperate in order to get the job done.
Some of the members of the body are supported by the church to work full time or part time; this is to released them from the need to go and earn a living elsewhere – but they are not more important than the rest of the body. (I am paid to be good but you are good for nothing).
So every believer is a minister, we have different functions. Every ministry is important and we need to major on cooperation – we are dependent on each other to get the job done.
Paul sums up like this in Eph 4:16;
“From him (Christ) the whole body joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.”
5. Step # 5. To Activate Our Spiritual Gifts
“We have different gifts, according to the grace given us. If a man’s gift is prophesying, let him use it in accordance with his faith. If it’s serving, let him serve; if it’s teaching, let him teach; if it’s encouraging, let him encourage; If it’s contributing to the needs of others, let him give generously; if it’s leadership, let him govern diligently; if it’s showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully.” vs. 6
Now we could spend months studying spiritual gifts so this is a very brief overview today.
Paul says just as we received natural abilities when we are born physically e.g. touch, taste, sight etc … when we are born spiritually we are given one or more spiritual gifts – not to be confused with natural talents or though there may be some overlap.
(Now don’t put this in the too hard basket because this is very important).
When you become a believer God gifted you with a new capacity to minister to other people.
Tragically many Christians go through their whole lives and never discover their spiritual gift.
Now the Bible majors on spiritual gifts in several key passages.
1 Cor. 12:7 says, “to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good” and no one receives all the gifts – which is why there are no perfect ministers or pastors except Jesus.
God has planned it this way that we can be interdependent i.e. we need each other.
If I had all the gifts I wouldn’t need you and if you had all the gifts you wouldn’t need others.
No one has it all together we need each other like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. (Paul says ‘that love grows when we work together’).
Q1. What is the basis of spiritual gifts?
“We have different gifts according to the grace given us.” vs. 6
Grace means we didn’t earn them and didn’t deserve them.
“Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others faithfully administering God’s grace in its various forms”. 1Peter 4:10
The ministry gifts God gave me are not for me but for the Church.
Similarly the gifts God gave you are not for you but for all of us. Because we need each other – and Paul also says there are different forms.
Paul concludes, 1Cor 12:3, “But eagerly desire the greater gifts” and he is talking about gifts like prophecy, evangelism, teaching which benefit the whole body at one time.
Many people wrongly assume that at this point Paul is talking to individuals.
He is actually talking to the Church. He says, ‘as a church we should want all the gifts of God to be present and active in our midst because it builds up the Body’.
Q2. What is the purpose of spiritual gifts?
See Eph 4:11-13 (read overhead).
11“It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, 12to prepare God’s people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up 13until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ”.
So God gave gifts to the Church for two reasons:
i) So that the Body of Christ is build up.
ii) To promote unity out of diversity – gifts are only to be used to build others up not to build up our own egos.
It’s also vital that the fruit of the spirit is in evidence whenever we are using the gifts of the Spirit.
Now Romans 12:6 talks about seven gifts – usefully called motivational gifts. – Let’s see how they work.
Prophecy – proclaiming/revealing God’s Word.
Serving – I think that the order is interesting and important here.
Teaching – involves study and research
Encouraging – or exhorting others to grow in their faith.
Contributing to the needs of others, Paul says, give generously.
Q. How do you know if you have the gift of giving? You will love to give.
The question the giver asks when there is a need is not ‘how much can I afford to give’ but ‘what’s the least I need to keep to live on’.
Leadership – let him govern diligently. In the Greek this means with haste. The characteristic of a leader is that he/she doesn’t waste time.
Leaders are often accused of being too aggressive, especially by those who don’t have a leadership gift but this is because they are always striving forward.
The other test of a leader is that people will gladly follow them. If no one is following you, you are not a leader.
#7 Mercy; ‘If it’s showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully’.
Some people overflow with mercy. The word cheerfully in Greek means ‘shining brightly’. There is a cheeriness about them and they and people are cheered up by them (know anyone like that?)
Let me give you an example of how motivational gifts work.
If each of these seven gifts were represented in a family and someone just dropped the desert on the floor here is what each one of them might say.
Prophecy: ‘That’s what happens when you are not careful.’ Motivation: To correct a problem.
Serving: ‘Let me help you clean up.’ Motivation: To fulfil a need.
Teaching: ‘The reason that it fell is because it was too heavy on one side.’ Motivation: To discover why it happened.
Exhortation: ‘Next time let’s serve the deserts will be meal! Motivation: To correct for the future.
Giving: ‘I’ll be happy to buy a new desert’
Leadership: ‘Jim you get the mop. Sue, help pick it up. Mary, help fix some more desert’.
Motivation: To achieve the immediate goal of the group.
Mercy: ‘Don’t feel bad; it could have happened to anyone.’
Motivation: To relieve embarrassment.
So see how it all works beautifully together, we need each other which is why when you don’t find your place, the family suffers.
Now as I said there is a lot more to learn about spiritual gifts e.g. the different types of gifts.
Q #3 What is our Responsibility with respect to Spiritual Gifts.
What is important I think is that we understand that we are responsible to God to develop and use our gifts. We all like to see our children developing and using their natural gifts. God feels the same way.
Jesus told stories like the parable of the talents to emphasise this.
Remember one servant used her talents and multiplied it while another buried his in the ground.
If we have a gift we have a responsibility. God will hold us accountable for what we did with our gift.
He is not going to compare us with someone else but He does expect us to remain true to what he has called and equipped us to do.
God’s question for us is, “What did you do with what I gave you?”
So three steps:
1. Examine: Do you understand spiritual gifts? Have you studied what the Bible says about this subject?
2. Experiment: Try out different ministries – there are many opportunities for you can serve. Experiment!
3. Exercise: Paul’s advise to Timothy was to, ‘Sir up the gift that you were given.” Develop it.
I am primarily an exhorter and the natural inclination of my heart is to encourage people to grow in their walk with God.
Q. What does all this mean for our Church?
If we are going to be true to Christ we have to take spiritual gifts seriously.
Paul says, “When each part of the body is working properly the whole body grows”.
Q. Now what are the implications of spiritual gifts for the church?
1. The Church is an organism not an organisation. It’s the living growing Body of Christ; therefore it is to function like a body not a business. The Bible says again and again that Christ is the head of the Church the Body. Eph 5:23.
2. The Church is to operate on the basis of spiritual gifts not an organisation chart. That means that if someone wants to start a ministry – say to prisoners or shut-ins – God is most likely calling them to take the initiative.
And if you see something else that’s happening in the church that you would like to join in we are not going to say sorry we only have room for one person in our business plan. If you have a gift and a calling God wants you to get involved.
3. The Church is into ministry not maintenance.
Our focus is on what we can do to meet peoples’ needs (ministry) rather than what we need to keep the church going (maintenance).
We don’t want to be like the grease factory that was so successful in selling grease they had to build a bigger factory but the more machinery they purchased the more of their own grease they needed to service their machinery.
And so it went on until eventually they had to shut down the sales department because they were using all the grease on themselves.
Churches can do that by tying up all their people resources in administration.
We have to constantly remind ourselves to travel light.
But as we close let me just bring it back to our individual response.
What are you going to do about your spiritual gifts?
The Bible says, “Don’t be a hearer only but be a doer of the word.”
When we have dedicated ourselves to God His next question for us is,
“Are you willing to work with me in building up the body of Christ in the way that I have gifted you?
Someone asked Noel Webster, a leading American executive;
Q. “What was the most sobering thought he had ever had. He said “My personal accountability to God.”
One day we will all stand before God to give an account for the way we have used the gifts He has given us – the gift of life, of time, of the spiritual and natural gifts that He has given us.
And He will ask, ‘did you bless the Body of Christ or did you hold back?’
There is a place for you here in St Andrews where you can be involved. God can use anything for His glory but don’t do it because you have to do it but because you love to be involved in what Christ loves.

Prayer:
Father, I thank you for what we’ve looked at today and the excitement we feel from understanding your Word. I pray that each person who has listened to this message would find their place in the Body of Christ.
We believe that you have given us all gifts. As we dedicate ourselves to you we thank you that you can use our abilities and the talents that you have given us for the greater glory of your name and for our own growth.
Help us not to be just hearers of the Word but to be doers also. In the wonderful name of Jesus we pray. Amen.