3 For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you. 4 Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, 5 so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. 6 We have different gifts, according to the grace given us. If a man’s gift is prophesying, let him use it in proportion to his faith. 7 If it is serving, let him serve; if it is teaching, let him teach;8 if it is encouraging, let him encourage; if it is contributing to the needs of others, let him give generously; if it is leadership, let him govern diligently; if it is showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully.
Why are we supposed to present our lives as a living sacrifice? So we may serve Him effectively, so we may be useful to Him, so we can use the gifts He has blessed us with for His glory, so that we can reach the lost, so we can glorify Him.
V3 shows us that we need the right attitude, a humility that should genuinely spring from self sacrifice. We ought not to think more highly of ourselves than we should, rather we should recognize our own depravity and the mercy we received that, by it's very definition, we did not deserve. Our life then is not about us, or about we can do - but about God and what He can do through us, when we are willing to selflessly serve Him.
And with that humble attitude, we also need to recognize that we do have a responsibility within the body of Christ, that we do have a function, and that we need to use our God given gifts for His glory and for the building up and growth of the Church. We're essential but not indespensible. We need to have the right balance here in recognizing our worth, but recognizing it in humility. Basically - we need to get moving. If we have the gift of service, we need to serve. If teaching, we need to get teaching. Just do it - like the Nike slogan says. Do it, with the right motivation, with the right attitude, as a living sacrifice.
And that should start in our homes, should it not? In our own homes, and then to the people around us, our neighbours, and wherever God calls us to minister in service to Him.
There's nobody put together exactly like you are. God has given you a combination of gifts in different areas and to different degrees, with a purpose - for you to use them in His service to glorify Him. You cannot assume that "someone else can do it".
MacArthur adds...
every one of us is a spiritual snowflake, there's no two of us alike. If you don't do it, it isn't done the way God would have chosen originally to have it done. Oh, He'll stick something in the gap, but you'll forfeit the blessing and God's purpose in its truest and purest sense has to be passed on to others who wouldn't be initially His choice.
Another problem that you get if you over simplify the gifts is the problem of confusion. I see confused people all the time and they ask me this when I travel around, "I'm having a terrible time defining my gift. I went to a seminar and they told me all these were the gifts and I don't seem to fit into any one. I sometimes think I have a little of this and then I think I have a little of this and I just don't know what my gift is." And I always say to them, "Don't worry about it. Your gift is what you are, that's all." It resists a label. And if you keep trying to label it and over simplify and over define it, you're going to cause confusion.
And then there's another problem that comes when you over simply the gifts and that is a rationalization that says, "Well, that's not my gift, I can't do that. Sorry, I'd certainly like to give to this cause but my gift is not giving. Praise the Lord," see. "My gift is taking, do you have anything I can...?" See. I mean, there's a lot of that rationalization. Well, that's not my gift, I'd certainly like to help but, you see, I have the gift of showing mercy and I'm certainly not going to teach anybody anything or exhort anybody, no, no, no.
See, that over definition, that over simplification becomes an excuse. And then, of course, I think an over definition has another problem, and that is it leads to self-deception because people get locked in on a gift they think they have and they don't have it. "Well, I've got that gift. Once I taught something and somebody said, `Boy, that was good,' that's my gift." And they narrow it down and they think that's it and that may not be it. So we resist that over simplification. You are absolutely unique and you need humbly to evaluate your giftedness even though it resists a definition.
We may be able to do good things, even helpful things - but we should want to do the best things, the things God has specifically designed for us to do using the specific combination of gifts He has blessed us with.
And it all starts with being thankful for the mercies of God.
I'm so thankful for the mercies of God for me that I give Him my life. And having given Him my life, I then look at what is left in humility and say, "Lord, all I am I want to use in Your service." And whatever my gift is I begin to use it to minister to the body. And if you haven't been doing that, may I say to you what Paul said to Timothy in 2 Timothy 1:6, "Stir up the gift of God that is in you?" Stir it up. Stir it up...
focus on the Lord, give your life to Him, offer it as a living sacrifice. And out of that the Spirit of God produces the humility and begins to make the gift function...... seeking Him and finding our walk with Him, the gifts given us will operate.
Tomorrow's scripture focus: Romans 12:9-13
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