Our Gifts
LESSON: We each have gifts with a role to play
BIBLE PASSAGE: Romans 12:4-5 (NLT)
“Who knows how to walk on your hands?” (Look around) “Let me show you how to walk on your hands.” (Attempt to do so. Fail miserably)
“Do you know why we can’t walk on our hands for any length of time? Because our hands are not made for walking on. Any more than you can put corn in your ear and expect to eat it (insert corn cob in ear) or talk out of your belly button (You’re on your own here!). You can’t do these things. Because your hands are made for holding, your ears are made for hearing, your belly button… well, never mind that.”
“What I want you to understand is that you have certain parts of your body that do certain things and you can’t expect them to do other things.
I’m going to read to you from what book? (Hold up your Bible) And what is the Bible? (The Word of God)
Read John’s letter to the church in Rome (New Living Trans.): ‘Just as our bodies have many parts and each part has a special function, so it is with Christ’s body. We are many parts of one body, and each one of us has different works to do. And since we are all one body in Christ, we belong to each other and each one of us needs the other.’
Think of it this way – what if your hand said ‘I’m just gonna go put this over here’ and your foot said ‘I’m gonna go play the piano’ and your mouth says ‘Soy hablando Espanol’ and you can’t get anything done, can you? We all have to work together – in our body and in our church body as well.
So what is it you can do in this church? (Ask for suggestions. Prayer. Acolyte work, such as candle-lighting. Singing in the youth choir. Send cards to people.) Does the power of prayer work? Yes, it is a fact that the power of prayer does work. What else can you do? You can sit and be here. Because the fact that you are here tells us that we are preaching God’s word. The Bible says, “Let the Children come to me, for the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to such as these.” The fact that you are here means you are contributing to this church. And each one of you has so many blessed skills, some of which you know and some of which you don’t know yet – none of which includes walking on your hands. And that’s okay too, because you do so many other great things.
What I want to do is say a Prayer. I want to say “Thank you” to God for bringing each one of us into your church and may we know what our abilities are so that we may contribute them, knowing that great things will occur because of our one small addition to the greater whole 0 in everything we say and everything we do.