Ephesians 4 - Gifts for Ministry

I'd like to bring a message about the work of the ministry out of Ephesians chapter 4. Some of what I've thought and believed in the past, and maybe that's shifting a little bit. But I do want the vision for this message is that everyone here could catch a glimpse of God's heart for the function of the body of Christ. What if everyone here would catch a glimpse of God's heart, a vision of what God really wants for the body of Christ, everywhere, not just here, but anywhere, everywhere that God's people meet at all times.

And if by God's grace, I could be a part of bringing that to pass, it would be a blessing to instill vision into every heart of that which is God's desire for the body, the church. And maybe, maybe this could be used to lay a foundation in some of your hearts. For this time for this church, and maybe you won't always be here in this church, but that you could be established in what God's word says.

Even you children or your youth, young people, we all need a clear vision for the body of Christ. So turning me to Ephesians chapter 4, as we begin here, in Ephesians, the first three chapters very specifically speak about the divine plan of salvation, God's heart there, the revelation of that salvation. And then chapter two, you have how that the Gentiles were lost and we all were partakers of that lost condition.

And chapter three, he brings together the Gentiles and the Jews, and basically the first three chapters gives this glorious foundation of our position in Christ as individuals and who we are in him. We've been saved, we've been washed, we've been forgiven by the blood of the lamb, and that is the foundation that is laid. But then he goes into chapter four, and he begins with, in chapter one, in verse one, you find the word walk.

Now he wants, he's laid the foundation for the Christian to give us understanding who we are in Christ, and now he says he wants us to walk. If you go to chapter five in verse one, or verse two, it says, and walk in love. And again he's saying, I want you to walk out of that which has been laid before you.

I want you to now, instead of not, you've had an experience in Christ, you've experienced the glory of God, salvation per se, now I want you to walk. What good is a Christian if he doesn't learn to walk? So we need to learn to walk. So let's read some of these verses here.

Chapter four of Ephesians, I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech or beg you that you walk worthy of the vocation wherewith you are called. With all loneliness and meekness, with long-suffering, forbearing one another in love, endeavoring, or another translation says, eager to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. Do I, as a part of this, of the body of Christ, exercise eagerness to maintain unity in the body? There is one body, one spirit, even as you are called in one hope of your calling.

One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all. And that's kind of the backdrop of the part I really want to look at is the next portion of this chapter. But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ.

I want to be looking at the gifts that he gave and how that those are to function in the body. Wherefore he says, when he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive and gave gifts unto men. Have you ever stumbled over that one? He led captivity captive.

Have you ever wondered what that really means? Can I see your hands? What does that mean? He led captivity captive and gave gifts unto men. Let me tell you a little story about David. When Ziklag was taken, before David went up to the throne, before he became the actual king, he was anointed king as a young boy.

Ziklag was taken by the Amalekites and who destroyed it. And they took captive all of the women and the children and everybody who was in Ziklag because David and his men had been off fighting in a war. When they came back, they found Ziklag burned and all the women and children gone.

They then followed after them and they found them in a valley somewhere all spread out rejoicing and feasting and making a great party about the victory they had just won. David and his men, 400 of them, surprised them and they overcame them and they won the battle. And it was a whole day that they were slaughtering, killing them.

And then they took all of that spoil back home. They recovered all the women, all the children, plus all the spoils that they already had there. David took all that along back.

When they came back to Ziklag, David sent gifts to the people of Israel. In 1 Samuel chapter 30, David came to Ziklag. He sent part of the spoil to his friends, the elders of Judah saying, here's a present for you from the spoil of the enemies of the Lord.

It was for those in Bethel, in Negev, in Jander, and there's several verses. There's numerous cities that he mentioned there that David sent gifts to at that time. It was the normal thing that when a king would overtake the enemy, that they would take the spoil along back to their city.

They would also take the captives, the other king that they overcame and his leaders and his army. They would take them back in chains and they would parade them through the city. It was a show of shame to the kings that lost the battle.

It was the number one thing that you could do to shame your enemy was to lead them in captivity through the city when you came back home to your people. And at that time the king would give gifts to all his people of the spoil that they had gathered. That's the kind of the picture of the background here.

We also have scriptures where when David brought the ark up to Jerusalem, all of Israel had gathered together. And they had this, evidently, a great big parade when the Levites, the priests, they brought the ark of God into the city of David there. And David led the procession as the king, you might say.

Actually, he was dancing in a linen ephod, it says. But it was a great time. And David made an end of offering the burnt offerings and the peace offerings and he blessed the people in the name of the Lord.

And he gave to every one of Israel, both man and woman, to every one of them a loaf of bread and a piece of meat and a flagon of wine, as King James says, but it really might be a cake of raisins. He gave gifts to every man and every woman of Israel and sent them away. Now let's go back and read this in Ephesians 4 again.

What has just happened? Paul is writing about the ascension of Jesus Christ and how Jesus Christ, who had been up in heaven before, he had descended to this earth, but now he has ascended. And when he ascended, what did he do? He gave gifts to men. And if you want to look at and you want to make some imagination, literal picture of imagination in your mind, when Jesus was lifted up off the earth and he went back up into heaven, his disciples saw him go, and the angels showed up there, but they saw him going up into heaven.

And Paul says that when he ascended, up on high, he led captivity captive and gave gifts to men. And maybe at that time, Jesus, as he's going up, he's giving gifts. You don't see him doing that.

But in the spiritual reality, it must have happened. Or maybe it was when he got back up into the throne room, got back up into glory, and led that possession of victory there in front of the Father and all the angels. And at that time, maybe he gave gifts.

And part of those gifts were given 50 days later at Pentecost. That's maybe when they really were given. But he gave gifts to men.

Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth? He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens that he might fill or fulfill all things. That's in parenthesis, those two verses. But let's read verse 8 again, then we'll go to verse 11.

Wherefore he saith... Now notice again, Paul is quoting Old Testament. The Old Testament gave a picture of this. When he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive and gave gifts unto men.

Verse 11. And he gave some apostles and some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers. The gifts that he gave.

Why would he give gifts to the church? What would be the purpose of that? Would that be so there could be a nice story room built to put them in? Would it be so that we can put them on a shelf up here and show the gifts that we've been given? Like trophies? Is that the kind of gifts? No. But he did give gifts. And the purpose of them is for the perfecting of the saints.

For the work of the ministry. For the edifying of the body of Christ. Till we all come in the unity of the faith.

And of the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect man. Unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. So that we henceforth be no more like children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine.

By the slight of men. And cunning craftiness whereby they lie in wait to deceive. Let's face the facts.

There are people lying in wait to deceive. There are people out there who want to lead astray. But speaking the truth in love may grow up into him in all things which is the head, even Christ.

Christ is the head of the church. We have scriptures also in the Old Testament. Where it says in Ezekiel.

He says and I will set up one shepherd over them. He shall feed them. Even my servant David.

He shall feed them and shall be their shepherd. And so Jesus Christ is that shepherd of the sheep. And he is a personal you might say shepherd to each person.

Each believer. And God is saying he's setting up a shepherd for each one of us. And that's the picture there.

And in Jeremiah he says I will set up shepherds over them which shall feed them. And they shall fear no more nor be dismayed. So now he's talking about plural shepherds.

So in this picture here we have the body of Christ. And Jesus has given gifts to the body. These gifts are here.

They are given. And they're to be used. How do you feel if you put time and energy into a very specific gift.

To give to someone. Your wife. Or your husband or your friend.

And they receive the gift. But they never use it. Or maybe they don't even like it.

And when you actually give the gift they're like I don't want that. Does that ever happen to you? Have you ever given a gift and a person didn't like it? How does that make you feel? Or you gave a gift and you expected them to use it like maybe a... What if I gave like a chainsaw to my son to use. And year after year I come back and it's always sitting on the shelf.

And it's never even been used yet. It's still in the original wrapping. How would I feel? He doesn't want my gift.

Is it possible that we have gifts from the Lord that we're not using? I look a little bit more at this verse 8 where it talks about captivity. Taking captivity captive. Very interesting.

When Jesus was crucified, buried and rose again. There's probably a whole lot more happened than what just meets the eye. So when these victorious kings would take their captives.

The other king and his men. And lead them back home. They would lead those kings into captivity.

Those kings were captives. And they led them back into captivity. Or they led them back into prison you might say.

Right? What did Jesus lead? Who were the captives that Jesus led into captivity? You might also understand that Jesus went and he preached to the spirits in prison. After he died on the cross. What did he do with those people? Did he lead those people out of a place of sheol into a place of... I don't know.

We'd have to look more deep in that. But he led captivity captive when he ascended. Who were the captives that he took? What are your thoughts? Who did he lead captive? And he put them in prison.

Any thoughts? Demonic powers. Okay. Death.

Okay. Anything else? So he led death. Demonic powers.

He took them captive. And he led them into captivity. Does that make sense? I don't know what your thoughts are.

The ESV says when he ascended on high he led a host of captives. And he gave gifts to men. So Jesus is the body, is the head of the body.

And Apostle Paul here is giving some instructions and directions for the body on how to function, how to work, how to walk together in the unity of the spirit in the faith of Christ. I wonder what your experiences are in church life. How have these gifts operated in your experience? Have you ever seen them operating fully? Some years ago when we were back in the 90s and early 2000s when Brother Denny was here, Brother Mose was here and so forth, there was a good bit of talk about a five-fold ministry.

Have you ever heard about that? Five-fold ministry. What is your picture of that? What is it for? Does it work? If you don't take these gifts and see that they operate in your congregation, what happens? If the gifts are not operating, what happens? What happens when they do operate? I believe that according to the word of God here, when these gifts are in operation, they are for the purpose of perfecting the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ. These gifts have been given specifically for the edifying of the body of Christ, for the work of the ministry, for the perfecting of the saints, that till we all come in unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God.

Let's talk about what the gifts are a little bit. Let's also go back to 1 Corinthians and look at something there. 1 Corinthians 12.

Turn there with me. We have another passage here about gifts that are given. Let's start at verse 26 in 1 Corinthians 12.

And whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it, or one member be honored, all members rejoice with it. Speaking of the members in the body, now you are the body of Christ and members in particularly. And he had been speaking earlier about the eye and the ear and the different parts of the body and how that the eye should not say to the ear until I don't need you and so forth.

He's laying it out how that every part of the body is useful and is needed. Is there anyone here this morning that does not feel needed? Might be afraid to raise your hand. How's that? You're not needed here.

Okay. So here's a part of the body that does not feel needed. At home he does.

At work he does. It doesn't feel needed here. But let me ask you, is he needed? Some parts of our body we can do without.

Is there anyone here with some finger missing or a thumb? Can you function pretty normally without that? But there are parts of the body, especially the hidden parts which we cannot function without. Is each part needed? Yes. Do we care? How do we care? Whose job is it to care? So we're going looking at Corinthians here.

And God has set some in the church, first apostles, second prophets, third teachers. After that miracles, gifts of healing, helps, governments, diversities of tongues. God has put these in the church.

They are here. Are they functioning? If not, why not? Are all apostles? No. Are all prophets? No.

Are all teachers? No. It's an obvious answer. Do all have the gifts of healing? No, they don't.

Do all speak with tongues? No. Do all interpret? The answer is no. We're talking about the function of the body.

Each member has a specific job to do. Each member has a specific place to serve. Each member has a specific calling, you might say.

Or a specific gift. Gifts have been given. This king, when he ascended up on high, he gave gifts to men.

He gave them with purpose. And he gave them very specifically into the church. The body.

Looking at this one here, five-fold ministry. In the past, I saw this one way. I'm sure there's more than one way to look at it.

And I felt like, and I believe that, that we were operating as a body of Christ here with this five-fold ministry vision and picture. And we saw it working out. This is pretty much back in the time when Brother Denny would have been here.

At that time, we would have seen it functioning. Brother Moes, Brother Aaron, and myself. Different ones were there at different times.

But most, very definitely, Brother Denny would have filled the role of an apostle. Brother Moes would have filled the role of an apostle as well. An apostle is one who is sent with a message.

A messenger with a message. Who is sent. That's the picture of an apostle.

And Brother Denny and Brother Moes specifically operated in that function, in that gift. And they went out with this message. They had big picture vision.

And they planted churches. Brother Moes would have been even more of a prophet than an apostle may be. And so he was more prophetic.

He's the one who saw problems before anyone else could see them. And he would speak up about them. That's the work of the prophet.

The prophet has a very important place to play in the body of Christ. If we do not listen or give heed to the prophetic voices, the gifts of the prophets, the gifts of prophetic in the church, we will smart for it. If it's not operating, the tendency is to go into, down a road, which most people see is too late.

They see it too late. The prophet sees it ahead of time. That's the blessing of it.

What about the evangelist? Are there people who are gifted evangelists? Absolutely. I love to watch them at work. They minister to people.

They bring souls to the kingdom. They preach the gospel. They share the love of Jesus.

And they have such a unique gift of bringing souls into the kingdom. We should all be exercising some of those gifts. And then you have pastors and teachers.

And the pastors are shepherds. They're the ones who bring the sheep together and care for them. They're the ones who, they lead the sheep.

Then you have the gift of teachers. And a teacher is one who searches the truth, searches out the word. And these gifts are different in the operations.

So what would happen in a minister's meeting where these five gifts were operating, and I've experienced this, and I've lived in this, I've walked through these times, and I would love to see this type of ministry functioning here. I believe it's the heart of God. The teacher is one who generally, he searches things out, and when he presents something, he can back it up with facts.

He digs things out. He needs to have facts to back up what he's presenting. Any teachers here? And we as a five-fold ministry team, we learned how to value each of those gifts in this team.

There would be times when I would speak up, being more prophetic, I would speak up about something, and I actually came to learn that they will shoot it down. I learned to expect them to shoot it down, because they're not seeing it. At first, it would really bother me, and I'd get agitated about it, because the prophet, when he sees something, he has no facts to back it up.

And the teacher needs facts to back it up. They say, well, you know, can you show it to us? Can you explain what you really mean? Well, no, I can't explain what I mean. Anyone here that feels that way? Sometimes you see things, and you speak things out, and they want you to explain what you're saying.

Well, you almost feel stupid, because you can't explain it. But I've learned to live that way. It's part of it.

But then I also really appreciate the gift of the teacher who digs things out and explains everything. I love it. I value that.

And I learned that if I would present something in a ministry meeting, I expect them to shoot it down. Okay, it's fine. I learned to be okay with that.

But guess what happens? So often, the very next minister's meeting, which we had them each week, they would bring this back up, and they would discuss it, and they would all agree. Yeah, let's go for it. That's right.

Okay, fine. This happened over and over again. When these gifts are functioning properly in the body, then we can each value the gift in our brother.

We can recognize it and value it. Sometimes, though, when our hearts are troubled or we're not walking in grace, those gifts are exercised in a wrong way, and that causes trouble. Anyone ever see that happen? That happens often.

A lot. But when we are walking, so when we walk with lowliness and meekness, with long-suffering, forbearing one another in love, eager to keep the unity of the spirit and the bond of peace, if that's our vision, that's our goal, instead of me having my own vision, my own goal about me being right or I'm right and they're wrong or they're just not seeing it, no, we've got to have a vision of walking together. What happens in the absence of these gifts operating? What might it be like if a church is led by a teacher? Lots of positive things, good teaching, everything makes sense.

What might be missing? And I'm wondering, what is your experience in this? I would like to give some time for you to talk about, for you to tell us a little bit what your experience has been in church life. How have you seen these gifts used and utilized fully or have not seen them? Or you've seen the misuse of them? Or you've seen maybe just one or two of these operating? But I also want to look at, so that's been a bit my experience in the past and I still look back with great fondness and love and joy in working together with my brothers in the ministry team at the time that we valued those gifts in each other and valued what God was doing. That, I feel like some of that has been a very vital part of keeping this church together through the last 15 years of lots of turmoil.

When there was a lot of turmoil among many of the charity churches, the ministry team here working together in love is what held this thing together. I know some of you don't understand that or realize it or know it. But I've walked through it.

But I'm wondering if you, I want you to think about this, what has your experience been maybe past church life and so forth, how have you seen these gifts operate? The blessing in them or how have you seen them not operate? But I want to give another point here about this where it says for the perfecting of the saints, verse 12, for the work of the ministry. That's the King James. The ESV says it this way, to equip the saints for the work of the ministry, for the building up of the body of Christ.

So the picture I kind of gave you was that there's a five, what is called the five-fold ministry. You have these five specific gifts in the ministry team ordained men who've been called by the congregation to operate as a ministry team and function that way. I believe that is a very real possibility and a beautiful thing that can happen.

I'm not saying it has to be that way. Maybe there's a different way of looking at it. So if these gifts have been given, He gave some apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers and then verse 12, to equip the saints for the work of the ministry.

There's a difference there. Instead of seeing this as a five-fold ministry which oversees and operates and basically does the work of the ministry in the church, the other way of looking at this is that these gifts are given to equip the saints for the work of the ministry. To equip each one of you for the work of the ministry of the whole body.

I actually believe that is probably very real. Because every single one of you have been given gifts and so part of the calling, part of the work of the leaders of the congregation is to for each one of you, each one of us to understand the gifts and calling God has given to us individually, not as ordained men but as men and women in the body of Christ each one having received the gifts for ministry. So instead of having five people as ministry team, we have a the whole body is fitted for ministry.

Maybe one of the challenges of a leader there's many challenges but one of them is to somehow change the focus, change the idea of the average bench holder that is looking to the ministry to do the work. How to change that to take the responsibility that each one of us have been given a ministry or a place to serve. Alright? Make sense? How do we do all that? I'm not so sure.

I'm referring back to a time when I was in the ministry team. Such a joy, such a blessing. And for many years we worked in that way.

And I treasure that. And I would love to see that happen here. I would love to see at least five elders each one what would happen if we had five elders in this congregation each one filling one of these roles one of these gifts.

I know we're looking at ordaining elders or elder, I'd say we need to ordain elders according to what Jesus wants us to have. They're here. The gifts are here.

And we need to give them value. We need to recognize those gifts. However, when we go to ordain elders let me give you a word of wisdom.

I don't want you to be looking at this and saying, OK, which one is a teacher? Which one is an evangelist? Which one is an apostle? Which one is a prophet? OK, that's the one I'm going to vote for. That's the one I'll put my voice to. I remember when I was ordained as a minister many years ago afterwards someone came to me and they said, they told me this they said, when you go to ordain men don't look at their gifts and abilities and decide upon that but choose let your choice be the man or the men who are humble who are faithful.

That's what we have in the book of Acts. Choose ye out men who are full of the Holy Ghost men who are faithful. You put a man you ordain a man, a faithful man and God will give him gifts.

I believe Paul writes in Timothy that gifts are given by the laying of hands. And God is able to give specific gifts to faithful men. Put a man into ordain a man who is very gifted maybe he's very gifted at speaking he'll probably split the church.

But you ordain a faithful man God will give him gifts. I would like to give some time here for some of you to speak up a little bit. What is your experience either positive or negative concerning what I call the five-fold ministry? What have you seen? What have you experienced? Some of you have been ministers.

How did it work? Can we have the mics? I know we're not perfect. And I know that we work with men. We're not working with angels.

But, Reuben, go ahead. Yeah, one of the couple observations that I have from my perspective you were talking about what happens when these gifts aren't there. I would see that in our early days we had the strength of the apostle and the prophet, but we lacked the teacher and the pastor.

So we had a lot of outreach, we had a lot moving but we didn't have the discipleship and the mobilizing within. And then we flipped that to where now we have the pastor and the teacher but we don't have the apostle and the prophet. And so then it gets really ingrown and there's a lack of vision there's a lack of moving forward and it tends to be more inward focused.

So that's two imbalances that we see just within our own congregation. Another note, there's a local church here in the area that started with the idea that they were going to have a five-fold ministry right from the beginning. So there were five men put in place and each one was given their assignment.

And a number of years later that fell apart because of that lack of humility but also because there was just a title given. These were men that were actually operating in those gifts. So I think that the five-fold gifts and ministry is a very powerful I don't know what the right word is the model that we've been given but it's not something that we can just put together ourselves.

It's something that God needs to put together. Get your hands up if you want to talk. You asked what a church led by a teacher would look like and I can tell you it looks like a library.

A lot of good solid information sitting on a shelf. In the past we were part of a church that was led by a pastor and this was a very godly pastor and I really really appreciate my time there and still consider this man a dear brother. But that did not work.

This guy had a heart for his people and a pastor's gift. He loved people and he brought them together and he just shepherded them and cared for them made everybody feel loved and cared for. What that did is it drew a lot of people because that's what we crave.

We all want to feel cared for. This church grew so quickly that it felt threatening because he was starting to lose control and not being able to care for everyone. So what that made him do naturally was clamp down and it brought in a feeling of control and the church didn't split.

The church is still going but he's not there anymore and a lot of those original people aren't there anymore either. I think that's what happened. It grieved me then, grieved me still in a way that some of this teaching wasn't there.

They could have walked that through and the church could have grown in a healthy way. Timothy and then Jay. So I really appreciate this topic.

It's a topic I've pondered a lot in looking at church and ministry function and all of that. And I think as I consider the way you introduced the message about the first several chapters being about our salvation and as we look into this part, the walking part as well, I think one of the big keys is to understand that this is also a supernatural work of God in us. And it's kind of like we need to position ourselves to yield ourselves to allow him to do that in us.

I think to me the biggest key is the point that you brought last about the fact that this is for the equipping of the saints for the work of the ministry. I think the biggest downfalls I've seen is when we think we can ordain five men and they will do the ministry for us. No, no, no, no.

That is only the beginning. That is only leading out in perfecting, equipping the saints so that the saints can minister. So that the body can minister.

It's an entire congregation moving with the focus of Christ as head understanding that we each have a place to function with or without an official title. And I think probably all of us would love to be a part of a church where we feel like we're a part. Jay.

When we were in South Africa in Cape Town we were part of a church for several years. A good church, I would say a solid church by the way many people look at churches who had a high emphasis on the word of God. Good teaching, expositor type preaching and sola scriptura and equipping the people with the word of God.

And that was the main focus. And it's interesting people that went there appreciated it. There was a good sense of vision around that particular concept.

But we left there then and the pastor also left after we were there and they had another two pastors I believe. We went back and visited that church 20 years later. And going in there for me it was pretty predictable.

It was quite legalistic. There was a lack of vision. The same people were there.

There were some new people that came in but it really lacked vision. It lacked outreach. And they were going through the motions and that's just the way it felt.

But a couple of people were very happy because we have a preacher now who's continuing in that thread, that vein of good Bible teaching and they were satisfied at that. Thank you. Thank you for those testimonies.

Yeah, I just want to share a little testimony on this. So when we first moved to the church in Cheyenne where we were for 10 years or so I kind of saw the five-fold ministry working out but it wasn't all. It was a smaller church, right? So it was only 15, 20 families.

But to see the workings among the brothers as they just worked in their natural God-given abilities as they shared and preached and got around. One of the benefits of being in a smaller church is your turn came around a little more often to share on a Sunday morning either through worship leading or devotions or sharing a main message. And it was just kind of a beautiful thing to see each gifting come out whether it was teaching, the gift of prophecy.

And then it was interesting how the gifting sometimes in one man were, you know, he would get up and he would prophesy and preach against be careful, we're headed a certain direction but yet he was the same guy that had the heart to have a Mother's Day breakfast so that all the ladies could be blessed, you know and see different sides of different people come out in different ways. So one thing, you know, I've always been concerned about is the gifting of discipling fathers in how to be better fathers within the church. So, you know, I think there's areas where each one of us needs to improve.

Sometimes I think too, we just need to get out of our own way and realize we have the light of Christ in us deal with the things we need to deal with so that we can be more useful to God and His kingdom in whatever ministry He's called us to. I think of the disciples of Jesus staying in the upper room till they were filled with the Holy Spirit. Sometimes we are tempted to step into ministry without waiting for being filled with the Holy Spirit so these gifts can flow.

Dan Smith. One quick side thought. As Brother Jay was describing a church with good Bible teaching but kind of predictable results.

Probably if the church became somewhat legalistic and content and such like maybe it wasn't good Bible teaching Good Bible teaching should affect people and change people in the right ways. But really the primary point I would like to make is I want us to be careful at least I suggest we be careful not to divide people by the gifts so that a teacher is a teacher a pastor is a pastor an evangelist is an evangelist etc. etc.

There are many people who the Lord has blessed with multiple gifts or they have multiple abilities or multiple talents and we don't want to just look at that person and categorize them which we tend to do and that's always whether we're talking about gifts like we are now or whatever we're doing we have this it's sure easy to put people in a box and say well okay you're a type A personality you're a type B you're a pastor you're an evangelist White people are complex and our goal is to all of us become like Christ and Christ we can hardly put in a box, can we? Have you heard the have you seen do you see the gift coming out? You just manifested something your gifting brought you to a place where you said what you said and it's important and we value that Are you with me? So there's different gifts operating here just recognizing that Thank you Are we done? Is anyone else? It's 12 o'clock Lester? Did we all notice that in the where there's talks about the gifts there's one gift in there that I think we can all fit in there's no need for somebody to feel that he's left out without a gift it says gifts of helps I wonder if that's Lester's gift So there's a lot more that could be said and taught about the gifts this is one portion of it and this is a very specific part which specifically addresses the ministry to the body In 1st Corinthians it was a more broad one You could also go to Romans chapter 12 which is more of an individual gifting so there's a lot to be learned a lot that could be looked at there but yes the gift of helps is very much needed and the gift of administration which is you know one that ruleth well you don't clearly see might not clearly see that in these five but it certainly is room for a person that has this gift to also do that and we don't categorize each other by their gifts like Dan is saying but it's but God wants us to use the gifts that he has given us and don't be ashamed of them Lester don't be ashamed of the gift of helps it's very much needed as are all the gifts in the body so may the Lord add his blessing to his word and to all of our hearts here this morning thank you for listening and my desire is that there would be vision for what the head really wants the body to be experiencing here and there's a verse in Corinthians that says that we are of his flesh and of his bones and the picture the thing that I get I'm not sure I can do justice to that is that we are of the flesh and bones of Christ that means we are so integrally intertwined there's no way to separate who Christ is in me in a sense I am I'm completely involved even to the point of his flesh and his bones that's who we are in Christ and each one of you who are partakers of this glorious salvation are members of his body you are a part of him of his flesh and of his bones God bless