Analysis of Free Spiritual Gifts
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Spiritual Gifts Paper
Part 1: What are your top 2 spiritual gifts? Do you agree with the results? Why or why not?
According to the analysis, my top 2 spiritual gifts are showing mercy and administration respectively. I agree with the results of the analysis because of several reasons. On showing mercy, I am usually empathetic towards people and I do not like seeing bad things happen to them. In addition, the suffering of others moves me and such suffering usually compels me to go out of my way to help them. On administration, I also agree that it is one of my strongest spiritual gifts. This is because I have successfully started and headed several initiatives against very great odds. In the church, I have had the privilege of starting and heading a youth initiative that helped to spread the gospel through acting and other performing arts. I have also successfully organized several functions and events for church groups. Outside the church, I have held positions of responsibility in school and got several certificates of merits for my administrative skills.
Part 2: Specifically, how can you use your gifts at this time? How might you misuse your gifts? Be specific.
I can use my spiritual gifts of showing mercy and administration to serve the church of Christ in several ways. On the gift of showing mercy, I can help to counsel the people who are in distress as well as those who are in need of a listening ear and advice. Specifically, I hope to help youths who are addicted to alcohol and drugs as well as those suffering from conditions such as HIV/AIDS. To help those in distress, I can visit the sick in hospitals every Sunday to provide material support to them, comfort them, counsel them, listen to them, and pray with them. This is especially intended for patients in hospices who are suffering from terminal illnesses and usually forgotten by society. Terminally ill patients especially require a lot of support and love. Visiting terminally ill patients who are in hospices and giving them hope and solace while spreading the gospel of Christ can be of benefit to them. I can also extend the same considerations to the elderly people who live in homes of the aged, refugees and immigrants. Many illegal immigrants and people have come to seek refuge in the country. Many people look down at these people and fail to appreciate the turmoil that is in their lives. My spiritual gift of mercy can help to provide succor to such people. Other groups of people who might benefit from this include those in spinal injury hospitals, drug rehabilitation centers, and those in prisons. This would work if I begun a ministry that would specifically concentrate on visiting the people in these institutions in order to provide succor to them.
On my spiritual gift of administration, I can use it to organize programs and put in place projects that will help to uplift the lives of disadvantaged people and help spread the gospel. As mentioned in the previous section, I can use my gift of showing mercy to counsel and provide support to those in need. However, this will not succeed if I do not put my administration skills to good use. Using my administration skills, I can draw up effective action plans and programs, mobilize well-wishers, raise funds, and oversee the whole ministry of visiting the poor, the sick, the destitute, and those in prison in order to support them.
The spiritual gifts can be misused in several ways. The gift of showing mercy can be misused if I allow others to use me as a doorstep and if I have ill feelings and I adopt a judgmental attitude towards those who are not as merciful as I am and towards those, I am supposed to help. I can also misuse the gift of showing mercy by betraying the confidence of those whom I am empathetic towards by sharing their secrets and suffering with others in a manner that disparages them. Gossiping about those who are suffering as well as exposing the weaknesses is bad. This is one of the ways that I can misuse the gift since in the course of helping others they tend to share their secrets as well as intimate details in confidence, which they would not be happy to have others know. Other ways through which I can misuse the gift of showing mercy is by owning others problems as if they are my own and becoming proud.
The gift of administration can also be misused by becoming proud and conceited, lording it over others, using success for self-glorification and self-gain, looking down on others, and pointing accusing fingers at others when things fail to work as expected. Overemphasis on logic and rational thinking at the expense of biblical and scriptural teachings and mistreating others if they do not do things perfectly are also examples of how misuse of spiritual gifts can be done.
Part 3: What were your 2 lowest scoring gifts? Do you agree or disagree? Why or why not?
My two lowest scoring gifts are giving and exhortation respectively. I do not agree that I am poor at giving. My dominant spiritual gift is showing mercy and one of the ways through which I show mercy towards others is through giving. For example, I usually give out my time to visit children who are suffering from cerebral palsy and assist the physiotherapists and other caregivers in helping these kids lead comfortable lives. Besides donating my time in the service of the needy, I also use my skills in service of the society. I agree that I am not very good at exhortation
Part 4: What impact does this knowledge have on your involvement in ministry?
This knowledge will have some impact in my ministry. Based on the analysis repot, I now strongly believe that I should only serve in ministries where my strongest gifts will be of much use. For instance, the results have reinforced my prior belief that I cannot make a good pastor or shepherd. My skills as an administrator would definitely get into my way as a pastor or shepherd since I would tend to use my knack of perfectionism and logical thinking to lead people at the expense of God’s word and this would be disastrous. Secondly, being a pastor or a shepherd calls for firmness in many instances and my spiritual gift of showing mercy may work against this. Consequently, I intend to work less on shepherding and pastoring and instead get involved more in ministries that involve comforting and supporting the poor, destitute, sick, and the hopeless. I do not believe that giving is my main weakness as reported in the analysis. However, I will try to improve on this score by dedicating more time in service of the needy people indicated above. I will capitalize on my strengths by using my gift of administration to complement my gift of showing mercy and this will help to create strong programs, action plans, and initiatives that would strengthen the ministry. It will also help me to raise more funds, mobilize more people, and get more material support to give to those in need hence help in the weak area of giving.