[A clip from the movie City of Embers is played first, which is what Pastor Jeff is referring to.] When you graduate from high school there, you have to function in the community; and so you reach into a bag, and you pull out your vocation. It has nothing to do with your personality, your talents, your gifts or abilities. Its simply random chance. Hopefully youll pull out something youre good at, something you like to do; but you just never know. Into the bag goes your hand, and comes something that will be your label, your job for the rest of your life. Im glad it doesnt work that way in our society; I dont know about you. But were going to be talking about spiritual gifts this morning. Were going to be in Ephesians 4 as were studying through the Book of Ephesians together. And like this story, the Bible says each one of us has a gift; each one of us has a gift from the Lord. Verse 7 (page 1158 of pew Bibles) reads, But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it, to each one of us-not to a chosen few, not to the elite, but to each and every person. If you are a part of the Body of Christ, you have a spiritual gift. You have a gift thats been parted to you by the Lord. In that movie (World vs. Christian: The Bible), that gift was imparted to every single person in that society; and likewise that gift was imparted for the benefit or the building up of society. In order for society to function, we must all have different roles and capacities; and their job was to help the benefit of greater society, so the gifts that you receive from the Holy Spirit are not for you. Theyre not for your benefit; theyre for the benefit of the church. Were going to receive gifts coming up next month right for Christmas. Hopefully some of you will receive at least one present. When you receive that present, it has the name of the person who gave it to you; and it has your name on it as a recipient. You open up the gift, and its for you to use for yourself, for your enjoyment, for your use, your purpose. However, the gifts that God gives are for the benefit of the church. He gives gifts to the Body of Christ to build up the Body of Christ, so the gifts that you have are gifts from God. Theyre not for you, but theyre for one another, and theyre not going to be natural gifts. What were talking about here are supernatural gifts that are not gifts youre born with. These are not innate talents and abilities that you might have; but unlike the movie, God gifts us in such a way that we are able to accomplish the purposes for which He made us. Its not like God gifts you a gift, and you go, Oh, mold scraper. Its going to be something you dont want-something you dont desire, something youre like, Oh, man. Why do I have to be…? Now, we cant pick our gifts. Just like in that clip, they didnt pick their job. It wasnt of their free will and volition; they picked it. Neither do you pick your gift, but the gifts are given by the Lord as He sees fit; but I promise you this: the gift He gives you will be fulfilling to you. When you use your gift, it will be a blessing to others, and it will give you an inner-satisfaction and fulfillment that Im being used by God. Now it might enhance your natural talents and abilities. Maybe youre a craftsman here today. You can build things with your hands. Thats not me, but maybe you have that talent and ability. Then the Holy Spirit may impart to you the gift of help, so you use that gift of craftsmanship to benefit another person; so the gifts of help-when you have that gift, you derive a satisfaction from helping others and ministering to others. So you dont pick your gift. Your gift is chosen by God, but God hand picks that gift, or I should say those gifts, for you. We have innate talents and abilities. God has wired us in such a way. Some of us are artistic; some of us are mechanical; some are athletic; some are analytical. We have different bends and skills, but that's not what Im talking about. What Im talking about is something thats given to you when you come to Christ; and when the Holy Spirit comes to live within you, God gives you a gift. Youll never guess what my greatest fear was growing up. I tried to avoid this like the plague. Grade school, junior high, high school, college, grad school-you name it: public speaking. Public speaking-wasnt good at it, hated it, and tried to avoid it at all possible costs. My mouth would get dry; my knees would knock; my palms would get sweaty; my voice would squeak; words would not come out right. The idea of being a pastor and speaking in front of people would have been a paralyzing thought to me; but when I came to Christ, guess what the Holy Spirit imparted to me? And some of you might question that; some of you might not be sure that He did [give that gift to me]. Maybe I should be a mold scraper, but thats your opinion. I found myself being able to do something at that age that I never could do before. It was not natural to me. It does not come natural to me. The Holy Spirit imparts to each of us a gift. Now as believers we have a responsibility: number one to find out the gift; and number two, use the gift and develop the gift for the glory of God in the building up of the church. But God has given you a gift. Its interesting in the next verse, Verse 8, Paul quotes the Book of Psalms, and he says, When He ascended on high, He led captives in his train and gave gifts to men. Now His train here is not a choo-choo train. Obviously, trains had not been invented. The train of course was the long flowing robe, the regal robe of the king or the emperor-the long train. He quotes here Psalm 68:18. In Psalm 68:18, God is pictured as a conquering king, as a victorious emperor who comes into a city and His enemies are in His train. In other words, when the king would be victorious in battle, he would come into the city, and following him would be his conquered foes. The king and his subjects were taken prisoner many times and brought into the city, and gifts were given to the king. Gifts would be given by the king that was being conquered in hopes that maybe his life would be spared. Gifts would be given to the king by thankful subjects as an act of worship. So he pictures God in Psalm 68 as the One receiving gifts as a conquering King, but notice how Paul changes it. Notice in Verse 8 of Ephesians 4, God is not the One receiving gifts. Jesus, the conquering King, is the One thats giving gifts. This is one of four passages in the New Testament that talk about spiritual gifts. Another word for spiritual gifts is the word called the Grace Gifts. Remember because Paul says here, He imparted to you grace. Right? Isnt that what he says in Verse 7? To each one of us grace has been given, of a gift. These grace gifts are called the charismata. Have you ever heard of charismatic before? Some of you might say youre charismatic. Others of you might say, Well, Im not charismatic. Well, if youre in Christ, you better be! The charismata are for all believers: the spiritual gifts, the charismata, are imparted to every single one of us. And so the Apostle Paul talks about the gifts that the Spirit gives to the churches. As in not only Ephesians 4, but if you want to study this sometime, you want to turn to the Book of 1 Peter 4; you want to turn to 1 Corinthians 12; and you want to turn to Romans 12. In those four passages, you will learn about the Spiritual gifts. Now these gifts, he says, It was He who gave some to be Apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers. So like it or not, I am a gift to you from God. I just turned 49 this week, and just because Im old doesnt mean you can turn me in for a newer model. You are stuck with me. You have to keep me. I am a gift. No refunds or exchanges permitted. A pastor is a gift to the Body of Christ. Teachers are a gift to the Body of Christ. You know I cant think of a time in the history of our church when weve had stronger teachers than we do right now. When I look at our team of teachers, I think of Pastor Tim and Pastor Jerry. Theres Dennis Babish who completed Chuck Colsons training. Theres Dr. Doerfer. Hes a missionary in Ecuador and has been for many years. Hes a physician; hes one of our teachers. Theres Pastor Gary Shields, a pastor in our community for many years. We have a good core of teachers, and you know what, church? We dont take advantage of them as we should. That's just the God-honest truth. Every class we have on Sunday mornings at 9:30 and 11 should be full, and theyre not. Theyre not. We should take advantage of those opportunities to hear these men who are gifts of God to this church. Take advantage of those classes when they start. Take advantage of them when they form. Learn from the Word of God every opportunity you can. But it says that the church has been given pastors and teachers, evangelists. Verse 12, why? …to prepare Gods people for works of service, so that the Body of Christ may be built up… That is an extremely important verse of Scripture, Verse 12, …to prepare Gods people… You. For what? …for works of service…that the Body of Christ may be built up… What thats teaching, friends, is quite simply this: every believer is a minister-not just those that are paid, not just those who are trained, but every believer is a minister; and one of the jobs of pastors and teachers is to equip you so that you can use your gifts, your talents and abilities, to minister to others-to do the work of the ministry, to serve. Every believer is a minister, and I want to illustrate this to you from one of my family traditions. Our family has several seasonal traditions. In the fall, we like to go look at leaves. It usually turns into a contest to see who can find the best leaf. It has to have the right symmetry, color and it cant have holes in it and all that. At Christmastime, we have a tradition to find the best Christmas tree. You win if your tree gets chosen and is cut down. In the fall, we go and apple pick. Usually that turns into a contest to see who can find the best apple. There are certain criteria. It has to be a nice big size; it should be nice and ripe and red. It should be nicely formed. It shouldnt have any worm holes in it or bumps in it. It should be a really nice apple. We judge to see who gets the best apple, so were going to use an apple orchard as our illustration. Now were going to envision us as sitting in an apple orchard for church. There we are around an apple tree, and whoever the pastor is in your illustration, he/she is preaching from the apple pickers manual. You are gathered around in your chairs; and along the orchard, there are various other congregations around other apple trees studying the apple pickers manual. The pastor-the head apple picker-is up there, and hes teaching. Hes saying, Now the way we pick apples is we grab the apple. We twist the apple, and we pull on the apple. It is then put into the bushel at your feet. We gather the apple. There are many apples that we need to pick. All around this orchard, there are apples that are going to fall. There are apples that are going to hit the ground unless somebody picks them, so we must not allow them to be trampled under foot. We must pick the apples. Then you watch as the pastor picks the apple and puts it gently into the basket, and everybody claps. He talks about apple cider, apple pie and all the wonderful things that can be made from apples. Every week, he teaches you about apples and apple picking. Then what usually happens is the way the church is structured normally in our society, the pastor says, Amen. Everybody remains in the chairs while the pastor starts picking apples. He picks apples and puts them in the basket, and they form opinions on the job hes done. They might come and look at the bushel and go, Well, those are some nice apples, Pastor. Youve done a good job. This bushel is half full! There might be others who are in important apple picking committees who will come by and go, You know, he used to pick more apples than this. The apples used to be riper than they are. They seem like theyre a little yellow this year, a little green. You know that tree over there, that pastor picked his bushel full. Its overflowing. How come our baskets not overflowing? Then theyll study it. Theyll say to the pastor, You know, Pastor, you did a great job this year. There are a lot of apples in this bushel. Were going to give you a raise. Or theyre say, You know, Pastor, we dont know how to tell you this, but theres not as many apples in your bushel as there used to be. You know our rival-I mean our fellow church across town-there seems to be a lot more apples in their bushel than ours. We dont know how to tell you this, but unless you start picking more apples, we might have to look for another apple picker. You know you go out there and you work hard. You pick apples, and well be pulling for you. Remember, were paying you. You pick those apples. Isnt that how it goes? What does the Bible say? The Bible says thats not Biblical at all. In a Biblical church, the pastor preaches from the Bible. He says, Heres what a Christian is, and heres what a Christian is called to do. Heres how a Christian does it. If we transfer this into the illustration of the apple orchard, when you say, Amen, everybody rises from their seats and goes out throughout the orchard and everybody picks apples. This guy, hes got a lot of balance, so he climbs the ladder. This ones tall, and he can reach other apples from the ground. This one has a good eye, so she can spot apples. This ones a good cook, so hes able to make apple pie and apple crisp. This one goes in the ground and picks apples that are falling but are still salvageable and good. We all have different gifts and callings, we all go around the orchard, and we all work together to pick the apples. We bring them together and we rejoice and say, Look what God has done. Look at this harvest. Its everybodys job, not just those that are trained from the apple pickers manual or whove been to apple pickers school. Its every single believers responsibility; so when I say Amen, and we go home, throughout the week, the work of the ministry goes on. You use your gifts to touch lives. You use your gifts of compassion, mercy, administration, helps and leadership, and hospitality to make a difference for Jesus Christ in your world. Its the responsibility of every one of us. However that basket looks, full or empty, is our responsibility jointly. Thats what the Bible teaches. Until we all reach unity in the faith, in the knowledge of the Son of God, and become mature… The word mature means perfect. Some of your translations may say that-perfect. You say, Well, Im not perfect. I dont know anybody who is perfect. Well, thats a good point. Its an important word for us to understand. Its the Greek word teleios. Teleios means something that is fulfilling the purpose for which it was created. Really when you think about it, the key verse in Ephesians is Ephesians 2:10 (page 1157 of pew Bibles), For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God created in advance that we should walk in, meaning that we were created for a purpose; and our spiritual gifts help us accomplish that purpose. They help us to move towards perfection, towards maturity. The chairs you are sitting on right now are teleios. They are perfect in the sense that they are accomplishing the purpose for which they are made. They are holding you up. I dont see anybody collapsing. I dont see anybody wobbling. I dont see anybody saying, Whoa! This is hard. Youre comfortable, youre relaxed, and the chair is functioning; its working. But if you were to truly look at that chair and scrutinize that chair, youre going to find flaws. You might find a thread thats torn; you might find some fabric that is scratched; you might find a chip of paint somewhere; you might find a stain from a communion glass that was spilled there; youre not going to find a perfect chair. Maybe its missing a tip, so its a little wobbly; but its functioning as it was created for. Its working; its accomplishing its purpose. Youre not perfect. Im not perfect. Were far from perfect. We have scratches, dings, and were damaged goods here today. However, if we are accomplishing what God sent us to do, we are in the process of being made perfect-teleios, becoming mature. So the question I have to ask you, and I dont want you to raise your hands. I dont want to embarrass you in any way, but number one, do you know what your gifts are from the Holy Spirit? Do you know what your gifts are? And number two, are you using those gifts? Its for a lifetime. Its not for a season. It has nothing to do with your age. The gifts the Holy Spirit is giving you are for a lifetime of service. Not only will you build up the body, but the Bible says this is one of the ways you mature. So if youre not maturing, if youre stagnant in your spiritual work, one thing I ask you are you using your spiritual gifts? That's one of the biggest ways to be stagnate, by not using your gifts. You see, the wonderful thing about Christianity is in so many ways, its the fountain of youth. You want to know what the fountain of youth is? Its in our faith because physically we grow old, but spiritually we never have to grow old. Outwardly, were aging; inwardly, the Bible says we can be renewed day by day. You mature physically. You reach a certain age-maybe its 16. For me, it was about 16. For some of you, it could be 18; some of you, it could be 20, but right in that range, you are going to mature. You are going to get as tall as you will ever get. You may grow in other ways if you know what I mean; Thanksgiving and Christmas will help us grow in other ways. Ive been getting a lot of birthday treats lately. I might be growing in other ways, but Ive stopped growing up this way. You reach the age of maturity. Youre born as a baby, and youre bald; and you reach a certain age, and youre getting all the hair youre going to get. Then it starts falling out. Then it starts growing in other places where you dont want it to grow; so we grow up, then we mature, but then we start to grow old. In the things of God, we dont have to grow old. In the things of God, we can stay forever young. The Bible talks about that dynamic in Chapter 4. He says that we are to mature to the fullness of Christ. What does that mean? That means you never reach the point. If the definition of maturity is you are like Christ, then friends youre never going to reach that, right? In spiritually speaking, you can continue to mature till the day you die; and you will never reach the fullness of Christ. You will never be as mature or perfect as Christ. That process continues into eternity. So as a Christian, you should be maturing and growing through every stage and every age of your Christian experience. When this happens, Paul says in Verse 14 (page 1158), Then we will no longer be infants tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. The Ephesians knew about that all too well. You see, over here in the banner to my left, do you see the second picture-the burning scrolls? What were those? The Bible tells us in the Book of Acts that when they came to Christ, they took their witchcraft, their spells, their incarnations, their chance, and they burned them. You see prior to that time, their worship of the goddess of fertility-Artemis or Diana-consisted of offering certain prayers to Diana: Just say this prayer. We said this prayer to Diana, and we had a great sacrifice. Or they would say, Just make this gift to Artemis. We did it and we had a wonderful hunt that year. If youll just read this spell, say these words, youre going to be blessed, so many of the spells and incantations that were burned were the same because a lot of people had them. This is the one. This is what you need. Until a new spell came along, till a new incantation came along, somebody would fool you into buying that; so youd buy that. Then they came to Christ, and they said, We dont need these things anymore. These are not applicable to our lives anymore. Lets burn them. Lets get rid of them. Friends, if youve been around Christianity long enough, theres certain waves that come through where somebody gets a new idea or a new teaching that the church has never seen before. Look what the Holy Spirits doing over here. I have a friend that flies all around the country, Oh, Gods doing something great in Canada. Lets go there. Gods doing something great over here. People are getting in the spirit in Canada now. Theyre barking like dogs. Wow, thats exciting! Its the latest trend. You read certain books that say, Nobodys ever discovered this before, but if you say these things, then Gods going to do this for you. Friends, thats elementary. That is not something that we should be interested in. Gods Word is once and for all delivered to the saints. We have everything we need right here (in the Bible). We dont need to look for the newest way or the newest trend. Gods Word is once and for all delivered to the saints. You get your email or a chain letter that says, So and so said this prayer to this saint ten times, and they won the lottery, or, they won a new car. So you need to say this and pass this on to ten friends. Dont break this curse. Dont break this or youll be cursed. Im telling you-break it! Delete the email. Throw the letter away. You dont need that. You have Christ. We should not be vulnerable to those kinds of things-those surface Christianity things. Paul says we need to go deeper. Dont be affected by the wind and the waves at the surface. Go deeper. As some of you know, Im a recreational diver. Im not a serious guy thats going 300 feet deep to find black coral or something. Im staying at the surface. I was in Florida and we like to dive in the Keys because the water is so clear. I was on a boat, and I had the same captain. Ive told you about him before from another experience. This is the same captain who said something to me in an accent. I was a little nervous about my first dive in the ocean, what I would see. You go like six miles out from shore, and its the real thing out there. I was just nervous about sharks. I said, Hey, I wont see any sharks, will I, Captain? I wanted him to go, Oh, no. No, dont worry about that. He looks at me rather serious, and he says, I cant tell you whether or not youll see sharks, Mate, but I will tell you this: theyll see you. Thanks, Captain. I feel so much better now. That's the guy. We were on the choppy sea, and Im the kind of guy who when I go to Great America, you can twirl me, put me upside down, spin me; it doesnt bother me at all. I could do that all day and not get sick, but we were on this boat; and it was up and down for hours, riding the waves. Even when we sat, we werent anchored for a dive. The boat was just constantly rocking. I said, Captain, I dont know if I can do this dive. Im just not feeling good. I feel terrible. I feel like Im going to throw up. Ah, go in the water. If you go in the water, youll feel better. All right, Captain. So I jumped in the water, and I was about 10 feet deep; and the whole sea was rocking. I remember just making this big circle about ten feed going down and up and down and up. I was thinking, Oh yeah. This is a lot better. This is a lot better. Then I had the bright idea that I should go deeper. Maybe he means I should go deeper in the water, so I went down 30 or 40 feet. Guess what happened? Just like that, I felt better. Instantly the nauseousness was gone. At the surface, everything was moving and churning-the waves and the wind, but I went deep and things settled down. When I went deep, things became stable. I was not susceptible anymore to the wind and the waves. Thats what they experience on the surface. I was now deep. It was calm down there regardless of what was going on up above. That's what the Holy Spirit is saying to us in this passage. Surface Christianity-were susceptible to the winds and the waves, but when you go deep in God, its stable there. It can be still there and quiet there. Youre not as vulnerable there. The waters are calm there. Paul is encouraging you and me to go deep in the things of the Lord. One of the ways we go deep is through serving the Body of Christ, using our gifts. Verse 15 says, Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into Him who is the Head, that is, Christ. From Him, the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work. You have a part to play. You have a job to fulfill. He talks about the church as this dynamic, living expression of Christ-the Body of Christ growing, changing lives. Be aware of His Spirit, be aware of what He is doing in us, and what He desires to do through us, allowing us to go deep in the things of God beyond the surface, so we can mature and grow up-so that we can be effective, bring about life change, and be transformed ourselves. I have a mediation that I would like you to listen to today. Id like you to listen to this gentleman as he talks about this even flow, this dynamic changing in the Christian life as God seeks to build His image into us. Lets listen together. (The flow of development" can be found at http://www.sermonspice.com/product/16952/the-flow-of-development.) Lets pray: Lord, Your truth does not change, but we should. Were called to continue to mature and grow. Lord, some of us today-if we were to be honest-we would say that our spiritual lives have become stagnant. Were not changing; were not growing. Some of us are treading water. Some of us might even feel like were drowning. I pray this morning wed do some of that reflection-that we would be bold enough to pray the prayer and say, Lord, why did You put me here? Whats my purpose? Whats my calling? I want to fulfill that call. Lord, if we will pray that prayer, You will answer that prayer. Lord, for those of us who know our gifts and know our callings but are not actively serving, Lord, speak to these hearts as well. Bring them to that place of service. I know that people get tired. I know sometimes people feel burned out. Lord, the gifts Youve given us are for a lifetime. Its not like an earthly vacation that we choose 40 years and retire. Its something that Youve called us to all our days. Lord, help us to enter into that dynamic flow and that awareness of Your Spirit. Lord, bring us to that point where we desire the maturity, the Christ-likeness that You are seeking to bring about in our lives; that we would discover, deploy and develop our spiritual gifts to build up the Body of Christ and to serve You; to recognize that we each have a part to play. In Jesus name we pray, Amen.