What Are Your Spiritual Gifts?
In Romans 12:6-8; 1 Corinthians 12:8-30; Ephesians 4: 11-12, and 1 Peter 4:11 the Bible talks of spiritual gifts that are given by God to individual believers in accordance with his will. The purpose of these gifts is not to help us build our careers and find success. The gifts are given for one purpose, “so that the body of Christ [the church] may be built up.” (Ephesians 4:12).
Christians are most fulfilled when they are serving using their spiritual gifts. When we understand our spiritual gifts we are better able to understand ourselves and how God has uniquely empowered us.
How so we determining our spiritual gifts? There are at least two ways. We will call them the check list approach and the inventory approach. You may want to do both to see if they are consistent.
Before beginning this evaluation, pray that the Holy Spirit will guide and make you aware of your God-given gifts.
A. The Inventory Approach: Take one of the more standardized spiritual gift inventories that are available in most Christian bookstores.
The following are two examples:
Bruce L Bugbee, Don Cousins, and Wendy Seidman, Network Participants Guide: The The Right People, In the Right Places, For the Right Reasons: at the Right Time (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2005).
Peter Wagner. Discover Your Spiritual Gifts (Ventura CA: Regal Books, 2005).
B. The Check List Approach: Look over the following list. Put a check opposite those that seem to describe you. Next, go back over the items you have checked give each a number: 1 if this is very strong in your life and descriptive of you; 2. if this is somewhat strong and descriptive of you; 3. If this is one of the least descriptive of the items you checked. Then ask three people who know you well to do the same. List the items that were ranked number 1 on all the lists. Probably these are your spiritual gifts.
Spiritual Gifts
___ Administration |
___ Apostleship |
___Craftsmanship |
___ Creative Communication |
___ Discernment |
___ Encouragement |
___ Evangelism |
___ Faith |
___ Giving |
___ Helps |
___ Hospitality |
___ Intercession |
___ Knowledge |
___ Leadership |
___ Mercy |
___ Prophecy |
___ Shepherding |
___ Teaching |
___ Wisdom |
___ Healing * |
___ Interpretation * |
___ Miracles * |
___ Tongues * |
___ Counseling ** |
___ Celibacy ** |
___ Serving ** |
___ Music ** |
* These gifts are not included in some lists because they are more easily identified.
** These gifts are not listed in Scripture but are identified by some Christians as spiritual gifts.
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