What is Our Spiritual Potentiality?

If God is the giver of every good and perfect gift, then it would be unwise to keep the gifts of God hidden. Having been gifted and called to ministries as diverse as the persons who have received these gifts, it is incumbent upon us to discern the nature and purpose of these gifts in our lives. The place to start, as a community of faith, is to affirm in our own contexts the word that described the experience of the Corinthian church, which, according to Paul, was enriched in every way through gifts of "speech and knowledge of every kind." They didn’t lack any “spiritual gift as [they waited] for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Cor. 1:4-7). If the church grasps this message, then the next step is for God’s people to discern and discover the nature and use of their own gifts, so that they might join together as one body in service to our God.

Embracing our spiritual potentialities, our giftedness, is to affirm that we are created in God’s likeness, with a mandate to love and serve God. The implications for churches, especially Mainline Protestant churches, of the people of God discovering their spiritual gifts are incredibly significant, for if the people of God will claim the sense of empowerment that comes with this discovery will be transformative.

The reticence that some may have in adopting such a quest is understandable, because it runs counter to the long held belief that ministry is something that ordained clergy do, while the laity benefit from such ministry. But the potential benefits to churches who embrace the possibility of their people discovering their spiritual gifts present are too great to ignore. Not only might the people who inhabit our churches grow spiritually, but churches might grow in their ability to engage in community transforming ministry that brings hope and healing to fragmented and broken world. Jim Wallis made the statement: “Religion is personal, but not private.” Wallis was speaking about the political implications of faith – of religion’s place in the public square. Gifted people are people who engage the world where they find it. Ministry in churches that embrace their gifts will touch not only the people within the church it will touch the world outside. The faith of the gifted will touch political, social, environmental, issues. There is no area of life that the church’s ministry does not touch, for gifted by the Spirit we are one body, with one purpose, to share the love of God with all people.

What are the possibilities? To what ministries might God be calling us to take up? Jürgen Moltmann speaks to the wondrous possibilities that lie before us as people of faith.

The person who believes becomes a person full of possibilities. People like this do not restrict themselves to the social roles laid down for them, and do not allow themselves to be tied to these roles. They believe they are capable of more. And they do not tie other people down to their own preconceived ideas. They do not imprison others in what they are at present. They see them together with their future, and keep their potentialities open for them. [Jürgen Moltmann, The Spirit of Life: A Universal Affirmation, Margaret Kohl, trans., (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1992), 187.]

As we trust God, ourselves, and our neighbors, our “charismatic potentialities are awakened” and we begin to join in a ministry that makes a difference.

[Excerpt from Gifts of  Love, unpub. mss.]

A Church Moved by the Spirit

The keystone story of the Christian pathway to spiritual transformation is found in the Pentecost story. Having been told by Jesus to wait upon the Spirit before taking up their calling to carry his good news to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8), a small band of Jesus’ followers wait patiently until the day of Pentecost, when the Spirit falls upon them like “a mighty wind.” At that moment, as the Spirit of God falls upon this gathering of God’s people, it is quickly apparent that this room cannot contain the presence of the Spirit. Soon, the whole city --a city that’s full of pilgrims -- begins to hear the message that the Spirit has come to give witness to the risen Lord, Jesus the Christ (Acts 2). In the moment that the Spirit blows through this community of disheartened and fearful disciples, they find new resolve and purpose, giving birth to a new movement of God in the world. It is through them, and all who follow in their footsteps that Jesus Christ is present to the world.

If one takes a journey through the Book of Acts, one will watch as the Spirit empowers and guides this new movement of ordinary people who took up extraordinary callings. The result of this movement of the Spirit is that the people who would come to be called Christians would leave an indelible mark on the world. The Spirit drew these first disciples together, empowering and gifting them, so that they could go to their community with a word of healing. As Peter said to the man sitting in the city gate: “I have no silver or gold, but what I have I give you; in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk” (Acts 3:6). This has been the message of the church, when the church has truly understood its calling: God will not leave your life unchanged.

When that earliest community of faith gathered for worship and prayer, they comforted each other and gave generously to those in need. At our best, we continue this tradition. We serve meals to the hungry and provide homes for the homeless. We lift up the downcast and bring healing to the hurting. Such a church, to quote Fred Craddock, is “going out and serving other people who are not even grateful, hurting when anybody else hurts, emptying their pockets for other people’s children, building a Habitat house when their own house is in bad need of repair and the paint is peeling, going to the woman’s house and mowing her lawn when their own grass is twelve inches high.”  [Fred B. Craddock, The Cherry Log Sermons, (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 2001), 69.]

The message of Pentecost is simple: when the Spirit begins to move in our midst, expect things to change. When the Spirit is moving our hearts begin to focus on the needs and concerns of our neighbor. We begin to practice the ancient art of hospitality. We advocate for justice and for peace. With the coming of the Spirit, the call to change the world begins to resound. It’s important that we understand that the point of Pentecost is not the spectacle of tongues of fire, but is instead the transformation that occurs when the Spirit moves in the midst of the church. As the church opens its doors to this refreshing wind of the Spirit one should expect to find a community that is learning to live out the two great commandments: love God and love neighbor.

An excerpt from Gifts of Love (unpublished manuscript)