a gift

The theme for our women’s retreat was “Spiritual Gifts”.

{I don’t know about you… but my reaction when I heard the theme was ‘eye-roll’ – yes, keeping it real here.}

I was going to ‘serve’.
I had offered to help put together small groups. I had no idea what the Lord had in store for me that weekend… but, my pride sure told me that I had nothing new to learn on this topic. {sheesh!}

My precious husband… who I should probably listen to more often… had this little gem for me.

“Maybe you should go with an open mind.
Perhaps there is something new you could learn.”

I had my mind made up.
I had taken the ‘spiritual gifts tests’ many times before… then was put in a room to talk about the gifting I had.

See, I knew this stuff…

Even in the midst of my pride,
God met me that weekend.
It was absolutely beautiful and amazing!

My eyes were opened to new things about how the Lord works and why He has made me the way He has.

But, what was so beautiful was sitting with other women, some old friends… some new, sharing about each others gift.

It was almost like Christmas as we asked each other,
“What gift did you get?”

A few weeks ago, one of our Pastors was teaching about gifts…
He was teaching from Ephesians 4.

“So Christ himself
gave the apostles,
the prophets,
the evangelists,
the pastors and teachers,
to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.”
Ephesians 4:11-13 NIV

My Bible, in the NASB translation adds a word to the text…
It reads,
“So Christ Himself gave as apostles,
as prophets,
as evangelists,
etc.”

That little word, ‘AS’ is not a part of the original text.

When you take it away, there is a new understanding of what these gifts are.

“…Christ gave the apostles,
the prophets…”

Do you see it?

The gifts are the PEOPLE.

It isn’t just something you do.
It isn’t just something you have.
It isn’t just something offered.
It is me.
It is YOU.

Sweetly broken, sometimes ugly, graciously redeemed.

You are a beautiful gift.

Open it.

~~
This post is a part of the 31 Day Challenge: My Ugly, His Beautiful. You can follow along here.

Care to join in on the writing challenge? The Nester is putting it on – you can learn more here.