You are called; walk in it
Martha Olawale
“To some people, the Spirit gives a message of wisdom. To others, the same Spirit gives a message of knowledge. To others, the same Spirit gives faith. To others, that one Spirit gives gifts of healing. To others, he gives the power to do miracles. To others, he gives the ability to prophesy. To others, he gives the ability to tell the spirits apart. To others, he gives the ability to speak in different kinds of languages they had not known before. And to still others, he gives the ability to explain what was said in those languages.” 1 Corinthians 12:8-10
There’s a misconception about the calling of God on His children that has both denied the Church and the world of the magnificence of the united power of the gifts of the Spirit. The brokenness of our humanity has unduly sectioned the gifts into hierarchies; because you have the gift of leadership, you get to represent Christianity, while others just need to come to Church.
As Christians, it’s easy to fall into a routine in our walk with God. We go to church, read the Bible, pray for our daily bread, and repeat. However, while these are basic tenets of our faith, there is more to our salvation than that. Our Christian faith is an adventure. It’s a journey that sets us on a course that partners with Christ to extend Calvary to the world around us.
What will it look like if every Christian operates in their calling? Imagine what the Church would look like if those with each gift Paul writes about in 1 Corinthians 12 operated in their calling, not for themselves or as a disruption but for the glory of the Father. The Church would be filled with prayer warriors and people always ready to serve.
There are gifts lying dormant in the Church of Christ. We file in and out on Sunday mornings and live below the duplicative power of our redemption. If we can spend decades growing in our careers and societal demands, growing in our understanding of the role God intends for us to play on the grand scale of humanity would change how we approach life daily. Instead of writing ‘me’ as the hero of the story, it would be more about Christ showing up through me to touch someone in my life.
We are saved to save others; rescued to rescue others; encouraged to encourage others; healed to heal others. Stepping out of the shadow that clouds God’s calling over our lives will mend the broken places we are called to restore and make Heaven more relatable in a world that keeps riding farther from it.
In verse 7 of 1 Corinthians 12, Paul writes, “The Holy Spirit is given to each of us in a special way. That is for the good of all.” Stop hiding your gift(s) behind the confines of your walled silos; learn your gifts, and boldly share the bounty of your salvation and all that comes with it with the world around you. For every loophole in the world, there’s a soldier of the Cross to fix it, and if we all live worthy of the call of God over our lives, the world would be better for it.
