5. Walking Out Our Unique Gifts & Calling (Philippians 3:10, Romans 12:6-8,
Hebrews 6:2)
The next maturity step identified by all
three passages is walking out our unique spiritual gifts and calling. In Romans
12:6-8, Paul exhorts every believer to “exercise” our spiritual gifts to
build up the body of Christ. In Hebrews 6:2, the writer lists “laying on of
hands”, which is frequently associated in scripture with being commissioned
for ministry or bestowed with spiritual gifts (e.g. 1 Timothy 4:14, 5:22, 2
Timothy 5:22). And Philippians 3:10 identifies “the power of His
resurrection”, which is a reference to spiritual gifts since scripture
repeatedly points to them as the evidence that Christ rose and ascended into
heaven (Ephesians 4:8, 1 Corinthians 1:6-7, Luke 24:49).
How do gifts/calling relate to spiritual
maturity? Let’s divide the answer to this question into four parts:
1) Our Calling is Natural
2) Our Calling is a Friendship
3) Our Calling Takes Time
Our Calling is Natural
Jesus said in John 15:5, “I am the
vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much
fruit.” When a branch becomes mature, it does not strive to bear fruit or
become anxious about whether it will produce enough. It simply abides in the
vine and fruit comes naturally. In the same way, bearing eternal fruit is a
natural consequence of walking with Christ and living out the things He puts in
our hearts to fulfill.
Our calling is often connected to our
dreams and passions. God does not ask us to be someone we’re not or exercise
gifts we don’t have. He does not squeeze us into someone else’s mold. He helps
us discover the unique purpose He created us for and live it out.
Psalm 37:4 says, “Delight
yourself in the Lord; and He will give you the
desires of your heart.” Notice the verse does not say God gives us what
we desire; it says the desires themselves come from Him. As we mature,
God shapes our desires to align with the purposes He created us for.
The things we
dream about when we mature are often very different than the things we dreamed
about when we were younger. The world and the flesh have a way of drawing us
after things God never intended for us. They evoke dreams of people being
impressed with us, recognizing us, and affirming us. However, godly dreams seek
to serve others in humility, not draw attention to ourselves. Colossians 3:3-4
says our true life and the glory God ascribes to us is not actually
recognizable in this age. It is hidden. It will only be fully revealed when
Jesus is revealed at His second coming:
“For you have
died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be
revealed with Him in glory.”
Maturing in Christ can involve a gradual
expansion of influence. First, we are given authority over our own hearts. The
Lord begins showing us what He wants to do in that sphere and invites us to
labor with Him. If we are faithful, He could expand our influence, for example,
to family members, friends, and coworkers. If we are faithful there, He could
entrust us with still more.
A person’s calling is multi-faceted. We
can be called to get married and raise a family. We can be called to exercise
certain spiritual gifts or lead a particular ministry. We can be called to a
certain field or industry. We can be called to minister to a specific age group
or ethnic group or city or country.
The journey into spiritual maturity is the
most valuable pursuit a human being can pursue, but Satan has many Christians
convinced that the pursuit of hobbies, money, comfort, or human affirmation is
more worthwhile. The truth is many Christians do not reach the maturity we are
called to. Paul warned in 1 Corinthians 3:13-15 that some believers’ lives will
bear no fruit and they will be judged for this, even though they are still
saved. Likewise, Jesus said many who receive the gospel remain unfruitful because
“the worries of the world, and the deceitfulness of wealth, and the desire
for other things enter in and choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful.”
(Mark 4:19)
Our Calling is a Friendship
Would a father treat his ten-year-old son
like a peer? Would he discuss in depth his marriage, his career goals, or his
trials? Of course not; he would only share what is appropriate for the boy’s
age. The fact that the boy is only ten years old does not cause the father to
love him less, but it does affect how he relates to him. It affects how deep
and mature of a friendship bond they can share.
Jesus relates to us in the same way – in
accordance with our maturity level. This is why it took three and half years of
continuously spending time together before Jesus could say to the disciples in
John 15:15:
“No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what
his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things I have heard
from My Father I have made known to you.”
The essence of friendship with Jesus is
Him showing us what He is doing, or wants to do, around us. He puts His plans,
burdens, and desires in our hearts. This is also a foundation of our calling. Calling and friendship
go together.
I have heard pastors teach that John 15:15
means everyone who is saved is Jesus’s friend. If that is true, why did it take
so long before He could call the disciples His friends? In this context, being
Jesus’s friend is more than just being saved. It is an indicator of spiritual
maturity.
Notice how John 15:15 says being a “slave”
comes before friendship. A prerequisite to our calling is submitting our
lives to the Lordship of Christ, which means we would do or surrender anything
we knew with confidence He was asking of us, even if it involved pain or
sacrifice. John 14:21 reiterates this:
“He who has My
commandments and keeps them [Lordship]
is the one who loves Me; and he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I
will love him and will disclose Myself to him [deepening friendship and
maturity].”
If we spend our whole lives in spiritual
immaturity, we miss out on deepening friendship with Jesus. We also set
ourselves up for a difficult judgment when we appear before the Judgment Seat
of Christ, as Paul taught in 1 Corinthians 3:13-15 and 2 Corinthians 5:10.
Our Calling Takes Time
God is patient and careful about opening
doors to our calling. Why? Because if there is anything we want more than
closeness with Him, we are not yet mature enough to have it without turning it
into an idol. Many Christians have found out the hard way that if we don’t
learn to be content before stepping into our gifts/calling, we won’t be
content afterward without feeding our flesh. We will start deriving our
self-worth from the good things we are accomplishing and the human affirmation
we are receiving (dead works). We will drift into pride and self-sufficiency,
which Satan is immediately ready to exploit.
When Moses was about 40 years old, he
considered himself “a man of power in words and deed.” He mistakenly
thought it would be obvious to his brethren that “God was granting them
deliverance through him” (Acts 7:22-25). However, from God’s perspective,
Moses was a long way off from being ready for such a responsibility. At eighty
years of age, God finally called Moses to do the thing he felt ready for at
forty. Only this time, Moses knew he was totally inadequate and had nothing but
God’s presence to depend on (Exodus 3:11-12). He was finally ready by God’s
standards.
Spiritual maturity, like physical
maturity, is inseparable from one key ingredient – time. While it is certainly
possible for time to pass without maturing (Hebrews 5:12-13), the
opposite is not true. It is impossible to mature without time passing. It does
not matter how passionately we worship, how diligently we study scripture, how
zealously we minister to others, or how consistently we fast or pray. All these
things are a good investment of time, but they can never be a replacement
for time.
Many Christians would say a believer who
has walked with the Lord devoutly for 10 or
20 years could be mature, but how many 10 to 20-year-olds (physically) do you
know that you would describe as being a mature adult? Probably none. It
is true that if someone is saved or rededicates when they are older, God can
redeem all their life experience and character formation up to that point. But
there is still something irreplaceable and transformative about decades spent
consistently walking with Him.