You see it's one thing to say I would love to be in a certain kind of ministry but am I equipped to be in such a ministry? Do I have the necessary gifts for that ministry? And for a lot of people when they start out in ministry particularly as you start out at the lower levels as I explained in the finding your ministry calling you start out at the lower levels of ministry and then you work up. You start out in a more natural realm and then move up into a more supernatural realm over time. So I'm going to take you back to the starting point if you like and I'm going to help you to start to identify and find exactly what ministry gifts you have and what you need and then we're going to look at how to get them etc.

And so this module on ministry gifts made easy is going to cover three complete series of teachings. The first one which we will start now is entitled finding your ministry gifts which is what we're going to be doing in this first initial series. After that we'll do another series entitled developing your ministry gifts and then the final and third series will be entitled demonstrating your ministry gifts.

And by the time we've gone through all three of these series of teachings you'll be well on your way combined with finding your ministry calling. You'll be well on your way to actually moving actively into doing exactly what God has called you to do and all the ministries that you've desired to accomplish. So we start now by trying to find your ministry gifts and as we look at this subject there are two main branches that we need to take into account.

You see when you ask a person what gifts do you have? What is the first thing the person begins to look at? They begin to look within themselves and say what are my capabilities? What has been given to me that other people don't have? What do I have that is unique? What do I have that I'm very good at that I consider my gifts which I can use to do the work of the ministry? And so your ministry gifts fall under two main groups. Firstly natural gifts which are the gifts that occur in a natural way which you may have had from birth or developed during your life that are gifts that you had that are are resident in you because of the kind of person that you are. But then we have also the supernatural gifts and the supernatural gifts are a whole new category all together and these are gifts that are not resident in us but there are gifts that we have to receive supernaturally from another source and we're looking at both of those in detail in this series.

So we start then with our natural gifts and when you look at yourself where are you going to look to find the gifts that you have that you've received naturally? Well we're going to look at the natural man the natural person the scripture teaches that we are made up of three parts firstly of a body and then of a soul and then of a spirit. Now we have gifts in all three of those parts of our beings we have resident abilities if you like things that we were either born with or developed through life or received things that we have right now and so the best place to start when you're looking at your abilities or your gifts that perhaps can be used in order to do the work of the ministry we need to start by looking at your body and your soul and your spirit and so we'll begin then by looking at the body first. What kind of natural abilities do you have in your body that equip you for ministry? Well there's various different things that come under the body firstly there are the body types.

What kind of body have you got? You say well is that important for ministry? That depends on what kind of ministry you're planning to do. You see some people have bodies that are more physically fit and better equipped to do any kind of work that involves something physical and manual and if God's called you for example to be a missionary to travel to foreign lands and to be able to stand the rigors of living in a foreign country you may have to have a particular kind of physical constitution. If you're a weak and sickly person it certainly would not be advisable for you to even consider going on that kind of calling so your physical condition actually is a very can be a very important part of deciding.

There are some people who have a greater emphasis on what we call brawn or brain. You know the butch types and the nerd types to use worldly terms out there. There are people and in the natural world and in the body building world they've actually categorized different body types the mesomorphs and the ectomorphs and the other morphs.

There are different body types skinny people, fat rounded people, the muscular types that they actually will categorize your body and interestingly enough the body types that they categorize are not always based only on the physical they actually are also based sometimes on the soul as well. They kind of mix together. So what is the best body type for ministry? That's not the point.

The point is what is the best ministry for your body type? You see the difference. So you may have to take into account your physical characteristics. Now some people they have a good brain.

Well we've all got a brain. If you didn't have a brain you wouldn't be alive. Your brain keeps you alive and keeps your body functioning.

But when we speak about a brainy person we're usually speaking about a person that has a very good intellectual capability and a brain that's very capable of absorbing knowledge and using that knowledge in a more intelligent way. Now let's not get away from it. When you were at school there were people that were in their academic streams and the higher levels and there were people that never had the brain power to get up into those higher levels.

Well does God need that? Not necessarily as we'll see but again it depends on whether we want to use this ability for the Lord. The famous prince of preachers Spurgeon is reputed to have said if I can be a ram's horn for the Lord that is wonderful but if I can be a silver trumpet that is even better. And God can use any kind of person but if we can have or develop characteristics that we can make available to the Lord that He can use we can accomplish far more for the Lord.

And so if you look through time at people that have accomplished great things you will find that it's not based on their physical characteristics but you'll see that people of different physical characteristics accomplished different kinds of things for the kingdom of God. And you may have to honestly take a good look at yourself in the mirror and say am I physically equipped to do this wonderful and marvelous ministry that I would love to do or should I just give up that idea because my body is not suited to it. It'll kill me and it literally has killed some people literally by trying to go into a ministry that puts them to physical stress that their bodies are not able to to handle and they minister for the Lord for a short little burst and they die and they're gone.

Well did God lead them into that ministry? I don't know but be honest with yourself and have a good look at your body. Okay and we have another capability that we can add to it here. Vocal capabilities.

What kind of voice have you got? You have this tiny little squeaky voice like it's hardly got any volume and hardly anybody can hear you. Would you like to listen to somebody speak like this for two hours? I wouldn't not if I was a man no. Okay now again there's limits but if God has called you and if you desire to move into a ministry that's going to require you to speak verbally to people, to stand up in front of large groups of people for example and to speak the word of God then you better have the kind of vocal power to speak loudly and clearly and distinctly in a way that will communicate to the people what you're trying to minister to them.

If you're born with a bad voice it could stand in the way of your ministry ability and then just the amount of stamina and strength that you have in your body. If you were called to be Paul who had to travel on all these missionary journeys and go all over the place it's going to require a certain amount of physical energy and physical stamina to be able to go through beatings and shipwrecks and fastings and you go and read a list of everything that Paul went through. Paul was a very unique kind of person who could do many things because of his physical capabilities and characteristics.

Now there are others who don't have those physical capabilities. It does not mean that they cannot do the work of the ministry. It just means that you cannot do the kind of work of ministry that people who have those capabilities can do.

You need to take that into account. Now can we do something about our physical condition? Absolutely. Can we develop any of these? Yes we can.

You can even change the look of your body type. You can change through diet and exercise, through eating the right kind of food, through following the way of health which is a whole other series that we teach. And you can make your body healthy and you can make your body strong and capable and we should be walking in divine health.

And you can develop your mental capabilities through study and with the Lord's help. And you can even go on vocal training and learn to train your voice so that your voice communicates well. These things can be changed.

They can be dealt with. But don't look at this and say I have this natural gift that's been given to me which equips me for the ministry. Because if you don't have some of these things then you don't have the natural gifts.

And yes they can be developed and in our next series we'll be looking at developing your gifts. We'll go into a little bit more detail as to how you can develop some of the gifts and abilities that you have. But so far we're still only sitting looking at the body.

Now there are some characters of the body that I'm afraid you're born with and you're not going to change. Because that's the kind of body you have. And you're just going to have to accept that that's the kind of body and you're going to have to realize that the Lord has an ability, a function, a ministry, a calling for you.

And the Lord knew what kind of body you were going to have when he decided on that calling. So you don't have to feel oh that's terrible I'd like to do this ministry but I can't because of the condition of my body. God knew about that.

He already took it into account and he will give you the kind of ministry that is totally suited to what your body is able to handle. And really the body is the least important one of all isn't it? But I'm mentioning it because let's face it some people have physical characteristics that are better. Some people have good looks where if they stand up everybody looks to them in admiration and says wow I would listen to anything that he tells me.

Well you can do something about that too. You can improve your looks in the way you yeah but let's face it some people they just seem to have been gifted and that's the term we use. They've been gifted with physical characteristics that other people don't have and that will affect how effective you're going to be and how people will respond to you in ministry.

Okay let's come then to the next more important natural characteristics and that is the psychological characteristics. Psychological. Now what does psychological mean? That sounds very technical but psuche is quite simply the greek word for the soul and psychological is derived from the greek word psuche and it means relating to the soul and within the soul lies your mind your emotions and your will.

Now what gifts what abilities do you have with lying within your soul that are possibly possible that possibly can be used for the work of the ministry? Well here's a important one right here. It's called attitude. Oh you weren't expecting that were you? Attitude.

What is attitude? Attitude is a particular mix of mind and emotions and will. It's a mindset if you like. It's a way of thinking, a way of feeling and a way of choosing.

The attitude that you have in your soul will determine what God can do with you and of what use you can be in the work of the Lord. Now what kind of attitudes can we have? Well here's a very important attitude to start with. A teachable attitude.

Now I didn't say that you needed to be intelligent enough to learn because we all have the ability to learn. In fact our brains are like sponges ready waiting to soak up every amount of knowledge and information that they can get but the amount of knowledge and information you actually receive is going to be determined by your attitude of teachability. You're looking for a ministry gift.

How teachable are you? Because if you are not teachable God can do very little with you. Because if the Lord cannot teach you his ways, if you cannot receive training for ministry either directly from the Lord or from those that God puts into your life, then how can God possibly use you to then be a person who can teach and influence others with the word of God. So if you are lacking this quality, this gift of being teachable, you better get it fast otherwise you're disqualifying yourself from a lot of ministry possibilities.

How about this one? Willingness to give. In other words an other orientation. Not an inward selfish orientation but an orientation to give out to other people what is within you.

Now a lot of people want to absorb knowledge and build up information and develop even these gifts and abilities so that they can stand up and be seen by men and everybody can say how wonderful they are and so that everybody can then come in and meet their needs. If that is your attitude in ministry, God can do very little with you. Because ministry, as I taught in the last series, is servanthood.

Ministry is service. If you do not have the attitude of a servant, then you're lacking one of the most essential gifts that is needed to do the work of the Lord. How about this one? Willingness to change.

Oh you know how many years it's taken you to become the way you are. You know how much programming you've received throughout your life. How much knowledge and studying and training and mentorship and whatever you've been through in your life.

And if God is calling you to something that requires you to move in a different direction to the way you have been programmed in your life, then you will have to change. Do you have the gift of teachability? Never thought of that as a gift did you? Do you have the gift of other orientation or giving up? Do you have the gift of being ready to change? If you don't have some of these basic orientations in your attitude, you've already limited the number of ministry possibilities that are open and available to you and that God can use you in. And then we come to another very big important one which is also based right around this whole psychology thing.

It's all part of the soul and it is temperament. Temperament. My pen seems to be running out of ink.

I need to change it. Temperament. What is temperament? Temperament.

Some of it you received even before you were born. Some of it was programmed into you by your parents. It can be changed by the experiences that you have in life.

Over time that temperament will determine what you look like and the permanent condition of what kind of person you are. Now I've taught on temperaments in a lot of detail in many different places. I have one specific teaching which I dealt with which you can also go through where I dealt with the nature of man and the human temperaments.

And I think I explained it pretty well there. So if you want to learn about the temperaments, go there. But I'm going to give you a quick summary of the temperaments and then I'm going to try and show you how they result in different personality types and how those personality types in turn will equip us for certain kinds of ministry.

And we're still looking remember only at natural gifts here. We're not looking at the supernatural yet at all. Now temperaments are based on two main parameters.

And so you can very quickly assess a person. The first parameter is emotion or emotional expression or the tendency of a person to express their feelings and to show their feelings outwardly. And the second one is assertion.

And assertion is the tendency of a person to be strong willed and to assert their will in their relationship with other people. And we can have different levels of emotional expression and different levels of assertiveness. And the simplest division will be high and low.

Okay. So if we take this idea as high emotion, that is low emotion. If we take this as high assertion and low assertion.

We now have four possible combinations. We have here a person who can be low on both assertion and emotion. We can have here a person who is low on assertion but high on emotion.

High on emotion and high on assertion or low on emotion and high on assertion. I've taught this all in detail concerning the temperaments. And so very quickly the four temperamental types and the names that we gave to them.

This one here is known as the analytical. This one is known as the amiable. Okay.

So the person who is low on both assertion and emotion is analytical. The person who's not very assertive but high on the emotion is an amiable. A person who's high on both emotion and assertion is known as an expressive.

And then we have our fourth and last one which is a person who is low on emotion but high on assertion. And they are known as a driver temperament. These are our four temperaments.

The analytical, the amiable, the driver and the expressive. And each of these have different characteristics. The analytical person is more introverted, very much a perfectionist intellectual type of person.

The amiable is more people oriented, friendly, loves being with people, loves helping people. The expressive is very goal oriented, thrives on excitement. And the driver is your typical boss type who is very strong and very work oriented.

And if you want the details on that as I said go and study the temperaments in detail. But each of these temperaments throughout our lives can be developed and we can swing out of them. Now you may start out and you will see even when a baby is born you can already see signs of temperament in that child.

Now that temperament can vary depending on the influence of the parents. And then as the child grows up that influence can be varied even more as the result of the influence of other people. And eventually over time as you grow up you come to a place where you tend to be more comfortable in a particular area.

Usually in a mix of temperaments with one main temperament and then usually swinging across to one of these side temperaments which makes you feel more comfortable. And as you tend into one of these four you will tend to develop a personality type. And a personality is something that's a bit stronger than temperament in that it's become a characteristic of who you are.

And now we're starting to get once again into your natural gifts and abilities. And your personality type will give you a natural ability or gifting in a certain direction. And so when it comes to ministry you will find that you will function more easily in a particular type of ministry based on your personality type.

Now this personality this temperament here called the analytical when it becomes the major influence in a person's life develops a specific kind of temperament, a personality sorry. The analytical is very good at planning and can be known as a planner. Because the analytical tends to have a foresight, looks into the future, looks at past experience, assesses possibilities based on past experience and can then almost predict that if we do it this way based on what we tried before the chances are that that could happen and if that doesn't happen that could happen.

And so the analytical has a very good capability of looking into the future and planning what kind of actions to take in the future. Now because of that the planner actually is very good and is very likely to become an instructor. The analytical is very good at instructing or teaching or imparting principles and knowledge to other people.

What kind of ministry is the analytical going to be very capable of being involved in? Any ministry that involves the impartation of principles and knowledge. And I'm sure immediately you're thinking teacher. An analytical is more naturally gifted to being a teacher.

Let's look then at the amiable and see what the amiable is capable of. As we come to the amiable, the amiable is also known as a cultivator because the amiable is able to cultivate relationships. Because the amiable is very people oriented, the amiable is able to develop relationships and friendships with people.

And because of that the amiable is often known as the connector. That's the kind of personality. The analytical is an instructor personality.

The amiable is more naturally a connector personality. Well what kind of ministry do you see the amiable being more naturally equipped to? In a ministry that involves working with people and putting them together particularly in group situations and in relationships. So the amiable is very good in a more pastoral or a counseling environment where you're working with people and bringing people together and developing relationships with people.

And we haven't even looked at the supernatural. We haven't even looked at the anointing of God. We haven't even looked at the calling of God yet.

We're only looking at natural temperaments. You're probably already thinking, well I don't really know what my calling in my ministry is. But wait there's a lot more to come.

Let me finish these two quickly and then we're going to finish this session. Okay the next temperament the expressive is also known as the developer. The expressive develops new things because the expressive is so very good at bringing out new things.

The developer is able to take people from where they are and bring them to move into something new. And so the personality type of the expressive is the motivator. The motivator.

Have you ever felt that you would love to be a motivational speaker? It's probably a very good chance that you are expressive in temperament and that you've developed a motivator personality. Well what is the best ministry if we're going to look at that for this type of personality? Well who's the best motivator? It is the prophet. The prophet is always giving people direction and new things and telling them what to do and getting them motivated into directions according to their ministry.

Can you see that? So by now you're thinking well I've got all the gifts I already need. I know what God's called me to be. He's called me to be a teacher.

He's called me to be a pastor. Or he's called me to be a prophet. But there's one more and that is the driver temperament.

The driver is also known as the organizer. That's because the driver has a natural ability to organize people together, to take charge and to get a group of people functioning as one. The driver has great capability in doing that.

So the driver, the driving personality is that of a director. What does the director do? He organizes everybody. He takes charge of the whole lot.

He sits right at the top, doesn't he? Well what kind of ministry do you suppose the driver or organizer or director is most capable of? Well any ministry that involves strong leadership and structuring people and putting them in their place and setting up an entire organization. Are you hearing the word apostle? Wow, isn't that amazing? There it is already. I can already see where my ministry is.

I definitely am a planner, instructor temperament. So I must be called to be a teacher. I'm a cultivator, connector personality.

So there's no doubt about it. I'm called to be a pastor. And oh yes, I know that I am a developer and a motivator.

I definitely must have the prophetic calling. I am the director. Obviously God must have called me to be an apostle.

Not necessarily. Not necessarily. He could have and certainly God can use these natural abilities.

But it's going to take more than the abilities of the soul. Because we haven't even looked yet at the abilities of the spirit, have we? We've only looked at the body and the soul. We have not even touched on the spirit.

That means that what we've looked at here so far, you didn't even need to be a Christian to have them. Unbelievers have got these exact same things. So how could we say that God could use that for the work of the ministry? If that's the case, God could use anybody out there who doesn't even know Jesus as their Savior and call them to the work of the ministry.

I'm sorry if I burst your bubble there. But hang on to it. Don't let these go yet.

Because God's not finished with them yet. And God is still going to use them. And I'm going to show you as we continue in this series, how God can take these very abilities and gifts that he's given you and still use them for the work of the ministry.

But first, we've got to look at the abilities and the gifts that lie within the human spirit. And that we'll begin to do in our next lecture in this series.

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