Let's continue to worship a God this morning by considering his word. I invite you to turn in your Bibles to 1st Peter chapter 4 1st Peter chapter 4 and I will be reading and you're hearing this morning verses 7 through 12. 7 through 11 pardon me and the focus of our exposition this morning will actually be in verses 10 and 11 but so that we can get the proper context. We will read verses seven through 11. So 1 Peter chapter four, verses seven through 11. Let's now give our attention to the reading of God's word. The apostle Peter says, the end of all things is at hand. Therefore be self-controlled, sober-minded for the sake of your prayers. Above all, keep loving one another earnestly since love covers a multitude of sins. show hospitality to one another without grumbling. As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good stewards of God's varied grace. Whoever speaks is one who speaks oracles of God. Whoever serves is one who serves by the strength that God supplies. In order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. To him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. As for the reading of God's word, the grass withers and the flower falls, but the word of our Lord stands forever. And we are grateful for it, are we not, congregation? Let's ask the Lord one last time for help as we come before his word. Father God, when we come before the ministry of the Word, we do not cease to worship and begin to be smarter sinners. Rather, Father, that trajectory of worship which began with the call to worship continues corporately as we sit, we hope, humbly and submissively and anticipating what you might say to us. So Father, would you speak through your Word this morning Would You open up the Scriptures through Your servant, unpacking it, showing the brilliance and glory of Christ, showing our need of Him, and how He, in so many ways, answers all of our needs, Father. We pray that Jesus would be magnified. We also pray, Father, that You would show to us Perhaps remind many of us what our gift is this morning and how we might wield it in the context of the church and even outside the walls of this church for your honor and your glory and that you might show us, Father, a little bit more precisely what exactly that means. I pray, Father, that we would not be glory mongers. taking to ourselves credit and kudos and attention. But Father, we would truly be that transparent pane of glass through which the glory of the triune God shines to this world, so that as your Son and our Lord has said, We might be a city upon a hill. We might show our works to this world and they might see them and glorify our Father in heaven. Give us help, we pray this morning. And we ask these things in your Son's name, amen. So two weeks ago we began to look in this passage at how the idea of the second coming of Jesus Christ, breaking through the clouds, and all that He brings, the judgment, the rewards, the final and full declaration to all men, women, and children of who is inside of Christ and who is outside of Christ, the new heavens, the new earth, all of that which we have called eschatology, how it conditions our ethic, how it drives and governs our ethic in the here and now, that is, how we live today, how we think, how we speak, how we operate, how we move, is conditioned by this eschatological hope. And we saw two weeks ago that there are two areas in particular within our lives that are touched by this eschatological hope. Number one, that we operate with a clear conscience in our lives, not only for obvious reasons, but specifically for the sake of our prayers. And then we saw, secondly, that this coming eschatological hope touches our love, how we love one another, especially the stranger in the context of hospitality. And now, finally, I'd like to come to this last area, this last ethic that Peter teaches on or touches on with respect to how eschatology conditions and touches our ethics. And that is the area of service. The way in which we view the end is the way in which we view service to the brethren. The first shall be last. The last shall be first. The way up is down and the way down is up. Jesus Christ has taught us this in the very example that was read before you in John 13. Jesus Christ left His realm in glory. became a man and became not only an ordinary man, but a servant of men in coming in the incarnation. His descent into the incarnation did not stop, as I said this morning, in becoming a man, but that descent continued as he bowed the knee and took the dirty hands into his feet of his disciples and washed them. And what is interesting about that example in John chapter 13 is that Jesus has an uncanny way of taking our conceptions, our commonly conceived conceptions of greatness, and turning them on their heads, doesn't he? Who is Jesus in John chapter 13? He is the king of the universe. He is the one who spoke and universes leapt into existence. He is the one who created the H, both of them, two, and the O in water. The very water that He is taking up and now massaging the dirt off His disciples' feet. And even as He is massaging the dirt off the disciples' feet, the very granules of dust and the H2O of water are breaking forth in worship as He does so. Yet, he is the servant. And he tells his disciples in that chapter, in John chapter 13, not simply, as I said this morning, go serve your brethren. But as a good pedagogue, Jesus Christ displays before them how to do so. You want to find your life? You must lose your life. The first shall be last, and the last should be first. Well, the church continues this selfless act of love in her service to the church. And one of the most powerful words I would submit to you this morning in the English language for the Christian is the word grace. In fact, we love that word so much that we've taken it as part of our namesake, Grace Covenant Church. Grace, as those words roll off the tongue of a Christian, They just burst into worship, why? Because grace is the unmerited favor of God. Mercy, that's a beautiful word. Not giving us what we deserve, right? But oh, how much more grander is that word grace. Grace is giving us what we don't deserve. And what's interesting about this passage can be summed up in a question. Have you ever seen grace? Not that lady named Grace, but have you ever seen Grace? Certainly in our mind's eye, we might run to the cross, would we not? And we think that Jesus Christ crucified on that cross is the very emblem of emblems of grace, and certainly that is true, but you were not there. Have you ever seen grace? And certainly, as we heard last week, we can, in some sense, in a mystical way, see grace exemplified in the bread, in the cup, in the Lord's Supper, that is true. But look at what 1 Peter 4 10 says. as each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good stewards of God's varied..." And there it is. Grace. Do you understand that when you serve a brother or a sister, and take it outside the four walls of the church, when you serve someone for the purpose of putting God's glory on display, what you are displaying before them is grace. You and all of your panoply of different characteristics and personalities, you and the way that you differ from the brother next to you and the sister to the left of you, you in your own unique way are taken up in the hand of God as an instrument and he shows grace through you as you serve. Have you ever thought about that? In my mind, that is an exhilarating thought. Number one, that I would be an instrument in the hands of my Redeemer. And number two, that grace in some sense could be shown, not by me in the sense that I am the source, but by me in the sense that I am the means. I am the means through which God is displaying His grace. In serving one another in this place, and even beyond this place, we serve the needs of believer and non-believer alike in the name of Christ. We show, and notice he says, God's varied grace. That word in the Greek, is the same word used way back in the Old Testament in the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament scriptures. That word is used to describe Joseph's multicolored robe. And what we see here is a very vivid, earthy picture of what God is trying to describe. All of you, even in this small congregation, have varied gifts. You have varied personalities. You have varied skills and abilities that you've honed over the years. And if you think of the church in some sense, we could think of it as that multicolored robe of Joseph through which God displays his grace in all those vivid technicolor colors. To put it another way, it's as if God's grace is a ray of light that is refracted through a diamond, and that refracted light comes forth on the other side in vivid HD technicolor brilliance. That is you. That is me, that is us. We are the varied color of God's grace refracted through His gift to show grace to the world. So my question this morning for us is this, how is God's grace shining through you in the context of the local church? Do you know what your gift is? Have you ever had that conversation? Have you ever had that thought stream? What is my gift? And if you don't know what your gift is, here's my next question. Does that ignorance keep you from serving God? in the church or just jumping in wherever you can be used so that, as we've seen, the panoply of multi-layered, multi-colored grace can be demonstrated through you as one patch on that robe of the church. Do you know what your gift is? This morning, Peter's going to help us think through our gifts. He's gonna show us, number one, the place of gifts, number two, the purpose of gifts, and then I'm gonna try to conclude this morning with just a few helpful suggestions to try to think through when you wanna know what your gift is. So let's begin this morning, as we're thinking through gifts, with the place of gifted service. The place of gifted service. Look at verse 10. The first thing that I think is incredibly important to notice in verse 10 is Peter's assumption. Look at Peter's assumption in verse 10. He says, as each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good stewards of God's varied grace. What does Peter do here? Peter simply assumes that you have a gift. He doesn't start with, let's figure out who are the haves and the have-nots. No, he assumes something paradigmatic for the church, and that is no one, to put it negatively, no one in the church is giftless. But everyone in the church has a gift. Now, some gifts are more obvious than others, are they not? But it might help you to think, and one of the things I'm trying to do in this message is to try to demystify for you the concept of gifts, because I think sometimes we think, oh, gifts are just really mystical, spiritual thing. You've gotta pray for three hours and fast for four weeks to figure out what your gift is. It's really not that difficult. And so one of the ways we can disabuse ourselves of the notion that finding your gift is some seance or ritual is to understand that there are three basic categories of gifts. I'm not talking about the specific gifts, but I'm talking about sources, if you will. One gift is just something with which you've been naturally endowed. something with which you've been naturally endowed. All of us in some sense were born with a knack or a gift or a skill or an ability in a particular area. You think of athletes who, while they do work out and they do practice and they do run and they do eat right and they do all those things, the bottom line is they've been given something from birth that I didn't get. They could jump higher, they could run faster, they could lift more efficiently. So these are natural gifts that we are given. But another kind of gift, a second gift, is just abilities and skills that you've perhaps not been born with, but you've just developed over the years. Things you've learned to do, and you've learned to do them well. And then a third category, I would say, is a gift that has been given to you by the Spirit, a specific gift. What would be an example of this? Well, I think in the first century, some of those examples would be the signed gifts, performing miracles, speaking tongues, things which we believe have ceased and now we just have the ordinary gifts. But we don't say ordinary in the sense that the Spirit doesn't still superintend and deliver them. One example of this category would be this. I know of a handful of men in my life who are now ministers of the word, they are preachers, but before they were saved, they were deathly afraid of public speaking. They couldn't speak their way out of a wet paper bag. They would get in front of people and they would choke. They would know not what to say or how to say it, and they had no courage and no ability to enunciate. And then the Lord saved them. And then with that salvation, they began to notice within them a desire to teach and preach the word of God. And then they would get small opportunities here and there to do that. And then the church recognizes externally that they had this gift to speak. And so maybe they went to seminary, they got some type of training, and then they became a minister of the word. I believe that is an example of a gift that the spirit can give post-conversion. But here's the thing, Edmund Clowney says it well, whether it is a natural gift with which you've been born, or whether it is a gift that you have developed and grown, or whether it is something that the Spirit has given you, every gift that is ours by creation has been touched by the Spirit in our recreation. What do I mean by that? You know, I think of a car salesman, for example, if you're a car salesman, please don't be offended by this, but a car salesman who has a knack for getting you into this convertible, right? I mean, this convertible is looking for you and you've been looking for it, you don't know it, but I'm here to tell you that it's a match made in heaven, okay? They just have a knack for selling you a product. And I have seen car salesmen who have been saved and the Lord has taken that same gift set and, you know, polished off the edges and knocked off a few things and specifically tailored it to make it useful for evangelism. Not in the sense that they're selling a product, but in the sense that they certainly are pitching something, are they not? They are pitching eternal life. And they do it in a way that is now governed and guided by the Spirit. That's how the Lord works. He takes your gifts that you have, and He, listen, sanctifies them for holy use within the church, and even outside of the church. So it may be helpful to recognize these three categories. Another thing I'd want to point out to you just very briefly is, and I've already mentioned it, If you look through this whole epistle, unlike Paul in 1 Corinthians 12-14, Peter does not mention in any way, shape, or form what we might call the signed gifts, the miracles, speaking in tongues, interpreting tongues, those types of things. Throughout Peter's whole epistle, he seems to be just talking about the ordinary gifts. Then the last thing I'd like to say under this heading is, when you look at the whole New Testament, it's kind of interesting, there's about three or four, maybe three and a half different lists of gifts. Have you ever noticed that? And you know what's interesting to find out when you compare all of those lists? None of them are the same. None of them have exact, as if, you know, God gave to Paul or to Peter the divinely inspired, you know, thus you shall not change or manipulate list of gifts. What does that communicate to us? It communicates to us there is no one divinely inspired list of gifts. If you want to call it a list of something, it may be a list of categories of gifts. But you may not, as you examine your life and your personality and your gift set, find something that Peter or Paul specifically mentions, you may find it as a subcategory of one of the categories that they mentioned. Which tells us that the possibilities of gifts that we may use in the church, in some sense, is endless. And we'll talk a little bit more of that in a moment. So the second thing now that we've looked at the place of gifted service, I wanna look now at the purpose of gifted service. The purpose of gifted service. And I would submit to you this morning that what Peter gives to us is a two-fold purpose in exercising our gifts, and they come right out of the text. In 1 Peter 4, verse 10, he tells us first, to use your gift as a steward to serve one another. So he's already assumed as each one has received a gift. Now he says, use it, and now he's specifying the purpose here, use it as a good steward. The purpose of serving is not to put on display our own giftedness, but to serve one another. So, a good metric, if you will, for fleshing out this principle is this. You don't measure the quality of your service by whether or not people got to see how awesome you were at what you did. Instead, you measure the quality of your service by whether or not the person was served and helped by what you did. Now, there may be a slight difference between those two, but in my mind, it's a slight difference that makes a huge difference. It's not about us. It's not about our Gift being put on display. It's not about us getting kudos. It's not about our backs being patted by the people for what we have done. It's about the people that we serve for the glory of God. I like what Rosaria Butterfield says. She has a book on the hospitality. She has some helpful things in there. But one of the things she said that really stuck out to me is this. She has people over to her house all the time. She has like an open door policy. And by the way, I don't want you to have a guilty conscience to make you think like you have to have an open door policy. That's how she does it. Kudos to Rosaria Butterfield. But one of the things she said, is she said is, here's my goal at the end of the night, after I have people over. Let me start with what my goal is not. My goal at the end of the night is not to have my guests come up and ask me for the recipe of that coffee cake that I made. That's not my goal. My goal at the end of the night is to have somebody come up to me and ask for a follow-up conversation about the gospel that we mentioned in conversation. That's her goal. And I think likewise, if we have any goal in our service, besides what we're gonna look at in just a moment, which is the glory of God, it should be that the gospel rise to the surface and gospel-oriented issues be at the center. That's what we want. If the point is, man, you make a mean coffee cake, well, that's great, but it's not the point. So as a good steward, we recognize that what you give in service has first been given to us by God. That's the whole concept of a steward, right? We don't often hear this word anymore. They used to be called flight stewards and stewardesses. Now they're called flight attendants, right? They've changed the name. But what is a steward? A steward is one who takes the resources that they have and uses them, distributes them for the purpose of the master who has given them to him or her. So what does that mean in the case of Christians in using their gifts? Brethren, every single thing that you have, whether it is your time, your resources, your house, your car, your money, everything that you have has been given to you by God as a steward. And so listen very carefully. we are not to hoard our resources. Have you thought about that? Your resources are not primarily or even exclusively for the purpose of serving yourself. If I could put it really practically, your TV is not just for you. Your car is not just for you. Your money is not just for you. As a steward, one of the things that Christians do is they try to think within the categories of the things that God has given them and say, God, how can I use this money? How can I use this car? How can I use my time, my energy that you have given me to serve the needs in my body? Now listen, what I think a tendency is for many of us is to go to extremes. You say, well, Lord, how can I help the starving kids in Africa? That's fine, that's noble, but aren't there needs in our own congregation? Shouldn't we start there? It's noble to go to Africa, it's noble to send your check to Africa, that's fine, that's fine. But when there's needs that are not being met in our congregation, that's a good place to start. So as a good steward, we are not hoarding our gifts, but we are thinking of how we can use our resources on a horizontal level to serve our brethren. So the first purpose in service is that we use it as a steward. But then the second purpose is that it be used for God's glory and not our own. Look at verse 11c. He says, whoever speaks is one who speaks oracles of God, whoever serves is one who serves by the strength that God supplies, and then he just launches into doxology. In order that in everything, God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. To him belong glory and dominion forever and ever, amen. Now I want you to just think about that movement for a minute. Here, Peter's talking about service, and Peter can't help but lapse into doxology, which means God getting all the glory, all the praise, all the honor, in his thinking about service. Have you ever lapsed into doxology in your thinking about service? Has the recipient of your service ever lapsed into doxology in thinking about the reception of the service at your hands? Brethren, that's the goal. The goal is to soar in worship and doxology by either giving service or receiving service. But you know, I think that we are so well catechized, so well instructed in the question, what is the chief end of man? And we answer, the chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy him forever. It's kind of like, We used to joke around in Reformed church circles about what every child will, what are the three answers that every child will give in catechesis? God, Jesus, Bible, right? I mean, if you get God, Jesus, Bible, you're gonna get somewhat of a correct answer to the question. We could probably also add, for the glory of God. Because we say that all the time, do we not? We always say, oh, everything I do is for the glory of God. My question is this, sometimes, Because we're so well catechized and instructed in this theological category, those answers can seem like what? They could seem like white noise to us. They could seem like, yeah, I gotta do everything in the glory of God, let's get on with it. But have you ever stopped and asked yourself, what does it mean? What does it mean that God gets the glory? I think if you think of it this way, it'll help you to get some handles to it, okay? If as a result of your service to a brother or sister, that brother or sister, listen, has a higher view of God, even if it is coupled with an appreciation of you, that they have a higher view of God than God has received the glory. Have you thought about that? If that person to whom I serve has a higher view of God because of what I've done, then God receives the glory. And I think it's not hard to imagine how that kind of thing could happen. You know, there are people in our congregation that are served on many different levels. I think one of the most common ways is... You know, a sister has a baby or somebody is sick or something like that and our church rallies the wagons and we take meals to them, right? Well, I think if we're thinking correctly, people can say, I know that that family did it because they love me, but I think when it's all said and done, they did it because they want to see God magnified and glorified. Can we see God magnified and glorified through a meal given? Absolutely. So that's the question we should be asking ourselves. Does somebody have a higher view of God or of me through what I'm doing? And if the answer is the former, a higher view of God, then this is the purpose for which service is put there. Now, what Peter does after giving these two purposes, is he then goes into two specific categories of gifts. Two specific categories of gifts. And he just mentioned speaking and serving. Now, some people, some commentators have said, well, what this is, is Peter is really talking about speaking, meaning the office of elders, bishops, pastors. And then he's talking about serving, which is a category for the office of the diaconate, the deacons, and their serving. I'm not convinced that that's what Peter's doing here. He's going to address the elders in 1 Peter 5, and he's going to say what he needs to say there. I think what Peter's doing here is not that. and I don't think he's meaning to give any type of exhaustive list. I think what he's doing is he's giving two categories of service. In other words, there are forms of service that involve speaking, and then there are forms of service that involve serving. And so in those two categories, he wants to give a stipulation for each on how we do it. So what about gifts that have to do with speaking? He says, do so as one who speaks the oracles of God. Now, I want you to think about this for a second. When we admonish one another, when we encourage one another, when we edify one another, when we exhort one another, when we, if necessary, rebuke one another, all of those things are categories of speaking. So this could be preaching, this could be teaching, this could be counseling, this could be a one-on-one conversation at Starbucks, it could be a one-on-one conversation out in the parking lot after Sunday morning or evening service. And though we're not all called, for example, to admonish or correct, let's face it, there's some in the congregation who just do it better than others, right? Are there not some people who after they've come and pointed out something in your eye, okay, they've confronted you. That's no bones about it. They've done it so well and so tactfully and so tastefully that you just wanna hug them. Have you ever known a person like that? Okay, and it doesn't mean that that's required in order to do it, but it does mean there are some people that are more gifted in doing it than others. Admonishing is a very difficult thing. But the fact of the matter is, whatever form it takes, there are gifts of speaking. Overall, Paul says that we are to speak the truth in love. So whether it is in the pulpit by a pastor or mutual encouragement between brothers and sisters, in private, over coffee, whatever, what Peter is saying here This sin is that you are to speak what God has spoken, the oracles of God, the message of God, the revelation of God. Now, what does this mean? He's not saying you have to give new revelation. Come on, we're Protestants. That's not what he's saying. Here's what he's saying. In my mind, when somebody providentially comes to you and they want input, okay? And we all have somebody in our life that does that, right? Whether moms, it's your children, or moms, it's your husband, or husbands, it's your wife, or somebody, a coworker at work, or somebody in the congregation. Whenever somebody comes to you and they're soliciting, right? They're soliciting your opinion on something, we have one of two options. Number one, we can just give our opinion. Now that opinion may or may not align with the word of God, and that's a very big distinction, but we can just give our opinion. Or number two, we can give them God's revelation. Now that doesn't mean that we necessarily have to crack open the Bible and say, let me go to this book and this chapter and verse. You can do that, that's fine. Sometimes when two moms are talking together and they got their hands full, they just don't have that option, do they? But here's the thing. I think oftentimes what happens in church settings life together with Christians, is without knowing it so inadvertently, somebody asks us our opinion on something, and let's assume for sake of argument that that category, that thing, is something that the Bible addresses. But without thinking about what the Bible says, they just give their opinion, and their opinion may make sense, it may be good, but it also may be contrary to what the Word of God says. Or it may, listen, be less than helpful than what the Word of God says, right? And I can give you an example of this. My wife and I, as many of you know, have experienced three miscarriages. We've lost three babies in the course of our marriage, and they have been very, very painful times for us. And as you can imagine, in those grieving periods, we sought the counsel and input of other people, not just our pastors, but other brothers and sisters in the congregation, specifically those who had been through things like that, but also those who had not, whose opinion we respected. And sometimes we would hear this. Josh, Christina, it's gonna be okay. It's gonna be okay. God's gonna give you a baby. I just want you to think through that answer with me for a moment. And I just want to say. I have every confidence that the brothers and sisters who told me that did so with a noble goal. They wanted to encourage me, right? And let's face it, can we all be honest? These conversations are incredibly difficult, are they not? And I think sometimes we as Christians, we have this knee-jerk reaction that when we're in an awkward conversation like that, we're kind of flailing around, so to speak, and we're just like, what can I do to get out of this conversation? And what do we do with some of our Christian customs? I'll pray for you, brother. That's like taking the pigskin and punting it, right? Let's just get out of this situation. I'll pray for you, right? But I think also what we do is we want to impose our good wishes on them, right? We want to impose our good wishes on them, but here's the problem. It is a good wish that everything be okay. It is a good wish that we get a baby. But is that what the Word of God tells me? The Word of God never gives me a promise that my wife's womb will open. In fact, there are many women in Scripture whose womb never opened. There are many women in Scripture whose womb didn't open for many, many years, and then through a miracle, supernatural intervention, it did. But it doesn't help grieving couples to tell them, listen, something that God has not said. So this is what Peter's getting at here. This is what Peter's getting at here. If you are to speak in your gifts, you speak the oracles of God. Isaiah says to the teaching and to the testimony, if they will not speak according to his word, it is because they have no dawn. Brethren, we're not here necessarily, please listen to me, to make people feel better. If that happens, great, and we want that to happen, but we want the raw materials of the word of God to be the means by which people feel better, right? Because we want hope to be concrete, and I think, In situations like couples who don't have a baby, instead of focusing on the baby that may or may not be, we need to focus on the God who is constant and figure out how my contentment needs to be in Him and not the good gifts that He gives or what? Withholds. So this is what it means to speak the oracles of God and congregation, I exhort you The only way you're going to be able to think in categories of Bible so that you have grist for the mill to give answers to people is if you know your Bible. You know, one of the things I've noticed, not only in ministry, but just in my Christian life, is I engage in a conversation with a well-meaning brother or sister, and they're zealous about a particular issue. Maybe it's social justice or something like that, and that's fine, let's have that conversation. And in the course of the conversation and the dialogue, you know what I've noticed? I'm like, I don't think they've ever read Ecclesiastes. I don't think they've ever read Job. I don't think they've ever read books in the Bible that, you know what, actually speak to this whole social justice issue. And they're speaking in categories and rhetoric from Facebook and social media and drive-by tweets that, you know, are well and good for the context, but they're not biblically saturated. If we're gonna think in categories of Bible, we have to know our Bible. So if we're to speak, we're to speak oracles of God, but then secondly, the second category that he gives is service. And what does he say in verse 11b? He says that we are to serve by the strength that God supplies. You know, at first this phrase, it seemed puzzling to me. What does it mean that service is by the strength that God supplies? But then it occurred to me, when you begin to enter into the lives of others, through service and sacrifice, things can get really messy really quickly, right? Have you ever had a person or a family over for your house like overnight, like two or three nights? Boy, talk about getting pushed out of the zone of comfort and convenience, right? Maybe some of you like French vanilla creamer in your coffee. But so does your guest. And your husband didn't go to the store and get, you know, an extra supply, and so there's only two tablespoons left. And if you're a good host, what do you got to do? You got to give it to them. So now you got to drink black coffee. Or now you got to drink coffee with milk in it, which is horrible. Okay? So, you know, serving people is difficult, is it? It puts us outside of our convenience zone. But it's in those times that you have to remind yourself what you're doing and why. No doubt it was humiliating for Jesus to wash His disciples' feet. Was He pushed out of His comfort zone? He wasn't sitting at the right hand of the Father in heaven with angels surrounding Him, worshiping Him, was He? No. He did not come, though, to be served. He came to serve. And so it is with us. Service and sacrifice requires that we depend on the strength that God gives. Even in the moment when we don't want to be doing what we're doing, if we're honest with ourselves, right? Like we would rather be alone with our kids and our wife and nobody else around if we're honest with ourselves. But we're just like, Lord, in that moment, I need you to give me the strength because this is not about me. I don't want to hoard my resources. I want to use them and leverage them to serve my brothers and sisters. So Lord, give me the strength that seems to be not supplied by my own hollow motives. So now we've looked at the place and purpose of gifted service. Now what I wanna do here is I wanna offer you just now as you think through what your gift is, let me just offer you three questions to ask yourself, three questions to ask yourself to try to figure out what your gift is and how you could put it into service, okay? And then after that, I'll give two suggestions, okay? Three questions, number one. This is under number three, finding your patch on the multicolored robe of God's grace. What are three questions you can ask yourself to figure out what your patch on that multicolored robe of service is? Number one, what are the needs of the congregation? We've already mentioned this, so I'm not gonna spend a lot of time on it. You may be an expert in underwater basket weaving, and that is awesome, and if I ever need that, I will give you a call. But there may not be anybody in the congregation that needs that, right? So where do you start with service? Listen, you don't start with, what do I do well? We'll get there. But we start with, what are the needs in the congregation? Secondly, ask yourself this question. Where has the Lord given you some level of expertise, experience, know-how, and success? Some of you are quite savvy, for example, in computer technology. And you know, for example, in our social media, internet-driven age, we can't afford as a church to be stuck in the past and unwilling to use a webpage. There have been many people that have come to this congregation because they saw us on the web. I don't know of anybody, there may be some out there, I don't know of anybody that found our church by a telephone book. Do they even make those things anymore? Okay, so we have to proceed with time, okay, and we need to have a website. And you know what, I'm not super good at that, but many of you in the congregation are. And so some of you have stepped forward and said, hey, I wanna help with that. Perfect, that's what Peter's getting at, okay. What is something that you excel in, okay, and then you put that together with the first question, what is a need in the congregation? But now thirdly, and this is where a little specificity is needed, Does the congregation recognize my gifted service in this area? There are some gifts that you can employ in the context of grace covenant church that we don't need to vet you for, right? Okay, so it's fellowship meal, and somebody needs to take out that trash, because I mean, it is just spilling over, all right? We're not gonna do a background check on you before you could take the trash out. You just tie it up and take it out, right? But there are other things in the context of the New Testament church that require, listen, the corroboration of the congregation. And two of those are the office of pastor and the office of deacon. Now, why am I mentioning this? Because in my years of Christian experience, not only in ministry, but just in serving in the church, sometimes, sometimes, I've seen well-meaning men who have the desire to be a pastor, the desire to be a deacon, okay? Paul says if anybody aspires to the office of bishop, that is pastor, overseer, it is a good thing to which he aspires, that's good. What he has is what's called the internal call. He has an internal desire to do it. And what do we do? Well, we look at the requirements for elders in 1 Timothy 1 and 3, and the requirements for deacon, and he may look at those requirements and say, yep, tick, tick, tick, tick, I've got all of them. I can teach well, I'm hospitable to strangers, I have a good reputation with those outside the church, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. But in the context of the church, does he get to make that judgment call? No, he doesn't get to make that judgment call. Who needs to make it? The congregation. you. And this is what is called the external call. So a man has an internal call to be a deacon or a pastor, the congregation must affirm that with an external call, which is the congregation's way of saying, we recognize this gifting in you. We recognize your reputation. We recognize that what you are in private, you are in public, and so we want to affirm those things. So if in thinking through your gifting, you may, and there may be some of you in this congregation who have this, an aspiration to be a pastor or a deacon, that needs to be confirmed by the congregation. So why am I bringing this up? Don't think that the desire alone is sufficient. We also need an external calling. But now, When you think about these three questions, for many of us, that seals the deal. We're like, OK, I know what it is. Maybe serving in the Sunday school, maybe giving a little extra, whatever the case may be. But for others, you're still left scratching your head. What is my gift? I feel like I don't have anything that kind of jumps out and grabs me. Let me give you two suggestions if you're still left scratching your head, OK? Number one. Use your creativity and the needs of the saints to suggest an area of service that would be beneficial to the congregation. You know, we just recently had something called Cupcakes, Coloring, and Conversation. It was a ladies' event. And some of you heard that and you're like, I've never heard of that being done in a local church before. And some of you are like, yeah, I've seen something like that. It's a cool idea, okay? Can I let you in on a little secret? It wasn't about cupcakes. It wasn't about coloring. Cupcakes and coloring were a catalyst for Christ-centered conversation. That's what it was about. It was a reason, listen, a catalyst, a reason. to bring ladies together to share life together, to cry together, to laugh together, to talk about Jesus, to talk about what's going on, talk about how they're maybe failing in their roles as a mother or failing in their roles as a wife and how they're excelling in their role as a mother and excelling in their role as a wife and getting edification and encouragement and hope through the gospel around the table of cupcakes and coloring. And you know what I love so much about that is that that came from ladies getting together, and if you will, if I could put it metaphorically, channeling their creative juices. That's what we want. We want you to channel your creative juices with the overall goal of Grace Covenant Church in mind, which is to edify and encourage the saints through Christ-centered conversation and fellowship. There's a guy in our congregation who was talking to me and he's like, I love hunting. I just love going out and blasting God's creation. I mean, take Dominion, right? What if I got a group together, some guys, we went for two nights and we just took Dominion and blasted God's creation and then thanked God for the meat and then had some more meat and then followed it up with some dessert of some more meat and prayed and sang hymns and went, great! Because you know what? It's an excuse. It's a catalyst to bring people together for Christ-centered conversation. That's what we want. So use your creative juices. You got an idea? Bring it to the elders. Pitch it. We want to see it. We want to see, listen, the multicolored robe of God's very grace be displayed like a kaleidoscope in Grace Covenant Church. Finally, this is what I think would be helpful. In some cases, in some cases, your service to the church may not be something specifically tailored to you. Instead, it just may be your simple presence and participation. My wife and I have been in a number of churches, and there was a wonderful church that we served in in Louisville, Kentucky, wonderful church. One of the things they did is they had mandatory nursery service. Mandatory. Made a few exceptions for nursing mothers and whatnot. But you had to be there. And so we, a few times, every three months or whatever, we would go in and we'd be on diaper duty, the hallowed diaper duty. And I remember thinking one morning, I gotta be honest, I'm not totally looking forward to changing diapers. And then almost every time, what I came away with was this. Through my service and watching these precious little children, two things. Number one, that mom and that dad, who have been running around like chickens with their head cut off Monday through Saturday with work and school and kids and feeding and cleaning and everything else, they get this one little moment of sanity, this hour and a half of public worship service to worship God. Not everybody has to do it, but they chose to put kids in, and I get to serve them in that. I get to be a part of the mechanism that makes that possible. And then secondly, I know that infants don't understand a lot, but they understand something. I get a chance to pour into this little blessing the gospel. I could tell them about Jesus, tell them about love, tell them about the Holy Spirit. I get an hour and a half to do that. What a blessing that is. Now, is it my gift that I go to school and study child development so that I have all these skills? No, I do love kids. But sometimes in the case of grace covenant church, you may not be quote unquote called to it. Be careful with that language. You may not be called to it. It just may be this is something that the church needs you to do. So show up. Be present and participate, and do it for the good of your brother or sister as a good steward of God's grace, and do it for the glory and honor and prestige of Jesus Christ. We've been fed a line in culture and in Disney movies to what? Follow our hearts, right? Almost every Disney movie, it's like, oh, well, following, if that means disobeying your parents, follow your heart, and then the music comes in, and there's just gooey emotion going on. You know, I am, as a Christian, I have a majority of issues with the assumption of that advice. My heart is exceedingly wicked, above all things. I'm naturally selfish, I deceive myself. But on the other hand, as a Christian, I think there's something very right about that advice. even if it's not what the culture in Disney movies mean when they say it. My heart has been made new by the Spirit of God. I now have a desire to imitate my Lord, who came not to be served, but to serve. And our Lord initiated us, every single one of us, into the fellowship of the towel and the basin. And he put us there to serve our brethren deferentially, selflessly, and humbly. And if my service to my brethren will result in God being glorified, then that transcends my own selfish desires to do something that specifically fits my own skill set. Sometimes service is, well, it's just service. And God can be glorified in it and through it even if it's not right up your alley. The last thing I'd say as I close is this. Brethren, even the commandment to serve is law. Do this. Yes, do this, it's a command, do this. Do you judge your acceptance with God by the quality of your service? No, dear beloved. You judge your acceptance with God by the quality of Jesus' service. It is Jesus' perfect, personal, and perpetual obedience and service to God and man that makes you acceptable before the Father. and says, you come to this Lord, this Savior, Jesus Christ, the perfect servant, the one who took conceptions of grandeur and greatness and turned them on their head and said, if you will be first, you will be last. You come to this Jesus this morning, and out of gratitude for what he has done for you and God, you turn to your right, to your right, and to your left, and you serve your brethren. Let's pray.