I am rather excited about the young adult Bible study that Duane and I have been preparing for the next few weeks. Before Christmas, a number of individuals expressed interest in looking at spiritual gifts. I thought it was a great idea but wanted to take it in a little bit of a different direction.
The young adults are figuring out their lives, who they are and what it is they want to do with their lives (or at least the next 5-10 years). I've been there and have worked through many of those issues. Not to say that I've entirely figured things out but I am beyond the initial panic.
In addition to looking at what spiritual gifts are/are not and trying out a few different spiritual gift inventories, we will also be incorporating a few ideas from the book, "Why you can't be anything you want to be" (AF Miller, Jr). Hopefully it will be a God-driven process through which they are able to gain a clearer sense of purpose and direction.
It is the first of all problems for a man to find out what kind of work he is to do in this universe. ~ Thomas Carlyle
That at each man's birth there comes into being an eternal vocation for him, expressly for him. To be true to himself in relation to this eternal vocation is the highest thing a man can practice. ~ Shakespeare
Men outside their proper callings are like joints out of place in the body; in finding his proper place, each must examine both his "affections" and his gifts. And that they may the better judge aright, for what calling their children are fit, they must observe two things in them: first, their inclination; secondly, their natural gifts. ~ William Perkins
Most of our life is in large part a rationalization of our failure to find out who we really are, what our basic strength is, what thing it is that we were meant to work upon in the world. ~Ernest Becker
Each one or you must--without presumption, certainly without boastfulness--courageously appeal to those interior resources, must make use of those personal energies, that God the Creator has providentially placed in you as so many gifts ... It is not a question of standing alone and egotistically closing in upon himself. It is only a question of fidelity to the truth of one's human nature--the carrier of an unrepeatable destiny. ~ Pope Paul VI
... I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. ~ Ephesians 4:1