The Pursuit of God by Tozer - Reflections (16)

 

“Our gifts and talents should also be turned over to Him. They should be recognized for what they are, God’s loan to us, and should never be considered in any sense our own” (page 28).

 

The first “gift assessment” I saw was around 1990. I’m sure they existed before then, but the first one I saw was when a friend brought one to me that his church was doing. This particular assessment required that the participants have people who knew them fill out portions of the assessment based on their knowledge of the participants. I dutifully and politely (unusual for me I suppose) filled out the request form, but I did so with inner hesitation.

 

Since then, I have seen many forms of gift assessment, and I have yet to see one with which I am comfortable – not one. In fact, the more sophisticated they become, the more I am not only uncomfortable, but the more I fear in terms of a descent into Gnosticism and beyond (more on this below).

 

The most critical element which these gift assessments lack is the Cross of Christ. 

 

As our chapter on possessing nothing emphasizes, all that we have must go to and through the Cross, it must be offered up to God. Without having been to the Cross, and remaining in the Cross, our gifts and talents are poison for they are rooted in self-reliance and not in Jesus Christ. When Jesus says, “Apart from Me you can do nothing,” He includes our talents and gifts. This means, in part, that our greatest gifts are also our greatest weaknesses and dangers, for if we rely on ourselves and our own abilities we will live according to the flesh, the natural – and our fruit will be death, death to ourselves and death to others.

 

Our fruit may not look like death, it may look, “Good for food, be a delight to the eyes, and desirable to make one wise” (Genesis 3:6), but it will most certainly result in death.

 

Then we have the assumption that God wants us to primarily use our “natural” gifts and talents and to not venture into areas in which we are not naturally gifted. This thinking is carnal and not spiritual; it rests on the natural and not on the Holy Spirit – it requires no dependence on God. We ought not to make such assumptions.

 

Moses argued with God that he was not, “eloquent,” and that he was “slow of speech and slow of tongue” (Ex. 4:10). Paul writes to the Corinthians, “I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling, and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom…” (1 Cor. 2:3 – 4). Jeremiah protested to God, “I do not know how to speak, because I am a youth” (Jer. 1:6).

 

God calls people into areas of service for which they are not naturally gifted; let us not be so foolish as to look at the outward, or to evaluate people and church life the way the world does, Christ Jesus is the Head of the Body. The Word of God may very well come to us through the most shy and soft-spoken man or woman in our midst, but we will never know if our eyes are focused on the natural and not on the Cross of Christ. We are too easily impressed.

 

It is easy for us to forget that God’s strength is “made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9). We tend to forget that it is the Holy Spirit who works in us, the Body of Christ, as He wills, not as we will (1 Cor. 12:11). Our presumptions are dangerous. Just because we can do things does not mean that we should do things, things done in the “natural” are best left undone. If it is not of Christ Jesus, if it is not through the Cross, then we had better leave the task alone.

 

One of our problems today is that we have built edifices ourselves rather than in Christ, ignoring Psalm 127:1, “Unless the LORD builds the house, they labor in vain who build it; unless the LORD guards the city, the watchman keeps awake in vain.” What we have built ourselves we must maintain ourselves, what we have artificially built, must be artificially maintained.

 

Then we have groups and ministries that were born of the Spriit, but at some point veered into the flesh or worse (Galatians 3:3; also see Revelation chapters 2 and 3). Naturally we justify our actions and thinking, for we must grow, we must acquire more, we must be bigger and better each year. We end up riding a tiger which will devour us if we dismount.

 

Let’s recall that Isaac was a child of promise. In the “natural,” Abraham and Sarah could not produce Isaac, they were old, they were just too old. When Isaac was given to them, he was not given to become an idol, he was not given so that Abraham and Sarah should center their lives around him, he was not given to be taken into the inner most shrine of the heart – the place where only God is to dwell.

 

So with us, so with our churches, what God gives us is never ours to possess, it is given to us in trust and we are to be good stewards of God’s gifts and resources – we are to own nothing – how can we own anything if we are owned by Jesus Christ? The words “my” and “mine” ought to never enter our minds, for all is to be surrendered to the Cross, and all is to remain in the Cross.

 

Before we conclude this reflection (in our next reflection we’ll ponder what Tozer writes about how we can respond to Christ in obedience), I’ll comment on gift assessments which include personality and temperament analysis (more and more gift assessments now include this element).

 

Only God truly knows us (Psalm 139) and only the Holy Spirit can reveal what we need to know about ourselves (Psalm 19:11 – 14; Psalm 139:23 – 24; Hebrews 4:12 – 16; Philippians 2:12 - 13). Preoccupation with self-analysis is never-ending and leads downward and downward into Gnostic darkness. The great question of life is not, “Who am I?” but rather, “Who is Jesus Christ?”

 

Our lives are transformed into goodness, truth, and beauty as we behold Jesus Christ, not as we ponder our emotional and psychological navels (1 John 3:1 – 3; 2 Cor. 3:17 – 18; Rom. 12:1 – 2). We are not capable of defining ourselves, of truly understanding ourselves, only our Creator – Father truly knows us. (I have written more extensively about this on Mind on Fire when exploring John 15:1ff.)

 

I have seen people become trapped within psychological assessments, adopting them as core identities and using them to pigeonhole others. I have witnessed people obsessed with these assessments. Some of these assessments have their roots in anti-Christian teaching, and one which is quite popular in some Christian circles has been propagated by a heretical “Christian” teacher who is opposed to the Christ of the Cross and the Cross of Christ.

 

In Christ, we discover our gifts and callings as we live in relationship in the Body of Christ, as we experience daily life with other disciples. Our gifts and callings can change, for sure they ought to mature, we have various seasons of life, and we must always abide in the Vine. The fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, which humanistic assessments offer, leads to death.

 

Because I can hear some readers protesting, I will add that I have used basic assessments before, both in business and in the church, that make no pretense of exploring the “inner person.” People in church tended to make more of them than intended, often confusing them with their identity – I would not do this again. People in business tended to see them as tool to help them understand how they make decisions and communicate, nothing more.

 

We are a supernatural people, living in communion with a supernatural God, let us trust our Lord Jesus in these things as we live in relationship with one another.

 

Let us recall that all must be offered to Christ on the altar of the Cross, including ourselves.

 

Have your gifts and talents been crucified with Christ?

 

Galatians 2:20.