Excel in Your Gifts

The Spirit Comes
Woven together in Love

Gift of Languages

1 Corinthians 4:6-13  The Message

⁶ All I’m doing right now, friends, is showing how these things pertain to Apollos and me so that you will learn restraint and not rush into making judgments without knowing all the facts. It’s important to look at things from God’s point of view. I would rather not see you inflating or deflating reputations based on mere hearsay.
^7-8 For who do you know that really knows you, knows your heart? And even if they did, is there anything they would discover in you that you could take credit for? Isn’t everything you have and everything you are sheer gifts from God? So what’s the point of all this comparing and competing? You already have all you need. You already have more access to God than you can handle. Without bringing either Apollos or me into it, you’re sitting on top of the world—at least God’s world—and we’re right there, sitting alongside you!
^9-13 It seems to me that God has put us who bear his Message on stage in a theater in which no one wants to buy a ticket. We’re something everyone stands around and stares at, like an accident in the street. We’re the Messiah’s misfits. You might be sure of yourselves, but we live in the midst of frailties and uncertainties. You might be well-thought-of by others, but we’re mostly kicked around. Much of the time we don’t have enough to eat, we wear patched and threadbare clothes, we get doors slammed in our faces, and we pick up odd jobs anywhere we can to eke out a living. When they call us names, we say, “God bless you.” When they spread rumors about us, we put in a good word for them. We’re treated like garbage, potato peelings from the culture’s kitchen. And it’s not getting any better.

 

For Reflection

What an image, "...on stage in a theater in which no one wants to buy a ticket."  I have felt that way sometimes.  Haven't  you?  Haven't we all been called to be misfits in our contemporary society?   When society ignores the poor we lament and advocate for compassion.  When society favors the rich and powerful we lament and advocate for justice.  When society uses false justification for retribution and hate we lament and advocate for peace and reconciliation.   Where society seeks order we lament and accept that life is messy.  We are indeed misfits.

Pray
prayers of praise and thanksgiving for the living God.  Pray for those who are misfits because the Holy Spirit guides their lives.  Pray for those who stand in contrast to  those who teach false prophesy.   Pray for those who advocate for and practice forgiveness, compassion, peace and  distributive justice