TALENTS

034 – JUNE 2006

WE NEED EACH OTHER

1 Cor 12:14 “For the body is not one member, but many.”

People have different gifts and talents. Sometimes it’s nice to know which are yours and … which are not.

Now, I am not a carpenter:
When I pick up a tool, my family starts to shake their heads. If I pick up a power tool, they all run for cover.
I cannot find a stud. If my life depended on it, I could not find it. I can hammer and knock all day, only to drive nails through the sheetrock and into the empty space that lies behind it. I’m not sure that I could find the things, even if the sheetrock was not up yet!!!
My dad was a finished carpenter. He could measure and cut to a paper-width of a fit. I am quite satisfied with somewhere between a quarter and a half inch fit. For example, I made a bookshelf and the distance between the end of the shelves and the insides of the verticals were so wide that we lost the Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary down the sides.
The worst job I ever did was to assemble one of those huge one piece picnic tables. Everyone always ate on a slant.
It’s simple. We are all different. We have different gifts and talents. I can take a decent photograph but you need to call someone else for your carpentry needs.

1 Cor 12:15-17 “If the foot should say, Because I am not the hand, I do not belong to the body …
And if the ear shall say, Because I am not the eye, I do not belong to the body …
If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the smelling be?

I can teach a bit, but you would not want me in charge of decorating the church.
I’m a bit charismatic so I can do an acceptable job at “greeting” but don’t ask me to cook for the church supper.
I could, however, wait on table, but expect some kind of water disaster if you ask me to fix the plumbing problem in the men’s rest room.
I could even play the guitar to help out with the music, but I can’t read music very well and the Easter Cantata would collapse if I were in charge.
Think about this - I can share hope with my circle of acquaintances (photographers, business community & basketball friends), but someone else will have to share with those that I may never meet. It’s nice that I don’t have to feel the pressure of relying on me for the whole thing.

I Cor 12:21 “And the eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you.” And the head cannot say to the feet, “I don’t need you.”
24 “But God has combined the members of the body and has given greater honor to the parts that lacked it, so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other.

We are all different and we need each other.