A blog post I wrote in 2018.
People often tell me, “I don’t know what my spiritual gifts are. Should I do a spiritual gifts test?” I have no objection to spiritual gifts tests, but I don’t think that they are necessarily the best way to discover your gifts. The last spiritual gifts test I did told me that I have a gift of evangelism. Since I have converted no one, rarely speak to non-Christian people and am generally Australia’s worst evangelist, this suggests to me that spiritual gifts tests are not always accurate. I have another suggestion for discovering your gifts.
The Old Testament book of Nehemiah begins this way: “The words of Nehemiah son of Hacaliah. In the month of Chislev, in the twentieth year, while I was in Susa the capital, one of my brothers, Hanani, came with certain men from Judah; and I asked them about the Jews that survived, those who had escaped the captivity, and about Jerusalem. They replied, ‘The survivors there in the province who escaped captivity are in great trouble and shame; the wall of Jerusalem is broken down, and its gates have been destroyed by fire.’ When I heard these words I sat down and wept, and mourned for days, fasting and praying before the God of heaven” (Neh 1:1-4).
Nehemiah was in exile in Babylon, a place ruled by Persia at that time. He heard bad news about Jerusalem, the holy city. He wanted to do something about this problem. His first response was to pray and fast and repent on behalf of the Jewish people. His prayer fills chapter one. What interests me in regard to spiritual gifts is Nehemiah’s next response to the bad news. He decided to ask the king for something. This was a rather unprecedented move, since although Nehemiah had a position in the royal court (Neh 1:11c-2:2), he did not have much by way of rights.
Nehemiah told the king about the problem in Jerusalem (Neh 1:3). “Then the king said to me, ‘What do you request?’ So I prayed to the God of heaven. Then I said to the king, ‘If it pleases the king, and if your servant has found favour with you, I ask that you send me to Judah, to the city of my ancestors’ graves, so that I may rebuild it’” (Neh 2:4-5). Now Nehemiah might have continued to pray about the problem or he could have sent Hanani back with some money for rebuilding the walls. Instead, Nehemiah responded like a leader and asked to be allowed to go there and rebuild the walls. This marks Nehemiah out as a man with leadership gifts. His response to the crisis brought to light the gifts and calling that he had been given. His response was given by the Holy Spirit.
The same method might be applied to discerning your spiritual gifts. Perhaps one night 60 Minutes airs a story about homeless people. And perhaps there are six different Christians watching that episode of 60 Minutes. The first one thinks to herself, “I will mobilise some people to help local homeless people.” The second one decides to pray for homeless people on a regular basis. The third realises that his church needs to be taught about what God says about the stranger and the vulnerable. The fourth looks for a Christian organisation that helps homeless people and sends a generous donation. The fifth person goes out into the nearby park and invites the homeless people to a meal at her house. The sixth one receives a prophetic word about what his church must do in their neighbourhood.
Each person had the same input and each responded differently. We could discern the spiritual gifts of the six Christians above by looking at their responses to the situation. The first has a leadership gift, the second an intercessory gift, the third a teaching gift, the fourth a gift of generous giving, the fifth a gift of mercy and the sixth a prophetic gift. Many people simply assume that their responses to input are natural. But Christian believers are led by the Holy Spirit. Your response is part of that leading.
So if you want to know what your spiritual gifts are, then observe your responses to events and crises. What is your default response when someone is sick? What is your default response when a natural disaster happens? Assuming that you are walking according to the Spirit and not according to the flesh, your responses are likely to reveal your gifts to you. If you cannot recognise these, then quite likely your friends will recognise your gifts from your responses. And you will recognise theirs. In my opinion, this kind of observation is a more natural way to discover your gifts than filling out a questionnaire.