Using Your Spiritual Gifts

3. GOD HAS GIVEN US A PROMISE

The parables tells us a message: the person who serves faithfully will be rewarded.

There two principles that are highlighted here.

A. Those who are trustworthy in little things will be given more

When you use your gifts, you will grow more gifts. When you faithfully use your spiritual gifts, you will get more gifts you don’t have, or you will grow in the effectiveness of your present gifts.

1. You can get other gifts. "Desire earnestly the best gifts" (I Cor. 12:31). Paul wrote to the Romans that he wanted to come see them and help them get some spiritual gifts they didn’t have. "I long to see you that I may impart unto you some spiritual gift" (Romans 1:11).

2. You can grow your present gifts. This means you can become more effective. Paul was not satisfied with Timothy’s use of his gifts, "Stir up the gift of God which is in thee" (II Tim. 1:6). This is a picture of stirring up the coals of fire to make it hotter.

You will never be used greatly by God until you are faithful in what he has given you to do now. (Verse 19)

B. Little things of life we show whether or not we can handle the big things.

Little things of life often turn into the big things.

Everyone who has, more will be given, but as for the one who has nothing, even what he has will be taken away.

“Now ask me why there are Christians who said they have no gifts—and I will tell why”

“ ‘Yes,’ the king replied, ‘but to those who use well what they are given, even more will be given. But from those who are unfaithful, even what little they have will be taken away.

4. GOD HAS GIVEN US A WARNING

The warning is clear to those who do nothing with the talents that God has given. They will lose what they have been given.

A. There is Christian that they know they are gifted but they bury their gifts instead of practicing it. Like the servant in the story.

B. There are Christians that they don’t care about their gifts.

Illustration. Dear Abby recorded a powerful story. A young man from a wealthy family was about to graduate from high school. It was a custom in their affluent community for parents to give their graduating children a new car, and the boy and his dad had spent weeks visiting one dealership after another. The week before graduation they found the perfect car. They boy was certain it would be in the driveway on graduation night.

One the eve of his graduation, however, his father handed him a small package wrapped in colorful paper. The Father said the package contained the most valuable gift the Father could think of. It was a Bible! The boy was so angry he threw the Bible down and stormed out of the house. He and his father never saw each other again.

Several years later the news of the father’s death finally brought the son home again. Following the funeral, he sat alone one evening, going through his father’s possessions that he was to inherit when he came across the Bible his dad had given him. Overwhelmed by grief, he brushed away the dust and cracked it open for the first time. When he did, a cashier’s check dated the day of his high school graduation fell into his lap --in the exact amount of the car they had chosen together. The gift had been there all along . . . but he had turned away.