John Bevere - The DANGER of Neglecting Your Gifts

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Hey everyone, welcome to lesson two of Multiply. The title of this lesson is Stewardship. I’m going to open with Romans 12:6: «In His grace» (Greek word «charis»), God has given us different gifts (charismata) for doing certain things well. I love that! So, the first word we emphasized was grace in the last lesson, and the second word was charisma, or gifts. Now we’re going to turn our attention to the third word, and to do that, we’re going to go to 1 Corinthians 4:1, where Paul makes this statement: «Let a man so consider us as servants of Christ and stewards.»

Now listen to that word «stewards.» It’s our third word, and it’s extremely important. First of all, let me give you the definitions of the word «steward.» First, let’s start with the English dictionary: it is the careful and responsible management of something entrusted to one’s care. Now let’s go to the Greek dictionary; the Greek word for steward, which I will not attempt to pronounce, will be on your screen. It means one who has the authority and responsibility for something; one who is in charge; one who is responsible; an administrator; a manager.

Now, «steward» is not a word that we use a lot today, but from these two definitions, we see three distinct things. Number one: a steward is an overseer of what belongs to someone else. Number two: a steward carries the authority to manage what has been entrusted. Number three: the steward is responsible; he or she will give an account to the owner of how they handled what was entrusted to them.

So, let’s give examples of stewards to understand this more clearly. The best one, in my opinion, would be Joseph in the Bible. If you read about him in Potiphar’s house, he kept getting promoted until eventually, he was over Potiphar’s entire household. The Bible says that Potiphar didn’t even know what was going on financially or in any other capacity in his household, only what he ate at his table. In other words, he completely entrusted Joseph. He didn’t micromanage him; he didn’t tell him what to do in every detail. He just turned the running of the entire household over to Joseph and didn’t think about it.

If you look at a financial planner, many people have financial planners that plan for their retirement. Do you know that many of these people don’t even ask questions of their financial planner? They trust that their money is being invested well. Another example would be our warehouse manager at Messenger International. We send out thousands of books a week to people all over. Our warehouse manager is amazing. I never walk into the warehouse and say, «I want to make sure you’re doing this right.» So, a steward is not one who is micromanaged. It is expected of the steward to handle what is entrusted to him as if the owner were handling it. In other words, he captures the owner’s heart, desires, and motives for what he is responsible for.

So, what specific stewardship was on the Apostle Paul? Well, let’s read. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 4:1, «Let a man so consider us as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God.» There was a gift on the Apostle Paul’s life. What was that gift? It was a gift of revelation knowledge. He stewarded what God was revealing to his church and was very faithful in releasing it by writing letters, teaching, and preaching. He stewarded the gift of God’s revelation knowledge of the grace of God through Jesus Christ very well.

Now, does this apply to us? 1 Peter 4:10 says, «As each one"—now I want you to listen to those words—"each one.» It doesn’t say «as each pastor» or «as each minister.» If you are born again and the Spirit of God resides inside you, you have been trusted with a gift or gifts. What are those gifts? They are God’s ability that He gives you to go beyond your natural ability in a certain specific area. Okay, «as each one has received a gift, minister it to one another.» Don’t sit on it; minister it to one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. So, there’s our word «stewards.» God says, «You are a steward of my ability,» and He said it’s the manifold grace of God. Now, the word «manifold» means variegated or many-sided. So, what Peter is saying is that each of us has a gift, but when we look at the spectrum of gifts that God has given, it is manifold; it is a multitude of gifts.

We have different gifts. If you look at my body, I have many different members, but each member can do things that the other members can’t do. If you look at my fingers, they can do things that my nose can’t do. My nose can do things that my toes can’t do. My toes can do things that my stomach can’t do. My stomach can do things that my liver can’t do. Now, happy is the man or woman who knows their gift and operates in it; miserable is the man or woman who tries to operate in somebody else’s gift. Wouldn’t it be amazing if this morning I woke up and my thumb said, «Hey mouth, I’ve had it! You’ve been preaching and teaching people for 30 years! It is my turn! Move aside; I’m going to do this course today.» It would be ridiculous! It is not gifted to do that. That’s how ridiculous it is when we try to operate in somebody else’s gift.

It is so important that you understand what your gift is and that you steward it well. Now, I want to use Paul’s attitude about his gift as a template of how we should treat our gifts. This is so important. Listen to Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 9:16–17: «If I preach the gospel, I have nothing to boast of, for necessity is laid upon me. Yes, woe is me if I do not preach the gospel! For if I do this willingly, I have a reward; but if against my will, I have been entrusted with a stewardship.» Now, whoa, this is heavy! Paul said, «If I don’t use my gift, woe is me!»

Okay, I’m going to tell you what the word «woe» means; it’s going to blow you away! You need to brace yourself! Prepare for this. Okay, it is the Greek word that is at the bottom of the screen. That’s the last time I’m going to say that. Don’t expect me to pronounce Greek words; I’m not a Greek expert, but I can read a concordance and lexicons. The Greek word means «disaster,» «horror.» Another Greek dictionary, the Complete Word Study Bible, says it’s the interjection of grief or indignation. Each occurrence of this word in the New Testament implies a very serious and terrifying judgment. I know this is probably causing you to shake and tremble a little, but relax; this is not about your ability; this is about God’s ability on your life. It is only about you stewarding what He gave you well. It is akin to calling a curse upon himself.

So, Paul, when he says, «woe is me,» it is akin to him calling a curse upon himself. So, the bottom line here is that it’s a very serious thing to neglect the gift of God on our lives. My example is those two women coming to me from the states of Texas and Florida and saying, «John, if you don’t write what God is giving you to write, He will give that ability to somebody else, and one day you’ll stand in judgment for it.» Now I think about it. If, 40 years ago, when I was a 20-year-old man, you would have walked up to me when I knew there was a call on my life to go to the nations of the world, and you would have said, «John, the way God is going to send you to the nations of the world is through your writings,» I would have laughed you out of the room. Yet, I look at where I am today and realize that I never would be where I am today, impacting lives all over 27 nations, had I not been faithful to that gift to write. So I would have to echo Paul’s words, «Woe is me if I didn’t write the books that God called me to write! Woe is me if I didn’t preach what God called me to preach!»

I know this is serious, but listen to me: God is not hiding what He has placed on your life from you. All it takes is a little seeking. Again, I want to emphasize, if you haven’t watched the course «Gifted,» do so because we cover thoroughly how to discover the gifts of God and how to develop the gifts of God in your life.

Now, let’s go back to Paul. Paul understood the value of the gift that God entrusted to him. He realized that if he neglected that gift, others would suffer loss of what God intended them to receive. That’s sobering when you think about it. So, the gift was not for him; it was actually for those he was sent to. If you look at my gift to speak, it’s not for me; it’s for you. So your gift on your life is not for you; it’s for those you are sent to.

Now, let’s go back to Paul, and this is really going to shake some of you—in a good way. If you look at Paul’s gift, if you look at my gift, it’s a noticeable gift, right? I mean, I stand on the platform; I speak to thousands; I do courses, and thousands are watching. But the gift you have may not be as noticeable as mine. However, when I go to the Scripture, I read in 1 Corinthians that the gifts that are unnoticeable God has placed greater value on. Wow! It’s amazing! We put such a premium on platform gifts because they’re noticeable.

Let me give you an example: a person can live without being able to speak; they can make hand motions and communicate; they can make gestures and communicate. A person can live without a leg; oh yeah, I know people that have lost legs, but they’re still living and functioning. But a person can’t live without a liver. Now, it’s interesting—voices get attention. What a beautiful voice! Legs get attention; what a gorgeous set of legs! But I’ve never seen a person get attention for their liver. Have you ever seen someone walk up to a person and say, «Dude, that is such a gorgeous liver you got!» That’s ridiculous! It is an unnoticeable part, yet it is more important than a leg or a mouth. That’s the way it is with the gifts in the body of Christ.

Now, God said this; I didn’t, so don’t look at me with that funny look right now. I’m telling you God is the one who said that the gifts that are not noticeable are actually more valuable than the ones that are. That means if you’re called to the marketplace, you’re called to education, you’re called to healthcare—you may think, «Oh, well, what good is my gift in building the kingdom of God?» It’s very valuable! Listen to me; it’s very valuable! I cannot stress this enough, and if you don’t see your gift as valuable, you will neglect it. You will not operate in it, and people will suffer that God has sent you to minister to and build up.

I know this is heavy, and we’re in the second lesson, but this is beneficial because I know the outcome of what’s going to happen in this course. You’re going to discover your gifts, and you’ll begin to multiply; you’ll see your effectiveness in impacting people’s lives soar. So here’s the sobering truth that I want you to write down: if we don’t manage our gift properly, others will not experience the benefit and will even suffer loss of what God intended them to have.

Now, let’s go back to 1 Corinthians 4. Paul says, «Let a man so consider us as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God.» Moreover, this is verse two: «Moreover, it is required in a steward that one be found faithful.»

Now this is amazing. For the rest of this course, this is the word we’re going to focus on: that is the one requirement of a steward. Now, it’s really interesting to me that Paul doesn’t say, «Here is the list of requirements of a steward,» and he doesn’t list all these different words that are important. He wants to emphasize one word. The one word he emphasizes that is required is that a steward is faithful to what he is entrusted.

So, the one thing that God is going to look at in how you handle what He gave you is: were you faithful? What does that word «faithful» mean? Well, I have been before teams—whether it’s a ministry team, a business team, or a church conference—and I’ve asked, «What is your definition of the word 'faithful'?» I’ve gotten some wonderful responses. Here are some of the responses I’ve received: steadfast, consistent, dependable, reliable, loyal, true, trustworthy, devoted, truthful, resolute, obedient. This is a list; it’s not exhaustive.

Can I say one of the most important definitions of «faithful» I’ve never once heard? I’ve never heard it from a ministry team; I’ve never heard it from a marketplace team; I’ve never heard it at a conference. In all the times I’ve asked, I’ve never heard one of the most important definitions—the primary definition of the word «faithful.» And you know what that definition is? You have to go to lesson three because I’m not going to tell you until the next lesson. See you then!