Articles
Using Our Talents
I don't know if you get these little DIY (Do It Yourself) videos when you are strolling through Facebook or not, but I like to watch them. It's amazing what some of these guys can build with scrap metal, a few bolts and nuts and maybe an old bearing or two stuck together with a little welding. And how simple it is sometimes, with me left thinking "how easy was that" yet I never thought of it, and probably wouldn't have!
People like that have a talent for seeing something, and looking around to see what resources they have to build it with. Most of the time it is something that could be built numerous ways, yet they seem to build it out of stuff laying around the house, and sometimes their simple masterpiece works as good as or maybe even better than some commercial version.
God gives us all some abilities, some people perhaps more than others. Some may get specific special abilities in some areas that are rare and allow them to be 'experts' in their field, and some get a general ability to do many things to some degree, not necessarily mastering any.
I think sometimes we focus too much on what our specific talents are and where they rank on the world's importance scale, instead of focusing on what we do with them. We are all probably guilty of ranking people based on what we see them do or maybe 'how' we seem them do it. Granted, sometimes their actions paint a pretty good picture of their ability in one area or another, but let's understand that doesn't mean they don't excel in other ways. Could that statement not apply to all of us?
Stick figures are good for me if you want me to paint you a portrait, but if you want your car painted, I can handle that. So if we only observe a failed attempt to paint a mountain scene on an easel, we don't necessarily know where one's true talents are. God needs a lot of different talents to carry out His work, to be His hands, His feet and His mouthpiece in this world.
We fail if we associate talent with intelligence. God isn't interested necessarily in our level of smarts. I believe no one would argue that Jesus didn't call 12 well known highly educated Rabbis to follow Him and be His Apostles. He called common people, some more educated than others, but all more or less average. So if you or I are sitting around doing nothing with what God has given us because we think we aren't the best one to be putting that to use for God, we may have it all wrong! Look at what the Apostles accomplished.
God's will for us is simple. He wants us to use what He has given us to His glory, and not hide it because we don't have a degree on the wall, or have been to a special school to train. Some of the best men I've known, most of whom are dead now, came from a time when few went to college, and others joined the military or just got a job when they finished 12th grade. All had something to offer, but the level of importance of the things they taught me wasn't based on their education or mine, it came from a sincere heart that had learned life's lessons and was trying to pass them along to upcoming generations. One of them was my dad, definitely a DIY guy!
Today, just use what God has given you. If that's a PhD with some other initials behind your name, great, God needs you! If it's something entirely different, God needs that too and both may well be equally important. May we all look to see what we have been given, and put whatever that is to good use.
Read Matt 25:14-30 Parable of the Talents
