And a certain man of the sons of the prophets said unto his neighbor in the word of the LORD, Smite me, I pray you. And the man refused to smite him. Then said he unto him, Because you have not obeyed the voice of the LORD, behold, as soon as you have departed from me, a lion shall slay you. And as soon as he had departed from him, a lion found him, and slew him,  1Kgs 20:35-36.

If you know your Bible, you know that is only the beginning of the story, but it was certainly the end of it for that second young prophet.  Here is the hard lesson we all must learn:  serving God is NOT for wimps.  Sometimes God asks for difficult things.  Sometimes they seem impossible.  But God expects the impossible from us—the things you cannot do alone, He will help you with.

First century Christians understood this.  Many of them converted knowing they might be thrown into prison or even the arena within a week.  And us?  We want promises of health and wealth.  We demand a life where no one contracts a serious illness, where our homes never blow away in hurricanes or tornadoes, where jobs are never lost, accidents never happen, and babies never die.  We want the reward now—the perfect life in the perfect place.  Then we will consider serving God.

It doesn’t work that way and it never has.  This prophet could not believe that God would ask him to strike his fellow prophet.  “Why God would never…” you can hear him thinking just as so many say today.  He found out there was something a whole lot worse when he didn’t have the gumption to do as he was told. 

It breaks my heart, but I have a feeling that a whole lot of people are going to meet the same lion he did.

As they were going along the road, someone said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” To another he said, “Follow me.” But he said, “Lord, let me first go and bury my father.” And Jesus said to him, “Leave the dead to bury their own dead. But as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” Yet another said, “I will follow you, Lord, but let me first say farewell to those at my home.” Jesus said to him, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God,” Luke 9:57-62.

Dene Ward

Look at what is before your eyes. If anyone is confident that he is Christ's, let him remind himself that just as he is Christ's, so also are we. 2Cor 10:7.

We’ve been examining all the repeated lessons in the New Testament, the ones the writers felt needed a rerun because they were that important.  Usually we look at the passage in context.  This one we will take squarely out of context.  The message still works and it is rerun again and again, in every context imaginable.  We obviously need, as the passage says, reminding.

Some of the Corinthians were still having difficulty accepting Paul as an apostle.  In this short verse he reminds them of what should have been obvious:  We both belong to Christ.  That should have had an impact on them when they considered what he was telling them and how they received him.  Don’t you judge the motives of a brother differently than anyone else?  You ought to because you know he has sworn allegiance to the same Lord as you, the one who demands a lifestyle that abhors sin.  He isn’t a pagan.  And that kinship creates an instant bond no matter where you may run into one another.

This lesson has been taught in the scripture since the beginning.  The fact that Cain killed his own brother made that murder even worse.  When Lot and Abraham began having difficulties, Abraham came to him to work things out.  It shouldn’t be like this, he told Lot, because, “We are brethren,” Gen 13:8.  When Moses saw the two Hebrews fighting he said to them, “You are brothers.  Why do you wrong each other?” Acts 7:26. 

Yes, if we are brethren, if we both belong to Christ, it should make a difference in how we treat one another.  Peter goes so far as to say that obeying the truth should have the effect of producing in us not just cold, formal love for each other, but an intense and passionate love, one that never pretends.   Having purified your souls by your obedience to the truth for a sincere brotherly love, love one another earnestly from a pure heart, 1Pet 1:22.  If I do not feel that way about my brothers and sisters, he seems to be saying, then maybe I haven’t really “obeyed the truth.”

John agrees.  He says if we do not love our brethren, we are in darkness and in death; that we are liars and murderers, 1 John 2:9-11; 3:14-19; 4:20,21.  Christ died for us all.  If he loved me that much, he loved you that much, too, which means I should love you that much and you me.  We are instantly bound together in the same emotional context of gratitude and wonder and unity. 

I know, I know.  You’ve heard these “love” lessons all your life.  When you hear another starting, you almost sigh and roll your eyes.  “Again?  What else is there to say?”

Nothing.  It’s a rerun, but it’s a rerun found in nearly every book of the Bible.  That means it’s worth our hearing again.  And again.  And again. 

Unless you think you’ve already got this one whipped?

With all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Eph 4:2-3.

Dene Ward

Maybe this is one of those urban legends that everyone has heard from someone.  I am really not certain, but Keith’s mother once told us about a young woman who began attending services with them back in the 1950s with her three young children, the oldest about 6.  She arrived just on time and left quickly.  But unlike many of those types, she was always there, her children knew the basic Bible stories, and she herself was attentive to both class and sermon.  In fact her keeping to herself seemed to be more a product of embarrassment than anything else.

My mother-in-law, astute observer that she was, had noticed something.  The children were always neat, clean, and combed except for one thing—their clothes were always wrinkled.  This was back before the day of permanent press and polyester.  There is nothing quite as wrinkled as old-fashioned cotton—except maybe wrinkled linen—which was way beyond this woman’s means.

I forget now how she managed to ask.  Maybe it was the offer of an iron, which I know she was generous enough to do.  Knowing my mother-in-law though, she probably just came out and asked.  However she did it, she got an answer.

The woman’s husband was not a Christian.  He not only refused to attend services with her, he refused to get up and help her get the children ready.  So every week after their Saturday evening bath, she dressed them for church and then put them to bed.  The next morning it was easier to get the three tykes up and fed and herself dressed for church.

After all these years, I’ve heard nearly every excuse in the world for missing Bible classes or the morning services altogether.  This young woman could have easily pulled two or three off the list and used them.  So why didn’t she?  I can think of three good reasons.

First, she loved the Lord.  Nothing and no one was going to come between her and her Savior.  She knew the perils of allowing excuses to keep her away from the spiritual nutrition her soul needed, and she was not so arrogant as to think she could feed herself with no help at all.  “I can have a relationship with God without the church,” I have heard more times than I can count.  She knew better.

And because she had her first priority correct, the others fell right in line.  She loved her children, but more than that she loved her children’s souls.  She had to combat not only the usual onslaught of the world, but the huge impact of a father’s bad example.  She was still in her early 20s so she had probably married quite young, too young to really understand the challenges of this “mixed” marriage, maybe even so naive that she thought “love would conquer all” and he would change easily.  Now she knew better, but she was more than ever determined to save her children.

And despite it all, she loved her husband and his soul too.  She knew that any little chink in her armor would allow him the rationale he needed to remain apathetic to her faith.  She understood Peter’s command in 1 Pet 3:1,2,  Likewise, wives, be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives, when they see your respectful and pure conduct.  The more he resisted, the stronger she needed to be, and if taking her children to church in wrinkled clothes did the trick, then that’s what she would do.

This young woman shows us all that excuses can be overcome by pure will.  Certainly we are not talking about the truly old, ill, and otherwise unable to go out either regularly or on occasion when there is truly a “bad day.”  We are talking about people who allow a little, or even a lot of trouble to become too much trouble to serve God.  I know many who work around the hurdles and snags that Satan throws in our paths.  It costs them time, money, and a whole lot of extra energy, but they have their priorities straight.  They know who comes first, and they understand that our modern “sacrifices” are an insult to the word. 

If finding excuses comes easily for me, maybe I need to consider throwing out my permanent press and wearing some wrinkled clothes.

And when one of them that sat at meat with him heard these things, he said unto him, Blessed is he that shall eat bread in the kingdom of God. But he said unto him, A certain man made a great supper; and he bade many: and he sent forth his servant at supper time to say to them that were bidden, Come; for all things are now ready. And they all with one consent began to make excuse…And the servant came, and told his lord these things. Then the master of the house being angry said to his servant, Go out quickly into the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in hither the poor and maimed and blind and lame.  And the servant said, Lord, what thou didst command is done, and yet there is room.  And the lord said unto the servant, Go out into the highways and hedges, and constrain them to come in, that my house may be filled.  For I say unto you, that none of those men that were bidden shall taste of my supper.  Luke 14:15-24.

Dene Ward

I am still walking on that elliptical machine I told you about a few years ago.  With another measureable loss of vision lately, it becomes more and more the only safe way to exercise—you don’t step in any holes or trip over limbs or vines on an elliptical machine

I stepped off one day a couple of months ago and looked at the read-out.  It informed me that I had “walked” three and a half miles in 30 minutes.

“Wow,” I thought.  “Not bad.”  And then I thought to myself, “Wait a minute.”  Thirty years ago I only managed five miles in 48 minutes JOGGING.  That’s over nine minutes a mile.  And thirty years later I am supposed to believe I beat that rate WALKING?

“Hmppph,” I muttered with my new perspective, “If that’s true, I’m a Martian.”

Looking at myself through the eyes of cold clear logic, I cut the read-out figures almost in half.  Maybe I managed two miles—maybe.  I don’t have much faith in that read-out now.

But—can I be just as clear-headed when I examine my heart?  Can I see with cool logic that my words and thoughts give me away? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks, Matt 12:34.  Can I see the flaws, the weak spots, the chinks in my armor?

Believing the best about myself may seem “healthy. “ It may feel good.  It may give me a boost, and surely it’s more important to be encouraged than depressed, isn’t it?  Spiritual buoyancy is not the way to Heaven.  In fact, it will lead you the other direction quickly. 

I need to see clearly.  Deluding myself about my faults won’t fix my soul any more than walking two miles will burn the same calories as walking three and a half.  And one is a whole lot more important than the other.

Let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you thinks that he is wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise, 1Cor 3:18

Dene Ward

“Then the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were foolish, and five were wise. For when the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them, but the wise took flasks of oil with their lamps, Matt 25:1-4.

Every time we hear this parable the same point is made—it was foolish to have no oil for their lamps.  But one thing has always struck me from the outset of this little story.  Why were they carrying lamps in the first place if they didn’t also pick up some oil?  It’s like carrying a gun in a dangerous place but no ammunition.  It’s like carrying a hair dryer to a primitive campsite.  It’s like peeling a five pound bag of potatoes with no pot to cook them in.  Why bother? 

Does that mean the story isn’t valid?  Nope.  I see those same foolish people every Sunday.  They get up early to come to church and sit on a pew and a listen to the preacher—but they have made no commitment to God, to their Lord, or to their brothers and sisters.  They do absolutely nothing all week long—no Bible reading, no praying, no serving.  They live exactly the way they want to live, and usually don’t get caught.  Or maybe they are relatively moral, having been taught by their parents to be good people—not because God requires righteousness of His servants.  In fact, God is the last person on their minds in every decision they make.

What’s going to happen when the trumpet sounds?  They will suddenly realize they did not bring any oil.  They carried a lamp every Sunday and somehow thought it would light itself or give off light simply because it was a lamp, or who knows what irrational reason. 

You know that word translated foolish?  It means “stupid.”  It’s the word moros.  Look familiar?  I think it’s the word we get “moron” from.  Don’t be a moron.  If you plan to carry a lamp, put some oil in it.  And, according to the parable, carry some extra.  Sitting on the pew never has saved anyone, and it won’t save you.

​“What to me is the multitude of your sacrifices? says the LORD; I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fat of well-fed beasts; I do not delight in the blood of bulls, or of lambs, or of goats. “When you come to appear before me, who has required of you this trampling of my courts? Bring no more vain offerings; incense is an abomination to me. New moon and Sabbath and the calling of convocations— I cannot endure iniquity and solemn assembly. Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hates; they have become a burden to me; I am weary of bearing them. When you spread out your hands, I will hide my eyes from you; even though you make many prayers, I will not listen; your hands are full of blood. ​Wash yourselves; make yourselves clean; remove the evil of your deeds from before my eyes; cease to do evil, learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless, plead the widow's cause, Isa 1:11-17.

Dene Ward

Lucas lives five minutes from the beach.  On our first visit we drove across Santa Rosa Sound and strolled the white sand beach, watching the sandpipers’ maniacal little legs dodging the last remnant of a wave as it crept across the shiny wet sand, and looked across the emerald green water for the first sign of a dolphin breaking the surface while the seagulls screamed overhead hoping for an errant crust or dropped crumb.  We plodded along, our feet sinking into the mud, leaning into westerly winds that would blow the curls right out of your hair, our words caught just as they slipped out of our mouths and blown away like dust bunnies in a fan.

We weren’t alone.  Pale-skinned tourists in floppy sunhats scoured the beach for shells.  Children played tag with the waves.  Older tweens and teens, their hands and legs breaded with sand, carried pails of mud for sandcastles and sculptures, and gathered shells and driftwood for ornamentation.  Lovers of all ages strolled hand in hand, eyes only for one another.

Condos line the beach, ten or more stories of glittering glass reflecting the sun, balconies furnished with umbrella-ed tables and cushioned chairs and potted plants of the sort than can tolerate the sun, the heat, and the salt spray that constantly drifts over the narrow spit of land between the surf and the sound.

“Wonder what one of those costs?” we often ask, telling ourselves we would never tire of the view and the calming rhythm of waves pounding the shore again and again and again.

But guess what?  Before long we’d had enough and we piled back into the car for the five minute drive back to the apartment.  The first time we visited, we walked on the beach three times in three days, but soon it was down to one almost obligatory visit, and this past visit?  We didn’t go a single time.

It’s easy to get used to things.  When we moved to Illinois for two years, I saw snow for the first time in my 21 years of life.  Guess who was out playing in it, digging tunnels through eave-high drifts, throwing snowballs with mittened hands, and building snowmen?  All of our neighbors stayed inside where it was warm, peering through their blinds at the crazy people from Florida.

A few weeks ago a YouTube video went viral.  It pictured something not often seen these days—a young man helping a poor, elderly woman check out in a grocery line one item at a time because she was not sure she had enough money, and doing it with patience, respect, and kindness.  Isn’t it sad that something like that has become so rare that, just like a landlubber at the beach or a Floridian in the snow, everyone stops in their tracks to look?

And isn’t it sad that some Christians need the example that young man set?  Giving courtesy and respect where it is deserved and even where it isn’t, yielding our rights, speaking with kindness, affording others the right to make the same mistakes we do without incurring our wrath, and realizing that not everyone operates on OUR timetables—THAT should be so common among us that no one gives it a second thought and certainly wouldn’t take a video of our actions as something rare—even behind a steering wheel.  Instead, we pat ourselves on the back for doing these things once every now and then.

We should be like the waves incessantly breaking on this world with mercy, grace, and kindness, whether the shore is rough and rocky or flat and smooth.  No one ever questions whether the next wave will come.  It rolls in again and again, over and over and over without a break in the rhythm, so regularly that no one stops to say, “Look!  Here comes another wave.”  If it didn’t come, it wouldn’t be a wave.

Are you a wave, or just an occasional splash?

Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation. 1Pet 2:12

Dene Ward

We are well over a thousand now—and counting.  I have been writing up these little things so long I can’t watch something happen without thinking the phrase above.  In fact, more than once Keith and I have looked at one another after some oddball event and said it in unison: “There oughtta be a devo in that.”

“Go to the ant, thou sluggard.  Consider her ways and be wise,” Solomon wrote.  “Look at the birds,” Jesus said, and, “Consider the lilies.”  Both of them taught valuable lessons from the things around them.  The parables were nothing more than every day occurrences with analogous meanings.  Parables were not uncommon in the Old Testament either, and many of the prophets taught lessons with the visual aids of their own lives or actions.  Hosea and Ezekiel come instantly to mind.

Even the writers of the New Testament used athletic contests, farming truisms, and anatomical allegories to teach us what we need to know about our relationship with God, with one another, and in our homes and communities.  Telling stories is a time-honored and perfectly scriptural way of teaching God’s word.

In fact, maybe if we started looking at the world that way, at the things that happen in our daily lives as if they had some meaning beyond the mundane, some deeper spiritual use, it might just be that our lives would change for the better.  It might be easier to see where we need to grow, maybe a place we need to make a one-eighty before we get much further down the road.  There is something about watching a dumb animal and thinking, “I didn’t even have that much sense,” that will straighten out your attitude.

If I have done nothing else for you in all these years, maybe I have accomplished this.  Maybe you have learned to look at the things around you and say, “There IS a devo in that—I need to make a change.”

But ask the beasts, and they will teach you; the birds of the heavens, and they will tell you; or the bushes of the earth, and they will teach you; and the fish of the sea will declare to you. Who among all these does not know that the hand of the LORD has done this? Job 12:7-9.

Dene Ward

 Yesterday I paid the end-of-the-month bills.  The largest one, the one we never expected to have in our old age, was the mortgage payment.  I looked at the bill in order to be sure I made the check out appropriately and laughed out loud. It said, “Mortgage Servicing Company.”  This is the company we cannot get to answer our phone calls or letters.  In fact, when we sent a follow up letter complaining because they had never answered the first, we finally received a reply that said, “We already got this request so we are ignoring this letter.  We are still thinking about it.”  That was nearly two years ago.  So much for “servicing.”  We are supposed to service them with our money, while they do nothing at all to service us except complain if we ask a question.

 Yet after all these years, I recognize the problem because it has found its way into the Lord’s Body too. Probably 90% of the complaints I hear about local congregations are from people who think they should receive more service than they give, if they give any at all.  Have we forgotten whom we worship, the greatest Servant of all?  Do we have any idea what the word “disciple” means, learning to follow in His footsteps?  No, we are focused on what we want, what is comfortable or convenient for us, what we believe we need, and how no one is giving us those things. 

 What we ought to be asking ourselves is, do I do for them what I am expecting them to do for me?  No one visited me in the hospital.  How many have I visited in the hospital in the past month?  No one called when I missed a couple of weeks ago.  How many have I called?  No one invited me into their home.  How many have I invited into mine? And we usually have excuses for why we haven’t that seem perfectly legitimate to us.  Why won’t we assume our brothers and sisters have equally legitimate reasons? [Love] bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things 1 Cor 4:7.  Could it be that my love for others is lacking?

 I have noticed that when I focus too much on myself, my trials, my hardships, the problems of life that come my way, I will inevitably lose my focus on my brothers and sisters in the Lord and the needs of the Body.  Once I leave my pity party (they are not much fun anyway!) and begin to serve the needs of others, my mood improves, my energy grows, and I am happy and even eager to do for others.  That is what being a servant of the Lord is all about.  We should teach that from the beginning.  Paul obviously did because as soon as he converted Lydia she besought us, saying, If you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come into my house, and abide there. And she constrained us Acts16:15.  This woman knew what being a disciple of Christ was all about, and it was not all about her. 

 Would that we would all learn what a brand new babe in Christ seemed to automatically know.

 Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins.  Show hospitality to one another without grumbling.  As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God's varied grace: whoever speaks, as one who speaks oracles of God; whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies—in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. To him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen1Pet 4:8-11

Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. For if anyone thinks he is something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself. But let each one test his own work, and then his reason to boast will be in himself alone and not in his neighbor Gal 6:2-4

Dene Ward

 Forty years ago we vacationed in the Smokies spending some time in Maggie Valley, wandering here and there and eventually winding up in the back room of the Pottery Barn, where a potter spun her wheel, both entertaining and enlightening the tourists in her art.  We watched as she fashioned a vessel about eight inches high, widening to four or five inches in girth.  As the gray, wet slurry washed over her hands and down her fingers she explained that she planned to make an intricate lip that curled outward.  As the pot continued to rotate under her hands she began that lip only to have it collapse about a third of the way around.  With hardly even a sigh she began again.  This time she might have made it an inch farther before it once again fell in a heap, this time taking part of the pot with it.  She repaired the pot before beginning on the lip yet again—only to lose it even sooner. 

 At that point she looked up to us and said, “Well, folks, there is something wrong with this clay so I will have to change my plans and make a plain old straight lip instead of the one I prefer.”  Instantly my mind went to Jeremiah 18—finally, I understood it.

 The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD:  rise, and go down to the potter's house, and there I will let you hear my words.”  So I went down to the potter's house, and there he was working at his wheel.  And the vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter's hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as it seemed good to the potter to do  Jeremiah 18:1-4

 Of course, Jeremiah is speaking of the nation Israel, not individual people, but Paul uses the same imagery in 2 Tim 2:20-22.

 Now in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver but also of wood and clay, some for honorable use, some for dishonorable.  Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable, he will be a vessel for honorable use, set apart as holy, useful to the master of the house, ready for every good work.  So flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart. 2 Timothy 2:20-22.

 Here is the gist of it—God will use us one way or the other.  Yes, we have a choice how He uses us, whether we choose to be malleable clay or marred clay, vessels of honor or vessels of dishonor.  But we will be used, period.

 I imagine you have some pottery in your home, or have at least seen some.  I have a beautiful vase given to me by one of my former piano students.  I will always keep that vase in a place of honor—a shelf where everyone can see and admire it.  It is a vessel of honor.

 My grandmother had some beautiful pottery as well.  But she had one piece of pottery she kept under the bed.  If you’re over 60, you know where this is going.  For the rest of you, remember, back in my grandmother’s day no one had running water in the house.  Keith didn’t even have running water until he was 15.  That pottery under the bed was a necessary item—a chamber pot.  Especially where Keith lived—way up in the Ozarks, next door to Jed Clampett.  In the winter no one wanted to traipse outside in the middle of the night in the snow to the outhouse.  But no matter how useful—how necessary—that thing was, no one would have considered it a vessel of honor!

 So the question this morning is NOT will God use you, but how will He use you?  That’s the only thing you have a choice about.  Will you be a beautiful vase or a chamber pot?

The Lord has made everything for His purpose, even the wicked for the day of trouble, Proverbs 16:4.

Dene Ward

We just returned from a birthday party—a double birthday party, which meant twice as many guests, twice as many cakes, and twice as many gifts.  It also meant twice as much time unwrapping the gifts. 

That last part did not bother Silas at all, but it seemed to bother Judah a little.  He started playing with one gift and then was handed yet another to unwrap.  So he had to stop playing and unwrap.  Once it was done, he started playing again, sometimes even went back to the first one he had unwrapped, but then he would be handed another.  You could almost see his little brain forming the thought, “There is such a thing as too many gifts.” 

The next morning even Silas had trouble with the number of gifts.  I sat and watched him go from one to the other, back and forth.  I wondered if he wasn’t finally realizing, you can only play with one toy at a time.

Have you ever read Proverbs 31 then slumped your shoulders in defeat and thought, “I can’t possibly be that woman?”  Take heart.  God does not expect you to have every gift this woman has, nor to play with them all at once.  Just think for a minute:  what does he tell those Corinthians in chapter 12?  Some of you have this gift; some of you have that one.  Some of you have yet another.  Don’t try to be what you are not—just use what I give you the best you can (the Ward version).

Cooking I can handle, most of the time.  Bookkeeping I have down pat.  But the only things I can do with a needle and thread are sew on a button, take up a hem, and mend a seam.  I can’t darn, quilt, crochet or knit.  I have made clothes and worn them, but I consigned them to an early death as soon as I had replacements.  I have finally learned to master the pressure canner instead of cringing in fear, but I couldn’t decorate one wall much less a whole house—I have no eye for it.

Do you see the point?  The Proverbs 31 woman is the ideal.  God lists it all, and it gives us some sense of duties in the home.  What it doesn’t do is command us to be some sort of Jill-of-all-Trades Renaissance Woman.  It just says, this is where the center and purpose of your life and everything you accomplish in it must be—your family.  Be the best cook or the best seamstress or the best gardener or the best organizer or the best comforter or the best home businesswoman—or maybe two or three of those--whatever present God has given you to unwrap.  Do that, and you have “done what you could.”

For as in one body we have many members, and the members do not all have the same function, so we, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another. Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them: if prophecy, in proportion to our faith; if service, in our serving; the one who teaches, in his teaching; the one who exhorts, in his exhortation; the one who contributes, in generosity; the one who leads, with zeal; the one who does acts of mercy, with cheerfulness, Rom 12:4-8.

Dene Ward