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SPIRITUAL GIFTS RENEWAL PARTY Celebration of Gifts Worship Notes Opening Prayer Welcome to Worship - Greet One Another Song WOV #718 "Gather Us In" WE CONFESS THE USE OF THE GIFTS Leader: In the name of our Creator, Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. All: Amen. Leader: We are here as the celebrating church, unashamed in our joy and again willing to be touched by the gift of life from God. All: Into our nostril God blew the breath of life. Leader: And we became a living being. All: Amen. Leader: We have been given great gifts by our Creator - gifts for teaching, healing and helping. All: We do not use the gifts as we ought. We instead choose to love the trinkets of the world, even though they rust in our hands. Leader: We have been given talents and abilities for the betterment of the realm of God on our earth. All: We make choices to build our own private realms and to hide behind walls of fear and greed. Forgive our neglected vows, our broken promises, and the sin which separates us from you. WE TRUST THE GIVER OF THE GIFTS Today is an amazing day! This is the day that God has made and we gather to give thanks for God's goodness to us. God has forgiven our sin, renewed our broken promises, and fulfilled our neglected vows in Christ's death on the cross and his resurrection from the grave. We are free because of God's great love for us. We are free to discover God's gifts and use them in service to others. We are free to live life to the fullest. We are free to love one another with a new kind of love. Praise God, the giver of every gift. SONG OF PRAISE WOV #797 "O God Beyond all Praising" SCRIPTURE LESSONS ON THE USE OF GOD'S GIFTS Ephesians 4:7, 11-16 (p. 1821) Psalm 100 (LBW p. 263) 1 Peter 4:10-11 (p.1891) SONG: WOV #784 "You Have Come Down to the Lakeshore" AFFIRMATION OF FAITH We believe in God, who created and continues to create. God came to us in human form - Jesus - to save a troubled world from sin and death, and give us the possibility of eternal life. We believe the Holy Spirit is God with us - working in and through us to make all things new and to give hope where there is despair. God calls each of us to discipleship - to belong - to reach out and to care. God calls us to be kind to others, to work for justice on earth, and to feed and clothe the poor and the hungry. God calls us to publicly proclaim Jesus as Messiah and Savior of the world. Amen. SPIRITUAL GIFTS - - (Share a message) STRETCH AND SING WOV #752 "Here I Am Lord" MATERIALS HANDED OUT AND EXPLAINED BENEDICTION CLOSING SONG WOV #744 "Soon and Very Soon" ________________________________________________________________ "The power that drives you and your congregation" - Neal Boese We are accustomed to gifts arriving in packages neatly wrapped and ready to use when we open them. We generally use them and then discard them when done or put them on the shelf if not particularly useful or just use them for special occasions - whatever the case may be. This is not the case when we receive gifts that come from God. They come in all sizes, all kinds of wrappings and are intended for use over and over again, all the time. Gifts that come from God never wear out; carry with them the resources with which to grow and are adaptable to all ages, to all people for all time. They cannot be bought nor sold but are the most valuable items of life. "The Earth is the Lord's and all that is in it." (1 Cor. 10:26), therefore life itself, in all its forms, is a gift - whether it be the tree, the bird in it or the lumber jack cutting the tree down to build his house. These life gifts are necessary but it is the spiritual gifts that give meaning to life. Unless that lumber jack can share God's gifts with someone there is no reason for his work, no meaning to his life. Life gifts meet needs in all arenas of life but spiritual gifts give meaning to life. The help us carry out the special task of bringing people to God, i.e. bringing people to an awareness of God's presence surrounding their lives. They may not be in tune with it but God is there. Spiritual gifts are the special instruments God gives for the unique tasks of the Church. Spiritual gifts are those given to carry out God's purposes. The use of our spiritual gifts is evidence or a demonstration that God's Holy Spirit is working in us, enabling us to do things we could not otherwise do. Spiritual gifts then are supernatural but they are not necessarily sensational, i.e. enough out of the ordinary to astound us when in use. Many of the gifts God gives, to convey spiritual truths, are quite ordinary in appearance, many are very quiet and unassuming, others are strong and controversial. In Scripture there is no one place where all the spiritual gifts are listed. Throughout the Old and New Testament one will find descriptions of life gifts and spiritual gifts given to people for use in carrying out God's plan for the world - to unite the people with and into God's Kingdom. It is not always easy for us to identify the special gifts we have been given but there are a great variety of resources now available to help define them, the Bible being our main resource. It is our personal enrichment and to the benefit of the Church that we make a special effort to identify and intentionally use these gifts. ________________________________________________________________ Name: Year form first completed: Date updated: Address:
Telephone: Identified spiritual gifts: Age Category: ___ Jr. High ___ 46-55 ___ Sr. High ___ 56-65 ___ 18-35 ___ 66 & over ___ 36-45
I would like to offer services at ____________________Church using my gifts as described below, and hereby provide this registration of my intentions. I realize that my primary responsibility as a Christian is to use my God given gifts in the everyday activities and contacts of my daily life. If at any time my situation changes altering my ability to fulfill my intention, I will contact the Church office to change or add more offerings, possibly reducing or increasing my time commitment as may be necessary. I wish to channel the use of my gifts and time involvement as follows (as best as I can determine at this time); 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10.
God is forever creating and re-creating and so new ideas, activities and experiences are an opportunity God presents to all of us. Please share your thoughts, comments, offerings or suggestions with one another and with the Evangelism Committee. Feel free to offer comments below:
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