For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb.
Individuality: Each Individual is precious to God and has distinct gifts, talents, goals and needs. All of these are to be played out in relationship with God and community. You could even call it Biblical Collectivism.
One of the core concepts of my life, and hopefully of my ministry, is God-inspired individuality. I believe that God made each and every one of us unique in our personality and spiritual gifts. And my passion is to help people realize that ONE THING that God created them to do. To find their niche so to speak. Here at YEC, we do seminar weekends called "Discovering Your Ministry DNA" and we are starting to trial run a small group called "Connections", that partially focuses on who God made us individually. Each one combines the individual's personality and spiritual gifting, to help us find out what that ONE THING is that God calls you to do.
This passion began to stir in me when I was in Germany doing some training for the Grip Birkman (another tool that combines our personality with spiritual gifts). I was sitting in the Western European Mission Board for the Southern Baptist (Humorous picture for you, think about sitting in Europe expecting a European accent, and then when they speak it sounds as if you are ordering at a Waffle House), asking God why in the world I was a pastor. It had been ingrained in me that a pastor was basically a grandfather. A pastor didn't ruffle feathers, he was just a wise person who gave sage advice, his highest priority was for people to be content and build a happy (not always healthy) church family. Words like leader, progress and numerical growth were for business not church. Yet I knew in my heart, God had called me to challenge and be challenged, to lead people beyond comfort into mission. I knew he had made me, what my father in law has coined, a directional leader not a devotional leader. So I thought that God had forgotten what a pastor was suppose to look like, when he called me.But in that training, it had been made clear to me that I could be a leader and a pastor. God knew who He made me and what He called me to do. He wanted me to be a pastor who challenged people to pursue God's mission. I also found out that He still wanted me to give good advice and not ruffle feathers for the sake of ruffling feathers. But in that moment I knew that I did not have to fulfill any cookie cutter definition that people may have about being a pastor.
I hope this is as refreshing to you as it was for me. Even if you aren't a teacher, that doesn't mean God hasn't given you talents that can help the kids you love. Just because you have a servant's heart instead of a speaker's tongue, doesn't mean that God isn't going to use that to bring people to faith in Jesus. God has instilled his plan for us in the way he knit you and I "together in (our) mother's womb." along with the situations our lives put us in. Individuality is God-inspired. But here's the funny thing, God inspired individuality is for the benefit of God and others. It is not solely for our benefit or whim and fancy.
This is our warning. We cannot allow our focus on individuality to turn to a focus on individualism!!!!!!
Individualism: Individualism is the moral stance, political philosophy, ideology, or social outlook that stresses independence and self-reliance. Individualists promote the exercise of one's goals and desires, while opposing most external interference upon one's choices, whether by society, or any other group or institution. Individualism is opposed to collectivism, which stress that communal, community, group, societal, or national goals should take priority over individual goals.
I believe that Individualism is one of the prevailing heresies (wrong teachings) in the Church today. We believe that the Gospel is only about my personal connection to God (I believe that personal conversion is a must but it's not the entire Gospel). We believe that we don't need others in our walk with Jesus. I.E. You don't need to go to church to be a Christian. We don't believe that our interaction with people has anything to do with our relationship with Jesus. I.E. I can sleep with my boyfriend or girlfriend and it doesn't affect my relationship with Jesus. We say that generosity is not essential in our relationship with God. I.E. What I do with my money or my time has no bearing on my relationship with God. Individualism causes us to be self indulgent and selfish in our walk with Jesus, far away from Jesus' call for us to "take up our cross and follow him".
So as we read the Gospel of Jesus let's stand firm in the fact that God loves us so much that he created us each individually with a specific purpose. Let's also stand firm in the fact that our lives are not for ourselves, but for His glory and for the benefit of those we come in contact with. Like we like to say in our leadership meetings, "It's not about you and your preferences".
