Yesterday during Sunday school we read some of the parables in Matthew 25. The teacher asked for volunteers to read different parts of each story. I volunteered to be a servant in the parable of the talents and held out my hands to accept five Hershey’s kisses that represented talents from the Lord. In the end I had doubled my talents and received an additional talent from the servant who hadn’t made an increase, but instead hid his until the Lord returned. At that point my hands were full. Our reading led to a discussion of gifts, spiritual and mortal. As I listened and thought about how the Lord makes sure each of us has at least one gift I considered the doctrine that not only do we have gifts from the Lord, but also that He is willing to bless us with more. In fact, he expects us to make more of the gifts with which he does bless us.
In Melissa Young’s essay, Hands (found in the current issue of Segullah) she shares an experience from a drawing course she had when a classmate whose keen drawing ability captured characteristics in her face she was sure she was hiding. Amazed at the likeness staring back at her from his paper tablet she wanted to watch as he drew so she could learn from him. But as the desire entered, she was also reminded from some experiences of her own that some things cannot be copied or learned just by watching someone else with the gift, they come from the soul. Still haven’t read the essay? Go read it!
I love the idea that as we reach within to develop the gifts our Father has given us we can catch a glimpse of the person we are yet to become. As we work with Him to do, serve, develop, share what he has already blessed us with we bear worthy fruit. If we do this, I believe our hands will not only be full, but they will do what Melissa says, create beauty, comfort, and cheer, something worthy of being recorded, “on the fleshy tablet of the heart.”
What did you like/learn from this essay?
What helps you discover/develop the gifts that have been given to you?
What divine connection do you sense from the gifts you have?
Yipee!!! I’m the first to comment on your post Heather.
I loved the essay “Hands” ( I just read it at your prompting) and I dig your thoughts. I love your last paragraph-where it begins–”as we reach within to develop the gifts our Father has given us we can catch a glimpse of the person we are yet to become.” I love that Melissa related multiple experiences with others that led her to a growing realization of her gifts and how her hands could be used. Her mother, her friend in high school, her classmate the artist-it makes me aware of how much we need each others gifts to recognize our own. I love that through struggling with recognizing others’ gifts and then realizing that she did not have the same gifts, Melissa came to appreciate both her gifts and the gifts of others.
It makes me grateful for the unique soul in each of us is. Grateful for how rare our own gifts and struggles are and how comparing one gift or struggle to another to find their value can be so damaging. I guess it reminds me to be grateful for what I’ve been given and for who I’m becoming–but more importantly, for me right now, it makes me grateful for the gifts of others and how much I can learn through them…
From this beautifully written post and this particular sentence, “…as we reach within to develop the gifts our Father has given us we can catch a glimpse of the person we are yet to become.”, I’m reminded of how most of us have yet to discover our true gifts. The obvious, “out-front”, gifts we use and show to the world are many times just small gateways to the self-discovery and line-upon-line understanding of the our real gifts. The discovery of our true greatness and potential is a lifelong pursuit, and hopefully we never really feel we’ve arrived.
I enjoyed! This made me feel happy.
Wonderful, Heather! One of my favorite thoughts about gifts comes from Heber J. Grant, who felt like his one talent was the ability to work hard, and through that gift he was able to develop many others. I love how gifts multiply, and how we are constantly able to discover new things about ourselves and others.
I also love how an awareness of the doctrine of gifts can help create a sense of humility. There are many things I would like to do but have learned that they are not one of my five-talent gifts (through experiences like the drawing-class). Oh, how I would love, love, love to sing well, but no matter how hard I try to multiply my two talents in that area, I will never sound like someone who started out with five. I’ve learned that I have some one-talent gifts and some three-talent ones, etc. Everything comes from above, and I can’t take any more credit (or blame) for my gifts (or my lack thereof) than I can for the color of my hair or eyes. Knowing this keeps me humble about the gifts I do have and less resigned about the ones I don’t, while still enabling me to multiply.
I also love how the concept of gifts relates to Isaiah 10:15 “Shall the axe boast itself against him that heweth therewith? or shall the saw magnify itself against him that shaketh it? as if the rod should shake itself against them that lift it up, or as if the staff should lift up itself, as if it were no wood.” We may, through our efforts, develop ourselves into a lovely ten-talent axe or saw, but we still need the Lord to make our gifts truly useful. He is both the source of and the power behind all gifts.
I appreciated the insights shared about spiritual gifts. I know that I have been richly blessed with many spiritual gifts. The use of them though, in my experience comes when the Spirit moves me and uses me to do God’s will. I believe that some gifts come naturally and just flow in the moment. Others though, have to be worked at. For example, I am currently trying to develop the spiritual gift of tongues by learning Spanish. It is a righteous desire and I am sure that I can be helpful to others through this gift. But, this gift will take time to develop and a lot of faith and patience on my part and on the part of others I try to communicate with in Spanish.
Dorothy
I’ve prayed to know what my talents are, for guidance to develop them, for ways to share them. The answers haven’t been outright, but rather in the processes of discovering, developing, and sharing. It’s never not a process. I see something, I like it, I try it. If I like it enough, I’ll stay with it, work on it. If I don’t initially like it, working on it grows into love.
Like Melissa’s hands, mine are aging. Our souls, though, are aged. How “old” is my soul? I’m not sure, but I do have a pretty strong feeling it is directly related to talents. If discovering, developing, increasing my talents are a function of time, how much of that is my effort, how much is grace (they are gifts, after all); how does this affect how I see myself and others? And does this contribute to the building of the kingdom?
And, Heather, your statement of catching a glimpse of what we are yet to become emphasizes how important faith is! “The substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not (yet) seen”! Who is this May, really? It seems I need to exercise some faith in myself, being a child of Heavenly Father.
Thanks for the wonderful thoughts!
I’m struck by the idea of a talent lying buried in your soul. Sometimes it’s difficult to figure out what we excel at, but I think Melissa touches on something important: when the act or action or talent taps into our soul and reveals it– then we can exercise our talents and start to see our possibility. I love this idea you bring up, Heather, of having faith in our talents and seeing where that takes us.
Now if I can only do it…
For me, I can identify a couple of concrete “talents”, and the rest I think I’m trying to turn into talents. Im really hopeful that I can multiply my talents by sheer exertion and effort. Naive and wrongheaded probably, but it’s what seems to work for me.
If I don’t input a considerable amount of energy and sweat into something, I rarely find satisfaction at its result. And most of the gifts I notice are not spiritual gifts but other manifestations, such as with my running, piano playing, gardening, etc. Maybe someday when I’ve developed more patience and temperance, the Lord will work on me in more meaningful and subtle ways.
I have this feeling that I know my strengths and weaknesses and my problem is not so much developing or changing those but more accepting them for what they are. I’m not saying that gifts cannot be bestowed, developed, improved, or consequently lost. But, for me, discovering talents is more a process of learning to trust myself.
I think developing talents has more to do with developing self-esteem than it does about developing a certain set of skills. The most “talented” women I know are those that when one takes away their “skills,” they are just as valuable, as strong, as laudable as before.
I am grateful that I am finally at the point in my life (most of the time) where I understand that other women’s talents are a blessing to teach and inspire me. There used to be a time, sometimes there still is, when their talents would make me feel inadequate. I realize that inside of me too is a great mother, artist, friend and lover of life. I am grateful that the Lord has placed these women in my life so that I can evolve into the woman that I want to and was meant to be. My mission president used to say that we are gods in embryo. Inside myself, somewhere, I posses the ability for greatness. I guess that is what life is right?
Heather, thanks for turning me on to Segullah, I love your writing.
It’s interesting to read this because just the other day I was doing something for my calling and having a conversation with our primary president. She said to me “Kelly, I think this a spiritual gift of yours.” She of course listed what she thought to be a spiritual gift of mine. I realized that I felt uncomfortable with hearing that and made some sort of minimizing comment about what she said. We all can be uncomfortable hearing compliments, so I can appreciate that. But I think too often inwardly we minimize our spiritual gifts because we don’t want to be prideful or conceited or arrogant, etc. I’m not saying we should go around declaring our spiritual gifts to others, but we need not minimize them if it comes up in an appropriate conversation and certainly not minimize them inwardly to ourselves.
Thanks for giving me the opportunity to think more about this.
I’m so grateful for the insigths that have been shared. What a wonderful forum to increase our faith and to think about the things we are trying to learn and hoping to understand.
Thanks to everyone who has taken the time to read and share.