Individual spiritual inheritance. Identity, redemptive gift and destiny.
Who am I – my identity.
How am I made – redemptive gift.
What am I made for – destiny or birthright.
Rom 8:28 And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.
Do you know His purpose for your life?
Have you accepted His call?
Rom 12:6 Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, each of us is to exercise them accordingly: if prophecy, according to the proportion of his faith; 7 if service, in his serving; or he who teaches, in his teaching; 8 or he who exhorts, in his exhortation; he who gives, with liberality; he who rules, with diligence; he who shows mercy, with cheerfulness.
Inheritance – Redemptive Gift. Prophet, Servant, Teacher, Exhorter, Giver, Ruler, Mercy. In proportion to faith in serving, in teaching, in exhortation with liberality with diligence with cheerfulness.
That gift is put in us at conception, and determines the course of our lives, regardless of whether we become Christians or choose to reject Christ. Each person has one primary gift that shapes how we think, feel and act by default.
It is how am I wired up or made that enables me to engage in the process of restoring creation. Psychologists term these differences in people as “basic temperaments”, or personality types. How wonderfully am I made.
Psalm 139:14 I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Your works, and my soul knows it very well?
Psa 139:17 How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God! How vast is the sum of them!
There are other contributing factors that will influence how the redemptive gifts are expressed in a person’s life. Do we know and understand ourselves fully? Yes – then it probably won’t matter. No – it is important to understand.
Parenting-Every child’s parents have their own redemptive gifts. Their gifts impact how they view the world and how they raise their children. Therefore, the parents’ gifts will leave a very significant imprint on the children, regardless of what the child’s own gifts are. Also, the potential character weaknesses of a parent’s gifting can impact the child as well.
If a child’s parents are servant and exhorter, for example, the child may grow up in a home where the exhorter is financially irresponsible and is living in denial. The servant parent will try to help meet the child’s need, so the irresponsible behavior by the exhorter parent may be reinforced by the servant. Skewing the proper redemptive gift qualities of the child.
The child may grow up lacking the knowledge needed to be financially responsible and be a good steward of resources. Problem especially if their redemptive gift is giver. These dynamics create insecurity, confusion and negative influence.
On the positive side, a child who has the redemptive gift of prophet and is raised by an exhorter. Prophets tend to have difficulty relating to people. Exhorter’s strength is the ability to maintain relationship with others. The child will most likely be much more relationally oriented than others with the gift of prophet. Because they learned relational skills from their parent, the prophet has the imprint of the parent’s exhorter gifting.
Birth order-Studies have shown that there are distinct imprints on a child’s personality based on where they are in the birth order. Firstborn children tend to be more driven and perfectionistic by nature. Second born can be competitive or very passive.
The baby of the family is often much more relational and horizontally focused. That does not mean that all firstborns are gift of prophet, and all babies of the family are exhorters. Being firstborn can intensify all the strengths and weaknesses of any gift (double the good, double the challenges).
Maturity-Everyone is at a different level of maturity in their personal development and Christian life. A person’s level of maturity will color how they live out the characteristics of their redemptive gift. Those who are immature or those who are not seeking to live in the fruit of the Spirit will exhibit the weaknesses of their gifts more than the strengths. While nobody has reached perfection, we should all be working on our character issues to grow up to maturity.
Gender -There are several issues regarding gender and redemptive gifts. It is easy to stereotype certain gifts, such as prophet, ruler, and teacher, as being more masculine and servant and mercy as being more feminine. Men often reject the idea of being a mercy or servant because they perceive it as being weak. This is a misconception as the gifts of servant and mercy have some of the strongest spiritual authority.
Women with the gifts of prophet and ruler often find it hard to be accepted, validated, and nurtured in a church setting. The natural boldness and strength of the women’s gifts can intimidate some men who traditionally occupy those roles. Both men and women need to see the beauty of God’s design, instead of trying to be something other than who God made them to be.
Woundedness-Everyone has experienced painful situations and relationships that have left them wounded. Wounds can change our perception of ourselves and of God. For example, someone who grew up with an abusive authority figure may become very self-sufficient and independent because they believe they have to make it through life on their own. This is not how God necessarily designed them to be if they are exhorter, servant or mercy gift.
In the prophet and giver gift, independence is motivated through the God-given design. How we are broken, the pain in our soul, our wrong response to pain, the coping mechanisms, and how we compensate for those wounds will influence how our gift is expressed. Sometimes people build walls of self-protection as a way of surviving painful circumstances. These self-protecting walls may not reflect our gift and may hinder its God-intended expression.
Left-brain vs. right-brain. Whether a person is right-brained or left-brained is an organic issue. Right-brained people tend to see the whole picture. They are generally more creative and emotional, because emotional concepts and messages operate in the right half of the brain. Left-brained people see the various parts, process logically and in a linear fashion, and think more strategically.
Most people have a fairly effective blend between the two sides of the brain and can transition between them with ease, while some people are dominated by one side or the other. Each of the gifts will be expressed differently, depending on whether the person is right brained or left-brained.
A left-brained teacher will look different from a right-brained teacher. A left-brained teacher will be more analytical and research-oriented, will compartmentalize, and will break down information into bite-sized pieces. Right-brained teachers will express their gift more emotionally and more relationally.
Left-brained teachers enjoy spending hours researching in the lab or in the library. Right-brained teachers love to be in the classroom and light up when the students ‘get it’. Some of the gifts tend more toward being left brained in their basic God-given essence and in their expression, like prophet and ruler, which tend to be better at being logical, prioritizing, making decisions, and organizing.
The servant gift is more right-brained and therefore may tend to be more emotional and expressive through actions, rather than vocally. The mercy gift is more right-brained, visual, creative, and inclined to the arts and worship. A mercy or servant raised and taught in a left brained environment may have suppressed those parts of their design that were not seen as acceptable, or they may have acquired organizational skills from watching the parents, but that does not alter the spiritual DNA of their gift.
Culture and timeframe. The family, community, and time in history in which a person lives can have a radical impact on how they perceive themselves and express their gift. The redemptive design is often revealed as a person is able to experience events and challenges that make their heart and spirit come alive. If you are a woman with a gift of ruler who lives in a culture or time when women should be seen and not heard, there will be a large reservoir of untapped potential because you were not given an opportunity to shine.
Your nation and family of origin also have an impact. Your family and your community or country have influenced you because that’s what they needed or what was accepted. If you were raised in a nation with a redemptive gift of prophet (such as the United States or Germany), you will have natural affinity for more of the characteristics of prophet, because it is what your culture affirms and cultivates. But this does not mean that your redemptive gift is prophet.
Redemptive gifts are not restricted to people. Churches have redemptive gifts – DNA God placed in the foundational vision. Regions and cities have redemptive gifts. Nations have redemptive gifts.
England Ruler. Wales Exhorter. Scotland Prophet. Ireland Teacher. Brazil Giver. Canada Mercy. France Exhorter. Germany Prophet. India Servant. Italy Exhorter. Netherlands Giver. Norway Mercy. Spain Prophet. USA Prophet.
We can observe external behavioral characteristics of the seven gifts. We can observe whether someone is quiet or verbally expressive. Whether someone has an independent spirit and prefers to work alone or to be in a group. Whether someone is task-oriented or relational-oriented.
Principle and birthright or blessing. Principle can be defined as a universal non-optional cause-and effect relationship. How things are designed to work. Birthright or blessing is how creation and people are supposed to be affected by our gifts.
Prophet, Servant, Teacher, Exhorter, Giver, Ruler, Mercy. Design Authority, Responsibility, Sowing and reaping, Stewardship, Freedom, Fulfilment.
Prophet Principle: Design. Design is the art of weaving principles together in order to produce change. The principle of design is foundational to all the other principles. God has called the prophet to study principles (to look at problems and opportunities) and assemble them into sets that produce results.
Birthright/Blessing: The passion of the Prophet is to once again have the opportunity to take themselves and others to the outer limits of excellence with God. Showing the picture of God so dynamic and real that it moves people out of the comfort they are experiencing and into a journey that will bring them to fulfilment of what God created them to be.
Servant Principle: Authority-God gives more spiritual authority to servants than other gifts because they don’t want it. Not infected with the empire-building germ like the other gifts.
The servant’s prayers for leaders carry more weight than other gifts. Highest level of authority over death spirit in spiritual warfare (in premature demonic attack) because God trusts the servant to do only what He has asked them to do. Authority over land (restoration of ecology).
Birthright/Blessing: The servant walks in holiness in their own life. They are willing to embrace a high calling of holiness and bring a sense of purity and cleanliness. When the servant hears truth spoken it resonates deeply.
The servant has the tenacity to reach out to the wounded and hurting (not limited to, but especially in family situations). The servant finds fulfilment in being a life giver to allow others to do their work. They provide cleansing and authority to others. There is a deep desire to empower others to achieve their best.
Teacher Principle: Responsibility-The teacher is to walk in responsibility in every area of their life. Their highest responsibility is to worship God. They must make worship a lifestyle, that they would anticipate and enjoy being with God. If the teacher is carnal, they will be selectively responsible and unwilling to impose responsibility on others. The teacher would rather work hard at persuading people to change rather than confront.
Birthright/Blessing: Intimacy-The teacher must know who they are as they walk out God’s will and then reveal the manifest presence of God to the rest of the body of Christ. The Lord wants to be present in the life of the teacher having them experience and celebrate Him.
Exhorter Principle: Sowing and reaping. The exhorter must embrace pain and suffering. The most difficult area for the exhorter is to suffer rejection. They must confront sin and be willing to face rejection from within the community. They must incarnate truth and earned authority through pain and suffering. The exhorter is able to be a world changer for Christ when they embrace the principle.
Birthright/Blessing: Know God personally and experientially, take time away from people to know God and have His authority. The body of Christ is dependent upon the exhorter becoming all God created them to be. God has called the exhorter to be a world changer!
Giver Principle: Stewardship-God doesn’t want 10% of the giver’s finance/assets; God wants all of it to establish relationship and to accrue generational blessing to pass on to others. Money is not the issue, it’s about their relationship with God. Example in Job 31:16: Job has an incredible relationship with God, is a steward of his money and assets. He walked in high justice, holiness and ethical behavior in all that he did.
Birthright/Blessing: The blessing for the giver is a generational anointing. The giver has the authority to release a generational blessing into their family line and community and be a life-giver through blessing (not just money). The giver is to have a generational worldview– think long term. Abraham received authority from God and passed it on. He changed the world and was considered a friend of God. Blessings come in the context of being dependent and in relationship with God.
Ruler Principle: Freedom. The ruler is to go from bondage to obedience to freedom. Rulers have the tendency to be focused on task and do what’s required and not walk in freedom. They must walk in spiritual freedom. Like the giver, they are good at making things happen in the natural, but God wants dependence upon Him. The ruler is to be first of all righteous.
Birthright/Blessing: Generational freedom from sin – central part of blessing. The ruler possesses a high level of spiritual authority and is called to earn authority in the heavens and release it to the generations. There is an immense authority given to the ruler. How does the ruler accrue spiritual authority to pass it on? By honoring God and going beyond obedience.
Example- David, a man after God’s own heart. The ruler is to release generational blessings into the world and spiritual realm (must learn to not only do the tasks but honor the Lord). Noah was an example of releasing blessing. The ruler must seek God to find out what He has called them to do and then honor Him in walking it out. No one has the spiritual dominion that the ruler has.
Mercy Principle: Fulfilment-By design the mercy gift is able to engage spirit to Spirit with God. This is the highest fulfilment for the mercy. Coming full circle to a new beginning. They must pass it to others to be fulfilled, not leave things undone.
Birthright/Blessing: The mercy must find fulfilment in God and impart that blessing to others. As the Mercy is sanctified, they sanctify their environment (time, people, place) and are able to transform the sinful into the holy.
Don’t be frustrated, appreciate!! Culture of honor. Our greatest hindrance to harmony is our lack of recognition of how God has hardwired each one of us to respond to Him. The greatest downfall in churches is being centered around uniformity – instead of being distinct and seeing how beautiful diversity can be in making us a ‘whole church’!