Tag Archives: stir up the gifts

March 17, 2026 · 5:07 AM

Prioritizing God’s Presence

A friend of mine recently posted a quote that I’ve been thinking about for a couple of days now. It says that we need Christians who prefer the secret place more than the public place and who love God’s presence more than the platform. It goes along with something I tell my son, “Your talent will get you on the platform, but your character and your alone time with God is what will keep you there. We live in a time where anyone who is gifted or talented can create a platform, get views and influence people. We’ve somehow elevated a person’s talent over their walk with God. I believe that’s why we have some of the best church services in the history of the world right now, but we’re having the least impact on the world in Church history. Prioritizing God’s presence matters.

There’s a story in Leviticus 10 that has always stuck out to me. The sons of Aaron, Israel’s first High Priest, offered strange fire before the Lord, and fire went out from the presence of God to consume them and kill them. Verse 3 says, “And Moses said to Aaron, ‘This is what the Lord spoke, saying: “By those who come near Me I must be regarded as holy; And before all the people I must be glorified”’” (NKJV). The “strange fire” has been talked about for a while, but the consensus is that God provided the fire in the Temple and these two sourced fire outside the presence of God. In other words, they used a human source for their fire and not a divine one. God reminded them and us that we must treat Him as holy and we must use Him as the source for our fire, talents and gifting.

2 Timothy 1:6 says, “I’m writing to encourage you to fan into a flame and rekindle the fire of the spiritual gift God imparted to you when I laid my hands upon you” (TPT). The way to keep that flame holy and to make it burn brighter is found in the secret place of God’s presence. It’s recognizing your talents are God given and the anointing comes by spending time alone with God. We can’t afford to bring strange fire before God by taking credit for our talents and receiving the glory that is due to Him. We must learn to separate the holy from the profane as mentioned in Leviticus 10:10. That distinction comes from knowing what’s from God, honoring Him with it and through spending time in that secret place with Him. We must prioritize God’s presence in our lives and offer holy fire to Him that recognizes Him as the source of that fire.

Photo by Encal Media on Unsplash

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October 4, 2021 · 5:43 AM

Raising Your Lid

In his book “The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership”, John Maxwell starts with the Law of the Lid. It basically states that your leadership ability determines your leadership effectiveness. There’s a lid on your ability to be an effective leader. The good news is that it’s based on your abilities. Every one of us have unique abilities, and we are able to increase our abilities thereby increasing our effectiveness. The problem most people face is that we get stuck in our ways and become complacent with our level of effectiveness. The choice is up to us to do the work, enroll in classes, read and spend the time and effort it takes to raise our lid. When we do, it exponentially increases our effectiveness.

There’s a spiritual law that works the same way. Our spiritual disciplines determine our spiritual effectiveness. There’s a lid on our ability to be effective Christians. Just like the other lid, it can be raised but it takes efforts on our part. In both of his books to Timothy, Paul was writing to him to help him increase his level of effectiveness. We know 1 Timothy 4:12 where Paul tells him not to let anyone despise his youth, but to instead be an example to all. He was reminding him that age has nothing to do with his ability to be effective. It had everything to do with how we utilized his spiritual gifts and attended to his spiritual disciplines.

2 Timothy 1:6 says, “I’m writing to encourage you to fan into a flame and rekindle the fire of the spiritual gift God imparted to you when I laid my hands upon you” (TPT). There are things we must do to keep the spiritual gifts we’ve been given active and effective. We must fan them, add fuel to them and rekindle them. Our daily spiritual disciplines will do that. When we add fuel to our fire by increasing our knowledge and understanding of Scripture we increase our effectiveness. When we increase our time in prayer, we increase our ability to hear God. When we increase our study and meditation of God’s Word, our lives increase exponentially. If we want to be more effective as believers, we must raise our lid through spiritual disciplines.

Photo by Aziz Acharki on Unsplash

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June 27, 2018 · 5:54 AM

Fanning The Flame

I consider myself somewhat of an expert when it comes to building campfires. I spent years in a scouting program, and I know to build a fire it requires three things: oxygen, fuel and heat. One of my favorite things to do on a camp out is to restart the fire in the morning from the embers. I move back all the ashes, find a small ember, add some kindling and blow on it. It doesn’t take long before I get a roaring fire and can start cooking breakfast. To me, there’s just something cool about starting that fire from the embers. It reminds me that it doesn’t take much to get a fire going.

When I read 2 Timothy 1:6, I think of starting that fire in the mornings. It says, “That is why I remind you to fan into flame the gracious gift of God, [that inner fire–the special endowment]” (AMP). Paul was reminding Timothy, and us, that each of us have God-given gifts inside of us that we have to keep going. They may be embers right now, but they can be fanned into a great flame. Just like a campfire, they need oxygen, fuel and heat in order to keep growing and to stay ablaze.

The heat comes from God. He’s the one who put the gifts in you. It’s up to you to add the fuel. The kindling required to ignite it is spending time in prayer and reading God’s Word. The oxygen needed to keep it going is putting your gifts into practice. When we neglect the gifts in us, we choke out the flame by cutting off its oxygen. God has created you for a purpose and has given you the tools you need to accomplish that which He created you for. It’s up to you to breathe new life into them and fan into flame those gifts.

Photo by Stacey Rozells on Unsplash

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