Got Talent?

-“I don’t want to play soccer, or baseball, or basketball, or football. I don’t want to join a swim team either!” Argh!

Sigh…

-“But Dylan, you are…”

-“I know, I know what you are going to say… I’m wasting my talents…”

This is a little dialogue that goes on at our house quite often lately. Dylan has incredible eye-hand coordination and, in my opinion, which is pretty worthless if you ask me, he is totally wasting it. He has gotten into his head that he doesn’t want to play any sports. And, to tell you the truth, I am tired of pushing.

This whole thing about talents is very frustrating to me. I consider myself rather talentless (here’s my insecurities speaking again). Therefore, I get really annoyed when I see gifted, talented people just … not using their gifts and talents…sigh…

I have to let go of that way of thinking.

Today was a good day to start.

As I was endlessly running errands earlier, in between stops, I heard bits and pieces of two broadcasts that really made me see things from a different perspective. First, I heard the last few minutes of a sermon from Pastor Rick Warren. He said something like: you are at the church you are because the church needs the talents you have…hmmmm

That got me thinking…

Later, I heard the last few minutes of a talk by someone I have never heard before, it was Pastor Dimas Salaberrios. This was a broadcast of Focus on the Family. At any rate, I heard Pastor Salaberrios wrapping up a speech about how God rescued him from the streets of the Bronx. Apparently, he had been a notorious drug dealer for a long time, and his conversion was nothing less than miraculous. He said that once he got out of jail, and was a fully committed Christian, His soon-to-be-wife took him to a church where they were going to have a mission that would smuggle Bibles into China. He said that his eyes opened wide at the thought of being able to smuggle for Jesus! He actually used the skills he had developed as a drug dealer to bring the Word of God into China!

As I heard that, I was like…WHAAAAT? It was a total slap on the face…but lovingly, of course…maybe more like Our Heavenly Father grabbed my face into His hands and shook it a little, like my Dad used to do when he wanted me to really see something…sigh…

Who am I to say I have no talents? Who am I to determine what God can and cannot use for the furthering of His Kingdom? Who am I to put limit on the Almighty? Who am I to judge how talents should be used? Who am I to decide when a talent is being wasted?

I cannot control what Dylan, Grant or anyone else decides to do with the gifts God has endowed them with. But I can control the way I look at their decisions. I can look at it from the perspective that God can and will use anything…even if we think we are not ready…even if we are not willing…even if we think we have nothing He can actually use.