I have been in the ministry since I was twenty years old. I am currently Executive Pastor at Calvary Church in Orland Park, Illinois. www.calvaryop.org
I have been in primary Church ministry, as well as, ministering in many social causes. I have worked for World Relief, Central Baptist Children’s Services and Adventures In Missions.
I have always been concerned that the Church has fallen woefully short on fulfilling the mission that Christ gave to us to love the world. Instead of having Churches that are mission stations, helping those in need, we have created “country clubs” meeting our own needs. I have written about this in my book, Close to the Heart of God. I believe part of this is due to the fact that we do not teach on the Spiritual Gifts.
Now, I will be the first one to say that the topic of Spiritual Gifts is full of ambiguity and is difficult to understand, but we must try. If the church is going to be relevant in the future then we must be involved in ministry using the gifts that He has given us.
I invite you to go to www.layministry.comand download your FREE copy of the Spiritual Gifts workbook and subscribe for the FREE RSS feed of this Blog. And then, let’s go viral! Send this Blog link, www.spiritualgifts.wordpress.com to everyone you know that could benefit from it. Together, I hope we can be the salt and light that Jesus intended us to be.
Ron Ovitt
Dear Pastor Ovitt,
Several weeks ago I was looking for your email address to contact you in regard to Catherine and Todd. To my delight, I found this website and downloaded your workbook. I teach a class at my church about Personality Profiles and Spiritual Gifts. I found your information refreshing and concise, and I will be using it in my upcoming class. I was also amazed that you encourage downloading the workbook at no charge. Not a common way to do things these days, but I am ever so grateful.
I mentioned it to your John last week and he encouraged me to contact you. My two session class begins this Wednesday and I would be happy to share with you how those who attend respond.
It has been many years since we have met, but I believe we will be getting to see each other soon.
Thank you again.
My best regards,
Barbara Dega
Dear Reverand Ovitt,
Your “country club” assessment of church is probably very close to reality. I have been moving through the lay leader classes within our church and each class is filled with
“we did this” and ‘”we have this” in our church but there is little mention of how they helped people.
I also believe that people are looking first for some common sense solutions to what seems to be complicated problems
and are simply unable to interpret sermons and scripture.
After they understand the common sense side, they might be more open to becoming active Christians and grow with Christ.
I would like to get the daily devotional of Pastor Ron Ovitt to my email.
Thanks Rose
Pastor Ovitt,
It’s my pleasure to have found your blog. Thanks God!
God is always be with us!
Greetings from Hong Kong,
Queenie
Ron,
Wow, what a great blog. I was blogging this morning myself, and I can’t even remember what it was I was thinking when I searched and found your blog, because I started poking around and reading. Great stuff!
I couldn’t agree more that;
“Instead of having Churches that are mission stations, helping those in need, we have created “country clubs” meeting our own needs”
but let me offer you this in slight contrast to when you said,
“I believe part of this is due to the fact that we do not teach on the Spiritual Gifts.”
while I believe that this assessment is correct, you have churches all over “teaching on spiritual gifts” that still never make the jump to helping the ‘least of these’.
Practically you might believe that a study is the best place to start…but I am of the opinion (because I have been there) that studies are what Country Clubbers do to make themselves feel like they are doing the work.
I believe with all my heart that learning comes from doing.
Case in point, we entertained two guys from Lifeway Publishing two weeks ago. They came in to learn about our ministry…and in particular, the way we are doing ‘missional’ (which is such a buzz word now).
As they followed us with cameras to our homeless grillout, our Eastside church restoration, and extreme room makeover at Caritas (houses homeless men and women in Austin), and our work at this place where homeless children come to socialize, study and just be loved on….they wanted to know how.
These two 30 year old Christian men….knew that this stuff resonated with them….and they’d love to do it, to take it back to Nashville and their churches…but just wanted to know where to start. I didn’t ask…but I bet they knew what their Spiritual Gifts were.
And the answer is simple, scary and messy….you just do it. You must, if you are the pastor lead the people in serving…and not lead the study. If you are passionate about a community….then it will become entwined in the way you live, where you spend your free time…where you entertain dreams and when you speak to people….you leave no doubts.
My spiritual gifts are in teaching, administration and something else besides mercy….HA!
But I love grilling hamburgers downtown, handing one to a homeless guy, I love meeting up with another homeless friend who plays a bucket for tips on 6th street (Austin’s answer to Bourbon Street) and playing drums with him, I love leading my Restore Community to make Care Bags for homeless guys and handing them out all over town when I see the guys with signs.
Doug…who responded to this same thread stated that;
“I also believe that people are looking first for some common sense solutions to what seems to be complicated problems
and are simply unable to interpret sermons and scripture.
After they understand the common sense side, they might be more open to becoming active Christians and grow with Christ.”
Why do we think we must interpret scripture and have a good handle on before we can become more active Christians?
I would argue that this is the churches fault.
Common sense said says to me….if Jesus said, Love your neighbor….we just do it.
Why not include people of little or NO FAITH BACKGROUND in our service? If we feel we have to jump through the hoops of faith, attain a certain status before we can ever become ‘active’ then we lose a large portion of sojourners to attrition.
Let’s include skeptics when we care for AIDS patients, the elderly, Single moms….that will resonate. They can related to being part of something bigger than themselves. It feels right when we love a neighbor….because that is how God designed us.
Food for thought….keep up the good work.
Tray,
Great feedback! I love the idea of “just doing it!” I think it is great when someone takes charge and does something. It is even better when they take a lot of others with them. I would tend to agree that simply a class would not be a good answer, however I don’t see many churches taking the gifts seriously. If they did I would think that a “what do we do to fulfill these gifts God gave us might be appropiate.” It is like a corporation studying “Now Go With Your strengths” and spending all kinds of time finding out what a person is really good in and never making a corporate change to redistrubute the labor.
I would have to say, if it was between getting to know our Spiritual Gifts and “just doing it” I would choose “just do it.” But does that have to be the only choice? Can’t we “Just do it in our giftedness”? We too have many ministries with homeless, addicitons, job training, feeding etc. and we try to use people in their area of skill, gift and passion. It makes for a great mix in long term ministry.
Ron
One more note…and thanks for responding.
This totally agrees with your point…but I’ll restate it the way i think …..we as churches, are guilty of equipping the saints for the sake of equipping.
We program the heck outta the flock…most larger churches have something going on every night….and most people think that they should (or are maybe expected to) be at most of them. We have left people NO TIME to love their neighbors. The best thing we could do is back off of most programming…do seasonal studies, and program in time to Love Their Neighbors or Serve Their City.
We are told to equip the saints for what? Works of service (or every good work)….and not to beat a dead horse….but we keep pushing the equipping without a corresponding push to works of service. Service is a HUGE part of personal discipleship.
Blessings
Tray,
No argument here. We decided to be an outwardly focused church awhile ago. We must reach out and love others. That is the purpose of this blog and I appreciate you adding a little “fire” to the cause.
God Bless you and your church as you minister to those around you.
This would probably be a good time to recommend some good books on the topic.
Externally Focused Church
The Present Future
and some great videos by Paul Borden (look up on google)
Ron