Jeremy L. Berg

I have a love-hate relationship with personal assessments.  I love self-discovery and hold the ancient motto of Socrates in high regard: “Know thyself” and “The unexamined life is not worth living.”  I’ve done the Myers-Briggs, StrengthsFinder, Spiritual Gifts inventory, EQ assessments, and currently doing some church planter assessments.

Here’s my main frustration and source of confusion in all such tests: They don’t easily separate ABILITY from one’s INTERESTS/LIKES. What do I mean? Well, I just happen to be very good at many things I do not particularly enjoy.  I could be successful in accomplishing many tasks but not feel comfortable or fulfilled doing them.

How about some examples:

1. In college, my first direction of study was Education and I was on course to become a math teacher because I liked the idea of teaching and I was good at math.  Fortunately, the light went on upstairs and I realized, “I hate math!”  I could have taught it well but I would have been miserable doing it.  Very miserable.

2. I happen to be very organized and have a degree of administrative abilities.  But I don’t enjoy either and would go insane taking a job that majored on administrative and organizational tasks.  I have the abilities, but I don’t find any joy in it.

3. When it comes to ministry this has been a great point of confusion for me.  In 2005, I answered the call of God to be a willing servant of God in my hometown of Mound attempting to reach the local youth for Christ by being an entrepreneurially minded, apostolic leader who successfully planted a new ministry that had a degree of success.  The entire time I felt out of my comfort zone, like I should be doing something else that fits my personality, gifts and passions.  But my highest value at this point in my journey was not natural giftedness, personal fulfillment, ministering in my “sweet spot” and so on.  My highest value was obedience to the call of God and trusting that He can use me to do great things even if I’m being stretched beyond my comfort level.  And I had a great burden for the community and was willing sacrifice a lot to see God’s Kingdom on the move.

Bottom line: I proved to have a great deal of ability in the area of entrepreneurial leadership and ministry planting.  I am not quite sure if I necessarily liked it or felt naturally wired for it.  It was a season of obedience and self-sacrifice for the Lord.

So, here’s my questions for the day:

When faced with two career/ministry options where one will have the greater Kingdom impact: Should we choose to do what we like and find more comfortable even if it has less Kingdom impact?  Or should we say yes to the less comfortable, less enjoyable, greater risk option because it may produce greater results for the Kingdom?

Have we lost sight of the Kingdom call to self-sacrifice and obedience in ministry?  I can’t help but think of Moses who was called by God to go to Egypt and do a job he didn’t want to do and didn’t feel gifted to do it.  He obeyed, and that’s what made him a great hero of the faith.  Then there’s Paul who seemed less than gifted interpersonally, but God used him in spite of his limitations. Jeremiah felt terribly inadequate, but obeyed God’s call to a hard and miserable task. And a handful of fisherman, who probably were better suited for blue collar work with their hands changed history because they dropped their nets at Jesus’ beckoning to become apostles.

I wonder how all of their lives would have been different if they had based their ministry choices on an online assessment tool?  Assessments are good, helpful tools.  I endorse them. But they can never override God’s sovereign call, and we must allow for some reckless obedience even when it means trusting God’s ability to work through our inadequacies.  As they say, God does not call the equipped but equips the called.

“Living life on the divine edge of God’s activity.”

Anyone else out there good at things you hate?  What do you think?