A Good Word From Wesley

There is nothing higher in religion; there is, in effect, nothing else;  if you look for anything but more love, you are looking wide of the mark, you are getting out of the royal way.  And when you are asking others, “Have you received this or that blessing?” if you mean anything but more love, you mean wrong; you are leading them out of the way, and putting them upon a false scent.

Reading something like this reminds me why I am in Seminary.  Reading the above quote is beginning to make me think that my concerns with our attention to “spiritual gifts” may not be completely unfounded.  To some degree, I think the idea of a “spiritual gifts checklist” kind of mechanism is simply a product of our ad nauseam specialization in the workplace.  Aside from where it really comes from, I am not convinced that it does a lot more than simply provide another label for people to cling on to in an expedition to “find themselves” (as if to imply that hidden deep down is an already-determined person and personality awaiting to be found). “Hi, my name is Joe. I am an ISFJ type B personality gifted in Service and Rocking.” (I intended for rocking in a musical sense, but I can be found swaying back and forth for no immediate reason also).

My personality type enjoys open-ended questions too much to get bogged down with such labels.

Instead, Wesley recommends we pursue love.  Thomas Aquinas – much like myself – was known to make use of Colossians 3:14 in such a matter:

And over all these virtues, put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.

Whatever your gifts are, may you deliver and develop them in perfect love.