The New Testament often uses the metaphor of a body to describe the people of God. Just like a natural body needs all its parts functioning well in order to be healthy, so it is with the body of Christ. To put it plainly, a body that does not have all its parts functioning properly is not a healthy body. At Sound City Bible Church, we are passionate about people knowing their spiritual gifts and being empowered to put them to use. 

What are the spiritual gifts?

There are five primary passages in the New Testament that speak about spiritual gifts (Romans 12:6-8, 1 Corinthians 12:8-10, 1 Corinthians 12:28, Ephesians 4:11, and 1 Peter 4:10-11) highlighting some twenty different spiritual gifts. This list of twenty gifts is most likely not exhaustive, and there exists the possibility of other gifts being given to God's people. However, it's worth emphasizing the importance of these gifts as they are the ones specifically mentioned in the Bible. For a more in-depth description of each of the gifts you can refer to our "Gifted" sermon series or the "Gift Definitions" page.

The "Ordinary" Gifts

• Leadership

• Apostleship

• Pastor/Shepherd

• Evangelism

• Administration

• Knowledge

• Wisdom

• Discernment

• Teaching

• Exhortation

• Faith

• Giving

• Helping*

• Serving*

• Mercy

*The spiritual gifts test below only outlines nineteen specific gifts; they have paired "helping" and "serving" together as one gift. During preparation of the "Gifted" sermon series, we felt that even though these two gifts are similar, there are enough differences that they deserve distinction.

Take the test

Before someone can grow in the use of their gifts, they need to be able to identify them. Our belief is that the best way to identify your spiritual gifts is in the context of community; those who know us best can help us see ourselves more truly and accurately.

Another tool that can be helpful is a "gifts test." A test like this is certainly not infallible, but the questions that are asked can help you to think through ways that you are gifted by God to serve others. This test, along with feedback from the Christian community, will be helpful as you determine what spiritual gifts are present in your life.

Although a description of all the gifts are available on the site, some gifts have been excluded from testing. These gifts are: tongues, interpretation of tongues, miracles, and healing. The reason for this is that those specific gifts are difficult to test for and should be self-evident within the context of the local church body. If you believe you have any of those gifts but have questions or if you just want to talk to somebody about this, please email admin@soundcitybiblechurch.com.