Read Ephesians 4:11-16 Gifts of Christ to the Church.
V 11 Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers.
Christ, who is the Head of the Body – the Church – also gives gifts that benefit the whole Church. They are gifts of individuals, specially equipped to work more in the public domain, nurturing the Church, giving it direction, and enabling it to grow through drawing people to faith in Jesus. ‘Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ.’ (v 12) These are more obvious gifts, and we tend to think of them as in some way superior to other gifts because of their public nature. But I want to draw us back to the best gift and one that Paul spends longer on than any other.. He introduces it this way in 1 Corinthians 12 ‘Are we all apostles? Are we all prophets? Are we all teachers? Do we all have the power to do miracles? Do we all have the gift of healing? Of course not! So you should earnestly desire the most helpful gifts.
But now let me show you a way of life that is best of all.’
And that leads in to that wonderful chapter on Love. ‘Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.’
Let us all allow the Holy Spirit to develop and nurture love in our hearts!