A teaching post for women who have been sitting on gifts God gave them for someone else
“Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms.”
— 1 Peter 4:10 (NIV)
There is a woman somewhere in your world who is waiting for something only you can give her.
She may be waiting for a word of encouragement that she is too ashamed to ask for. She may be waiting for someone to organize the thing that keeps falling through the cracks, the thing that has been a quiet source of chaos in her community. She may be waiting for someone to teach clearly and boldly the truth that she’s been circling but hasn’t been able to name. She may be waiting for someone to see her — really see her — and reflect back to her that she matters.
She is waiting for you.
Not the idealized version of you who has your gifts perfectly developed and your confidence fully assembled. The real you. Imperfect, still-learning, some days doubting whether you have anything worth offering — you.
The spiritual gifts God placed in you were not given for your benefit. They were given through you, for the people around you. And when you withhold them — out of insecurity, out of waiting for the right moment, out of wondering if you’re really gifted or just imagining it — someone doesn’t receive what God intended them to have.
That’s not a guilt trip. It’s an invitation to take seriously what He placed in you.
Gifts Are Not Talents (Though They May Overlap)
Before we go further, let me be clear about what we mean by spiritual gifts — because this is often confused in ways that matter.
Spiritual gifts are not the same as natural talents. They may overlap, and often do. But a spiritual gift is specifically a divine empowerment from the Holy Spirit — given not on the basis of personality or natural ability, but sovereignly, for the purpose of building up the body of Christ.
This means a few things worth sitting with:
First, you may have gifts you don’t feel naturally skilled at yet. Spiritual gifts grow with use, with faith, and with the presence of Jesus fueling them. The woman who has the gift of teaching may not have started out as a natural speaker. The woman with the gift of mercy may have had to learn, through her own suffering, how to extend the compassion that now flows so naturally.
Second, your gift may not be the one that looks most impressive. The gifts that tend to get applauded in church culture — preaching, leading, the visible up-front gifts — are no more significant in God’s economy than the gifts that function quietly and behind the scenes. 1 Corinthians 12 is explicit about this: the parts that seem less honorable are actually indispensable. The whole body depends on every part functioning as designed.
Third, your gifts are not yours to evaluate. You don’t decide whether they’re significant enough to offer. God decided what you carry, He decided who needs it, and He is the one who will make it effective when you steward it faithfully.
Gifts Flow From Communion
Here is the part of this conversation that is most important to me — the part that ties this directly to everything the Mary and Martha story has been teaching us.
Spiritual gifts flow most fully, most effectively, most powerfully from a woman who has first been with Jesus.
This is not a formula. It’s a pattern I’ve seen repeated over and over in Scripture and in real life. Mary knelt at Jesus’ feet and received what only proximity to Him could provide — a depth of understanding, a sensitivity to His presence, a capacity for prophetic action (pouring out the expensive perfume when others didn’t understand it). That posture of sitting and receiving was not separate from her ministry. It was the source of it.
The gifts you’ve been given need the same environment. They grow in proximity to Jesus. They deepen in the seasons when you’re spending real time at His feet. They become more discerning, more effective, and more life-giving when they’re fed by genuine communion with the Holy Spirit rather than just natural effort and good intentions.
This is why trying to activate your gifts by simply doing more rarely works for long. A woman who has been with Jesus brings something to her serving that cannot be manufactured by better technique or greater effort. There is a quality — a depth, an anointing, a quality of presence — that comes specifically from time in His presence.
Serve from your gifts, yes. But first, sit at His feet. Let the gifts be nourished before they are deployed.
The Wasted Jar
There is a moment in the Gospels that most people find strange. A woman takes an expensive jar of perfume — worth approximately a year’s wages — and pours it over Jesus’ head. The disciples are indignant. Why this waste? they say. It could have been sold and given to the poor.
But Jesus doesn’t call it waste. He calls it preparation for His burial. He says what she has done will be told wherever the gospel is preached throughout the world.
What looked like waste to the disciples was actually the most strategic act of that entire evening.
I think about that woman when I think about spiritual gifts that are being withheld. Not because offering your gifts is the same as pouring out expensive perfume — but because sometimes what looks like the obvious, practical, prudent thing to do is not what God is calling us toward. And sometimes the thing we’re sitting on — the gift we’re holding back because we don’t think it’s ready, because the timing doesn’t seem right, because someone might not receive it well — is exactly what God wants poured out.
What if the thing you’ve been hoarding out of insecurity was exactly what someone in your world needed?
What if the encouragement you kept to yourself, the teaching you felt unqualified to give, the act of service you kept postponing — what if that was someone’s moment, and it passed because you didn’t offer what you carried?
The gifts are not yours to hoard. They were given through you for others. Steward them.
Why Women Hold Back
I want to be honest about the reasons women withhold their gifts, because they are real and understandable — even when they’re keeping you from what you were made for.
Insecurity. I’m not sure I’m actually gifted in this area. What if I’m wrong? What if I try and it doesn’t work? Insecurity is one of the enemy’s most effective tools for keeping gifts dormant. He doesn’t need to convince you to abandon your faith — he just needs to convince you that you don’t have anything worth offering.
Waiting for permission. Many women have grown up in environments — family, church, culture — where it was not safe to step into their gifts without someone in authority granting access. Some of that caution is wisdom. But some of it has become a paralysis that keeps you waiting for a permission slip that may never arrive in the form you expect. At some point, the stewardship of your gifts is between you and the God who gave them.
Comparison. She does this so much better than I do. There’s no point in me trying. This loops back to the comparison conversation — but it’s worth naming here, because it shows up specifically around gifts. You are not competing with her. You are serving from your design in your context to your people. That requires what you carry, not what she carries.
Fear of impact. This is perhaps the subtlest reason. Sometimes we hold back because, on some level, we know that if we actually offer this gift faithfully, things might change. We might be needed in ways that feel uncomfortable. We might step into something larger than we planned. Gifts deployed in faith have a way of changing the trajectory of your life, and that can be as scary as it is exciting.
None of these reasons are reasons to stay stuck. They’re reasons to bring your honest heart to Jesus and ask Him to give you the courage to offer what He placed in you.
The Someone Who Is Waiting
Let me bring you back to where we started.
There is a woman somewhere in your life who is waiting for what you carry.
She may not know she’s waiting. She may not know what it is she needs. But God does. He designed you, placed gifts in you, arranged your life to put you in proximity to specific people in specific seasons — and He intends for what He placed in you to reach her.
When you serve from your gifts, you are not just being useful. You are being a steward of God’s grace — that’s the exact language of 1 Peter 4:10. Faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms. You are the form that God’s grace takes in her life in this moment. That is a weighty and beautiful thing.
She is waiting. Not for a perfect version of you — for the real, still-learning, given what I have and offering it anyway version of you.
Go ahead. Pour out what you carry.
Someone needs what only you can give.
For Reflection
- What spiritual gifts do you believe God has placed in you? If you’re uncertain, consider asking people who know you well — sometimes others see our gifts more clearly than we do.
- Where have you been withholding your gifts — out of insecurity, waiting for permission, comparison, or fear? What would it look like to take one step toward offering them?
- Who in your immediate world might be waiting for what you carry? Is there a specific person or situation that comes to mind?
This teaching is part of the At His Feet, In His Service series — including a spiritual gifts assessment and study guide to help you identify what God has placed in you and how He intends to use it. Learn more at https://awakewomensministry.com.