“You’re good at playing the guitar,” I said to a new friend playing at the church I’d recently started attending. “Thanks,” he said. “That’s my ministry.” There was that word again. Ministry. I didn’t know what that was or how someone “got” a ministry. I realized much later that my friend was using the musical ability he’d been given to serve others. When I took a class about spiritual gifts and discovered that one of my gifts was exhortation, or encouragement, I was a bit disappointed. It felt too plain. But I
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