To be excellent and selective or prolific and second-best?

What a title! My darling little brother once said to me (he was 17) I could either be one of two types of people. I could be all things to all people, serve everywhere I wanted to, do everything I was interested in, wear myself out, but only do a second-rate job, and in the process prevent other people from stepping up and doing the things I was doing, half-heartedly, to the best of their ability. OR. I could be selective in what I do and choose to sacrifice some priorities for other ones and make space for other people to shine. What a choice.

Sometimes its so easy to get caught up in the 'If I don't do it nobody will' mindset. We think that we are irreplaceable, that we alone can finish the job or bring home the medal. Truth is God didn't call us to each be the entire body of Christ - to represent both the eye and the ear, the mouth and the nose, the arm and the leg, the toes and the fingers. He called us each to be individuals, each with different abilities and gifts. As 1 Corinthians 12:8-31 puts it:

⁸ To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, ⁹ to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, ¹⁰ to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the discernment of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. ¹¹ All these are activated by one and the same Spirit, who allots to each one individually just as the Spirit chooses.

One Body with Many Members

(Cp Eph 4.1—16)

¹² For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. ¹³ For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.

¹⁴ Indeed, the body does not consist of one member but of many. ¹⁵ If the foot would say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. ¹⁶ And if the ear would say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. ¹⁷ If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? ¹⁸ But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. ¹⁹ If all were a single member, where would the body be? ²⁰ As it is, there are many members, yet one body. ²¹ The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” ²² On the contrary, the members of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, ²³ and those members of the body that we think less honorable we clothe with greater honor, and our less respectable members are treated with greater respect; ²⁴ whereas our more respectable members do not need this. But God has so arranged the body, giving the greater honor to the inferior member, ²⁵ that there may be no dissension within the body, but the members may have the same care for one another. ²⁶ If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it.

²⁷ Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. ²⁸ And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers; then deeds of power, then gifts of healing, forms of assistance, forms of leadership, various kinds of tongues. ²⁹ Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? ³⁰ Do all possess gifts of healing? Do all speak in tongues? Do all interpret? ³¹ But strive for the greater gifts. And I will show you a still more excellent way.

The Holy Bible : New Revised Standard Version. Nashville : Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1989, S. 1 Co 12:8

Trying to be a prophet when our intended position is as an evangelist is as silly as trying to be a finger when our true role is to be a nose. Even sillier is when we try to be both at once and never quite work out how to bend or to smell because we try to smell with our knuckle and bend with our nostril. Ridiculous analogy I know but I hope you get the point!

We have been called into the body of Christ for a purpose and a reason. We are needed. We are necessary. However we also need to remember that just as we have a place so do our sisters and brothers and its not fair to them to try and do everything. Far better to have not enough people on the host team and have to ask a random member of the congregation to help out than to have the same old people getting worn out and resentful. Who knows they may like it! (The random - not the 'usual'!!!).

This is an area I constantly struggle with but hey I'd like to think I improve with age and exhaustion!!! Somehow I am always sheepishly amazed by how incredible things go when I delegate them to others and encourage them through it instead of steamrolling ahead myself...

So my question is what is your aim? To be excellent and selective or prolific and second-best?