Scripture: Romans 12:3-8
Video Link: https://youtu.be/u8-QxbcMRtI
Audio Link: Stream Sermon – 30 Nov 2025 – Practical Helps by tawabaptist | Listen online for free on SoundCloud
Structure:
- Introduction
- Service
- Giving
- Mercy
- Conclusion
Introduction:
Good morning everyone.
It’s almost summer. Our trees and hedges are growing faster now. They will need a trim soon.
For many years I trimmed my hedges by hand, with a pair of manual shears.
It’s a bit of a workout and some of the branches are bit tougher to cut through. About a year ago I was given a petrol hedge trimmer. It is more powerful than my manual shears, and way quicker, like a hot knife through butter.
Both tools get the job done. One just requires a bit more time and effort that’s all. As much as I like my power tools, they are not suitable for every job. I still use my manual tools for certain tasks. Both are needed.
Today we continue our series on spiritual gifts. Most of the gifts we have looked at so far (in Corinthians 12) have been like my petrol hedge trimmer, they are like power tools, enabling you to accomplish more than you could by hand. Things like prophecy and discernment, healing and miraculous powers, as well as tongues and their interpretation. However, Corinthians 12 is not the only list of spiritual gifts in the New Testament.
In Romans 12 Paul has another list of spiritual gifts, most of which are more like manual tools (like my hand shears), more basic, requiring time and effort from us. Let’s read then from Romans 12, verses 3-8…
3 For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you. 4 For just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, 5 so in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. 6 We have different gifts, according to the grace given to each of us. If your gift is prophesying, then prophesy in accordance with yourfaith; 7 if it is serving, then serve; if it is teaching, then teach; 8 if it is to encourage, then give encouragement; if it is giving, then give generously; if it is to lead, do it diligently; if it is to show mercy, do it cheerfully.
May the Spirit of Jesus illuminate God’s word for us.
Some of you here may enjoy watching superhero movies. Films like Guardians of the Galaxy, Justice League, the Avengers and so on. One of the themes running through many of these movies is that no one person can do everything on their own. We are better together.
The individual superhero (whoever he or she is) inevitably comes to the realisation that, despite their special abilities, they cannot fight evil by themselves. They need to work together with others who have different abilities in order to save the world.
And this is Paul’s point in Romans 12. Each member of the church (the body of Christ) has a different gift. Some have a power gift and others have a manual gift. But all the gifts are needed for the body as a whole to function. No one individual can do everything on their own.
We (as the church) don’t need to save the world. Jesus has already done that. Rather we need to think of ourselves with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has given us. In other words, we should not try to do it all ourselves. We need to understand our gift and exercise it in a Christ like way.
In Romans 12 Paul lists seven gifts: prophesying, serving, teaching, encouraging, giving, leading and mercy. With the exception of prophesying, which is a power gift, the other six gifts are more like manual tools. They are what we might consider regular or everyday abilities. But that does not diminish their value. They are still spiritual gifts given by God.
Today we focus on the gifts of serving, giving and mercy. These three go together. They could be thought of as practical helping gifts. What then do we mean by serving?
Serving:
The gift of ‘serving’, mentioned in verse 7, originally meant ‘waiting at table’. Like someone who cooks your meal and brings it to you. The kind of service in view here is usually of a personal nature. It could mean mowing the lawns, making tea & coffee or looking after someone’s children. Any practical thing that helps other people.
Jesus described his own intention in terms of service and urged his followers to emulate him. For example, in Mark 10 we read: whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, 44 and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. 45 For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
As a demonstration of serving, Jesus washed his disciples’ feet at the last supper, the night before his crucifixion and death. Although serving others may seem quite menial and mundane, we never know how God might use our acts of service.
In John 2, Jesus instructed the servants at a wedding to fill six stone jars with water, each holding 20 to 30 gallons.
This was heavy time-consuming work. The servants had to get the water from the well. They couldn’t just turn on a tap. Backwards and forwards carrying water. Mundane manual labour. And yet these servants participated in Jesus’ first power miracle of turning water into wine.
Now there is more than one way to understand the gift of serving. We might think of the gift of serving as an enhanced ability possessed by certain individuals. Some people are better wired for doing manual tasks. They think in a practical way. Working with their hands to solve practical problems just comes naturally to them. They enjoy it.
We might also think of the gift of serving as an opportunity provided by God for a specific situation. Have you ever found yourself in the right place at the right time, with the right resources to help someone in need? Maybe a little thing like carrying their groceries or giving them a ride when they had been walking in the rain or fixing their car.
You might not always give them a ride or carry their groceries or fix their car, but on some specific occasion God gifted you with the opportunity to help someone and in helping them trust was strengthened and God’s love was shown.
As many of you know, Robyn and I recently took time off work to support our parents. For months I could see the day was coming when they would need our help and so I had been praying that God would allow us to honour our parents in their time of need.
God answered my prayer. Our time in Tauranga supporting parents was a gift of service to them. In between managing various crisis’s, we were cooking, cleaning, mowing, shopping and doing whatever practical tasks needed doing. It was a privilege. We got to be there for our parents and help them.
At the same time some of you helped us in practical ways also. Ewan led a couple of services for me. Brodie picked up some of the tasks I would normally do in the office. Angela mowed our lawns and Maddy weeded our vege garden. Others of you helped in different ways too. We received your practical help as a gift of service.
As followers of Christ, we are people of the way. It is not just the act of service that is important but also the way we serve. We are to serve in the way Jesus serves, with grace and humility.
Exercising the gift of serving requires more than simply having the time and skills to help others. It also takes a special understanding. The ability to sense what is helpful without needing to be told. Knowing when to serve and when to step back. Serving in a way that touches a person’s heart with God’s love.
In his paraphrase of Romans 12, verse 7, Eugene Peterson (author of the Message) says: ‘If you help, just help, don’t take over’.
The point is, whenever we exercise our gifts, we need to be careful not to overstep the mark. All the gifts have a potential shadow side. One danger with serving is that we might do too much for the other person. We might create a dependency or rob them of the joy and dignity of doing it themselves.
While it was a privilege to serve our parents, I would not still want to be there now. That would not be good for them or us. There is a time to serve and a time to let people do for themselves.
Giving:
Giving is closely related to serving. Giving means contributing to the needs of others. Making donations of money or food or clothes or whatever is needed.
Giving may be of a personal nature, from one individual to another, or it could be giving to support an organisation or a worthy cause. Jesus gave his life for us.
Giving (like serving) is a responsibility everyone has. Some people feel freer in themselves to give than others though. Marva Dawn puts it this way…
“One who is gifted with liberality gives generously not because they have much to give, but because they have a freer understanding of possessions and their importance.” [1]
If we truly believe all that we have is a gift from God and is his in any case.
And if we believe this life is not all there is, then we come to value material possessions in right proportion. It’s not that money does not matter. Money and possessions serve a helpful purpose in this life. But you cannot take it with you when you die.
In Matthew 6 Jesus says: 19 “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. 20 But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
Giving out of love for others has eternal value.
We are people of the way and as people of the way we are to exercise the gifts we have been given in a way that reveals something of the character of God. Generosity is a characteristic of God and so we are to give generously.
Again, in Matthew 6, Jesus says this…
2 “So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honoured by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. 3 But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4 so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.
Generosity is not only about the amount we give, but also about our intent.
To give generously is to give with simple kindness. Giving for the sheer pleasure of giving. Giving with pure motives, not for leverage or optics.
When the kids were young, we used to grow Dwarf beans over summer.
The remarkable thing about Dwarf beans is the more you pick them the more they grow. If we went away on holiday to the beach and stopped picking our beans for a couple of weeks, they would stop producing.
If we wanted beans when we came back from holiday, then it paid to ask someone to keep harvesting them in our absence, then the plants would still be giving a crop for weeks after our return.
God is generous. He gives us more than we need. When we share our excess with others, he has a way of making our crop fruit for longer.
Every gift has its shadow side. Giving should never become a substitute for justice. Giving large sums away to strangers, at the expense of your family, is not being generous. It is neglect. Being generous includes taking care of those closest to you.
If you are an employer, then pay your workers and your creditors fairly and on time. Justice is better than charity.
Mercy:
The last gift in Paul’s list in Romans 12 is mercy. Last but not least. Showing mercy is about helping people in distress. Lifting people out of a hole. Doing something for someone they cannot do for themselves. The good Samaritan (in Jesus’ parable) showed mercy to the wounded man on the side of the road.
Jesus showed mercy on the cross when he said “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do”. Forgiveness is an act of mercy. Saving someone from shame or embarrassment is an act of mercy. Donating blood (or a kidney) is an act of mercy. Doctors and nurses and home care workers are all agents of mercy.
Mercy includes acts of service and giving generously to those in need. There is considerable overlap with these three.
One of the reasons we went to Tauranga was to support Robyn’s dad who was having hip surgery. I took Malcolm to the hospital around 11am on a Friday. He was scheduled for his hip replacement at 1pm.
Malcolm went through all the pre-op checks with the nurse, then got changed into his (elegant) hospital gown and we waited… and waited… and waited… (like the Mainland cheese ad.) They say waiting is the hardest part, but that’s not true. Waiting is the second hardest part.
1pm came and went. 2pm came and went. Eventually, they took us through to the pre-op lounge, which is a room with lots of lazy boy chairs in it. The last room you wait in before being taken to the operating theatre.
Just before 3pm a different surgeon (not my father-in-law’s surgeon) came and told us a more urgent case had come in which meant Malcolm’s surgery had to be postponed. It was not the surgeon’s fault. The health system is under a great deal of pressure. You know the story.
My father-in-law was in a lot of pain. Bone grinding on bone. He had been on the waiting list for over a year. To get this close and be told you have to wait even longer, that was the hardest part.
This was out of our hands. We had no power, no agency in this situation.
We were at the mercy of strangers. They took us back to the waiting room we had been in before, the one without the lazy boy chairs. We sat in silence collecting our thoughts, nursing our disappointment, silently praying.
Fifteen minutes later the surgeon who had given us the bad news came back and told us he had managed to pull together a team and, although Malcolm was not his patient, he would do the operation instead. This was the best part.
The surgeon and his team showed us mercy. They went the extra mile for us. Who knows how many hours they had worked that week. We thanked the surgeon and Robyn’s dad had his hip replacement done, the last one that day.
I have no idea whether the doctor who operated on Robyn’s dad was a professing Christian or not, but he did show us mercy in a Christlike way.
He was willing to do the surgery. He cared about people and wanted good outcomes for his patients. He was not irritable or grumpy about it. He showed us kindness and compassion.
Jesus said, blessed are the merciful for they will be shown mercy.
Mercy is about the right use of power. To be able to show mercy you have to be in a position of power, relative to the person in need.
We are not all surgeons. We may not find ourselves in a position to help and heal like doctors and nurses can. As we get older, we may feel more and more like we are at the mercy of others.
Nevertheless, there will inevitably be times in our life when we are entrusted with power and have the opportunity to show mercy. In the same way the gift of service can be circumstantial, so too the gift of mercy can be circumstantial; an opportunity provided by God for a specific situation.
When it is in our power to help someone in distress, we are to recognise that opportunity as a gift from God and exercise mercy cheerfully. We need to keep our eyes open for the opportunities God provides to help others and be quick to respond.
Conclusion:
This morning we have heard about the gifts of practical helps, including serving, giving and mercy. These may be manual gifts, requiring some time, effort and sacrifice from us, but they are no less important and no less spiritual than the more spectacular power gifts.
What opportunities has God given you to serve, to give and to show mercy?
Let us pray…
God of love, we thank you for the different ways you have gifted each of us. Grant us eyes to see our neighbour in need, skilful hands to serve, generous hearts to give and a cheerful spirit to show mercy. Through Jesus we pray. Amen.
Questions for discussion or reflection:
- What stands out for you in reading this Scripture and/or in listening to the sermon? Why do you think this stood out to you?
- How are the spiritual gifts in Romans 12 different from the spiritual gifts in 1 Corinthians 12? How are they similar?
- Discuss / reflect on the two ways of understanding the gift of serving mentioned in the sermon.
- Have you ever found yourself in the right place at the right time, with the right resources to help someone in need? What happened? How did you feel?
- What does generous giving look like? How might you know if someone has the gift of giving?
- Can you think of some examples of showing mercy? Perhaps from the Bible or from your own experience.
- What gift has God given you? What opportunities to help others and glorify him?
[1] Marva Dawn, ‘Truly the Community’, page 126.
Tawa Baptist 