Lego Sets & Spiritual Gifts

When my son was quite young for Christmas, he had asked for a specific large Lego set that had a really cool castle with soldiers and a dragon’s lair.  He was thrilled when he opened it up on Christmas morning and saw the box with a picture of the toy all assembled.  When we opened the box, as expected, there was a big bag full of individual Legos and I spent a lot of time putting the pieces all together for him. He loved it and played with it the rest of the day.  The next day, he led me to a big pile of Legos on the floor. He had taken it all apart and now, he wanted me to put it back together.  I had to explain to him that this was the “fun” of Legos- for HIM to learn how to put them together so I showed him the instructions.  He tried for a while, but he quickly decided that it just wasn’t worth the effort, so he never played with the set as it was intended again.

This week as I was studying about Spiritual gifts, I realized that I have approached them the same way as my son did his Lego set. When I started, it seemed easy to identify spiritual gifts with other people, but it was difficult to see my own. Even when I looked at my patriarchal blessing,  I couldn’t help but wonder why I hadn't received the gifts that were promised to me.   Then I realized that I don’t see my spiritual gifts because I haven’t developed them nor have I put forth any effort towards them other than just waiting!  For some reason, I mistakenly thought that God gave spiritual gifts fully developed.  

 When we study spiritual gifts in the scriptures, we learn that they are given to every man, but the number and the variety of gifts differ. They are also given to testify of Christ and so that others can benefit. In Moroni 10 it states that spiritual gifts always accompany faith and faith requires a person to put forth effort. Elder Schmeil stated it simply in his October 2021 General Conference address:  “Faith to act & become.” This means that if we want the benefits of spiritual gifts, we need to earnestly strive to develop them.

 This made me think of the story of Nephi when he was commanded to build a ship.  At the time, he did not know how to build a ship, but through a lot of faith and hard work, he was able to not only build a ship, but successfully navigate it with his family to the American Continent from the Middle East.  To me, this example shows me that there really are no limitations as to what we can do with our spiritual gifts when we apply ourselves.

With this new understanding about spiritual gifts, I look at my patriarchal blessing in a new way.  It isn’t telling me about what is already mine, it is telling me to get busy if I want those promised blessings.  I now realize that I have a lot of work to do!

Scriptures & talks studied:

Moroni 10: https://site.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/bofm/moro/10?lang=eng

D&C 46:11-26 https://site.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/dc-testament/dc/46?lang=eng

1 Corinthians 12  https://site.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/nt/1-cor/12?lang=eng

Faith to Act & Become, by Elder ciro Schmeil of the Seventy: https://site.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2021/10/23schmeil?lang=eng&adobe_mc_ref=https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2021/10/23schmeil?lang=eng&adobe_mc_sdid=SDID=2082989EEECE7E3D-0F5F1A483B488144|MCORGID=66C5485451E56AAE0A490D45%40AdobeOrg|TS=1688003103&v=V01