The Mental and Emotional Effects of Being Spiritually Gifted.
Ya'll want the gifts of the spirit until you experience the suffering that comes with it. This is what it's really like being prophetic.
The gift of discerning spirits, mixed with self-awareness, and a dash of emotional intelligence, will have you somewhere in a room isolated from the world. But why? And how did we get here?
I’ve always been a feeler. But then, I became a hearer too. I can identify when someone’s attitude is off in a minute. I can quickly tell when a vibe has changed or when someone no longer wants my company. Toxic relationships and friendships have taught me a lot about how to read a room. My experience with people taught me how to develop my spiritual gifts.
When I became a Christian (for real), I was blessed with multiple gifts. I discovered these gifts through vigorous studying and application. The gifts I am referring to can be found in 1 Corinthians 12 in the Bible.
For Context:
Verse 4 Now there are [distinctive] varieties of spiritual gifts [special abilities given by the grace and extraordinary power of the Holy Spirit operating in believers], but it is the same Spirit [who grants them and empowers believers].
If you’re interested in knowing what the gifts of the Holy Spirit are read the full chapter to get familiar. In short, those gifts are:
Wisdom
Knowledge
Faith
Healing
Miraculous powers
Prophecy
Distinguishing between spirits
Speaking in different kinds of tongues
The interpretation of tongues.
Now that we’ve identified the gifts God gives believers imagine having all of them! (insert crying face)
Imagine walking down the aisle in a grocery store and “feeling” the need to pray for a random person. Imagine praying in your room, and you “feel” the need to pray for a specific issue dealing with a particular person. Imagine being around a group of people and you “hear” God whisper a scripture that gives you hidden information about something to come or something dealing with a group member. While this is a beautiful thing, imagine the warfare that comes with it. The amount of warfare and demonic activity that occurs when you are operating in your gifts is brutal. When your gifts aren’t submitted to God, you can find yourself experiencing battles in your mind and emotions when the devil comes to attack you. When you operate in the prophetic, the enemy has you as his main target. He only comes to distract, discourage, detour, and steal your gifts. His whole agenda is to cause you NOT to flow in your gifts. Not only will you experience warfare, but it's a part of the call to being spiritually gifted, and you can’t avoid it.
EXHAUSTING RIGHT??!! What started as a gift now feels very different.
The crazy thing is, I asked for this. I asked God to show me who he is and to develop me into the woman he called ME to be. I asked Him to reveal my spiritual gifts and prayed to experience him in deeper ways. Unbeknownst to me, the Lord sprinkled pieces of himself and his gifts all up and through me, and now I’m wondering if this is something I was truly prepared for. If I knew this was my calling, would I have asked for this?
It’s amazing to experience God through spiritual gifts, but when it begins to take a toll on me, what am I to do? Gifts come without repentance, meaning God can’t take them away, so how do I deal with this level of self-awareness and emotional intelligence? Lately, I have been struggling to feel “normal.” I crave to sit in a room by myself or interact with others without having this wisdom and knowledge downloaded to me every other second. Normal interactions that don’t require much from me are what I truly desire sometimes.
It’s hard to explain the weight of this thought but, I sometimes wonder if we know God at all. There was once a desire to be used by Him and to experience him in deeper ways, now that that has happened, we run away from the call in subtle ways. What started as a desire to get closer to God now feels like a burden.
If we pay attention to the bible and all those God chooses to use in this way, we see that they weren’t happy individuals. They seemed eager to do what God told them to do so that they could get on with their lives. For example, the prophets. Each of them had a heavy burden to carry (FOR GOD) and shared their discretion and concern with Him. Jesus himself even came to the point of wanting to re-nig on his assignment when it came close to his crucifixion. What does this tell and teach us?
God is NOT like us.
The fact that he gives us these gifts and the opportunity to use them lets me know there is a deeper reason for this. It tells me that God’s intentions are not our intentions at all. While we desired to be used by Him or to experience Him in deeper ways, we weren’t taken into account how that would actually go. He knows way more than us while we struggle to understand why. There are some things we just won’t ever know. There are some things we have to go through because we were picked by God. His reason is not to make us suffer; it’s to use us to reveal Himself to those who don’t know him. Yes, He desires to use us, but we have to accept that being used by God is not always ideal or glamorous.
I’m developing a deeper sense of who I am. I’m way past the point of being “gifted”, I’m entering into the understanding of “being used.”
Accepting the call on my life was not easy, nor was it what I thought it would be. But, if this is the way God desires to use me and His plan is to prosper and not to harm me (Jeremiah 29:11), then I have to TRUST that this call is meaningful. I have to accept the ways God wants to use me and be okay with that. I have to get comfortable with being uncomfortable as I grow deeper in my wisdom and knowledge of God. I must begin to expect suffering when it comes to being used. Every assignment or mission God gives me won’t make sense, feel good, or instantly manifest. The weight of the assignment can NOT be medicated through worldly outlets.
Because God gave me these gifts, I must constantly go to God for the antidote.
I must go to God even when the weight of the assignment is crushing me mentally, emotionally, and sometimes financially. What I see, hear, and experience is for the purpose of edifying others and exposing them to God’s spirit. That is the understanding! That is how you deal with the weight. You learn how to accept what and who you are as a spiritually gifted individual. This does not sound pretty or glamorous, but it is the truth.
The church hasn’t done a great job of speaking on the mental and emotional effects because it will possibly turn people away from the prophetic. Not everyone is called to the prophetic, but those who are understand that this assignment is not all fun and games. It’s real! It’s not fun; it’s not enjoyable most times. It does, however, make you closer to God and pulls out a version of you that can withstand life’s difficulties. It’s a lifestyle that helps you walk in fellowship with Jesus and help His people in many different ways. Once you accept how different and gifted you are, you stop desiring “normal” and begin to embrace the supernatural. When you accept your calling, you start to walk differently, and God begins to edify and grow you more. When you accept that your life won’t ever look like everyone else’s, you’re mental and emotional health increases. God can begin soothing the suffering when you stop resisting.
Yea, it sucks sometimes BUT, it’s a beautiful experience when your gifts are used to bring someone closer to God. It’s a beautiful thing to see when broken people find Jesus for the first time. It’s amazing to see the sick become healed and those who lived in darkness finally experience light. Just know that there are many ups and downs to this walk, but it will build you up and cause you to experience God in a very special way.
Trust God with what you feel, and don’t be afraid to express how you feel at times. He knows what you’re feeling, and He desires to soothe the suffering in His very own special way. Don’t rely on yourself to do so! Let the one who made you show you how to deal with and accept your gift(s). Don’t run away from the suffering, allow God to show you how to endure. Ask Him to help you accept your calling and to give you a strategy to embrace it.
Don’t let the weight of your calling cause you to run away from who you were meant to be. It’ll all make sense one day and you’ll have the experience of a lifetime.
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