“For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” (Ephesians 2:10)
Your SHAPE for God’s Service is a 6 session course which aims to enable you to understand the unique SHAPE God has made you, the gifts he has given you and how he might want to use you. We are all given gifts by God so that God’s Kingdom may be built up as each person finds the ministry to which God is calling them in the Church and on our ‘frontlines’ in the world.
Watch Dave’s introdutory video here
The Core Topics
Your SHAPE for God’s Service has a holistic approach. The sessions involve looking at:
Your Spiritual Gifts (God’s unique gifts to you)
Heart’s Desire (what motivates and excites you; what you love to do)
Abilities (your talents, knowledge and skills)
Personality (your character, personal qualities and strengths)
Experiences (your life experiences and what you’ve gained from them)
for God’s Service
The Individual Review
After the course ends, you are offered the possibility of a private Individual Review session with your life group leader or another of the church leadership, in order to explore what has been discovered, suggest possible areas of ministry (either in church or on your frontlines), and help you to make practical arrangements for action.
Course Materials
There is a participants booklet which will be available to all participants via the church office or your Life Group Leader, but all of the individual pages can also be downloaded below which is where you will also find the Leaders’ notes.
Session 1: PURPOSE
Session 1 video
To watch Dave’s video for sesion 1 click here
Handout 1B-Am I Called to ministry and God’s service?
Handout 1PR-Personal Reflection on your Experience
Session 2: EXPERIENCE
Handout 2A-Passages for Meditation
Handout 2PR-Personal Reflection on your Personality
You might also like to do the Enneagram online personality test too before next time. You can access it here (takes about 10 minutes).
Session 2 Leaders’ Notes – Experience
Session 3: PERSONALITY
Handout 3A-How is your personality energised
Handout 3PR-Personal Reflection on your Abilities
Session 3 Leaders’ Notes – Personality
EXTRA: Spiritual Pathways and Personality.
This week’s session looks at personality, and opens up the interesting question of how our personality relates to how we connect with God. A really interesting book on this is Spiritual Pathways – discovering your Soul’s path to God by Gary Thomas, which identifies nine different ‘spiritual styles’ or ‘sacred pathways’ which help people to connect with God. We are all different and connect with God in different ways. Which pathways you find most useful to connect with God with depends on your personality and character. You can read a helpful summary of this here and you can do an online assessment of which pathways you might find most useful here.
You can hear Dave say more about this on a Session 3 video Extra here.
Session 4: ABILITIES and HEART’S DESIRE
Handout 4A-What is your Heart’s Desire
Handout 4B- What are Spiritual Gifts
Handout 4PR-Persoanl Reflection on your Spiritual Gifts
Session 4 Leaders’ Notes – Abilities and Heart’s Desire
Session 5: SPIRITUAL GIFTS
Handout 5PR- Persoanl Reflection-Creating an overview of my SHAPE
Session 5 Leaders’ Notes -Spiritual Gifts
Session 6: SHAPING UP
Handout 6A-Reflection on your SHAPE
Handout 6PR-Preparing for my Individual Review
Session 6 Leaders’ Notes Shaping up
Individual Reviews
Individual Review Action and Summary Sheet – This sheet is used to summarise your discussion with your reviewer and passed on to the church office to note action that has come out of the review.