Work Well with All Types of People

Ann Westrate

It’s not only like owning and recognizing your gifts, but recognizing others gifts and pointing that out and telling them that and saying that to them, because that’s an encouragement, and it’s showing a humility of I need you, not like so focused on you need me.

Melissa Kruger

Hey, friends, hey

Unknown Speaker

and we’re here.

Melissa Kruger

It’s the deep dish where we like having deep conversations about deep truths, preferably over deep dish pizza. Every time, every time I’m here, I’m Melissa Krueger. I’m here with Courtney doctor, and today we are with our colleague, Anne westrate, and we’re going to be talking about the working genius and how we work together, because everyone wants to understand that, how we all work together exactly, because it’s a little bit of a miracle. But before we jump into work, Anne, can you tell us a little bit about who you are, what you do for TGC, and what it’s like to work with us. Oh,

Ann Westrate

well, I’m married to my husband, Ben. We have three sweet little boys, so that’s a big part of my life. But for TGC, I get to, technically, I’m the director of events, so I get to oversee the conferences and help make sure those happens. But in reality, what my job looks like is keeping you two on task, because so often we just get talking with all these great ideas and things. I’m like, hey, hey, like, we have to do something, ideas like bring it back in. But that’s what’s so fun about it is, you know, just working with you too. They don’t pay you enough. That is true. She

Melissa Kruger

has to bring all of her mothering skills to basically, sometimes

Ann Westrate

feel like you’re my teachers, like, do you see the time?

Courtney Doctor

I know maybe, yeah, I know it’s true. It’s true. You’re the most mature

Melissa Kruger

sad. There’s still hope for us. We can change and grow. She’s helping us. Well, today, what we’re going to talk about is a working genius assessment. Now, people may have never heard of that, that’s totally fine. We’re going to kind of go through it, but this is something that was pretty revolutionary for our team. We all took this test so you can go online and actually take this assessment. It’s really quick. Didn’t take long. Oh, I don’t think it took long. And what was so helpful about it was we started, you know, you get your report back and it tells you this is how you work. So it’s not really a personality assessment. It’s explaining, hey, this when it comes to the work you do. And this isn’t just professional work exactly. I mean this because I’ve realized it actually really applied to my motherhood too. It totally applies to our work together, but it also applies like your volunteer work at the church, or your volunteer work and wherever you’re doing it. So it applies in all these spaces, even I’ve seen it a little bit my marriage, but definitely that way, you know. And so it’s one of those things that’s a helpful tool. It’s not to constrain us to say you could only be this way. But what I really love is what it added to our team, even as we learn to appreciate what each other brings to the table and how we work. And so let’s just take five minutes to kind of discuss what what the categories are. So it’s basically this word widget. These are the letters we go by as widget. So we’ll be talking about W, I, D, G, E, T, the face.

Courtney Doctor

Very well, very well done.

Speaker 1

So that was the hardest part of the podcast. We’re done in order, genuinely.

Unknown Speaker

Okay, thanks. I wrote it down

Ann Westrate

just in case.

Melissa Kruger

So the first half the WiDS tend to be the where ideas originate in work. So we call them kind of the originators. This is, this is Melissa’s labeling, not, not the people who run working genius. And then the second half the what is it? The

Ann Westrate

executor, x, g, g,

Melissa Kruger

now I can’t separate it and still spell it. So whatever the last half of the word, those tend to be the executors of the ideas. So there’s two sides. Can you start us with the originators, the W, I Ds. Who are they? What did they do? Tell us about them. Yeah. So

Ann Westrate

the first one is W. That stands for wonder and wonder. They’re the people who look at the world and say, Why is it like this? They’re very curious. They want to understand, like, how things work, and is that really the right way it should work? I then we get to the inventors. They’re the ones who, hmm, I think Melissa is doing the happy dance. That’s one of hers. They come up with all the ideas, and they’re just like, Oh, I know how this could be better. You could do this, you could do this, you could do this, or you could do this. We definitely get that from Melissa. Oh, I drive them crazy. It’s great. And then D is the discern. They’re the ones who, okay, the wonder came up with this like problem to solve the the Ideator, the inventor, came up with the idea, and then the discerner is like, is that a good idea? Is that the right thing to do? Because there’s all these ideas, we can’t do them all. They see patterns. They’re more intuitive. And so that’s kind of they, they go back and forth a lot, and just figure out, what do we want to do? What is the idea that we’re originating? Yep,

Courtney Doctor

yeah. And then the last three or so. What did you call them? Not the implementers, but

Melissa Kruger

the executors. Executors? Well, it sounds like you’re killing someone.

Courtney Doctor

Oh, that’s true. You’re right, okay, implementers, so those three are going to be the last three letters, which are G, E, T, so G is galvanizer. They’re the ones who are like, Okay, that was a good idea. Like, it was an idea. It was a good idea. Let’s go. We’re gonna get excited about this. We’re gonna rally the troops. It’s really one of the best to have. Everybody needs a galvanizer. And then the enablers are the what’s not like the bad kind of enabling, it’s the good kind of enabling, the and enabling and enabling where it’s like, Hey, I’m going to provide the structure that you need to get this thing done. And then tenacity is the last one, and they’re the ones who are like, I’m going to see this all the way through. And the greatest thing that can happen in my life is to check it off like it’s I’m done with it. Yeah, that’s tenacity. The people that just want to get it done. I’m

Ann Westrate

gonna write something I already did on the list so I can cross it back

Courtney Doctor

and cross it off. And so in these six things, everybody has two, what they call geniuses, which, I love that, right? Right?

Courtney Doctor

Two compentencies, and then two frustrations. And it just like you said, it’s just a tool. It is one way of helping understand where you what your part is in a team, or in producing something, or really in working together in any way. And it was, it was so helpful because one of my frustrations was invention, ideating, and I didn’t know why, like, a blank page just drove you know, I felt dumb. And then, anyway, so it was super, super helpful. So two geniuses, two competencies and two frustrations, yeah,

Melissa Kruger

and what I loved, what was most helpful for me was actually learning about the frustrations. And I like that. They call it frustration, not weakness, and that’s not just like everyone gets a trophy. We don’t want to say anything hard to anyone, because my working frustrations are galvanizing and tenacity. Well, here’s the reality, to write a book or to do a project like that, you have to have a lot of tenacity, but by the time I get to the end of that project, I’m worn out. I’m exhausted. It’s, it’s where the wheels on the track are going slowly. It doesn’t mean we don’t do those things, right? So there. So we all

Courtney Doctor

have an idea every now and then,

Melissa Kruger

but we all kind of have to do everything in our life. It doesn’t. It’s not saying, Oh, you’re not tenacious so well, so you don’t have to take the trash out,

Courtney Doctor

right, right? No. But the difference, I think you said it so well, is because, like, when I get to the end of a project, I’m energized, like, this thing is done and I get to check it off, and I am so excited about that. I’m not worn out by that. Yeah, anyway.

Melissa Kruger

And I’m like, worn out by brushing my teeth. I’m like, I gotta do this again.

Courtney Doctor

Please do it again every day.

Ann Westrate

So then Courtney, what’s the difference between having a working frustration versus having a weakness?

Courtney Doctor

Yeah, well, I think it’s kind of what she’s saying, like we all have to do them, and they’re just places of frustrations where so my frustrations, I my working genius is really interesting, because I might the first two are frustrations, the middle two are my geniuses, and the last two are my competencies. So I kind of go in these blocks, and that’s not what everybody does, but so wonder and ideation or or what’s it called, invention are, are my frustrations? And it just gave I think I had for so long, felt like, whether in the different jobs that I’ve done, coming up with ideas is just never been something I’m good at. And I felt like, Man, that’s a huge weakness in my life. But to to frame it as a frustration, is not everybody gets a trophy. It’s to say, I’m not going to thrive there. And ultimately, and this is kind of what we really talk about a lot, is ultimately, it drives us to the fact that what the Bible says is so true. If the foot should say, because I am not a hand, I don’t belong to the body, and then if the ear should say, because I’m not an I, I don’t belong to the body. And so this whole idea that, yeah, we are gifted differently for a reason. And so that’s been one of the beautiful things. Like we knew the three of us worked really well together. We knew that in the process, the workflow process, that, for some reason, for. The three of us, it really worked. And so the we didn’t know.

Melissa Kruger

We didn’t know why.

Ann Westrate

We didn’t know how to explain it when people asked us exactly.

Melissa Kruger

But let me step back on that. Let me ask a question, why do we, and I don’t know that this, if this is just a female thing, why do we, when we see a gifting in someone else, immediately go to, well, I’m not needed. I mean, it’s clear scripture, pause, writing that. But I do think that’s what we do. We say, Oh, I’m just a foot or,

Courtney Doctor

Why am I so bad at this? Yes, so even like me not being able to ideate, and you will always have all these great ideas. And it was like, why can’t I come up with it? Right? Yes, right. And then, I mean, we were just grateful that Melissa was telling us what book to write or what thing to, you know, and but it put that in in context of, oh, I can take the idea and go do something

Ann Westrate

with it. It gave me so much freedom just to say, oh, like, this is a strength of Melissa’s. It doesn’t mean I never have to come up with an idea, but this is a strength, and I can help her by supporting her in that, because she doesn’t know how to do what I know how to do, and I don’t see how what I’m doing, like bringing the structure, like, it’s so easy to me. I’m like, of course, you guys know how to do that. That’s the thing you don’t realize.

Melissa Kruger

I think when we’re in our strength, we don’t even think of it as serving. So I remember I felt badly giving the implementation task to someone. Because I was like, Who wants to do 10 hours to do that? It’s fun to think of ideas. Let’s just sit around the room all day. But like, Y’all are actually getting the work done well?

Courtney Doctor

And I felt bad going to You mean, like, can you help ideate on this until we had the, you know, the language for it, I know. And then you’re like,

Melissa Kruger

yes, great, but I don’t want to do the spreadsheet, right?

Courtney Doctor

Well, I don’t really want to do this Yes. I want to galvanize everybody Yeah, and for life. So yes, exactly,

Melissa Kruger

yeah. And it’s so I think it’s, it’s that acceptance that yes, I’m either a hand or a foot or an eye or an ear. I can’t be everything, right, but I need to be the something God’s made me to be, yeah, and it was this, Oh, it’s okay, and it’s okay to just call them a frustration, yeah, not a not a hiding. Oh, I don’t do that. I don’t do spread Exactly.

Ann Westrate

It’s not an excuse. Yes, I don’t have to do that because I’m not good at that. You can actually, especially your competencies, you can actually be really good at something like I think before we took the working genius, we thought I might have tenacity as a genius, because I could just get things done, right? But it’s actually a competency of mine. And there’s seasons in my like personal life and in my work life, where I had to be doing the tenacity work. I was exhausted, I was so burnt out, right? But if I need to do it for a little bit, I’m okay. And so I think that that is, like, important to consider as well, well, and

Courtney Doctor

even, like you kind of mentioned early on how it plays into, you know, family life or church life. But even that was where it really helped me. Because what I think my top is that my top genius is galvanizing, and I think it is, and yes, it is. Everybody’s like, galvanizes all the time. But it was as a grandmother when you were like, because I took all five grandkids to a bear world, you know, it’s just like theme park thing, and I had to get them all in the car. And, you know, they’re all pretty little, and it and, but you were saying, Oh, you’re galvanizing. You’re like, sit down, put your shoes on, get in the car. We’re doing this. Like, it’s, you know, yes, but actually, the idea to go to bear world was my husband’s, oh, and it wasn’t mine. Isn’t that fascinating? That’s interesting. But I’m like, because he Yeah, that’s a great idea. Let’s go, yes. And then exactly. And so the idea was his. And then I was like, on it and got it done.

Melissa Kruger

So can we talk a little bit about the motherhood thing? Yeah, yeah, which is great work. And we’ve, yeah, we, even though we tend to think of this in a professional environment, it hit me of, oh, because I’m a DI discerning Ideator or ID. I don’t know which one or inventive discerner. I’m not sure I realize the young years of parenting require a lot of galvanizing and a lot of tenacity. Because guess what, children need their teeth brushed every day, every day, and it’s rough.

Courtney Doctor

How’s your kids Dental?

Ann Westrate

Funny story, yes, yes.

Melissa Kruger

Poor Kate, I think she’ll let me tell this story. Poor Kate got to school. It’s Elementary School. At chapel, they ask, stand up if you brushed your teeth this morning. She was like, I thought you were only supposed to brush your teeth at night. This is what happens to third children with a lack.

Unknown Speaker

I forgot to teach her

Courtney Doctor

that the other kids knew. If she had only had the language to stand up and say, my mom’s an idea, an inventor, not a tenacious person. She

Speaker 1

had the idea to brush teeth with the first child, with the third child,

Ann Westrate

boring by the third child.

Melissa Kruger

Get that done. So to now. Capacity those daily tasks, the tying the shoes, the dressing the kids, the doing the laundry. That was a really exhausting season of motherhood for me. But then when we got to the teen years, and it was more ideas and how to talk through that problem with them and how to discern, Hey, what should you do about your friendship? I was in my wheelhouse, and I found it so hopeful. You know, if you’re a mom listening right now, to think through, well, maybe one reason this season is particularly hard on me, and again, I didn’t get to escape this task. I still had to do them right, but it’s actually helpful to know this is why I’m so tired and Courtney’s not right, because we tend to compare and think what’s wrong with me that I’m not flying in the season to bear world, right, right? Because I’m probably not going to be that grandmother

Courtney Doctor

aren’t going to be. But even whether you’re a mom listening, or even if you work at your church, when I was on staff at a church, again, I look back on that season, and it was I was frustrated with the ideas I could implement all day long. I could get people rallied all day long, but I had a hard time kind of with the new initiative piece of it. And so it’s just fascinating. It kind of plays out in all of life. And I think what it did for us is it gave us that language for, like the landing of the plane of the First Corinthians verse that I read, and, you know, Paul says the same thing, Melissa, do you want to read that in Romans 12? Yeah, read Romans 12 because it gives us this you know, it’s not like the working genius is the end all and be all. There are a ton of different tools. It’s just the reality of, how do you land the plane in ways that you can really understand to make this biblical truth a tangible reality in your lives, for the fact that the way the Lord has wired each of us and the way the Lord has wired his body the church is in this exact way that we all have gifts, but none of us have all the gifts, and we really need each other. And so say that again, it’s we all have gifts. We all have gifts, yep, and but none of us have all the gifts, yes, and so even just putting them in these six categories makes it so, because a lot of times when we look at the spiritual gifts assessments, and we look at the spiritual gift tests, then it gets a little bit more. You know, they’re they’re kind of broad categories like teaching or leadership or hospitality or mercy, but I think the this particular tool, the working genius, which you can use any of them, but this one really gave us the language for understanding how the Lord had gifted us to do a particular job, but we cannot do it alone, and how then the three of us together. It’s, it’s one reason. It’s not just, I think, effective by God’s grace, but joyful by God’s grace. And so, yeah, read Paul in Romans 12.

Melissa Kruger

Yes, yes. Paul has things to say.

Courtney Doctor

Paul had a lot. He was working, definitely, discernment. Yeah,

Melissa Kruger

maybe, I think he was a galvanized, yeah, yeah, this is Romans, 12, three through maybe eight. For by the grace given to me, I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly

Unknown Speaker

relevant, actually.

Courtney Doctor

Yeah, Paul and I want you to not think more highly of yourself. Alyssa, okay,

Melissa Kruger

but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned for as in one body, we have many members, and the members do not all have the same function. So we though many are one body in Christ and individually, members of one another having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us. Let us use them, and then he goes through the list. So let me. Let me park on that for a minute. I think we tend to think about what we’re good at as being for us. Yes. So this is what verse five says. So we, the many, are one body in Christ, and individually, members of one another. And then it goes on. You know, we have the grace given to us, yet us, let us use them. And so it’s not to use them so that I get ahead or I glorify myself. It’s because we’re one body and we’re actually needed. What a beautiful thing. We’re needed. But it’s not up to us, right, right, you know? And so how can we in the church serve in that way, that, Oh, I bring my gifts to the table not to show that I’m great, or, Hey, y’all really need me,

Courtney Doctor

but which we do, though, yeah, so it’s both, but that’s right, but,

Melissa Kruger

but to have that servant attitude with our gifts, that these were given to, they have been received, to be given, and

Courtney Doctor

all of them, right? Because, like, it’s so easy to look at Anne’s gifts and think, Okay, those are so clearly serving others, yes, right? But even looking at Melissa’s as an idea she is given. Being us. I’m it. We’re and I am serving you both by galvanizing you.

Ann Westrate

I think one of the ways we can do that is by recognizing others gifts and saying them. So like Melissa, I am so thankful you gave me that idea, and so I’m gonna, like, help you implement that. So it’s not only like owning and recognizing your gifts, but recognizing others gifts, and pointing that out, and telling them that and saying that to them, because that’s an encouragement, and it’s showing a humility of I need you, not like so focused on you need me. That’s so good,

Melissa Kruger

because I am not here to manage your pride. Scripture doesn’t tell me to manage, to make sure Courtney’s humble, so I’m not going to pray actually, what Scripture says, encourage one another, as long as it’s called today. And I think sometimes in the church, who we can be like she already knows that. He already knows. I mean, he preaches every week. Why should I tell the pastor he did a good job this week? Right? You don’t know. We don’t know that somebody might be on the edge of quitting every day, we all feel that, and for someone to look at you and say, I think we could probably go back and in our minds, remember when someone looked at you and said, Hey, you’re really gifted at that, and that probably spurred on so much love And good deeds, because someone saw and affirmed your giftedness, and we need to be doing that collectively, and we don’t. It’s

Courtney Doctor

actually how we discern our gifts. I tell people all the time that thing that people ask you to do over and over again like nobody has ever and even if they had asked me to sing, they’re not going to ask me a second time, right? Because it’s not a gifting and so but if people are like, would you, would you organize this event? Or would you, there’s a woman in the hospital who needs care, would you be the one to go so we see as the body? So if we’re not back to your point, and if we’re not affirming each other’s gifts, we’re actually we’re depriving the body and that person of helping discern their own giftedness in that so it’s really important,

Ann Westrate

and the whole body suffers, then the whole body, self body suffers. Yes, it’s not just the person who is in front. You know, like, even like being here at TGC, right? There’s a lot of people in front, and it was, like, easy for me to be like, I want to teach like I’m trained in this. I love this. I want to do this like I should just sacrifice using my gifts so I can pursue my own dream. And I quickly realized, with a lot of your both of your helps, that that’s not necessarily the right thing to do, and that I bring so much to the table to support you all in doing your gifts, and I still get to learn, and I still get to use my gifts. And you know what, I’m a lot less exhausted.

Melissa Kruger

Wow, huh? So sometimes there’s a temptation of, oh, serving the kingdom is best when it’s really hard, right, right? Yeah, like it must be, if it feels like, if I’m enjoying it. I remember you saying this about speaking like you felt like it was almost wrong to enjoy what God had gifted you to do right, rather than just say, No, I do enjoy it. This is what he’s called me to and let me. Let me run in the path of your commands, because you have set my heart free. Right? Like to do that with joy? Yeah. Okay. Now one thing we, I think we can sometimes fall into, is we, especially like some people, maybe are in charge of hiring people or or maybe you hire out your friends or whatever. Like me have to pay great sums to keep them around. Um, it’s tempting to want to look for people like you, whether it’s in hiring positions, or even honestly, in friendships or people in your same season. Because, see, that’s a whole nother part of this. I know you know, what’s the danger of that? And how can we make sure to put a check on ourselves that, oh, I don’t actually need everyone who’s like me,

Courtney Doctor

right? Well, I mean diversity of all kinds, yes, yes, diversity of all kinds benefits each one of us, because when we see things through someone else’s eyes, maybe they are. They were raised in a country different than ours. Maybe they were raised in a subculture different than ours. Maybe they’ve experienced life in a body that is either a different color than ours or a different gender than ours, or, you know, they’ve experienced life differently, or they have different giftings, right? We benefit as we grow together and we learn from each other and so. So diversity of all kinds is vital, I think, even for our Christian growth like because we we actually really need each other. But diversity of giftings plays into that. That’s part of that. Because I

Ann Westrate

think it’s not only how we see the world, why that diversity is so important, but how we see God. You know, like, God is so big, I cannot fully, I mean, none of us will ever fully understand him, right? He’s so great, but I cannot, like, worship Him in the same way as someone else would. Worship Him. And so as I see someone else worshiping Him or serving Him with their gifts, I’m learning even more about my Lord. And I love getting to see that.

Courtney Doctor

Oh, I love that I never thought about that. I think Wonder might be the only, the only thing that God doesn’t have. He doesn’t have to wonder about anything, but he certainly has amazing ideas, creative, right, discerning, wise, beyond all, beyond all measure. I mean, you just, it’s like, yep, loves his people calls it enables us to golf and now all the way through, right? I mean, yes, exactly like all the way through. Never thought about that.

Melissa Kruger

But also, he’s so great and incomprehensible that no one person other than the person of Jesus Christ, can rightly reflect Him like we were created in the image of God. And so as the Earth was going to be filled with people, this is pre fall, yeah, it would his glory would go out through all the earth. And in some sense, it shows the greatness of God that we need so many giftings to rightly show forth his cure, right, you know, and so that he is using all of us. And what I love sometimes, I don’t know if you ever feel this. I’m watching the news or I’m seeing the state of the world, and I feel all this, well, I can’t, you know, live in a rural context and live in an urban context. I can’t live on mission in Charlotte and live overseas on mission like you feel like there’s so much work should be done. And I know for me, it’s been a sweet kind of check, and to be like, the church will do it, though, yeah, Melissa doesn’t have to do it, right? The church has got, God’s gonna work through the church, right? And to realize, and this sets up everything differently, right? Because then, let’s say Courtney does something amazing, or even, like, writes an amazing book, and it goes out to all these women or whatever. I’m not in competition with you. I’m like, Jesus just went out right, like his, his people, like collectively. So we’re cheering each other on rather than comparing. You’re so

Courtney Doctor

good at that, though your kingdom mindedness, it has, it’s so. So you always look to say, like, what you know, what Bible study needs to be written next? And you’ll say, Oh, that one’s already out there. It doesn’t matter, right? How it got out there. You’re like, Okay, we don’t need to do that, because the Kingdom already has that. And that is such an important mindset in all of this, right? Oh, the Kingdom already has that we can do. You know, what would the Lord call us to do?

Ann Westrate

And you’re good at noticing other people’s gifts, too. And so you’ll say you can do that. Sometimes I wonder if you’re just tired, right? Are we really interesting?

Melissa Kruger

Melissa’s lazy, and she tells everyone else what to do, because that’s kind of where my happy place is. You.

Courtney Doctor

You do like to pass your ideas off. She shares

Speaker 1

with the Kingdom needs? Go to it someone else. Go into someone else. But

Melissa Kruger

I can cheer each other on. Yeah, and I think sometimes, in his skin, it’s a right viewing of our gifts. We’re part of a body. I don’t it’s not just about me. So I even think about this, even how we grow our gifts, how we spend time with the Lord, how we root ourselves in the word, it’s not so I’m a better Bible teacher. So I’m better at something. All of those things are actually collective. Yeah, you know, my prayer time isn’t just about me, my time in the word isn’t just about me. I’m a member of a body, so me being strengthened by abiding in the vine and being fueled by Jesus makes the whole body stronger, right?

Courtney Doctor

My sanctification is not for me alone. Yes, it’s not my holiness, my pursuit of holiness, my growth in righteousness by God’s grace. None of those things are just for me, because I benefit as you two. Grow in the Lord, right, and continue. Then it causes me to, in fact, there’s a really good book called growing together, and it’s sort of it sort of that she had the idea and she did it herself. Oh, my word. She did all the gifts. It

Unknown Speaker

was a moment of grace.

Courtney Doctor

Um, but it’s that idea that that all of those things, I say it all the time in the in the context of Bible studies, like, don’t just do your homework each week for yourself, because when you do your homework in Bible study, and then you show up, your whole small group benefits from the fact that you spent time in the work. But so it’s yeah, it’s the same thing, like, we just need each other. We just need each other, yeah?

Melissa Kruger

And what a beautiful thing, you know, to belong, yeah? You know, we belong to one another and that. So then we start thinking of, think of gifting in a different way. It’s a stewardship issue, not a self like, Oh, who am I? I mean, yeah, that’s all important to try to figure this out, self fulfilling judgment, yeah? But it becomes a real. Stewardship. So let me ask one final question, and then we’ll, we’ll close up, how do we steward our gifts? Well, because scripture has examples where it says, you know, you were given five, right, whatever piece of talents you know, and you were given 10, and different people did different things with those talents and were rewarded for it. Or were, you know, told hey, you were you went and dug a hole and didn’t steward your gifts. And it basically says a really interesting thing, he who has will be given more, more

Courtney Doctor

work. It is. It’s more work,

Speaker 1

right? Go dig a hole. It’s because we were passionate for that. Let’s

Courtney Doctor

go. Gonna go barrier Exactly.

Melissa Kruger

So what has it looked like in your life to steward the gifts that God’s given? Because it does it, it is an active thing. It doesn’t just happen. It doesn’t

Ann Westrate

just happen trying to think, I think sometimes it involves sacrifice of what I thought my life would look like, or what I thought I wanted to do, or even like a dream in some case, but it always turns out so much better like because it’s it’s recognizing this is what the Lord has made me to do, and I might not have seen it at first, but as I do that, I feel his joy in a whole nother way. And so at first, primarily, you know, it plays out in my marriage and my family, with my kids, making sure that I’m using my gifts to bless them, and then my local church, like, if I’m not using my gifts in my local church, like, that’s where they’re for in a big that’s why God gave us a local church to be together and to go out and to spread the gospel together. And like you were saying earlier, we can get so overwhelmed by all the work that needs to be done out there, but we can’t do it all. And so we can see, though, this place that God gave us is the church, and we can serve and use our gifts there. And so I think that’s another big place we should be using our gifts. Yeah,

Courtney Doctor

I love that. And so definitely in the local church and in the you know, place he has put you to live and move and have your being. But I also think it’s the idea of creating space at the table for other people to come in and use their gifts. I think that that’s a huge part of stewarding our gifts, is that we’re not just focused on how am I stewarding my gifts? But it’s this corporate. How am I helping others steward their gifts, either making space for them, inviting their them in like you said, affirming them, recognizing them, telling them and then and then, rejoicing, rejoicing with them as they use their gifts

Ann Westrate

and not not putting them down when they’re not when they’re using their weakness, you know, like when they do something because they have to, and it doesn’t go well, still being grateful, you know, and not just being so frustrated, right, right? So,

Melissa Kruger

do you all remember the movie Karate Kid? You remember when he had to do wax on and wax off, and he had no idea why he was learning those skills. I think one way we can steward our gift, and I’ll just close with this, because you may be listening. You may be like, I don’t know what my gift is. God, each day is giving us a classroom, and he is faithful to grow us. And we may be doing things and we don’t know why we’re doing them. I don’t know if you ever felt like that I was doing certain things, and I’m like, why is this relevant to my life? What I’ve loved watching over I guess it’s now been 36 years of following Jesus is how he’s woven things from one part of my story with other parts to finally say, This is why you needed to do that. And so if, wherever you are in your story, I think you can trust that the Lord is developing your gifts. Because if he called you to himself, he has a purpose for you, and you are so needed. I think the saddest thing any of us who have the Holy Spirit indwelling in US can listen to the lie of Satan that you don’t matter. Yeah. He gave His blood for you. He put His Spirit in you. He will work through you. So you might feel like you’re in the wax on, wax off, and you’re like, What is my life? Yeah, but he will get you there, and he you have gifts. The church needs you. And what a wonderful thing I think of Dave when he says, I’d rather be a dork He burned the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked. Whatever we’re doing, it’s for the king, right? So it has value and it matters, and that’s the grace. Well, this is so fun talking about this with you guys. And one thing we like to end on, we obviously share with everyone that we like deep dish pizza, but we also want to hear what other people love and what’s what they enjoy. And so one thing the three of us love deeply is talking about food and eating. That’s.

Ann Westrate

Yeah, that’s often what we sidetracked on, yes. Talking about Yes,

Melissa Kruger

we all use our discernment to find where do we want to go to eat. So Anne, can you tell us one favorite recipe you’re loving right now? One

Ann Westrate

of my favorite recipes, it’s been in our family. Gosh, I don’t even know how many years. It’s called steak soup, which it’s not actually steak. It’s ground hamburger. Is it actually soup? It is actually soup. It is actually soup. It’s ground hamburger. And then just all these veggies and, like, it’s a thicker sauce, and especially in the fall and winter, I just like, I’ll make a huge batch, and then just put it in my freezer, because I love to heat it up. And it’s just been it reminds me my grandma. It reminds me my mom, you know. So it just like, has that emotional like, Oh, I feel like warm eating this, not only because it’s soup, but because it just reminds me of so many great memories at home. So it’s one of my favorites. We’ll come over and

Courtney Doctor

you can make it for us. Fantastic.

Melissa Kruger

We’ll make sure to link to it in the show notes. Yeah, oh yeah. But Anne, thank you for being with us and having me. Thanks for keeping us on track regularly in our life as we work together. But we do just encourage you find a place where you can serve, serve in your church, serve in your neighborhood, but just know that you’re needed and that God isn’t working you. Thanks for listening. We’re so glad you’ve been here for this episode of the deep dish, and we’ll see you next time.