Embracing New Gifts

REBECCA ABBOUD lives in Houma and is a parishioner of Christ the Redeemer. Rebecca serves as a liaison for the Office of Parish Support. In her free time Rebecca is passionate about spending time with people she loves, crafting, and planning themed parties and celebrations.

I am a sucker for a good personality test or quiz that promises to reveal my gifts to me! I don’t think that’s a bad desire. I think we all desire to know ourselves and our gifts more completely. What does it look like to let the Lord reveal those things for us? Have we ever asked him?

For most of my life, if you asked about my gifts, the answer would be simple: working with children. I’ve always had a gift for connecting with kids, perhaps because I’m just a big kid at heart. Until my early 30s, every job I held involved working with children—babysitting, summer camps, teaching, and youth ministry.

In 2020, the Lord called me to full-time diocesan ministry with the Office of Parish Support. I faced a significant hesitation: for the first time, I wouldn’t be working with children. Though it was clear that God was asking me to serve in the Office of Parish Support, I couldn’t help but question why He would call me away from the thing I loved and excelled in. As He led me into something new, He was asking me to surrender everything, including my gifts, to Him. Surrendering to the Lord has never been easy for me but offering my gifts— the things that brought life and bore fruit—was especially challenging.

New experiences, though often beautiful and exciting, can also be hard and stretching. My experience with the Office of Parish Support was no different. Though I was confident that this is where the Lord wanted me to be, I felt inadequate, and I questioned my abilities. In this new season, He began to reveal new gifts. He revealed gifts of accompanying others, gifts of fostering belonging, and more gifts I hadn’t recognized in myself. Often these gifts were drawn out by the situations He called me to, opportunities to use them.

I wish I could tell you that I embraced these new gifts with open arms, but I didn’t. I doubted them. I compared them to gifts I saw in others, wishing they were different. “That’s great, Lord, thanks… but I’d be a lot better at this job if I were smarter, a more eloquent speaker...” If I’m honest, I still doubt. I still compare. I still need the Lord (more often than I’d care to admit) to remind me of the gifts He’s given me. Without fail, He is there – revealing not only my gifts, but revealing more of Himself, and more of who He created me to be. In a beautiful paradox, the more I surrendered to Him, the more me I became.

Do we need Him to remind us? Don’t be afraid to ask Him. He never gets tired of telling us what He loves about us.

The Lord also provided people in my life who were quick to reflect my gifts back to me. These people knew me well and were willing to call out the gifts they saw in me. In the places where it was so hard for me to recognize my own gifts, or in the moments when I was quick to discount them, being surrounded by a community of people who saw my goodness was priceless. Their voices served as both echoes and reminders of the voice of the Lord. They affirmed what they saw, and it was exactly what I needed! Who are the people in your life that can reflect your gifts back to you? Whose gifts can you call out?

God is still teaching me how to use my gifts. Still revealing new ones. Still giving me opportunities to exercise the “old ones”. He is always doing something new, always revealing. Let’s pray that we have the eyes to see it! If there is a sense that the Lord is doing something new, be not afraid. Will it be hard and stretching? Probably. Will He be faithful? Undoubtedly.