This is a 'discovery' that I think is a defining element of my peers in ministry, perhaps a defining feature of Gen-Y awareness?

It's the recognition that I can't be and do everything and I'll work at my best and happiest when I play to my strengths, along the grain of my personality.

There's something very cool and very spiritual about this. It fits with the teaching on 'gifts' in the New Testament. It can be liberating to see that a gift is not merely 'I have no good reason NOT to do this' (H/T to MTS), a gift is also a inclination toward it.

It also fits with a general understanding of our humanness, our limitation, or 'lot' to use an Old Testament term. We must not presume that we can and should do everything out there.

In ministry this can save us from trying to do and be everything we think a godly pastor should be, and so making ourselves and our churches miserable when we can't. It can stop us from laying burdens on God's people that they shouldn't have to bear.

But, like any 'discovery' it has its problems, too. And these are problems that me and my peers will need to face up to.