Buggin' Me

I have to get this off my chest. I've broached the subject with T a number of times, but with no good conclusion. For anyone who knows my husband, it will come as no surprise that he is fully invested in developing students in many ways. A couple of tools he prefers to use to help students first understand themselves are the Myers-Briggs personality assessment (I've taken this numerous times... and it's hardly changed at all, much to my husband's dismay ;-)), and more recently, Strengthfinders, which is a tool for understanding your most active strengths created by Gallup. Neither of these tools in inherently "christian", but both are used, widely perhaps, by christian organizations. Along with these, many churches including ours have use of several versions of a "giftedness" assessment, which assesses which "gifts" have been bestowed on someone by the Holy Spirit. I don't have any idea how accurate it is, but altogether, each of these tools definitely have some positive use.

Here's my dilemma, and I'm still working on the differentiation between "personality" strengths and physical strengths. In other words, I'm open to WHATEVER insight, advice, ideas anyone may have on this line of questioning. I'm going to point to one particular scripture written by the apostle Paul, but in my mind I'm working from what I know from years of Bible stories the underlying theme that God uses our weaknesses (not our strengths) to make Himself known to others through us.

7To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. 8Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. 9But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. 10That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong." II Corinthians 12, NIV

(I copied and pasted this from www.biblegateway.com - which I LOVE! I did add the bold myself...) Anyway, this is the message that keeps popping up into my head when I read about, hear about, think about Strengthfinders. I'm not so opposed to people knowing and understanding their strengths or those of the people they work with. I happen to think that is highly beneficial to understanding why people do the things they do. I'm also not opposed to streamlining operations based on these findings. I think it's great to put people into positions where they will succeed and prosper - makes for good business. I guess my question is this:

If we limit ourselves to only the things we are good at, are we limiting what God might choose to do in our lives, how He might choose to make himself known to the world, how He might reveal his power?

It's sort of a loaded question, I know. I just worry that maybe by unraveling all the "mysteries" of our personalities to determine what direction we should take, we are slowly becoming more reliant on ourselves and not what God can do. Can God take a man with a speech impediment and make him a leader of a nation, delivering them from slavery into a land of milk and honey that was promised to them? If Moses took strengthfinders, what would he have determined about the role that God called him to? Would his pastor have blessed him in a ministry that involved public speaking, leading and representing the nation to pharaoh? I don't know.

I could go on about other examples, but really, I've just been intrigued by this idea that we can put people in the correct positions with these few assessment tools we have and based on our analysis of a team of people and all their strengths and personalities decide whether or not they will be successful. I just think that leaves little room for God to work. Maybe I'm totally wrong about this. Anyway, just a thought that's been on my mind.... aren't you glad you don't know the rest of what's on my mind! LOL