You Are Equipped

(This post is the final one in a short series of four posts on Hebrews 13:20-21. All posts in this series are adaptations from Emily's session at the women's event "Equipped to Serve" on February 18, 2023 in Newport, TN.)

"Now may the God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, equip you with everything good that you may do his will, working in us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen" (Hebrews 13:20-21).

We have spent the last few weeks beholding the beauty of our Equipper. We have seen him as our God of peace, our Lord, and our great shepherd. Now that we have paused to gaze at his glory, we can begin to focus rightly on ourselves, the ones who need to be equipped. The truth is that we simply don’t have the power to do God’s will on our own. We need God’s power to equip us and to work through us. Amazingly, the power God uses to equip us is the same power that raised Jesus from the dead, takes care of the sheep, and secures the eternal covenant.

But how exactly are we equipped? Here are three ways you are equipped if you are a follower of Christ:

1. You are equipped with a story.

You know your story, and you have a story worth sharing if you are a follower of Christ. It’s not a story of what you’ve done but of what God has done. It’s a resurrection story. You were once dead in your trespasses and sins, and now you are alive in Christ. That’s a story worth telling over and over again. You are fully equipped to tell that story because you were there for all of it. You have first-hand evidence for what God has done in your life, and no one can take that story from you.

I teach at a Christian high school, and a few weeks ago we had Spiritual Emphasis Week, which involved going to chapel every day for that week. It was completely student led, and I loved what the students decided to do on the final day. Several volunteers shared what they called their before and after stories. It was very powerful to watch and listen to a handful of teenagers share with hundreds of their peers what they were like before Christ, how they were saved, and what they are like now because of Christ.

I grew up going to church regularly and praying with my family before meals and before bed, but I didn’t have a saving knowledge of Jesus until I was 12 years old. I would have told you I was a Christian before then, but I was just a self-righteous rule follower. I simply thought I did enough good things to be accepted by God. Everything changed when God used Isaiah 64:6 to let me know that all of my so-called righteous deeds were nothing but filthy rags before a holy God. Nothing good I could do would ever make up for the sins I had committed. I was an enemy of God, and I was dead in my trespasses and sins. God opened my blind eyes to show me the truth of who I was and how desperately I needed him. He saved me from my sins and called me his own, and my life was forever changed. He created in me a love for his Word and a desire to do his will according to his Word. The journey hasn’t always been easy. There have been some very difficult seasons in which my hope has been incredibly shaken, but because I have a before and after story, every trial I face better equips me to tell of what he’s done in my life and how he holds me fast.

According to J.I. Packer’s observations, “When Christians meet, they talk to each other about their Christian work and Christian interests, their Christian acquaintances, the state of the churches, and the problems of theology – but rarely of their daily experience of God.” Let that not be said of us! Let’s speak about how we are experiencing God daily. If we’re not experiencing him daily, there’s an easy solution: seek ways to experience him. We do this through praying, through reading our Bibles, and through being attentive to the work that he is doing moment by moment every single day. There’s no excuse not to experience him daily, and we’re not meant to keep those experiences to ourselves.

So what’s your experience? What’s your before and after story? What were you like before Christ? How did God save you? What are you like now because of Christ? That before and after story is worth telling, and you are better equipped than anyone else to share it.

Your before and after story is worth telling, and you are better equipped than anyone else to share it.

Some of you may be thinking I grew up in church, I surround myself with good people, or I try to do all the right things, but you realize you don’t actually have a before and after story. Your life may be one of integrity and good deeds and kind words, but there has never been a radical change in your life that brought you from death to life. If that’s you, you don’t have a story to tell yet. You’re not equipped yet. The outside may look good, but the inside is in desperate need of real change. In Matthew 23:27, Jesus called the Pharisees “white-washed tombs” because the outside appeared “beautiful” but the inside was “full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness.” There must be a fundamental change of the heart to have a before and after story.

One of the subjects I teach is physical science, so bear with my nerdiness for a moment. There’s a difference between a physical change and a chemical change. A physical change is something like liquid water that freezes into ice and then melts again and then evaporates into water vapor and then condenses back into liquid water. Those are physical changes. It’s still H2O regardless of its state of matter. A chemical change, on the other hand, is entirely different. When something undergoes a chemical change, there is an identity change. For a chemical change to happen, bonds must be broken and a new substance must be formed. 2 Corinthians 5:17 says, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.” Becoming a Christian is just like a chemical change in that bonds must be broken. Those must pass away. Our bonds to sin and death must be destroyed so that we can have a brand new identity in Christ. The God of peace has provided the only way for those bonds to be broken and for us to have peace with him. We must know the Equipper before we can be equipped with a story to tell.

2. You are equipped with special gifts.

Peter makes this point clear in 1 Peter 4:10-11 when he says, “As each has received a gift” – “each” here meaning each and every believer with no exception – “use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace: whoever speaks, as one who speaks oracles of God; whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies – in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ.” Elsewhere in Scripture we see lists of gifts such as wisdom, knowledge, faith, discernment, service, teaching, exhortation, generosity, and mercy. All of these gifts and more are given by God. James tells us that “every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17), and Paul tells us that every gift is “empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills” (1 Corinthians 12:11). We’re all gifted differently, but every gift is given by God for the specific purposes of doing his will and making him known.

How have you been gifted? How can you use your gifts to serve? How can your gifts fulfill God’s will and make him known?

3. You are equipped for a job.

As a follower of Christ, you are equipped to do a job, and that job is to do God’s will. What is his will? There are probably multiple ways we could answer that question, but let’s look at what Paul says a few verses after the above mentioned one about being a new creation. Second Corinthians 5:20 says, “Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us.” A large part of God’s will is for us to be ambassadors for Christ, to be his representatives in this fallen world. No matter what formal ministry we’re involved in or what conversation we’re having or what good deed we’re doing, we need to remember that we are representatives of Christ. What image of him are we portraying? Is it an accurate image? We’re not perfect, but we should be known by our love for God and our love for people. The two greatest commandments tell us to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, and mind and to love our neighbors as ourselves (Matthew 22:34-40). We’re equipped to do that because God first loved us.

We’ve been equipped by the God of peace who raised our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd who laid down his life for us, to do his will so that he can rightly receive all the praise and all the glory and all the honor for all of eternity.

Let’s look for ways to share our stories, use our gifts, and do our job. Let’s find ways to serve so that God gets the praise and the glory. He’s fully deserving of it, and it’s a great privilege that we get to serve him and point others to him. We’ve been equipped by the God of peace who raised our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd who laid down his life for us, to do his will so that he can rightly receive all the praise and all the glory and all the honor for all of eternity. By knowing the gracious Equipper, we are well equipped to serve.