It's kind of like that age-old question: which came first, the chicken or the egg? Which came first? Did God first gift Oholiab and Bezalel with all manner of skills for craftsmanship and then chose to select them from among the Israelites to head the construction of the Tabernacle? Or, did God first choose them and then equip them for the job at hand?
Does it matter?
Let's face it. Sometimes, God hands us jobs or gives us callings that seem to require a certain skill set. The ability to acquire a new language is pretty helpful if you want to be a missionary in a foreign country. People skills (which some just have, and some don't) make ministry a great deal more affective. But do you have to have these things naturally? Does God give you gifts and skills and then call you to do any job that fits those skills? You have the gift of administration, better be a secretary or a c.e.o. You have a gift for teaching, than by all means, teach! The question always comes up, though, when you seem to get a calling that is outside your talents and skills set. Has that ever happened to you? And then you're plagued with questions: is this something you're really called to do? What if you can't do it? Should you really do it? What if you mess it up? This, then, is where people offer the assurance: God will never give you anything you can't handle. He will give you what you need to get the job done. After all, it is by God's power we can do anything at all, right?
So which is it? The chicken or the egg? Looking at this passage, God clearly says that He has gifted Oholiab and Bezalel with a number of extraordinary gifts, as well as a number of others. And if you look at the work they did in building the Tabernacle, their gifts were not simply specialized areas, but several areas: metalwork for the gold, weaving and embroidery for the curtains, woodwork for the construction of the articles. Usually, unless I'm mistaken, a craftsman will hone their skills on one particular craft, whether they dabble in others or not. It takes so much skill, talent, and work to master one craft, can you imagine mastering many? (Not more than one, many.) We know these multiple gifts are from God. But, it doesn't say that God chose these men because He had gifted them, or that He gifted them so that He could choose them. Maybe it's just a fine line of semantics, but does it matter? God has given them a job and He has given them the wherewithal to get it done. Does it matter which came first?
Next reading: Exodus 37:1-38:8
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