S.H.A.P.E. Assessment Results

Thank you Emily Buck for taking the SHAPE Assessment. We encourage you to meet with a Church Leader that you respect, to go over your results, so that they can help you discover a place to serve in the church and/or community, and also to help you fine-tune your 5 Main Focuses/Priorities listed at the bottom of this email under the ‘Wrapping it up’ section. May God Bless You!

[S]piritual Gifts

Here is how your spiritual gifts scored (in alphabetical order):

28%

93%

93%

78%

87%

81%

78%

37%

100%

To see descriptions on the Spiritual Gifts and how you can use them to further Christ’s Kingdom on earth, visit this link.

This gift’s evident in my life in the following ways:
I have always been academically-minded. I am a very curious person, and I’m also a skeptic so I don’t like to take anyone’s word for something without diving deep into researching it for myself. I’m the type of person who spends hours and days learning everything I can about a topic, sometimes a bit obsessively, just so I can have a greater understanding of it. In turn, I very much enjoy informing others as much as they’ll listen. If I feel learning about a certain thing benefitted me in some way, I’d love others to experience that, as well. I struggled a lot growing up with what I wanted to do as a career path so I pursued multiple options. Eventually, through the guidance of my husband after becoming saved, I decided I was ready to be a mom. In that journey, which I was very apprehensive to take since I was adamantly against having kids and wanted to be a “career woman only”, God showed me the reason for all the passions He had given me – to share and teach my children in every way I possibly could, especially to teach them about Christ.

This gift’s evident in my life in the following ways:
I grew up Catholic. I met my husband in high school when he was already a saved follower of Christ. It took a lot of philosophical debate and theological discussion on his part to try and convince me that the Catholic church wasn’t the Way. He moved across the country and we dated long-distance briefly, remained friends for a number of years, and the week he moved back to the east coast, I visited him and we got engaged. At this point, after some dark years on my end, I had started going to Christian church and had renounced my Catholic religion. My parents were more or less in the same boat at this point, too. None of us were Catholic anymore, but we were still lost in regards to a church and any sort of leadership in our lives. My husband and I went to a local church where we lived at the time in Charleston, but we really didn’t connect with anyone there. It felt very superficial to us. We stopped going after a while, and about a year into our marriage, my husband called me out for not being saved. He said I analytically and intellectually believed everything, but I didn’t believe truly in my heart that God died for me and offered me His salvation. I was offended, and he was right. It took about two weeks of prayer and confusion, and I finally broke down one day and asked God to save me. I offered Him everything I was, and I accepted His forgiveness. From October 2017 onward, I was a different human being. The old me was truly dead. Thinking back to my old life, it’s like watching a movie. It doesn’t feel like who I am – because it’s not. My reason for writing all of this is because of how God showed me who He was through my husband. He showed me how He can work through someone who is bold enough to put everything he is on the line, to put his entire marriage on the line in order to proclaim His truth to a lost soul. And if you knew me before I was saved, you would know how scared my husband could have been because I was really a volatile person in terms of anger issues. Seeing his example has shown me first hand how even if you don’t “feel” that trust in God, you can choose to trust Him in your actions by doing exactly as He says, even if it feels ridiculous to you. I will always follow by my husband’s side wherever he feels the Lord is leading us to preach His word to the lost and undeserving like He did for me.

This gift’s evident in my life in the following ways:
I’ve been through some weird issues in my life – I grew up with a mom who was an alcoholic (recovered now – praise God), I dated a 40 year old when I was 16, I’ve had horrible anger management problems, and I suffered an addiction myself. I was raised to be an optimist but grew up a pessimist. I needed the encouragement of a Christian when I was in these places, and I didn’t have them until I got older. I want to be the person to make others believe that it can get better. This life is full of tribulation, and we’ll never escape that. We need to count it all joy and welcome the wisdom and steadfastness it produces, and that’s incredibly hard to do in solitude. I don’t want to dilute the truth to make people feel good – the truth stands on its own, and it’s my duty as a Christian to share it. There’s a tough balance to strike between sharing truth and sharing love/grace, and they can only go together. In my opinion, exhortation is sharing truth and encouragement is sharing love/grace. We need to hold each other accountable in the body of Christ and to be filled with the knowledge of His Word and His mercy. I think because of some of the stranger situations I’ve been in, I have a lot of encouragement and honesty to share.

[H]eart

1. Taking care of my husband and babies – making them food, sewing them clothes, doing little things that make them smile, trying my best to be a submissive and Godly wife to edify my marriage and as an example for my children

2. Cooking for people – I have such a passion for cooking, and I love making people their favorite dishes or making something new and exotic to experience together with someone. To add to this, I love providing people with nourishment in general. I’m particularly moved by homeless people and try to go out of my way to help them and show them that God loves them through my actions. It hurts me very much that I feel I can’t do more for them in the long term.

3. Singing/playing guitar for people – music has always been a huge passion from the Lord in my life, and I have so much fun sharing it with others.

I don’t feel I have too much of a preference towards a certain age group necessarily. I’m still not super comfortable around young kids despite having a toddler and a baby on the way. I do get on well with folks older than I am. I always have, and it’s very natural for me to talk with older people. I wouldn’t be opposed to working with high school age either.

Definitely homeless ministry – that’s a huge one that really cuts me to my heart.
Also, I’d love to provide some sort of encouragement or guidance to young couples who are looking to get married/have kids. I’m not really sure if something like that exists, but I like the idea of it or maybe being on some sort of a prayer team for young couples.
I’m very passionate about nutrition and health so I’d love to get involved in something helping people take steps to honor God with their health.

Homelessness
Health/fitness
Other – Spreading of false/weak doctrine in our society and among megachurches especially

[A]bilities

Stay at home mom/operations manager for our family business

I have training as an EMT-B
I was a chiropractic assistant and a front desk coordinator for insurance
I worked retail and food/bev

I’m a good cook, I can sing/play guitar, I’m knowledgeable about nutrition and fitness, I’m an amateur seamstress, and I have a huge passion for languages.

I’ve taught a few classes in high school on marksmanship to the school’s ROTC marksmanship team I was captain of.

I’m compassionate and extremely stubborn/driven. I also believe I’m an intelligent person who enjoys accumulating and sharing knowledge.

[P]ersonality

Extrovert

50-50 High/Low Risk

Challenger

50-50 People/Project Driven

50-50 Follower/Leader

Solo

Variety

Your Primary was ‘The Retriever’, with your Secondary coming in as ‘The Lion’, and here are the descriptions of your Personalities, and how they can be used for God

Golden Retriever- Good at making friends. Very loyal. Retriever personalities do not like big changes. They look for security. Can be very sensitive. Very caring. Has deep relationships, but usually only a couple of close friends. Wants to be loved by everyone. Looks for appreciation. Works best in a limited situation with a steady work pattern.

Strength: Accommodating, calm, affirming
Weakness: Indecisive, indifferent, unable to express emotional, too soft on other people
Limitation: Seeing the need to be more assertive, holding others accountable

Lion- This personality likes to lead. The lion is good at making decisions and is very goal-oriented. They enjoy challenges, difficult assignments, and opportunity for advancement. Because lions are thinking of the goal, they can step on people to reach it. Lions can be very aggressive and competitive. Lions must learn not to be too bossy or to take charge in other’s affairs.

Strength: Goal-oriented, strong, direct
Weakness: Argumentative, too dictatorial
Limitation: Doesn’t understand that directness can hurt others, hard time expressing grace

[E]xperience

I copied some of this from the box a few sections up because I felt I wrote it how I would share it in person – I grew up Catholic. I met my husband in high school when he was already a saved follower of Christ. It took a lot of philosophical debate and theological discussion on his part to try and convince me that the Catholic church wasn’t the Way. He moved across the country and we dated long-distance briefly, remained friends for a number of years, and the week he moved back to the east coast, I visited him and we got engaged. In the interim of him moving away, I ended up dating a man 24 years my senior while I was in high school. It obviously created a great rift between my parents and me and shook all of our faiths. This man, who claimed to be a Christian, was actually the reason I first went to a Christian church. After two and a half years of this insane relationship, I ended it. It was only about a week later that I got engaged to my husband. It seems crazy, and I understand that but my heart was dead to that relationship almost from the moment it began. I was scared, alone, angry, and very confused. He made me feel as if the world was against me and only he understood me. Forgiving him was the biggest step I took in my faith when I was eventually saved, and I consider the experience as vital to my testimony despite it being quite disturbing for people to hear and for me to share.

My parents started attending Christian church, as well, and renounced their Catholic religion as I did. They were eventually saved, too. After the relationship with the older guy ended and I moved in with my husband (admittedly, fiancé when I first moved in), he and I went to a local church where we lived at the time in Charleston, but we really didn’t connect with anyone there. It felt very superficial to us. We stopped going after a while, and about a year into our marriage, my husband called me out for not being saved. He said I analytically and intellectually believed everything, but I didn’t believe truly in my heart that God died for me and offered me His salvation. I was offended, and he was right. It took about two weeks of prayer and confusion, and I finally broke down one day and asked God to save me. I offered Him everything I was, and I accepted His forgiveness. From October 2017 onward, I was a different human being. The old me was truly dead. Thinking back to my old life, it’s like watching a movie. It doesn’t feel like who I am – because it’s not. I thought my whole life that I knew God and was “probably” going to heaven because of growing up in church. It wasn’t until my husband called me out that I realized I kept that belief years into my “becoming a Christian”. I know realize how critical that moment of salvation is.

n/a

The biggest for me is probably my pregnancy with our first child. I was extremely scared and not totally sure we made the right decision in trying to have a baby, but I knew I was disappointed every time the test was negative. I began to get discouraged about our chances when suddenly the next test I took was positive. I was so busy being overwhelmed with excitement that I completely forgot any fears I had about “abandoning a career focused life”. Being a mom was suddenly my career. I was so terrified I wouldn’t be able to love our baby, and it was like the moment I found out I was pregnant, I knew I would give my life for our child. The more she grew inside me, the more I experienced God’s wonder from the inside out. I started to understand His love for us as His children in a way that made no sense to me before. I grew even closer to my husband, and we were both so consumed with learning everything about pregnancy, birth, and child-rearing in ways that are glorifying to God above all else. There were times when complications arose, and I was so wracked with fear and worry, I didn’t know how I’d make it through the pregnancy with my sanity. But day after day, God showed me such grace and I felt so silly now ever having worried about our daughter. The whole experience of pregnancy and motherhood thus far has changed my soul in ways I never imagined I could change. I’ve been doing an extended exercise in practicing the fruit of the Spirit since our daughter was about 8 months old and we were having issues with her sleeping. My husband has joined in, and it has taught us so much about how we need to grow in our faith and how we need to model that for our children.

In a more broad sense, being in ROTC in high school was a net positive experience. I struggled a lot with making friends, and this was a group of people who were all sort of outcasts like me. ROTC gave me a sense of discipline, purpose, camaraderie, and taught me the leadership/teaching skills I now possess. I was able to learn from older kids who had been through my experiences as a younger high school student, and I was subsequently able to teach younger kids once I was in the upper grades. It showed me how to treat a flock with authority but also mutual respect as a friend. I think, in hindsight, it’s a good model on how to act in a church community when I really didn’t grow up in one.

When I was working as a chiropractic assistant, I had a patient about 7 years older than me. She was very sweet, and each time we made small talk while adjusting her, we learned we had a lot of the same interests. She flat out asked me one day, “Do you have a small group or any Christian friends you regularly meet with or anyone you pray with and read Scripture with?” I was surprised since she didn’t know I was a Christian (at that point, I wasn’t a true saved believer yet, but I had the head knowledge). I told her no, and she invited me to come to her house church with her next week. I had no idea what it was, but I decided to go since at that point, my only “friend” was the man I was dating who was 24 years my senior. I was very nervous and shy, but the group was so kind and welcoming. We started off by eating together, and the hostess that night found out from the girl who invited me that I had a list of food allergies so she catered to that. I was so surprised at her hospitality to me, especially since I was 6 to 12 years younger than the rest of them. We did a Bible study on Acts 6, and after that, the men split off from the women so we could pray separately. That was confusing to me at first, but it was my first real introduction into Godly roles of men and women. When we prayed, I was so moved by the Holy Spirit coming through the words of these women praying for each other. One of them offered to pray for me, and I was so touched. I stayed with the group for about a year (until I moved to Charleston), and they helped lead me out of my relationship with the older guy and into the relationship with my husband, despite me sharing very little about either situation. Their combined Godly wisdom, kindness, and honesty really changed who I was. I don’t know that I’d have the relationship I have with the Lord or my husband that I do now if it wasn’t for them and for the single question from a stranger I barely knew. She’s now one of my best friends.

My mom has epilepsy, and one of the worst days of my life was when I was alone with her when she had her first seizure. I was 11, and she was knocked unconscious after the seizure because she tried to stand and fell to the floor. I called 911 and initially told dispatch my mom was hallucinating because she wasn’t speaking clearly. When she started to seize, I told the woman she was having a seizure, and she sent an ambulance. I was with my mom for what felt like an eternity waiting for the medics to arrive as she bled from the mouth and lay on the floor. I thought she was going to die, and my dad was working out of town as he had to throughout the year to make his pension as a pipefitter. She ended up being completely fine, and we learned the type of seizures she had were mostly harmless although scary. I was with her for three subsequent seizures, each time just the two of us. After her heart surgery, the doctors assured us she wouldn’t have them again, but she did. It was just before my first day of high school, and I woke up at 4:00 am to her on the floor – my dad once again in New York for work. I cried out to God and asked him why. I thought it would never end. She has been medicated and seizure-free since then. I lived in fear for so many years, but ultimately her health issues are what led me to get licensed as an EMT-B so I could help others in situations like mine. I wanted to be like the paramedics who, each time, gave me such comfort that they wouldn’t let anything happen to her. I also never wanted to be helpless in caring for my family in an emergency ever again.

My mom was an alcoholic for 29 years. I used to come downstairs from playing in my room with such anxiety every day not knowing which version of my mom I was going to get – the amazing, sweet, selfless, incredible, fun woman who nurtured my father and me or the obnoxious, bitter, selfish, cruel woman who made us feel like we made her miserable. My dad lived in denial for many, many years about her problem and didn’t really deal with it until after I moved out and got married. I remember having to get people to drive her home from events so she wouldn’t kill herself or somebody else behind the wheel. Nobody believed me that she drank because it was almost always in private. I loved her so much, and I thought it was my fault that she drank. I didn’t understand why she couldn’t stop. Finally, at church with my parents in August 2018, an elder gave a sermon that struck my mom in a way nothing else ever had. She went into an AA meeting the next morning and has been completely sober for 2 1/2 years. It was like God telling me that I was totally powerless and that no earthly logic could ever break an addiction. Only He has that power, and he proved it to me. The overnight change in my mom is still unbelievable to me, but the more unbelievable part is the forgiveness I feel for my mom. Her remorse is never-ending, but she doesn’t wallow in guilt. She has repented and accepted the forgiveness of God. And I’ve been taught things about the nature of addictions that I would never understand otherwise.

When my husband and I were first married, I was very angry and bitter about my past relationships. Sadly, I let that bleed into my relationship with him. We had been friends for so long and had previously dated, but we had never fought. Our discussions were always raw, honest, and philosophical. After years of becoming jaded due to mostly self-induced heartache, I was really a quarrelsome woman to him. On multiple occasions, I had gotten out of the car while he was still driving and stormed off in a blind rage. I screamed obscenities at him over little, foolish things. It took over 2 years into our marriage (a good year after I was saved) for me to finally come to terms with what it meant to be a submissive wife. I didn’t understand why the woman was “lesser”, and it took my husband’s love, leadership, respect, and devotion to show me that I was supposed to be lesser. Christ isn’t lesser than the Father – they are equal, but He is in submission to the Father. The Godly model for marriage mirrors that. It was a long and slow change, and I still have days when I struggle, but our marriage is so unbelievably strong in Christ. I was always so scared of divorce that I didn’t want to get married. Now I know that when you’re truly believers united as one, all of the darkness cannot overshadow the light.

Wrapping It Up

The Challenge: Based upon your S.H.A.P.E. Assessment above (the way God wired you), If you knew you couldn’t fail … and ‘lack of money, or time’ was not an obstacle… list your Top 3 Things you would ‘Focus’ your Life on, next to #1 Loving God & #2 Loving Your Neighbor (these would be your ‘3 God-Sized Dreams’ for your life)?

1. My Relationship with GOD

2. My Relationship with Others

• Putting Your Spouse First
• Your Kids Second
• Everyone Else After those

3. To evangelize to my unsaved friends in such a way they would be saved through the power of God working through me

4. To travel to Japan/other countries as a missionary by boat/living as a minimalist

5. To write and perform Biblically- based worship music