The Redemptive Gift of Exhorter (Update)

NOTE: If you are joining us from the previous post on the Teacher, welcome, and we hope this blesses you deeply.

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“You stood by my side all these years while I reaped the benefits of destruction. Now that I’m trying to protect the people I’ve put in harm’s way, you’re going to walk out?”

Tony Stark, Iron Man

I have received a few questions along the lines of something like: What happens if I have more than one gift?

There is at least one thing I would check before assuming you have more than one gift. That is, what kind of major emotional or spiritual wounds have been left unhealed?

Healing A Major Wound

Have the major places in your life, major life events encountered a large measure of deep healing? Often times, when more than one gift gets presented at the front, some part of us has been so traumatized that the real us cannot step forward, and therefore the real us has not been recognized. Allow me to illustrate this with my own life.

I was a rather soft and introspective kid who gravitated toward those that were not universally acclaimed by the rest of the society. I grew up with this crazy instinct to connect with the person who was probably the most hurt or wounded and in their woundedness bringing them with me into the rest of the group.

Somehow, in the course of time, that soft (some of you would have thought me effeminate) and gentle kid went into hiding and out came this wounded, outgoing kid who just wanted to fit in.

And even in my attempts at fitting in, I had this latent capacity to pick out the one needy or wounded person in the bunch of people and either I would gravitate to them, or they to me. Even when that capacity was ignored because all people saw or wanted to see was my capacity to draw a crowd, I knew I was not quite designed to work with crowds.

Design doesn’t stay buried permanently. It always comes back to the surface. Even in the middle of massive wounding. Even when it is flipping inconvenient and makes you look incongruent.

My design did just that. And like feelings that are buried alive, design never dies.

Another aspect of my own design in finding my own gift is realizing that I was not just made to fix a problem, but rather I was programmed for deepest understanding of a problem. Any problem I was interested in, I wanted to know what went into making that problem what it was. To this day, whenever I have a conversation with an allopathic doctor, one of my qualities that drives them up a tree is how all the parts of an issue are interconnected with portions of my body that they are not analyzing. How does this solution affect the rest of the environment of my body or my family member’s body in a deep way?

Because I presented as a introspect and a touch feminine, none of the male figures in my life ever invited me into their world to fix a problem. Not one. And I know I can solve problems (I spent three years as the top helper at a commercial electrical shop; where else like construction are you faced with repeated problems to solve for which no one wants to accept responsibility?) , but I was never given a place to learn how to solve problems and fail magnificently. I was never encouraged to learn the process to solve problems. I never got to take the widget apart, understand what goes into that widget, put it back together, turn it on. Fix the lawn mower, change the oil, answer the question, consider the relationship, use the wrench.

It wasn’t until I got into construction that I understood how hand tools work together, and was given permission, nay, instruction, to use them to solve a problem.

The Reason I Brought Up Problems In A Post On The Redemptive Gifts

Problems do not ultimately come from the enemy, in my experience. They come from the Lord to grow us and to instruct us and to mature us. We do our best maturing when we are weaving together principles, and solving problems that are complex. Each of the Redemptive Gifts have a set of problems for which they were made. The Exhorter is no exception, and his problems to solve pertain mostly to the missing pieces of truth pertaining to the nature of G-d.

The Meat and Potatoes of the Post: Behavioral Characteristics Of The Exhorter

So, the Exhorter….

1. Exhorters are social and relational. Of all the gifts, when they are the healthiest, they are the one gift that will interact with people in quantities that might put the other gifts on overload.
2. Exhorters hunt relentlessly for the key to a person’s heart in order to have an on-ramp to engage relationally at a deep level with people.
3. Exhorters know how to network, and make vast number of relationships to quickly build communities.
4. Their capacity to influence other people and marshal other people to their cause is often overwhelming. They typically enjoy a large personality that is hard to ignore and makes a strong impression. Think Elvis Presley.
5. Because of this, many Exhorters are outstanding at the resource of relationships. They have a built-in capacity to draw people into their sphere of influence. Therefore, as a result of their design, their lives, in the words of my ex-pastor, are “one big network”. Odds are, if they don’t know how to fix the problem you have, then they will know someone, or they will know someone who knows someone who knows someone who knows someone who will be an expert in your given problem. It is in this capacity to network, that we find a great strength and a a great weakness.
6. On the negative side, Exhorters, if they are not walking in a high level of character and integrity, can (please note I did not say WILL, as there is no guarantee any of us will or will not stumble) default to the pitfall of controlling others through that influence.
7. Many Exhorters that function in a low level can often move from a place where they are peers to a place where they are in charge. With the Aztecs, who were Exhorter as a group, “generally conquest followed commerce”.
8. Exhorters, for all their community building and many, many, do not excel at being fathers. Ed Silvoso, the founder of Harvest Evangelism and the International Transformation Network (organizations that both focus on transformation of large geographic regions, cities, and nations), is known for large networks and social transformation, but because of that cavernous horizontal capacity, he does not do a lot of vertical father/son mentoring. Mentoring and fathering, while not being foreign words to Exhorters, are foreign realities in fullness to Exhorters. They are not looking for individuals. Rather they are looking for the greatest reach horizontally for their effort. And they are capable of influencing those people easily.
9. Typically, Exhorters can crack open the Bible and grab the revelation that is missing from an embryonic body of truth. They are good at crafting the harsh and blunt message that the Prophet first conceives, in order that it would be more palatable to the audience. This parallels their love of right presentation.
10. They are, in a nutshell, the most horizontal of the gifts.
11. Exhorters are frequently not focused on one task or one objective, unless that goal is very broad. They wear many hats, and simultaneously work for many goals. Social change over individual connection is their preference. Consequently, that can leave them functioning very shallowly.
12. Exhorters are the master communicators of all the gifts, especially when it comes to communicating the concepts of the spirit in the language of the soul. They translate and relanguage, usually with great finesse and skill in order to get people understanding and on board with whatever they are pursuing.
13. While Prophets have the license to hunt, Exhorters use a fisherman’s net. While a Prophet might drive a HumVee or a sports car, depending on what is necessary, Exhorters will drive a double-decker, bright red colorful bus.
14. Turning from the individual application to the institutional application, the Exhorter’s capacity to influence the large groups is embodied by the Hollywood film industry in all of its entertainment glory.
15. In an Exhorter organization, the treasure that is unpacked in its varied flavors is the treasure of Ubiquity. That is, the product of an Exhorter company has a global reach that is easily recognizable from culture to culture and nation to nation: the product is everywhere. The Disney brand is easily one of the most ubiquitous brands anywhere.
16. Exhorters, as well as Prophets, and I would argue Mercies, are the most verbal of the gifts. While Mercies need to ascertain the trustworth of the audience in question, and Prophets typically speak without reference to the opinions of their audience, Exhorters will take their daily unused quota of words, build a relationship with someone very quickly and engage in expanding their circle of influence. There is little more they enjoy more than a good conversation, and they will form communities with even the smallest of time allotments.
17. Back on the personal and the positive side of things, the Exhorter usually puts a premium on the concept of presentation. They like to present a package that looks good, is appealing to the eye, is stylish, etc. There is a concern for not just THAT they are presenting themselves, but also the MANNER in which they are presenting themselves. Exhorters have a thing with appearance, and the initial visibility.
18. Lots of sparkle, an affinity for jewelry. Bling.
19. Institutionally, the cars of the American automotive industry, out of Detroit the Exhorter City, are also Exhorter, when taken as a whole. They are built to impress or get a certain image across. The Mustang, the Corvette, the muscle cars. The Fast and the Furious franchise. Very much huge in presentation.
20. Because they are obsessive with presentation, Exhorters often have have a highly-polished brand image, which also results in people beating down the doors to work for those companies like dogs and burn out in service to them.
21. One sign you are in an Exhorter organization is that the employees are usually all exhausted and overburdened with more projects than they can manage, because the Exhorter’s capacity to dream runs way ahead of the capacity of his workforce to keep up with the workload. Oftentimes, the enemy will test the Exhorter in the area of “walking in reality”, and the Exhorter will think that his people can handle more than they actually can. Walt Disney, and the related Pixar were notorious for burning out their employees and moving onto the next, in their relentless drive for better, larger, faster, stronger, harder, more. Because Walt’s vision ran larger than the money came in, his brother Roy had to work from week to week to keep the company solvent.
22. This highlights another capacity of the Exhorter. They frequently think more can be achieved than really can with a given set of resources.
23. Exhorters are one of the visionary gifts typically.
24. Exhorters frequently find themselves, because of their capacity for vision, to making others serve the vision.
25. Exhorters, in order to be wildly successful, must demand of themselves a relentless answer to the question “Is this realistic? Am I in denial?”
26. Because of the issues with dreaming, vision, and non-reality, combined with their capacity to easily make relationships and connections, Exhorters can often find themselves in ethical and moral failure.
27. They can also find themselves in a place where they move the boundary markers in the area of relationships.
28. An Exhorter, when they play a game with friends or opponents, frequently has a path to winning that includes destabilizing their opponents psychologically.
29. If the opponent is truly perceived as a threat to the Exhorter, then they Exhorter might resort to attempting to humiliate the opponent or gaslighting. Exhorters are not known for being willing to make sacrifices unless it makes them look good. There are exceptions to this rule, in which case you have a really mature Exhorter, but….
30. In order for Exhorters to excel, they must without exception embrace pain and reality in order to have a large return on investment. The preeminent example of an Exhorter in film is Tony Stark/Iron Man in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Especially telling are four scenes from the movie that reveal the Exhorter-ness of the character (see below this checklist).
31. The Exhorter said, “Jarvis, sometimes you gotta run before you walk.” Move into their revelation or vision and ask questions later pertaining to execution later.
32. The Exhorter flies too high first, leaps before he or she looks. Tony Stark, Iron Man.
33. The Exhorter, with flair and presentation, gives a large demonstration of the Jericho Missile, and BOOM! FLASH! SPARKLE!, and never missing a beat, has the perfect spread of the champagne after the fact. Again, Tony Stark.
34. The Exhorter, when they finally decide to embrace their principle, and embrace the pain of sowing and reaping and reality, may sometimes be called to make the ultimate sacrifice of themselves, in order to move the needle massively for those around them. Tony Stark, again. “I am going to stop them, even if it means I die.” And there is usually a flash that only they can do, in which they take care of others at expense to themselves. They are meant to give themselves to a cause often at great expense to themselves.
35. When the Exhorter makes themselves, not their followers, vulnerable, the organizations they lead thrust forward in a positive fashion.
36. The L-rd will NOT directly confront the Exhorter over the issue of Reality because the Exhorter has to choose to put his or her sacrifice first and care for his or her employees before he thinks about asking them to sacrifice. This is just like the L-rd will not directly confront a Prophet over the issue of fractured relationships because the Prophet has to learn how to lay their free will down in order to create a win/win where the needs of the one AND the needs of the many are met AND where they choose a place of vulnerability and humility with their friends.
37. I think there is a principle there. See my next smaller post.
38. Exhorters, just like their benchmark, Jesus, have to grow to maturity and learn how to make the ultimate sacrifice in order to bring life to others. They have to embrace Reality in order to receive their disproportionate harvest of Reality from sowing into that principle.
39. The Principle for the Exhorter is threefold in its manifestation. First, the Principle of Pain and Suffering. Second, the Principle of Sowing and Reaping. Third, the Principle of Reality. If the Exhorter does not have a firm and strong willingness to walk in Reality, hunt for Reality, understand Sowing and Reaping, and then embrace the pain, then most of the negative manifestations will rear their ugly heads. There has to be a staunch hunting for a realistic vision and a realistic understanding of how long a particular vision is going to take to execute, or else the Exhorter is going to find a great deal of frustration.
40. Exhorters are designed to understand and work in principles and make those cause-and-effect relationships known to others in the body. Moses, Solomon, and Paul were designed and expressed huge gluts of principles in the bodies of Scripture that they authored, precisely because principles are what make up reality.
41. When a peer relationship is upended because one of the parties pulls out in front and grabs for a superior position in what was once a thriving horizontal relationship, the upending of that relationship can feel like a betrayal. Exhorters of all the gifts have this problem the most. This is a place where the Exhorter has to be careful and demonstrate a huge amount of self-control.
42. They have an astounding ability to form community quickly. They are the social glue that helps build community easily in a group situation.
43. The big movement is that this is G-d’s choice for the world-changers. They can draw in and communicate to a large cross-section of diverse people, and they cross every kind of barrier, cultural, religious, social, economic, and make friends easily.
44. When an Exhorter is high-functioning, their capacity for influencing the crowds becomes full of one Sowing-and-Reaping, Pain-and-Suffering, and Reality-Laced obsession: What is the vision of G-d for this group of people?
45. In the Believer’s Armor in Ephesians 6, the fourth item is the Shield of Faith. This is the Faith delivered once for all to the saints. This Shield of Faith is repeatedly seen in early Christian iconography (See below)
46. This points to the Exhorter’s major strength in teaching, which is unpacking the part of the truth pertaining to the nature of G-d that is missing from the complete package. The Exhorter gift has a whole host of patterns of 3 that show up regularly in their lives and in the passages of Scripture. Their principle (Pain and Suffering, Sowing and Reaping, Reality) is threefold, their day with the sun, moon, and stars is threefold, and their unpacking revelation is threefold (The Trinity).
47. Exhorters are frequently known for moving boundary lines, creating an oppressive workload, changing peer relationships to leader/follower relationships, and treating what was true in a previous season as untrue in following seasons.
48. A reason for this is that Exhorters don’t realize they are doing it, and they don’t do it with a bad intention. It often has to be pointed out, and if they are going to have healthy relationships, then they need to be able to have relationships with people from whom they can receive real and blunt correction.
49. Expanding on the reason for this, unless the Exhorter is willing to walk in their principle (which I will get to later), there is often a disconnect between reality, actions, and intentions, Bill Clinton’s behavior during the Lewinsky Scandal was vintage Exhorter walking in non-reality, “It wasn’t adultery because I didn’t mean it as adultery”. Many times, a low-level Exhorter does not view their actions as wrong because there is no malice in their heart toward the person with whom they are interacting.
50. I think part of the reason Exhorters don’t understand or realize or have a difficulty walking in the threefold Exhorter Principle, is that their root iniquity is the opposite of Reality, which is Denial. There is a denial that kills the best of the Exhorter. Walt Disney had it, Hitler had it, FDR had it, and others.
51. In order to combat these sorts of non-realities, they have to hunt relentlessly for a realistic sowing and a realistic situation and a realistic solution to a complex problem. They will often want to present an oversimplified solution to a problem and as a result can create an eroded trust in their capacity to lead.
52. And when they are unhealthy, Exhorter anger can be pretty full of rage and harmful and abusive.
53. For unhealthy Exhorters, we look at Jezebel.
54. And for healthy Exhorters, Moses, Paul, Jeremiah the Prophet, Deborah the Prophet, Solomon the King, and of course, the Lord Yeshua.
55. Exhorters have a strong penchant for group cohesion, unity, and the principles of fair play, when they are healthy.
56. The above pictures reflect the Exhorter tribe, for better or worse. They are, in order, Adolf Hitler, Jeroboam Son of Nebat, our current President Donald Trump, California, Napoleon Bonaparte, FDR, Winston Churchill, Hollywood, King Solomon, Walt Disney, Jesus, Doug Addison, Ed Silvoso, and Todd Bentley. In addition, the City of Los Angeles, Chicago, Detroit, and the Automotive Industry are all Exhorter.

Giver

This is just a brief unpacking of the gift, gang. And while there is more, be aware that you, Exhorter Tribe, are designed to “shine among them like stars in the sky as you hold firmly to the word of life.”

With that, we proceed to the next in sequence, the Giver.