Spiritual Gifts: The Full Biblical List and How to Discover Yours

1. What Are Spiritual Gifts?

Spiritual gifts are special graces the Holy Spirit gives to particular believers so they can build up the Church and serve the world. St. Paul puts it in one sentence: "To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good" (1 Corinthians 12:7). The Greek word Paul uses is charisma, a gift of grace, and the Catholic Church calls these gifts charisms.

The Catechism defines them plainly: "Whether extraordinary or simple and humble, charisms are graces of the Holy Spirit which directly or indirectly benefit the Church, ordered as they are to her building up, to the good of men, and to the needs of the world" (CCC 799). Elsewhere it explains that these special graces are "oriented toward sanctifying grace and are intended for the common good of the Church" (CCC 2003).

Three truths follow, and every one of them should light a fire under you.

• Every Christian has at least one. "As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God's varied grace" (1 Peter 4:10). Nobody in the Body of Christ is a spectator.
• The Spirit chooses. "All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills" (1 Corinthians 12:11). You cannot earn a gift, buy one or demand one.
• Gifts are for others. A charism is a tool for building up your brothers and sisters. Hoard it and it rusts.

The early Church turned the world upside down (Acts 17:6) because ordinary believers used what the Spirit gave them. That same Spirit has been poured into you at baptism and sealed in you at confirmation. The question is whether you will use what you have been given before your time runs out. No one knows the day or the hour (Mark 13:32). The master in the parable of the talents came back and asked what each servant had done with what he was given (Matthew 25:14-30). He will ask you too.

2. The Complete List of Spiritual Gifts in the Bible

The New Testament lists spiritual gifts in five main passages, and no single list is complete. Paul gives different examples to different churches, which tells you the lists are samples of the Spirit's generosity, open-ended by design. Here they are, passage by passage.

1 Corinthians 12:4-11

"Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit" (12:4). Paul then names nine manifestations of the Spirit:

1. The utterance of wisdom
2. The utterance of knowledge
3. Faith
4. Gifts of healing
5. The working of miracles
6. Prophecy
7. The ability to distinguish between spirits
8. Various kinds of tongues
9. The interpretation of tongues

1 Corinthians 12:28-31

"And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healing, helping, administrating, and various kinds of tongues" (12:28). This list adds apostles, teachers, helping and administrating. Paul then asks, "Are all apostles? Are all prophets?" (12:29), and the expected answer is no. He closes with a command and a promise: "But earnestly desire the higher gifts. And I will show you a still more excellent way" (12:31).

Romans 12:6-8

"Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them" (12:6). Paul names seven: prophecy, service, teaching, exhortation (encouragement), contributing in generosity, leading with zeal, and acts of mercy with cheerfulness.

Ephesians 4:11-12

Christ "gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ" (4:11-12). This list adds evangelists and shepherds (pastors), and it states the purpose of every gift: equipping the whole Church for ministry.

1 Peter 4:10-11

Peter sorts the gifts into two broad kinds: speaking ("as one who speaks oracles of God") and serving ("as one who serves by the strength that God supplies"), "in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ" (4:11).

Gifts named elsewhere

Many Catholic and Protestant teachers add gifts named in other passages. Paul calls his own celibacy a gift: "each has his own gift from God, one of one kind and one of another" (1 Corinthians 7:7). Peter sets hospitality right beside the gifts (1 Peter 4:9-10). Bezalel was filled "with the Spirit of God, with ability and intelligence, with knowledge and all craftsmanship" to build the tabernacle (Exodus 31:3). Music, writing, intercession and craftsmanship all appear in modern Catholic discernment lists on this basis.

3. What Does Each Spiritual Gift Mean?

Each spiritual gift is a particular way the Spirit works through a person to build up others. Christian traditions define some of them a little differently, so where views differ, both are given here.

• Utterance of wisdom: a word that applies God's truth to a concrete situation, often settling a hard question.
• Utterance of knowledge: many Catholic and Reformed teachers, following St. Thomas Aquinas, read this as a grace for explaining the truths of faith; Pentecostals and charismatics usually read it as a supernatural insight into facts the speaker could not otherwise know.
• Faith: a charism of bold, mountain-moving trust that God will act in a specific case (1 Corinthians 13:2), distinct from the saving faith every Christian has.
• Gifts of healing: God working through a person's prayer to restore the sick. The plural in Paul's Greek suggests many kinds. See our guide to praying for healing.
• Working of miracles: acts of power beyond nature, given as signs of God's kingdom.
• Prophecy: speaking a word from God for "upbuilding and encouragement and consolation" (1 Corinthians 14:3). See our guide to the gift of prophecy.
• Discernment of spirits: the ability to tell whether something comes from God, from the human spirit or from the evil one (1 John 4:1).
• Tongues and interpretation: prayer or speech in a language the speaker has not learned, and the gift of making its meaning known to the assembly. See our guide to speaking in tongues.
• Apostles, evangelists, shepherds: gifts for founding, proclaiming and caring. Catholics hold that the Twelve held a unique, unrepeatable office, while the apostolic and evangelistic spirit lives on in missionaries and preachers.
• Teaching: explaining the faith so it takes root and bears fruit.
• Service and helping: the practical, often hidden work that keeps the Body alive.
• Exhortation: encouraging, comforting and urging others toward God.
• Giving: unusual generosity with money, time or goods, given "in generosity" (Romans 12:8).
• Leadership and administration: guiding people and organizing work so the mission moves forward.
• Mercy: compassion for the suffering, given "with cheerfulness" (Romans 12:8).

Notice how many of these are ordinary. The Catechism insists on it: charisms may be "extraordinary or simple and humble" (CCC 799). The grandmother who prays faithfully for every family in her parish and the young man who sets up chairs every Sunday are using gifts as truly as the preacher who heals the sick.

4. Tongues, Prophecy, Healing and Deliverance: Go Deeper

Tongues, prophecy, healing and deliverance are the four gifts people ask about most, and each has its own full guide on this site. These are the gifts that stir the most hunger and the most controversy, so they need more than a paragraph. Start with the one you are wrestling with, and read all four before you settle your mind.

A word of care before you go on. If you or someone you love has frightening symptoms, see a doctor and, where it fits, a mental health professional, alongside a priest. Medicine and prayer work together. If you are in crisis or thinking about harming yourself, reach out now: in the US call or text 988, in the UK and Ireland call Samaritans on 116 123, and elsewhere find a line at findahelpline.com. For the wider battle against the evil one, see our guide to spiritual warfare.

5. Charisms and the Seven Gifts of the Holy Spirit

Charisms and the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit are two different things, and confusing them is one of the most common mistakes people make about spiritual gifts. Charisms are given to particular people for the good of others. The seven gifts are given to every Christian in a state of grace for their own holiness.

The seven gifts come from Isaiah's prophecy of the Messiah: "the Spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the LORD" (Isaiah 11:2-3). The Hebrew text names fear of the Lord twice; the Greek Septuagint and the Latin Vulgate render one of them as piety, which gives the traditional seven. The Catechism lists them: "The seven gifts of the Holy Spirit are wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear of the Lord. They belong in their fullness to Christ, Son of David. They complete and perfect the virtues of those who receive them" (CCC 1831). Our guide to the Holy Spirit summarizes these seven gifts alongside the fruits of the Spirit from Galatians 5.

St. Thomas Aquinas drew the line clearly. He called charisms gratiae gratis datae, "graces freely given," and distinguished them from sanctifying grace, which makes a person pleasing to God (Summa Theologiae I-II, q. 111, a. 1). The consequence is sobering. A person can exercise a real charism and still be far from God. Jesus warned that on the last day many would say, "Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?" and he would answer, "I never knew you" (Matthew 7:22-23). Holiness is measured by love and grace. Gifts are tools placed in your hands.

Both matter. The seven gifts make you holy. Charisms make you useful. Seek holiness first, and use whatever charism the Spirit places in your hands without delay.

6. Why Love Is the Greatest Gift

Love is the greatest gift because every other gift serves it and every other gift will end. Paul places 1 Corinthians 13, the great hymn to love, right between his two chapters on charisms, and the placement is deliberate. After telling the Corinthians to desire the higher gifts, he says, "And I will show you a still more excellent way" (12:31).

Read that again and let it cut. Tongues without love is noise. Prophecy without love is nothing. Mountain-moving faith without love is nothing. Paul goes on: "Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away" (13:8). "So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love" (13:13).

The Catechism draws the same conclusion: "charity is the true measure of charisms" (CCC 800). A gift used with pride, to gain followers, money or attention, has already failed the test. A small gift used with great love has passed it.

So ask yourself honestly. When you pray for spiritual gifts, are you hungry to serve, or hungry to be seen? Repent of the second today. Then ask boldly for the first. Paul's next sentence after the hymn to love is a command: "Pursue love, and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts" (14:1). Both halves. In that order.

7. Have the Gifts Ceased? Cessationist and Continuationist Views

Christians disagree about whether the more dramatic gifts, such as tongues, prophecy, healing and miracles, continue today. Cessationists say those gifts ended with the apostolic age. Continuationists say all the gifts remain available until Christ returns. The Catholic Church has never taught that the charisms ceased. Here is each view stated fairly.

Cessationism

Cessationism is common in Reformed, Presbyterian and many Baptist and dispensationalist churches. Its classic modern defense is B. B. Warfield's Counterfeit Miracles (1918); more recent voices include Richard Gaffin and John MacArthur, whose book Strange Fire (2013) sharply criticized the charismatic movement. Cessationists argue:

• The sign gifts authenticated the apostles and their message (2 Corinthians 12:12; Hebrews 2:3-4), and that purpose was fulfilled.
• The Church is "built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets" (Ephesians 2:20), and a foundation is laid once.
• With the canon of Scripture complete, revelatory gifts like prophecy and tongues are no longer needed. Some read "when the perfect comes" (1 Corinthians 13:10) as pointing toward this, though many cessationists do not rest their case on that verse.

Cessationists affirm that God still answers prayer and still heals. What they deny is that individuals today carry the gift of healing, prophecy or tongues in the New Testament sense.

Continuationism

Continuationism is held by Pentecostals, charismatics and many other evangelicals, such as the theologian Wayne Grudem. Continuationists argue:

• "The perfect" in 1 Corinthians 13:10 is the return of Christ, when we will see "face to face" (13:12). Until then, the gifts continue.
• Paul expected the Corinthians to keep using the gifts "as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Corinthians 1:7).
• Peter's Pentecost sermon applied Joel's prophecy to "the last days" and promised the Spirit "for you and for your children and for all who are far off" (Acts 2:17, 39).
• No passage in the New Testament says the gifts will stop before Christ comes.

Between the two sits an "open but cautious" position that accepts the gifts may continue while warning against excess. The book Are Miraculous Gifts for Today? Four Views (1996) sets these positions side by side.

Where Catholics stand

The Catholic Church has never adopted cessationism. The Second Vatican Council taught that the Spirit "distributes special graces among the faithful of every rank" and that charisms, "whether they be the more outstanding or the more simple and widely diffused," are to be received with thanksgiving (Lumen Gentium 12). The Church has recognized healings and miracles in every century, and her process for canonizing saints still examines reported miracles with medical experts. See our guide to how the Church verifies miracles. St. Augustine, who once wrote that the tongues of Pentecost were signs suited to their time, later recorded many miracles of healing in his own city in The City of God (Book 22, chapter 8).

The Catholic position also differs from classical Pentecostalism. The same paragraph of Lumen Gentium warns that "extraordinary gifts are not to be sought after" presumptuously, and that judgment about them belongs to the Church's pastors. Catholics are open to every gift and submit every gift to discernment. For the history of the movements that revived interest in these gifts, see our guides to the charismatic movement, Pentecostalism and the Catholic Charismatic Renewal.

8. What the Catholic Church Teaches About Charisms

The Catholic Church teaches that charisms are real, varied, meant for the common good, measured by love, and subject to the discernment of the Church's shepherds. The Catechism gives the core in three paragraphs.

• They serve the Church. Charisms "directly or indirectly benefit the Church, ordered as they are to her building up, to the good of men, and to the needs of the world" (CCC 799).
• They are received with gratitude and measured by love. "Charisms are to be accepted with gratitude by the person who receives them and by all members of the Church... charity is the true measure of charisms" (CCC 800).
• They are discerned by the Church. "It is in this sense that discernment of charisms is always necessary. No charism is exempt from being referred and submitted to the Church's shepherds" (CCC 801).

CCC 801 goes on to quote Lumen Gentium 12: the shepherds' task is "not indeed to extinguish the Spirit, but to test all things and hold fast to what is good" (cf. 1 Thessalonians 5:12, 19-21). Both halves bind. Bishops and priests must not quench the Spirit, and the faithful must not refuse to be tested.

In 2016 the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith addressed this directly in the letter Iuvenescit Ecclesia, on the relationship between the hierarchical gifts (the ordained ministry) and the charismatic gifts. The letter teaches that both come from the same Spirit and that the Church needs both, echoing St. John Paul II, who called the institutional and charismatic dimensions "co-essential" to the Church.

What Catholic discernment looks for

1. Fidelity to the faith. No genuine gift contradicts Scripture or the teaching of the Church. "Test the spirits to see whether they are from God" (1 John 4:1).
2. Fruit. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23). "You will recognize them by their fruits" (Matthew 7:16).
3. The common good. Does the gift build up the Church, or build up the person using it? (1 Corinthians 14:12)
4. Humility and obedience. A person with a genuine charism accepts correction from the Church's pastors.
5. Order. "All things should be done decently and in order" (1 Corinthians 14:40).

9. How to Discover Your Spiritual Gifts, Step by Step

You discover your spiritual gifts by praying for the Spirit, serving in many ways, watching where your service bears fruit, and asking the Church to confirm what you see. Gifts show up in action far more often than in introspection. Start these steps today, and keep at them for a season.

1. Get right with God. Gifts serve love, and love grows in a heart in grace. If you are carrying serious sin, go to confession this week. Then receive the Eucharist with a hungry heart.
2. Ask the Father for the Spirit. Jesus promised: "how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!" (Luke 11:13). Ask every morning. Pray the prayer below. If you have not been confirmed, ask your parish about confirmation; if you have, ask God to stir up the grace you received.
3. Study the lists. Read 1 Corinthians 12 to 14, Romans 12, Ephesians 4 and 1 Peter 4 slowly, one chapter a day for two weeks. Mark the gifts that make your heart leap and the ones others have already seen in you.
4. Serve in three different places. Teach a class, visit the sick, help with music, cook for a family, lead a small group, pray with someone. Gifts are found by doing.
5. Watch for fruit. Where do people seem helped, encouraged or drawn to God through you? Paul's measure is building up: "strive to excel in building up the church" (1 Corinthians 14:12).
6. Ask people who know you. Ask three mature Christians, "Where have you seen God work through me?" Their answers often surprise people and are usually right.
7. Notice your joy. Real gifts often come with energy and gladness in using them. Paul tells the one who shows mercy to do it "with cheerfulness" (Romans 12:8).
8. Bring it to a priest or spiritual director. Charisms are submitted to the Church (CCC 801). A wise guide will help you separate a real call from a passing enthusiasm.
9. Pray with others. The first believers "devoted themselves to prayer" together (Acts 1:14) before the Spirit fell. Find a prayer group, a Bible study or a circle and keep showing up.
10. Use it this week. Whatever you suspect your gift might be, use it on someone in the next seven days. Gifts grow with use and shrink with neglect.

Steps three and nine are where most people stall: they never finish the study and they never find people to pray with. Pro gives you both, with in-depth Bible studies and a circle of believers to pray alongside. Get Pro for $49 once. Lifetime access, and a full refund inside 30 days if it does not help.

10. Are Spiritual Gift Tests Reliable?

Spiritual gift tests can start a useful conversation, but no questionnaire can tell you with certainty what the Holy Spirit has given you. Many churches use inventories that ask you to rate statements such as "I enjoy explaining Scripture to others," then score you against a list of gifts. They are popular, and some people find them helpful as a first step.

Keep their limits in view:

• They measure self-perception. A test can only reflect how you see yourself, and most of us see ourselves poorly.
• They mix gifts with temperament and skill. Liking spreadsheets is a talent. The charism of administration is the Spirit using that talent to build up the Church.
• Their lists vary. Different tests use different lists, often shaped by the theology of whoever wrote them. A cessationist inventory will leave out tongues and healing.
• They cannot replace discernment. Scripture and the Church point to fruit, the confirmation of others, and the judgment of pastors.

If you take a test, treat it as step three in the list above. Some Catholic programmes, such as the Called and Gifted process from the Catherine of Siena Institute, pair an inventory with teaching, interviews and a period of trying out the gifts, which matches the Church's own approach of discernment over time.

11. How to Use Your Gifts Without Pride or Burnout

Use your gifts humbly, steadily and inside the life of the Church, for the good of others and the glory of God. Peter gives the rule: "whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies, in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ" (1 Peter 4:11). Here is how to do that week by week.

• Start where you are. Your parish, your family, your workplace. The Spirit gives gifts for real people near you.
• Stay under authority. Work with your pastor and parish leaders. Gifts used in isolation tend to drift.
• Give the glory away. When someone thanks you, point them to God. "What do you have that you did not receive?" (1 Corinthians 4:7).
• Rest. Even Jesus withdrew to pray (Luke 5:16). A servant who never prays will burn out and grow bitter.
• Keep the sacraments at the center. Sunday Mass and regular confession keep the gifts tied to their source. Neglect them and the gifts become performance.
• Welcome other people's gifts. "The eye cannot say to the hand, 'I have no need of you'" (1 Corinthians 12:21). Rejoice when God uses someone else.
• Never charge for grace. Jesus told the Twelve, "You received without paying; give without pay" (Matthew 10:8).

The Spirit's gifts are free and cannot be bought. What Pro sells is study material, guided prayer and a circle of people who will keep you praying while you serve. Get Pro for $49, once, with lifetime access and a 30-day money-back guarantee.

12. Counterfeit Gifts and How to Spot Them

Counterfeit gifts exist, and Scripture commands you to test everything. Jesus warned that "false christs and false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect" (Matthew 24:24). Paul told the Thessalonians, "Do not despise prophecies, but test everything; hold fast what is good" (1 Thessalonians 5:20-21). Wherever real gifts are moving, imitations follow.

Red flags

• Money attached to the gift. When Simon the magician offered the apostles money for the power to give the Spirit, Peter answered, "May your silver perish with you, because you thought you could obtain the gift of God with money!" (Acts 8:20). Anyone who sells healing, anointing or "breakthrough" is selling what God gives freely.
• Telling the sick to stop treatment. No true gift of healing requires you to throw away your medicine. God works through doctors and medicine as well as through prayer.
• Blaming the unhealed. Teaching that a person stays sick because of weak faith is cruel and false. Paul himself carried a thorn the Lord did not remove (2 Corinthians 12:7-9).
• Prophecies that set dates for the end of the world or demand obedience to a single leader. "Concerning that day and hour no one knows" (Matthew 24:36).
• Leaders who answer to no one. A gift that refuses to be tested by the Church has already failed the test (CCC 801).
• Manipulation and pressure. Emotional hype, shaming people who do not manifest a gift, or isolating followers from family.
• Bad fruit. Pride, division, sexual sin and greed in the lives of those who claim great gifts.

None of this is a reason to fear the gifts. Counterfeit money exists because real money is valuable. For a full guide to spotting false teachers, read false prophets, and for one modern movement that claims new apostles and prophets, see our guide to the New Apostolic Reformation.

13. Stir Up the Gift Today

Stir up the gift of God that is already in you, today, because the time to use it is short. Paul wrote to Timothy, "I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands, for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control" (2 Timothy 1:6-7). Timothy had a gift and had let the fire burn low. Paul's answer was to fan it.

Fan yours. Tonight, kneel and ask the Father for the Holy Spirit. Tomorrow, read 1 Corinthians 12. This week, serve someone in a way that stretches you. This month, ask three people where they have seen God work through you, and bring what you hear to a priest. Pentecost was the beginning. The Spirit who fell on the upper room is the same Spirit who lives in you now, and he has work for you to do.

The master in the parable came back for an account, and the servant who buried his talent out of fear lost even what he had (Matthew 25:24-28). No one knows the day or the hour (Mark 13:32). Do not bury what God gave you. Dig it up, and put it to work this week.