What Does It Feel Like to Be a Discerner?

Discernment is a God-given gift, but sometimes it’s a tough load to bear, and being misunderstood by others so often seems to be a package deal with this gift. I wrote the following description out of my own frustration and sorrow, and I think other discerners might relate, even if you didn’t realize yet that you had this gift:

Being a discerner so often feels like seeing the giant iceberg in front of a ship that seemingly no one else can see, warning everybody with urgency, and then being told to sit back and listen to the orchestra play its soothing music, because everything is right as rain. Couldn’t be better, in fact. Nothing to see here, folks!

The music is a funeral dirge and the crisis remains unaddressed because it is unrecognized or ignored. As a discerner, you have solutions to problems others don’t see, and they can’t value the solutions when they don’t recognize the problems.

Whether it’s ignorance, pride, a lack of responsibility or someone’s selfish motives getting in the way, the warnings go unheeded and the iceberg that could’ve been avoided ends up destroying not just the ship, but many lives. The tragedy that never should have happened brings irreversible harm and you are left to live with the grief of knowing it could have been prevented. No one was willing to order the simple change of course that would have saved the entire ship, because people generally don’t take warnings seriously about problems they think are imaginary or see as just another criticism. You’re viewed as the complainer when actually you were the prophet sent to prevent the catastrophe.

Or maybe you didn’t speak up, and then you’re left with even more grief, knowing the results might not have been any different but wondering…What if?

Sound familiar? If so, you might just have the gift of discernment.

Discerner friends, I know the rejection is painful and so are the accusations from others, but don’t give up your gift just because other people don’t always identify it or appreciate it! You’re not crazy; you just have a gift that often goes unrecognized and might have room for growth. Someday the warnings you give will be heard, the words of caution you offer from a place of love will prevent the tragedy, you will see your gift operate in the way God intended it to, and it will all be worth it.

Keep persevering, discerners. You have a powerful, important, and needed gift. Continue to do your part and be obedient when God calls you to share something you discern. There will be people who value your gift, and you will be a godsend to them just as they are to you. We all need each other, and you – and your gift – are not excluded.