# What people answer

> The assessment itself: the three lenses it uses, why it asks about what has happened rather than what you are like, and what a member is asked to agree to.

For: Everyone on the team, Members
Canonical: https://giftwell.app/docs/the-assessment

![The assessment on a phone: one statement at a time, with a progress count.](/docs-img/take.png)

## Three lenses, because Scripture has three

The New Testament never gives one master list of gifts. GiftWell follows the three it does give.

**Gifts (Romans 12, plus two).** Nine gifts: Prophecy, Serving, Teaching, Encouraging, Giving, Leading, Mercy, Administration and Hospitality. Five statements each, scored out of 25. This is the part that produces the bands on the result.

**How you build up the church (Ephesians 4).** Fifteen short statements give a first look at whether someone leans apostle, prophet, evangelist, shepherd or teacher. It is read separately from the gifts and never merged into them, and it names a leaning, not a title.

**Gifts of the Spirit (1 Corinthians 12).** Mapped by experience and hunger, and never scored, because Paul says they are given "as He determines". Nobody is told by a worksheet that they lack a gift the Spirit is free to give tomorrow. These answers are kept only if the person ticks a separate box.

Then a few questions no questionnaire can score: what stirs them, what they are good at, what their life allows right now, who they would most like to serve, and how they like to work. And one optional question, something they have walked through, that only the pastoral team ever reads.

## Why the statements sound the way they do

"I am encouraging" measures self-image. "In recent months I reached out to someone specifically to build them up" measures a life. Most people rate themselves highly on every virtue; far fewer invent specific recent events. So the statements ask what has happened, and some ask what other people have told you, because on exactly these qualities the people who know you are the better judges.

The full reasoning, with the Scripture and the research behind each choice, is on [Why we ask what we ask](/why-we-ask-what-we-ask).

## What a member agrees to

At the end, two plain choices:

- **Share my results with the pastoral team.** Ticked, your team can follow up by name, and the person appears in introductions, exports and Planning Center. Unticked, they are marked do-not-contact: nothing goes to exports, introductions, AI or Planning Center, but your pastors, admins and owner can still open the result in the app and read what they wrote.
- **Keep my answers about gifts of the Spirit.** Off by default. Only the names of gifts and how often, never words, ever leave GiftWell.

A church can also ask people their age. Anyone who may be under 18 is handled with extra care everywhere: see [What GiftWell never does](/docs/privacy-promises).

## It ends with a serving experiment

The result does not end with a score. It ends with a 90-day experiment on a serving team your church actually has, because gifts in the New Testament are discovered in use, and a season of serving followed by an honest conversation is the confirmation no questionnaire can provide.

## Practical details

- About ten minutes on a phone. Progress saves on the device, so someone can stop when the service starts and finish at lunch.
- No account, no app, no email required. An email only matters if they want their private link sent to them, or to use [My GiftWell](/docs/my-giftwell) later.
- Works with JavaScript off, inside your website, and on a bad connection.
- Retakes are free and always allowed, even when a church has reached its plan limit.