The question has often been asked, Are teachers born, or are they made? Some are born to teach just as others are born to a thousand other things: some to sing, others to write, still others to lead, to heal, to build, to nurture, and so on, each with talents enhanced by good training but not originating in that training. Gifts do not originate in books or in classes. True it is that such efforts may well improve a particular person's ability to do one thing or another, but they cannot grant them that ability in the first place. So it is in the realm of spiritual things. Teaching is a spiritual gift and, as this revelation suggests, some have received it and others have not. Teaching this principle, Moroni said, "For behold, to one is
given by the Spirit of God, that he may teach the word of wisdom; and to another, that he may teach the word of knowledge by the same Spirit" (Moroni 10:9-10). Similarly, we might say to one it is given to teach children of Primary age, to another to teach teenagers, and to yet another to teach adults. What then happens when we are called to labor in an assignment in which we have no gift? We can but respond that if the call came from the Lord—and such calls do—and if we thrust in our sickle with all our might, he will sustain us and bless our efforts so that his purposes will be accomplished. Revelations of the Restoration, p. 366-67
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