Serving in Real Life

[I had originally intended to share this message with the people of Friendship Church tomorrow. But this afternoon and this evening, as I worked on a message I'd originally thought I would simply share as a handout, I became convinced that it needed to be my Sunday morning message. This one is based on Matthew 23:1-12, about which I've written several times this week. I hope that you find it helpful. This particular message was inspired by the work of the fantastic people at Prince of Peace Lutheran Church in Burnsville, Minnesota.]

A man I know fairly well who lives not too far from here. Some twenty years ago, he left his job with a major corporation, where he was on the fast track to the top. He was tired of the corporate culture and he had an idea for starting his own business. He did that and within about seven years, he became extremely successful. By that point in his life, he was cruising along, volunteering many hours at his church, growing in his faith, mentoring younger men to follow Christ, and happy that his kids, now fully grown, were launching into their adult lives.

That’s when he and his wife received a full body blow. They learned that she was suffering from a severe degenerative disease. This man, a bit like the fellow I told you about some weeks ago who was a friend of another pastor in Minnesota, left his work, selling his business. Today, his full time job, done without fanfare or self-consciousness, is being with his wife.

If you even suggested that what he was doing was noteworthy or extraordinary, he would simply change the subject. He’s doing what he thinks the God Who loves us completely calls us all to do.

Last week, we said that real faith serves. It does so for a rather simple reason: God has loved us and our appropriate response to that love, given to us ultimately through Jesus’ death and resurrection, is to love God and to love others. That’s what Jesus Himself told us in our Bible lesson of last week.

But this must be more than a theological proposition. In real life, Jesus goes on to tell us today, our serving and loving aren’t rendered to call attention to what wonderful people we want the world to think we are. Our loving and serving are simply rendered in acknowledgement of God's love for us. Our loving and serving are means by which we can share the blessings of God's love with others.

Today’s Bible lesson begins what might be thought of as Jesus’ final pitch to His disciples and to all those people I call nibblers. Matthew, the writer of the Gospel book from which our lesson comes, calls this latter group of people, the crowds.

Nibblers are people like some of those who worship at every church every week everywhere in the world. They sing the songs at worship. They listen to the messages. They plunk their offerings in the plates or baskets as they pass by.

But they never really surrender their lives to Christ.

They never ask Jesus to take control of their lives, their psyches, their relationships, or their decisions.

They’re nibblers. They nibble on little bits of Christian faith, but never enough for it to make a difference in their lives.

As our lesson begins, Jesus is standing in the Temple in Jerusalem on the Tuesday before His Good Friday rendezvous with the cross. He has just completed a contentious argument with a group of people who have grown to hate Him: the Scribes and the Pharisees.

The Scribes, you know, were experts on the letter of God’s law. The Pharisees were members of the largest sect or movement among Jesus’ fellow Jews. They too, put a lot of stock in God’s laws, certain that they could do enough good things to make God open up heaven to them.

Both groups looked down their noses on others, certain that everyone who didn’t agree with them and didn't do all the right things they said God proscribed were going to hell. They even looked down on Jesus.

Jesus, we’re told, turned from the Pharisees to address His followers--the disciples--and the crowds--the nibblers--and said of those who hated Him, within the haters' earshot:

...They love to have the place of honor at banquets and the best seats in the synagogues, and to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces, and to have people call them rabbi. But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher, and you are all students. And call no one your father on earth, for you have one Father--the one in heaven. Nor are you to be called instructors, for you have one instructor, the Messiah. [And then Jesus said:] The greatest among you will be your servant. All who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all who humble themselves will be exalted.

There are no doubt all sorts of good reasons we might advance for becoming servants of others who humbly refuse to call attention to ourselves in our serving. A 1998 study cited by psychologist and author David Niven says that those who volunteer at least one hour of their time per week are 25% more likely to enjoy their regular jobs than those who refuse to lift a finger to serve others. Service is good for your mental health.

But in the end, for the Christian, there really is only one good reason to take the ethic of selfless serving and love of neighbor into our real lives. That reason is Jesus.

Although He was the King, Creator of the universe, and God almighty, Jesus, when He became a human being, lived as a servant.

Do you remember what He did on the night He was arrested, just two days after the events discussed in today’s Bible lesson?

He had gathered His closest followers for a final meal together, knowing that later that night He would be arrested and that on the next day, He would be killed on a cross. It might well have been a time when Jesus could expect others to take care of Him.

But after the disciples had all arrived, Jesus stood up, took off His outer garment, wrapped it around His waist, and then took a basin of water in order to wash the feet of each disciple.

Later, He would undertake the greatest act of love and service the universe has ever seen or will ever see: He died on a cross, taking the punishment for sin you and I deserve so that all who believe in Him will rise to live new life with God as Jesus did on the first Easter.

Love like that deserves a response.

The best response is a life that allows the serving love of Jesus to permeate our day-to-day existences!

I have to tell you when I consider the life of selfless, humble servanthood to which Jesus calls me, I recoil.

As a servant, I have been a failure. I have spent entirely too much time in my life acting like the Scribes and Pharisees, hankering to be a big shot and having all the world tell me what a wonderful guy I am. I’m utterly ashamed of that aspect of my personality!

A poem by Ruth Harms Calkin speaks well for me:

You know, Lord, how I serve You
with great emotional fervor
In the limelight.
You know how eagerly I speak for You
At a Women's club.
You know my genuine enthusiasm
At a Bible study.
But how would I react, I wonder,
if You pointed to a basin of water
and asked me to wash the calloused feet
of a bent and wrinkled old woman
day after day, month after month,
in a room where nobody saw and nobody knew?

Today is Reformation Sunday. On October 31, 1517, a young monk, priest, and theologian named Martin Luther posted ninety-five theses for debate on the door of the church in Wittenberg, Germany. (Church doors in those days were the equivalent of today’s bulletin boards and power point presentations.)

Luther was concerned that the Church of his day had fallen into thinking akin to that of the Scribes and Pharisees.

Rather than humble surrender and lives of humble response to the undeserved and unearnable love of God, to new life granted as a free gift to all with faith in Jesus, the Church was placing heavy burdens of legalism and pious hoops on people.

Luther, in effect, said, “No more! Christ proves that God loves us as we are. He sets all with faith in Him free from sin and death. Because of Christ’s amazing grace, we can live in humble response to God’s love for us.”

As Luther would remind us were he here this morning, the Christian knows that she or he can never be good enough to earn God’s love. But once that love has come to us, failing to serve God and neighbor, family and Church, world and community is to pour contempt on the grace and goodness of God.

It’s a bit like being handed a blank check from Bill Gates and not saying, “Thanks.”

Or like having someone cure us of cancer and not ever turning back in gratitude.

It's like being given a new lease on life and not making the very most of that life. (In fact, it's exactly like that!)

So, today, I challenge you and I challenge myself to live in humble response to God’s love for us all.

Consider embracing servanthood, freely given without fanfare or self-consciousness, as your life style.

One thing you might do is volunteer for a Sunday morning ministry at Friendship.

Spend time praying about your servanthood this week. Tell God, “Lord, I know how much You have done for me. How can I, without desire for reward or recognition, express my gratitude to You?” Then look for selfless ways to love others, in your household, among your neighbors, and through our church.

I believe that as a congregation and as individuals, you and I have only scratched the surface of the Christian life--we’re just nibblers--when selfless service in Christ’s Name isn’t part of our days.

Let’s dig deep in the Christian life by making love and service our way of life. The Savior Who loved us all the way to a cross deserves nothing less!

[The Calkin poem is cited in Chuck Swindoll's book, Improving Your Serve, which I recently read and reviewed.

[David Niven, not to be confused with the late actor, has written a number of books popularizing the results of various psychological studies. The one cited in this message can be found here.]