Exhortation

    ambassadors of the Faith: 

Sharing the Light and the Love of Christ

“Blessed is that Servant whom He Shall Find Waiting”

An Exhortation to Vigilance

“Be dressed in readiness,” Jesus begins in Luke 12, “and keep your lamps alight” (v. 35), because at any moment, He can step through the door of history and return to us for good.  As His bride, will we be eagerly waiting for Him? Will He find a ready home and a tender, welcoming heart?

Or will He return to an empty, run-down house, where people grew tired of waiting and moved somewhere else?  -- A place where the people He people He loved forgot all about Him? Will He find joy or uneasy surprise?

Jesus, of course, would rather find joy. Let’s look again at His counsel in verse 35, so we can live in bright anticipation instead of trembling dread: “Be dressed in readiness, and keep your lamps alight.”

In Greek, this verse begins with an emphatic use of the personal pronoun you.  Jesus is talking to each of us.  “You who worry and fear, you who cling to your fading possessions, you make yourself ready.  Take your eyes off the world and focus on me.”

So how can we do this? Jesus gives us two word pictures.  First, in His day, when people “dressed in readiness,” they gathered their outer robes and tucked them into their belts. In this way they could travel or tend the horses or cook a meal unhindered. Their clothes revealed their ready-to-work mindset, the same mindset Jesus wants to see in us.

Such an image evokes memories of my very first visit to a monastery on Mount Athos. The monks were engaged in their respective work duties and each of them took care to gather their robe and tuck it under their belt, thereby allowing them to complete their task unhindered.  This was especially true for the monks at work in the kitchen or tending their crops in the field.

Jesus’ second picture is in the command, “Keep your lamps alight.” In other words, keep the home fires burning.  Even today, leaving a light on means someone is expected.  It reveals a watchful, welcoming attitude.  When Jesus returns, He doesn’t want to arrive at a dark house while we yawn and fumble for the light switch. He wants to know that we’ve prepared a place for Him and are looking forward to His coming.

Now what exactly does it mean to “keep ready”? Does Christ expect us to sit at home, anxiously wringing our hands and peering out the window?  No – He wants us to get out and do His will in the world.

When I have had the occasion to be absent from our house in the late hours of the day, I am always comforted as I approach the darkened road to see a light burning at the end of the block.  That signals that someone who is very special in my life is waiting for me.

The first three evenings of Great Week are devoted to the Service of the Bridegroom – the Nymphios. Though the term comes from the Parable of the Ten Virgins, the theme for Monday evening’s service, it is applied to all three.  The theme of watchfulness is present in all three services.

Each evening we hear the hymn: Behold the Bridegroom sets forth in the dead of night.  And blessed is that servant whom he shall find on watch; unworthy the one he shall come upon lazing. Look to yourself, soul, that sleep does not overtake you, lest you be given up to death and be shut out of the kingdom. Be sober then, and sing out: Holy, holy holy are You, our God; through the prayers of the Theotokos save us.”

In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus asked Peter, James and John to watch and pray. They all succumbed to sleep and were not prepared to be at Jesus’ side during those agonizing and painful moments of His arrest, humiliation and pain.

There is praise for the servant who is ready. No man can tell the day or the hour when eternity will invade time and the summons will come. How, then, would we like God to find us?

We would like Him to find us with our work completed. Throughout my years of learning, I tried to do my best to please the instructors.  But oh how I dread the memory of those moments when a class paper was returned with the word “incomplete” stamped on it. Thus in life, we should strive to complete our work.  Jesus Himself said, “I have accomplished the work which you have given me to do” (John 17:4). No man should ever lightly leave undone a task he ought to have finished.

Procrastination is dreadful. It creeps into our lives and disrupts the harmony of life. It is something we all encounter from time to time. It has been stated that we tend to divide life into compartments. There is the part in which we remember that God is present; and there is a part in which we never think of Him at all. There is nothing so fatal as to feel that we have plenty of time. Jesus said, “We must work the works of him who sent us while it is day; night comes when no one can work” (John 9:4).

William Barclay writes, “Sin is doubly sinful to the man who knew better; failure is doubly blameworthy in the man who had every chance to do well.”

The admonition given to all faithful at the Service of the Bridegroom give us a sense of urgency:  Why so indifferent, miserable soul? Why do you appear heedless and uncaring at such a time? Why do you busy yourself with transient things? The end time is upon us, and we shall soon be parted from earthly concerns. While you yet have time, turn sober and confess: I have sinned against You, my Saviour; do not cut me down like the barren fig tree, but as the compassionate Christ, have pity on me as I cry out in awe: May we notb e shut out of the bridal chamber!”

 

Week 5: SHAPED FOR SERVING GOD

Introduction

We began this series by establishing that God made us for a reason. No one here this morning was a mistake or an accident. And because God made us, only He can tell us what we were made for. Our purpose in life revolves around Him. Therefore, the only way for us to find lasting joy and satisfaction is to devote ourselves to God, and dedicate ourselves to fulfilling His purposes for our lives.  

Brief review: Week 1: First purpose – Worship: we were made to love God, and we do that by giving him our attention, and our affections, and our actions.

Week 2: Second Purpose – Fellowship: learning to love God’s family; for each of us to make a commitment to a local church body, and then begin to share our lives, our resources, our homes, our struggles, our burdens, our joys and our sorrows with one another.
Week 3: Last week, third purpose: Discipleship - to become like Christ. God’s goal right now, is to transform you; to take you from wherever you are, and bring you through a lifelong process of change that will result in you becoming more and more like Jesus Christ.

Today we’re continuing our 40 Days of Purpose, and we’re going to look at God’s fourth purpose for your life, there on the top of your outline…you were Shaped to Serve God. 

The Bible says this, let’s read it together in Eph. 2:20, “We are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do”. You were made to make a contribution, not just to consume.  And what matters is not how long you live, but how you live.  We’re all meant to give something back.  We’re commanded to serve God back. 

Now whenever God gives us an assignment to do something, He never gives it to us without equipping us first.  And in the next verse Job says, “Your hands shaped me and made me.” (Job 10:8).  God uses five things to shape you:  Spiritual gifts, Heart, Abilities, Personality, and Experiences.  That spells ‘SHAPE’.  Those five things make you, different from anybody else in the world.  

God made you unique and your uniqueness is not for your benefit.  Look at the next verse. Let’s read it aloud: 1Pet. 4:10, “Each of us should use whatever gift he’s received to Serve others!  Your talents are not for your benefit.  God gave you gifts and talents and abilities and background and experiences and all these things for the benefit of other people, to be used by serving others. 

So write this down, “My fourth purpose in life is to serve God by serving others.”  That’s why you’re alive.   You were put here to serve God and the way you serve God is by serving other people. 

This is called “ministry”.  The word is often misunderstood. Ministry simply means using my shape to help somebody else in the name of God. This means every believer is a minister.  Now, not every believer is a pastor, but every believer is a minister  Any time you use your talents, your abilities, your background, your experiences to help somebody else, you know what that’s called?  Ministering.  And you know what you are?  You’re a minister.   I want you to turn to the person next to you and say “You’re a minister”.  All women are ministers.  All men are ministers.  All little kids, all old people, if we’re believers, we’re all called to serve Jesus Christ.  

Now listen to this, because this is real important.  Your SHAPE (spiritual gifts, heart, abilities, personality, experiences) determines your ministry, but your attitude determines your maturity.  You want to know what God wants you to do with your life?  Look at your spiritual gifts, heart, abilities, personality, and experiences.  But your attitude, your servant heart, determines your maturity.  

Now life is preparation for eternity.  And one of the things you’re going to do in heaven is serve God and serve others.  Now the good news is that God not only created us for service, He gave us a model.  You were created to be like Christ, and what did Christ do while He was here on earth?  He served.  Notice the next verse. Let’s read it aloud together: Matt. 20:28, “Jesus said, ‘Your attitude must be like My own, for I did not come to be served, but to serve’.” 

We’re going to look at what it takes to learn to serve like Jesus. Well it takes three things. 

1. Serving like Jesus means being available.  One day Jesus was walking down to go to Jericho and some blind men start yelling at him.  And the Bible says this (Matt. 20:30-32): “Two blind men shouted ‘Lord, have mercy on us! Jesus stopped and called them.  ‘What do you want me to do for you?’.” 

Notice that Jesus stopped.  If you want to be used by God, you must be willing to be interrupted.  Most of Jesus’ ministry and most of Jesus’ miracles were interruptions.  You think about it.  All the people he healed – the blind man, the lame man, the sick people, etc. – all of them were interruptions.   His first miracle? Interrupted at a wedding.  He second miracle? Interrupted on the way to Galilee.  It says, “Jesus stopped”.  Almost all the ministry He did, He did it because He allowed Himself to be interrupted.  The Bible says this: Prov. 3:28, read it with me, “Never tell your neighbors to wait until tomorrow if you can help them now.”  Servant-hearted people don’t procrastinate.  They’re spontaneous, they’re sensitive, and they say “OK, let’s do it!” 

Here was John Wesley’s motto:

Do all the good you can by all the means you can by all the ways you

          can in all the places you can and at all the times you can to all the people

          you can as long as you ever can.

And that’s what it means to be shaped to serve God.  You must be available.  You must be willing to step out and say “OK, out of my comfort zone, God what do You want me to do?” 

There are three common barriers that keep us from being available:   

1. Self-centeredness.  The Bible says, “Forget yourself long enough to lend a helping hand.” (Phil. 2:4) Any time you encounter someone with a need, it is God is giving you the opportunity to learn to serve, to learn to be like Jesus Christ.  You see the number one enemy of compassion is busyness.  And because I’m so busy, I don’t have time to serve.  I’ve got my agenda, my plans, my dreams, my goals, my ambitions. 

If you really have a servant heart, like Jesus Christ, you don’t mind being interrupted because your agenda is God’s agenda, and you get up in the morning and you say “OK, God, you want to bring somebody in my life today?  Bring them in!  We have this self-centeredness that gets in the way and gets to be a barrier.

2. Perfectionism.  This is wanting every thing to be perfect.  You say to yourself, “When it’s all just right, when things settle down, then I’ll serve.”  Let’s read Eccl. 11:4 together: “If you wait for perfect conditions, you’ll never get anything done.” Would anybody like to give a testimony on that verse?  Real servants, Christ-like servants, do the best they can with what they have for Jesus Christ today.  They don’t wait.  Unfortunately, many people worship excellence, even Christians.  And they say “Well, you know if you can’t do it first class, don’t even try.” 

What is needed is what we call “The Good Enough Principle”.  Which says, it doesn’t have to be perfect for God to bless it.  That’s the truth.  If God only used perfect people, what would he get done in this world?  Nothing!  We’re all a bunch of misfits.  We all have weaknesses/faults/failures/handicaps.  But guess what?  God uses us all.  Why?  Because God doesn’t use perfect people because there aren’t any.  So God says, “Don’t wait for perfect conditions.”  So go ahead and start serving while things are not settled down. 

3. Materialism is the third barrier that keeps us from being available to serve.  Jesus said, “No servant can serve two masters.  You cannot serve both God and money.” (Lk. 16:13).  He didn’t say, “You should not serve both God and money.”  He said, “You cannot serve both God and money.” You’ve got to decide whether you want to be rich or you want to be blessed.  You cannot serve both God and money.  The most important decision you’re going to have to make in life once you become a believer is, “Am I going to be a kingdom-builder or am I going to be a wealth-builder?”  Now if God wants to give you wealth, that’s great.  But it is not the number one goal of your life.  Because you are not going to take your wealth with you to heaven, but your character.  So you need to decide to be a kingdom builder.

2. Serving like Jesus also means being grateful.  To serve like Jesus, we have to serve gratefully, grateful that we get the opportunity to serve.  The Bible tells us a story about Jesus serving in an incredible way.  At the death of Lazarus, He went to the scene to do ministry, to raise Lazarus from the dead.  Now, He prayed to the hearing of all those gathered: The Bible tells us in John 11:41-42, “Jesus looked up and said, ‘Father, I thank You that You heard me.  I know that You always hear Me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here.’”    Jesus had an attitude of gratefulness in everything that He did. Now you might think, “I’d be grateful too if I could raise people from the dead.”  However, Jesus was grateful in the tough times.  Jesus was grateful when He was criticized.  Jesus was grateful when things were not easy in ministry. That was the attitude that He led in His ministry.  Ministry and miracles always happened in this attitude of gratefulness.   And the Bible talked about our attitude of gratefulness in Psalm 100:2. Let’s read this verse “gratefully” together: “Serve the Lord with gladness.”

Why do we serve God with gratefulness?  We serve Him with gratefulness because He’s given life to us through Jesus Christ.  And if He never did anything else for us, that is enough to be grateful for the rest of our lives to serve Him.  Look at what the Bible has to say about that over in 2 Tim. 1:9: “It is He who saved us and chose us for His holy work, not because we deserved it, but because that was His plan.”

Now, as human beings, there are some barriers that we allow to get in the way of gratefulness.  The first barrier is:

1. Comparing and Criticizing.  When you compare to others, when you criticize others, that is a barrier that gets in the way for all of us of being grateful.  The Bible tells us over in Rom. 14:4, “Who are you to criticize someone else’s servant?  The Lord will determine whether His servant has been successful.”  We’re all His servants.  And so it’s a matter of His opinion, not my opinion or your opinion of one another.  When you think about it, we’re on the same team.  We have the same goal.  We’re trying to make God look good to the world, let the world see how good He really looks.  And He’s given us different abilities, different tasks.  And to think that somehow we can compare or criticize in that is ridiculous. Comparing and criticizing get in the way of gratefulness.

2. The second barrier is wrong motivations. The Bible talks about this in Matt. 6:1. Jesus said, “When you do good deeds, don’t try to show off.  If you do, you won’t get a reward from your Father in heaven”.  The wrong motivation of showing off.  Self-promotion and servanthood don’t mix, but it’s easy to get them mixed up.  A lot of our service, can be self-serving at times.  We need to be honest with ourselves about that.  We serve to get others to like us.  We serve to be admired.  We serve to achieve our own goals.  We serve as sort of a bargaining chip with God. “God, I’ll serve and You take care of me here.”  All kinds of wrong motivations.  And it’s hard to see the wrong motivations in us.  I have them, you have them.  How do you know if you have a wrong motivation?  Gratitude.  When you lose a sense of gratefulness/gratitude in your life, you can know right away there’s something wrong with my motivation.

3. Serving like Jesus means being faithful.  It means you don’t give up.  You keep on going.  You don’t quit in the middle of your assignment.  At the end of Jesus’ ministry on earth, Jesus said this in John 17:4, He said, “I have brought you glory on earth by completing the work,” circle that “completing the work”, “that You gave me to do.”  I want you to be able to say that when you get to heaven.  You completed the work that God gave you to do.  Jesus was faithful in fulfilling His service.  He didn’t give up.  He didn’t give in.  He was persistent.  And if you’re going to be like Jesus it means you’re going to serve as long as you’re alive.  Now you may retire from your job someday, but you’re never retiring from ministry. 

The Bible says, (1Cor. 4:2) “The one thing required of servants is that they be faithful.”  What motivates us to stay faithful in serving God over the long haul?  By showing gratitude for the past and having faith in the future reward.  Any time you’re serving in Jesus’ name, no matter how small, it matters.  The Bible says this in 1Cor. 15:58, let’s read it aloud, “Throw yourselves into the work of the Master, confident that nothing you do for Him is a waste of time or effort”  Notice “nothing”: that means every little thing counts!

Several years ago two teenage boys tried to come into a church service at night; it was packed out and they couldn’t find any seats.  So they turned around and decided to leave because they couldn’t find a seat.  But one usher said, “Come on, guys.  I’ll find you a seat.”  And that usher personally escorted them down to the center and set them in the middle and found them two seats.  That night both of those boys accepted Christ and became Christians.  One of them was Billy Graham who has now led millions and tens of millions of people to Christ.  Do you think that usher is going to get any credit in heaven?  I’ll say!  We have no idea of the significance of small acts.  So never, belittle the little because it’s all important.  It doesn’t matter if you’re doing something important that is well known or if you’re doing something important that’s not well known.  It’s all important.  Would you write this down?  Don’t mistake anonymous with insignificant or even unnecessary.  Just because it’s not known doesn’t mean it’s unnecessary. 

Have you ever wondered why you’re here at SUCH. I’ll tell you why.  You’re here at SUCH because God knew you had something to give back.  He did not bring you here just to sit and soak and enjoy.  He brought you here to serve.  And He knew that you have something – background, talent, skill, ability, contact, network, or whatever, interest, hobby, whatever. 

How will God use you?  Well let’s just get real practical.  And I want you to right now in the back take out this little form that says, “SHAPED for Serving God”.  Notice it has a place for Talents & Ministry.  What I’d like for you to do is to fill this out in a minute and I want you to turn it in today so that we can know what you’re good at, so that we can know you’re here in the family, you have something, God brought you here, where you could find serving possibilities. 

Now listen, when you boil it all down, you can do two things with your life. You can waste it, or you can invest it.  The best use of life is to invest it in that which is going to outlast it.  It’s going to pay dividends over the long haul.

One day you’re going to stand before God and He’s going to say to you, “What did you do with what I gave you, the talents, the abilities, the background, the experiences, the freedom, the education, the family experiences?  What did you do with your SHAPE?”  Now you may be thinking nobody’s watching you, and nobody’s noticing what you do, but God’s watching.  Look at this verse, Heb. 6:10: “He will not forget how hard you’ve worked for Him and how you’ve shown your love to Him.”  How?  “By caring for other Christians”.  And God keeps His promise.  You know on earth they give awards for 10 years of faithful service?  In heaven you’re going to get eternal rewards.  Look at the next verse (Matt. 25:21). “Well done good and faithful servant!  You have been faithful with a few things so; I will put you in charge of many things.  Come and share your master’s happiness.”  You know, family, more than anything else, I want God to be able to say that about you; that God will look into your eyes and He’ll say to you, “Good job!  Well done!  You did what I put you here on earth to do.  You worshiped me, you fellowshipped with other believers, you grew in character to be like Christ, and you served Me, the way I shaped you.  Come on in and enjoy eternity and all the rewards I’ve planned for you.” 

Question: Is there anything in your schedule where you’re giving back unselfishly, or are you too busy?  Are you waiting for things to slow down?  Or do you have other priorities?  One day Napoleon pointed at a map of China and he said, “There lies a sleeping giant.  If it ever wakes up it will shake the world.”  Every weekend I look at the SUCH family and I say, “There is a sleeping giant.  If everybody who came here served here, what kind of enormous, spiritual, nuclear reaction would we see in Seoul and Korea and the world?”  I make no apology in saying to you that the most important thing you’ll ever do with your life is serving God in ministry.  It’s far more important than your career, it’s far more important than your hobbies, it’s even more important than everything else you can think of because they aren’t going to last.  But this is.  You were put here on earth to practice serving.

Let’s bow our heads.  Would you pray this? 

Father I realize that I was shaped to serve You by serving others.  Forgive me for the times I’ve put a “do not disturb” sign on my heart.  Help me to see the interruptions as opportunities to serve.  Help me to make time for what matters most.  You’ve been so good to me.  I want to give something back.  I want to serve You freely and gratefully and faithfully, and I want to practice before I get to heaven so one day I can hear You say “Well done, good and faithful servant”.  In Your name I pray, Amen.