Servanthood In Discipleship Series

31"When the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, He will sit on His throne in heavenly glory. 32All the nations will be gathered before Him, and He will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33He will put the sheep on His right and the goats on His left. 34"Then the King will say to those on His right, ’Come, you who are blessed by My Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35For I was hungry and you gave Me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave Me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited Me in, 36I needed clothes and you clothed Me, I was sick and you looked after Me, I was in prison and you came to visit Me.’

37"Then the righteous will answer Him, ’Lord, when did we see You hungry and feed You, or thirsty and give You something to drink? 38When did we see You a stranger and invite You in, or needing clothes and clothe You? 39When did we see You sick or in prison and go to visit You?’

40"The King will reply, ’I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of Mine, you did for Me.’

41"Then He will say to those on His left, ’Depart from Me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42For I was hungry and you gave Me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave Me nothing to drink, 43I was a stranger and you did not invite Me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe Me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after Me.’

44"They also will answer, ’Lord, when did we see You hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help You?’

45"He will reply, ’I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for Me.’ 46"Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."

This verse is very powerful to me. It really convicts me, but it also challenges me. Try to imagine Jesus actually talking to you and telling you “I was hungry and you didn’t feed me.” “I was thirsty, but you didn’t give me a drink.” “I was lonely and you didn’t welcome me.” “I needed clothing and you declined to clothe me.” “I was sick and you didn’t comfort me.”

It gives me that feeling that every little thing I fail to do I let God down and likewise everything I do matters to God. So remember no matter how small or insignificant a task is - it matters to God and it matters to others.

Repeatedly, when Jesus was asked what pleased God or how to please God, His reply was the same:

If you want to be great in the kingdom, you must become the servant of all. So what does it mean to be a servant?

Servanthood in its simplest form deals with people. At the heart of it is our willingness to go out of our way to meet a need in someone’s life and to accomplish something that needs to be done.

True servanthood, as is depicted in the Bible is more then just a desire to do what is right. It is dying to ones own desires and attending to the needs of our God and others.

The best way to summarize a servant is as a person who doesn’t exercise his own will but rather submits it in order to please his master. For us, our master is Christ. So as disciples, we don’t exercise our own will but instead we give it over not only to God, but to others, so that we can please Christ. Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of Mine, you did for Me.’

It is very easy for us as to fall into the trap of calling our good works servanthood, which often times are simply done to make our selves feel better. If we are to be true servants of Christ and not of our selves, there are several biblical qualities of a servant that we should possess.

In all things, a servant is humble. Being humble in servanthood means not worrying about who gets the credit for something. Being a humble servant means doing something and not expecting anything in return. If you are serving to get praise or to get a reward, you aren’t practicing biblical servanthood.