It's Good Lord, To Be Here

IV. Feeling the privilege to serve

Since many of you grew up in the church, this may not seem like a big deal to you, but to Paul and the Jews and Gentiles of his time - this was huge. He said to the Romans, “you were cut out of an olive tree that is wild by nature, and contrary to nature were grafted into a cultivated olive tree.” (Ro 11:24) In other words, he was stressing to them how UNNATURAL it was for them to be called children of Abraham - sharers of the Gospel - especially with their heathen upbringing! So Paul warned them and said that the Jews, “were broken off because of unbelief, and you stand by faith. Do not be arrogant, but be afraid. For if God did not spare the natural branches, he will not spare you either. (Ro 11:20) Arrogance comes before God and thinks, “God should be thankful that I’m here. God should appreciate the sacrifices I make in getting my kids to church. I hope the church appreciates how much money I give to church. God needs me - He wouldn’t dare to cut me off - because I’m just too important to Him.” Fear says, “God, I don’t deserve to be here. I was just a wild branch, growing out of control and condemned to die. Yet you brought me here in baptism, grafted me into your tree, and gave me the privilege of being called a Christian. You can make everything work without me. So I thank you for the privilege of being called a child of Abraham - even though I’m not a Jew - through faith. I thank you for involving me in your ministry.”

This was Paul’s attitude toward His own ministry. Even though he was a Jew, he was a persecutor of Christians. Therefore instead of approaching his ministry like a modern day Jonah, he said, I became a servant of this gospel by the gift of God’s grace given me through the working of his power. 8 Although I am less than the least of all God’s people, this grace was given me: to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, 9 and to make plain to everyone the administration of this mystery, which for ages past was kept hidden in God, who created all things. Even though that preaching led Paul to being persecuted and imprisoned and eventually most likely beheaded, Paul looked at his call to the Gentiles as a privilege. He gladly went about his duties courageously, because he knew in his heart that he didn’t deserve such a title as apostle - yet God gave him it nonetheless. No matter what the Jews thought about it or threatened to do about it, he had the call from God to preach to the Gentiles. Therefore, he accomplished his tasks with freedom and confidence - knowing that God called him to do so.

Sometimes when I invite people to church they say, “oh, if I went to church the roof would cave in!” What they’re insinuating is that there’s no way God would let them into church after all they’ve done. They don’t think God would want them after all they’ve done. The truth of the matter is that no matter how long you’ve been away - what you’ve done wrong - God still wants you here. He wants you to climb into the wounds of Jesus and completely bathe yourself in the blood of Christ. Through that blood - God doesn’t want you to only fear Him. Like Paul said, In him and through faith in him we may approach God with freedom and confidence. Like Paul, you also have been called. Even though you are a Gentile, even though you were born dead in sin, God called you to faith through your baptism. He called you to faith through the Gospel. You belong here - not because of what you’ve done - but because of Christ did for ALL of you. What a privilege it is for us to know that we - once dirty and stinking goyim - are a part of God’s plan of salvation - saved by the same grace that the Jews are!