“I Will Be A Servant in the Church”
Introduction:
Today, we have ordained three men into the position of deacon. Many times as events like this take place we fail to catch and see the meaning of what is taking place. First of all, it is important that we understand that word “ordain” simple means to set apart for a particular duty or service. When we ordain someone as an “elder” we set them apart for that specific function. When we ordain someone as an “evangelist” we set them apart for that particular function. When that person is set apart for a specific role, they are accountable to the church and to God to fulfill that specific function. Today, we set apart three men as deacons of the church. The meaning of the word deacon tells us a great description of what the job description of a deacon is. The word “deacon” comes from the Greek word, which means minister or servant. Therefore, this morning we have set apart people for the office of minister or servant within the church. Several things may come to mind when you hear of this, you may first think that the preacher is the “minister” of the church, but that is not true. The preacher is a minister or servant of the church, but not the minister. In fact even though we set apart individuals for the specific office of “deacon” or minister, we all are servants of the church.
Yes, the Bible does speak of a specific office within the church called a “deacon”. This office of “deacon” was first spoken of in Acts 6, when the number of disciples was rapidly increasing. One of the main ministries of the church at that time was distributing food to the widows in the church. That responsibility began to become overwhelming for the Apostles, so they called the people to select seven men, who would be entrusted with this responsibility and they would be “deacons” or “minister” in the church. There are three distinct roles that God has set apart within the church today. First is the evangelist, whose job is to set things in order and the preaching of the word. The second is the elders who are the pastors of the church, whose job is to shepherd the flock and to direct the affairs of the church. The elders are the spiritual leaders of the church and are in a position of mutual accountability to the evangelist. In other words I as the evangelist am accountable to the elders here for my responsibilities, and the elders here are accountable to me for their responsibilities as the shepherds. The third is the position of deacon, whose primary responsibility is as a servant, so that the evangelist and elders can likewise do their respective duties.
Today, I have three ways in which I want to encourage these three men set apart today, and also anyone specifically who has been set apart for a service…
1. Serve with Integrity
In all aspects I encourage you and everyone to be people who live a life of integrity, especially in your service to God. In other words don’t be like the church treasurer who after many years of serving stood before the congregation and thanked them for allowing him to serve and said, “believe me I got far more out of this job than I ever put into it.” Serve with integrity of heart.
2. Serve with Excellence
I want to encourage these men to serve with excellence, as though they were working for the Lord. We as Christians need to ensure that everything we do we do it well, God is worthy of our best efforts. I think of when Solomon built the Temple, he refused to use silver because it was not good enough to be used in God’s Temple. We need to have a mindset of serving to the best of our ability and never doing anything second rate or half way for the Lord. There is a reward for faithful service that is done with excellence.
I Timothy 3:13
One can use some common sense and learn that though there are blessings for serving faithfully with those duties that have been entrusted, but that is a great responsibility and there are punishments for not serving faithfully and with excellence. Deacons, don’t take your job lightly, God is worthy of your best efforts, and they will be rewarded.
3. Remember you are Accountable
I do want to remind these men that they are accountable to God for how they serve, so in that was this position is different from any job that they may ever have. These men are not just filling a role on a church board, but they have a responsibility to serve wherever they can to the best of their abilities. Remember you are accountable to God and not just to men.
With that in mind, you may have noticed the title of my message this morning is, “I Will Be A Servant in the Church”. That title has multiple meanings for us today. First of all it can be applied to those that have been ordained as deacons who were saying literally, “I will be a servant in the church”, but there is a sense in which we all should be able to make that same commitment. Not necessarily to serve in the office of deacon, but to be a servant and a minister of the church. Can you imagine what this church could do if every person that made up the church saw themselves as they should, as a minister in the church? We really are all priests and ministers in God’s service.
I believe one of the greatest problems facing the church is a lack of people with a servant’s heart. This is a problem that is plaguing the church and the world. People are interested in themselves that they forget that it is not about us, but we are called to serve others. We love it when we are served, and in our consumer driven culture many of the people within the church come looking for what they can get rather than what they can give. I said before as we studied the Gospel of John that we need to take off our bibs and put on our aprons and become servants in the church. We are all called to serve. I hope that the church here can strive even more to be a church where every member sees it as their task to do the work of ministry theirselves.
You may be wondering, what it is I am asking of you this time? Perhaps you thought since it was ordination day you would get a day off too of having the preacher preach to me. Well…I want us all to commit to being a servant. What exactly does this entail? I do not know if there is one particular action you can do to make you a servant, but I believe servanthood is more than actions it is an attitude stemming from the heart. There are only two options for what you can be. You can either be selfish or servant in nature. Are you a servant this morning or are you selfish? Here are some examples of what it means to be a servant. You have a lot to do one particular day, you feel overwhelmed, and then someone calls you and needs a favor that will throw your day off. If you agree you won’t get your chores done, you will get behind, you may be up later that night getting those things done, what do you do? A selfish person would make up an excuse to get out of it; a servant would make the sacrifices necessary and eagerly and joyfully help that person?
Suppose that you are at the store and someone is carrying some groceries, and their bags break and groceries go rolling all over the parking lot, what do you do? A selfish person acts like they didn’t see it take place, but a servant stops and helps in any way they can.
Suppose today we go up to a fellowship meal and after we are done eating you can’t wait to go home and rest, and the same crowd in the kitchen washing dishes, what do you do? Run out quickly to avoid helping or go in the kitchen and tell those people who clean every time we eat that it is their turn to leave and not worry about it and that you will stay behind and make sure all the dishes are clean and the building is back to how it should be?
Those are just a few scenarios, the list can go on and on, but what would happen if we had a servant’s heart? What would happen if we valued other’s needs above our own? Hear this, it is one thing to serve when asked, but a true servant eagerly searches for opportunities to serve however they can. Let us all commit to being a servant in the church and see, just see what happens.
Text: Matthew 20:20-28
I. Through Serving We Show We Value The Kingdom of God
Our actions, not our mere words show what we truly value. It is easy to tell people that you value that which you should value, but it is another thing to show through your priorities and actions that you value something. If you are a Christian today, than being a servant isn’t really an option, but it is a requirement. It is a requirement that many have not met. When we serve we show we value the Kingdom of God and show that we desire to accomplish the same mission as our King; reaching the lost with the message of Jesus. We are all servants in the Kingdom of God, and if we are servants than we should value the same things our King values. We see what God values from reading His Word. We see what God values by looking at God in the flesh in the person of Jesus. God values people! Therefore, we are called to serve one another and to serve using our talents and our abilities to build up God’s Kingdom. It is a sad thing when you think about people who claim to be a part of the Kingdom, which is the church, who do not have the mindset of a servant. Many have the opposite attitude of Jesus. They come wanting to be served and not to serve. Though there may be times we have to allow others to serve us, we must seek to serve others the best that we can. Our service shows that we value the Kingdom of God.
Ephesians 4:11-12
` We use our talents and serve as servants so that the church, God’s Kingdom can be built up. This building up occurs in two different ways. First, the kingdom is built up through numerical growth. I believe one of the greatest ways to reach people for Christ is to have a servant’s attitude. As people watch and see us serve one another and put one another’s needs above our very own people will want to be a part of the church, which serves and loves unconditionally. Look at the example of the early church with me and see how their servant attitude affected people.
Acts 2:44-45
Acts 4:32-35
There is no doubt that much of the growth we read about throughout the book of Acts was the result of people willing to serve.
The second way that the church is built up is through becoming internally strengthened. As people begin to serve the church will become stronger, it will become a greater force. The church will be built up as each person does their part in the Kingdom, but it all begins by becoming a servant. Remember the greatest among us, must be a servant.
I wonder what the state of the Kingdom would be if every person in the church showed the valued the Kingdom enough to serve in any way he or she could? I guarantee that lost people would be saved and the saved would be strengthened. Do you value the kingdom of God and it’s mission enough to take the time to serve.
II. Through Serving We Show We Value The Blessings of God
God has richly blessed each of us, and as thankful people we should return our blessings to others. Through serving we show we value the things that God has blessed us with and we want to bless others in return. As we said the other week we are stewards of the things God has put into our care, and we show that we value those things by serving others, not by selfishness.
III. Through Serving We Show We Value The People of God
We cannot just say we value people and not show it. We know that the greatest command is to love the Lord God, and the second is equal to it, and that is to love others. Many times we may be able to “amen” that command, but do we really live it and show that love by making ourselves available to others as a servant. Do we value people enough to really demonstrate that through our actions?
I Peter 4:10
God has blessed us all with different talents and abilities, and he expects us to serve one another with those talents.
Jesus conveyed one of the best examples of how a servant should value people in the parable of the Good Samaritan. He told about a man that was going from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell into the hands of robbers. The stripped him and beat him, and the text says they left him half dead. A priest happened to be walking down the same road and he passed by on the other side and a Levite did the same. Perhaps they did not want to become unclean before God, whatever the case they missed the point. The law was there not to keep people from doing good for people. Then we learn that a Samaritan man walked and saw him and reacted a little different than the priest and the Levite. He had pity on the man that was lying there for who knows how long, hurt, unable to move, probably dying. He took upon himself the nasty job of cleaning and bandaging his wounds. The he places him upon his donkey, and took him into town and stayed with him and took care of him, and then paid the innkeeper and promised to come and pay for any other expenses the man may incur. Who knows how much this cost that Samaritan man. The lesson though is we learn about a good neighbor and a true servant don’t we? The priest’s job was to value people, but did he really value people? Did the Samaritan value people? Absolutely! Let us be like that Samaritan man, willing to serve because our service shows that we value people and value others above ourselves.
Matthew 25:31-46
Attributes of a Servant…
1. Humility
In the summer of 1986, two ships collided in the Black Sea off the coast of Russia. Hundreds of passengers died as they were hurled into the icy waters below. News of the disaster was further darkened when an investigation revealed the cause of the accident. It wasn’t a technology problem like radar malfunction--or even thick fog. The cause was human stubbornness. Each captain was aware of the other ship’s presence nearby. Both could have steered clear, but according to news reports, neither captain wanted to give way to the other. Each was too proud to yield first. By the time they came to their senses, it was too late.
Many people do not like the idea of being a servant to others because they feel that they are too good or they do not want to do the dirty work of the Kingdom, but I will tell you that without the humble servant’s attitude that Christ showed we run a great risk. Jesus is our perfect example of a humble servant.
Philippians 2:4-12
We must ensure that we do not think of ourselves more highly than we ought. When we begin to get a dose of thinking we are too good to serve, let us remember the Apostle Paul considered that he was the least of all the Apostles, that he was the chief of all sinners, and that he was a servant of the church and of God. That humble attitude that we should have may get us involved with things we consider below us or things we would not typically want to do, but as servants we humble ourselves and serve others however we possibly can. If Jesus could get down on his hands and knees and wash the dirty feet of his disciples, and even his betrayer, there is no job that we are too good to do in the kingdom, but it begins with an attitude of humility, which considers others better than ourselves and ourselves as willing to serve in any way that we possibly can. Perhaps this begins by praying for opportunities to serve others and the church and seizing those opportunities when they come. In all things we must learn to put others above ourselves. Sometimes we are so wrapped up in ourselves that we fail to take time for others. We must never forget to put other people’s needs above our own. That is an attitude in which God blesses. Living this principle may mean you sacrifice some things, which you want, and even need for the sake of others. The attitude of humility is an attitude of the giving of yourself to others.
2. Submissiveness
A servant must also have an attitude of submissiveness. We are told in our society that we do not need to submit or place ourselves under anyone, but in the kingdom of God we are instructed to submit to Christ and also to submit ourselves to others. Many people make the mistake of seeing the church as a democracy, but the church is not a democracy, it is a theocracy, and we as servants need to be submissive and willing to serve. I have never seen a servant question or argue with their master to any avail. We must learn to be submissive, and if we are submissive than we are willing to serve. One of the biggest problems we face today is a submission problem. People refuse to submit to authorities, people refuse to submit to the Lord, people refuse to submit to one another and therefore we produce a society full of people looking out for whom they see as number one.
3. Joy
It is absolutely a joy and a privilege to serve God and to serve one another. Jesus said, it was more blessed to give than to receive and that is true not just of money, but also of time and energy devoted to serving. The ironic thing about serving others is that you as the servant always receive more than the one you are serving. We are called to serve with a joyful attitude, and we can because what a privilege it is to help each other.
Are you selfish or a servant?
