The Marks of True Spiritual Service 1
A Thankful Spirit
Why do people serve God? People serve the Lord from many motives. Some serve out of legalistic effort, as a means of earning salvation and God’s favor. Some serve the Lord for fear that, if they do not, they will incur His disfavor and perhaps even lose their salvation. Some, like Diotrophes (3 John 9), serve because of the prestige and esteem that leadership often brings. Some serve in order to gain preeminent ecclesiastical positions and the power to lord it over those under their care. Some serve for appearance’s sake, in order to be considered righteous by fellow church members and by the world. Some serve because of peer pressure to conform to certain human standards of religious and moral behavior. Children are often forced into religious activities by their parents, and they sometimes continue those activities into adult life only because of parental intimidation or perhaps from mere habit. Some people are even zealous in Christian work because of the financial gain it can produce.
But those motives for service are merely external, and no matter how orthodox or helpful to other people the service might be, unless it is done out of a sincere desire to please and glorify God, it is not spiritual neither is it acceptable to Him (cf. 1 Cor. 10:31). It is, of course, possible for a person to begin Christian service out of genuine devotion to God and later fall into an occasion or even a habit of performing it mechanically, merely from a sense of necessity. Pastors, Sunday School teachers, youth leaders, missionaries and all other Christian workers can carelessly leave their first love and fall into a rut of superficial activity that is performed in the Lord’s name but is not done in His power or for His glory.
In the opening verses of his letter to the Romans, Paul also set himself forth for his readers to see before he attempted to teach them some deeper truths of the gospel. He opened his heart and said, in effect, "Before I show you my theology, I am going to show you myself."
In his opening words to the believers at Rome, Paul tells of his sincere spiritual motives in wanting to minister to them. With warmth, affection, and sensitivity that permeate the entire letter, he assures them of his genuine devotion to God and his genuine love for them. Although Paul had not personally founded or even visited the church at Rome, he carried the heartfelt passion of Christ for their spiritual welfare and an eager desire to develop their spiritual and personal friendship. The letter to Rome reveals that Paul not only had the zeal of a prophet, the mind of a teacher, and the determination of an apostle, but also the heart of a shepherd.
When they first received Paul’s letter, the believers in Rome probably wondered why this great apostle whom most of them did not know would bother to write them such a long and profound letter. They also may have wondered why, if he cared so much for them, he had not yet paid them a visit. In verses 8-15 of chapter 1, Paul gives the answers to both of those questions. He wrote them because he cared deeply about their spiritual maturity, and he had not yet visited them because he had thus far been prevented. In these few verses the apostle lays bare his heart concerning them.
Paul did not serve because it was "fun" and self-pleasing. "For even Christ did not please Himself," he points out later in the epistle; "but as it is written, ’The reproaches of those who reproached Thee fell upon Me’" (Rom. 15:3; cf. Ps. 69:9). Nor did Paul serve in order to gain glory and honor from men. "For if I preach the gospel, I have nothing to boast of, for I am under compulsion; for woe is me if I do not preach the gospel" (1 Cor. 9:16). In a later letter to the church at Corinth he declared, "We do not preach ourselves but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your bondservants for Jesus’ sake" (2 Cor. 4:5; cf. 1 Cor. 9:19).
In verses 8-15, Paul’s words suggest nine marks of true spiritual service: a thankful spirit (v 8), a concerned spirit (v 9-10a), a willing and submissive spirit (v. 10b), a loving spirit (v. 11), a humble spirit (v. 12), a fruitful spirit (v. 13), an obedient spirit (v. 14), an eager spirit (v. 15). A tenth, a bold spirit, is mentioned in v. 16a.
I. Paul’s Thankfulness was Intimate Because of His Spiritual Closeness to God
A. For Paul, God was not a theological abstraction but a beloved Savior and close friend.
1. In verse 9 he says he served God in his spirit, from the depth of his heart and mind.
B. Paul gave thanks through Jesus Christ, the one eternal Mediator between God and man.
1. "No one comes to the Father, but through Me," Jesus said (John 14:6)
2. Believers in Him have the privilege of calling Almighty God, my God. "There is one God, and one mediator also between God and men, the man Christ Jesus" (1 Tim. 2:5).
3. It is because we have been given access to the Father through Jesus Christ that we always can "draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help in time of need" (Heb. 4:16), and can say, "Abba, Father" (Rom. 8:15).
II. Paul’s Thankfulness was also intimate because of His Spiritual Intimacy with Fellow Believers.
A. In every epistle but one, Paul expresses gratitude for those to whom he writes.
1. The exception was the letter to the church in Galatia, which had defected from the true gospel of grace to a works system of righteousness and was worshiping and serving in the flesh because of the influence of the Judaizers. It was not that the other churches were perfect, which is apparent since Paul wrote most of his letters to correct wrong doctrine or unholy living. But even where the need for instruction and correction was great, he found something in those churches for which he could be thankful.
2. Some years later, as he was prisoner in his own house in Rome while awaiting an audience before Caesar, Paul was still thankful. While there, he wrote four epistles (Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, and Philemon), commonly called the prison epistles. In each of those letters he gives thanks for the believers to whom he writes (Eph. 1:16; Phil. 1:3; Col. 1:3; Philem. 4). During his second Roman imprisonment, he may have spent time in the wretched Mamertine prison. If so, we can be sure he was thankful even there, although the city sewage system ran through the prison. I was told on a visit there that when the cells were filled to capacity, the sewage gates were opened and all the inmates would drown in the filthy water, making way for a new batch of prisoners. But Paul’s thankfulness did not rise and fall based on his earthly circumstances but on the richness of his fellowship with his Lord.
B. The specific reason for Paul’s thankfulness for the Roman Christians was their deep faith, which was being proclaimed throughout the whole world. From secular history we learn that in A.D. 49 Emperor Claudius expelled Jews from Rome, thinking they were all followers of someone named Chrestus (a variant spelling of Christ). Apparently the testimony of Jewish Christians had so incited the nonbelieving Jews that the turmoil threatened the peace of the whole city. The believers had, then, a powerful testimony not only in the city, but throughout the whole world. What a commendation!
C. By faith Paul was not referring to the initial trust in Christ that brings salvation but to the persevering trust that brings spiritual strength and growth. Faith like that also may bring persecution. Believers in Rome lived in the lion’s den, as it were, yet they lived out their faith with integrity and credibility. Some churches are famous because of their pastor, their architecture, their stained glass windows, or their size or wealth. The church in Rome was famous because of its faith. It was a fellowship of genuinely redeemed saints through whom the Lord Jesus Christ manifested His life and power, so that their character was known everywhere.
III. A thankful heart for those to whom one ministers is essential to true spiritual service.
A. The Christian who is trying to serve God’s people, however needy they may be, without gratitude in his heart for what the Lord has done for them will find his service lacking joy. Paul could usually find a cause for thanks so that he could honor the Lord for what had been done already and hope for what God would use him to do.
B. Superficial believers are seldom satisfied where they are and therefore seldom thankful. Because they focus on their own appetites for things of the world, they are more often resentful than thankful. A thankless heart is a selfish, self-centered, legalistic heart. Paul had a thankful heart because he continually focused on what God was doing in his own life, in the lives of other faithful believers, and in the advancement of His kingdom throughout the world.
A friend sent me an email that teaches thankfulness to its recipients:
If you have food in the refrigerator, clothes on your back, a roof overhead and a place to sleep, you are richer than 75% of this world.
If you have money in the bank, in your wallet, and spare change in a dish someplace, you are among the top 8% of the world’s wealthy.
If you woke up this morning with more health than illness, you are more blessed than the million who will not survive this week
If you have never experienced the danger of battle, the loneliness of imprisonment, the agony of torture, or the pangs of starvation, you are ahead of 500 million people in the world.
If you can attend church meetings without fear of harassment, arrest, torture, or death, you are more blessed than three billion in the world.
And if your parents are still alive and still married, you are very rare, even in the United States.
