Tonight I want to start out by having a little brain storming session. I have a blank card for each of you that I want to pick one of the sides and write the word “serve” at the top. Now, I want us to take a minute or two and just write down all the things that come to your mind when you hear this word “serve.” There is no right or wrong answers, just your immediate thoughts.
***Wait a moment or two and then have some of the youth share their thoughts***
Alright, now I want you guys to flip the card over and write the word “give” at the top of the card. Take a few moments to do the same thing and write down your immediate thoughts when you think of the word “give.”
***Wait a moment or two and then have some of the youth share their thoughts***
I think it’s kind of interesting to think about these two words, share and give, in conjunction with one another. I know when I think of each of these words separately, the first thought that comes to mind when I think about the word “serve” is doing things for others. The first thought that comes to my mind when I hear the word “give” is money being put into the offering plate. Typically, when I compare and contrast the two in my mind, initially I feel that I would much rather serve people than give. It sounds easier for some reason and much more rewarding. Once we get past our initial thoughts about these words and really think about it, we’ll find very quickly that there really isn’t much of a difference between the two.
Think about it for a moment…think about times that are serving your parents, the church, God, or anyone else for that matter. Aren’t you giving something in order to serve? Whether it be time, money, talents, or other resources we all have to give in order to serve. Likewise, when we are giving, whether it is putting money in the offering plate, giving away food at the Rescue Mission in Bridgeport, or giving time to help someone out, we are serving God and others at the same time.
Tonight we are going to continue to move along in the sentence that we have been discussing since January: Living to Grow, Serve, Worship, and Share. We spent a lot of time on living together and the important relationships that are in our lives and then we did a few weeks on growing into God’s likeness and how to hang out with Him. Over the next three weeks, we are going to focus on the importance of serving God and the others around us. Tonight we are going to focus on what it really means to serve, next week we are simply going to do it by participating in the 30 Hour Famine (of which we will have no youth group on Sunday next week because of that), and then the week after we are going to talk about why we should serve.
So again, for tonight let’s dive into the question of what does it really mean to serve. Instead of using the word serve tonight as we talk about it, I want to use the word give because, as we just said, it is the same thing but yet somehow more challenging in our minds. To help us look at this we are going to look at John 12:1-7 verse by verse.
“1Six days before the Passover ceremonies began, Jesus arrived in Bethany, the home of Lazarus--the man he had raised from the dead. [Which you can read about in chapter 11.]
2A dinner was prepared in Jesus’ honor. Martha served, and Lazarus was among those who ate with him.”
Now, this dinner was most likely a celebration that Lazarus was alive. Thus John’s point in bluntly reminding us that Lazarus was at the table with them even after he stated that it was at his house. It also was a very risky move on their part to throw this party because of the religious leaders.
You see, they were not happy that Jesus had raised Lazarus from the dead because “everyone was believing in him,” which was kind of the point of why Jesus did miracles; so that people would believe. The religious leaders were so selfish and caught up in their own ideas that a man being brought back to life wouldn’t even affect them. So, because they weren’t happy, they “had publicly ordered that anyone seeing Jesus must report it immediately so they could arrest him.”
So Jesus was risking his life, on purpose as we all know, by going to Bethany where the Passover celebration was going on because of the amount of people that would be there. Then, Simon, Lazarus, Mary and anyone else who were at the house, were risking their lives because they disobeyed the instructions of the religious leaders. Despite these big risks that were boldly being played out at this dinner, let’s look at verse three to see the boldest move of all in this story.
“3Then Mary took a twelve-ounce jar of expensive perfume made from essence of nard, and she anointed Jesus’ feet with it, wiping his feet with her hair. The house was filled with fragrance.”
What an amazing act of love that is displayed here! Picture the scene in your minds: The room is filled with people and everyone’s focus was most likely on Jesus already. Despite that, Mary walks right up in front of everyone and anoints Jesus’ feet with expensive nard, which was oil extracted from a plant found in the mountains of India. Because of the rarity of it, even the small amount that Mary used cost about a year’s wages. She then wipes Jesus’ feet with her hair. Even if there was someone who didn’t actually see the whole thing happen, everyone now was staring as they caught a whiff of the fragrance. This is an amazing act of service and giving by Mary that we should follow closely.
Mary gave her time! Verse two told us that Mary was serving at the dinner. She was spending her time getting the meal prepared and on the table so that everyone could celebrate. This would not have been as easy a task as one might think. It’s not like she just turned the stove on and threw in some Mac’ and Cheese and set the timer. This would have most likely been a long process of mixing, cutting, kneading, and cooking as she prepared. It would have been quite a sacrifice of her time.
Mary gave her resources! It is amazing to think that Mary gave something so valuable to Jesus – a years wages worth!! Not to mention if you added in the food and materials she had probably already used for the dinner, it would be much more. Could you guys imagine giving everything you made in a year to God? For New Canaan, the yearly family income average is $150,748.00!! Could you imagine just dumping that kind of money away onto some guy’s feet, but yet here is Mary doing just that. She realized that no amount of money or resource that she could have was worth more than Jesus. She also realized that it was solely God’s blessing in her life that she had it in the first place. Thus she simply gave back to God what was His to begin with.
Mary gave her life! Mary’s act of washing Jesus feet with expensive perfume was communicating her love and commitment to Jesus as God’s Son. As you will see in the following chapter and we’re going to talk about this in two weeks, Jesus washes the feet of his disciples telling them that they should follow his example and serve one another. The cleaning of feet was a nasty job, due to all the walking they did, and typically was done by the slaves or servants in the house. Mary willingly gives her life to Christ, cleaning his feet and symbolically saying, “I will serve you forever!”
All three of these areas, our time, resources, and life, are all things we should be giving to God in humble service but yet it is so difficult to do so. Often times instead of having a servant heart like Mary, we have an attitude like Judas that is shown in verses 4-6.
“4But Judas Iscariot, the disciple who would soon betray him said, 5‘That perfume was worth a small fortune. It should have been sold and the money given to the poor.’ 6Not that he cared for the poor--he was a thief who was in charge of the disciples’ funds, and he often took some for his own use.”
Excuses, excuses…we all have them when it comes to the area of giving and serving. Really they are just like Judas where we are simply just being selfish and want our time, resources, or life for us. We have this attitude of, “It’s mine and I am going to do with it what I want!”
Maybe our excuses don’t seem that blatantly selfish but if you take the time to really explore your excuse, selfishness is there. If you dig even deeper, selfishness really comes into play solely because we don’t trust God to take care of us and we need to take care of ourselves. We don’t give our time because we think we don’t have any time to give but in reality we choose where our priorities are and how to spend our time. We don’t give money or resources because we “need” it to live and God can’t provide more and make it last longer. We don’t give our lives because we “need” to have fun and a life following Jesus is anything but. Really, our giving really reflects our love and trust in God, that’s what it comes down to. I love the way Paul words it in 2 Corinthians 8:8 as he talks to the Corinth church about giving, “I am not commanding you to [give]. But I am testing how genuine your love is.” It is really hard to have an attitude like Mary and not like Judas but it is well worth it in the long run even though it might seem like a waste initially.
Most important in all of this is why we give. Why did Mary give her time to Jesus and His work? Why did she give her expensive resources? Why did she humbly give her life to Jesus as a life long servant? That answer is found in Jesus’ rebuke of Judas found in verse 7. “7Jesus replied, ‘Leave her alone. She did it in preparation for my burial.’” Mary knew that Jesus was going to die and she anointed him with oil to show her love and understanding. She knew this for three reasons:
1) Jesus had given his time to her and many others teaching them the ways of God and revealing to them that he was the Messiah, God’s Son who had came to save the world. 2) Jesus, being fully God, gave of his resources, as the entire world could have been his as he reigned in heaven, but instead he entrusted the world and everything in it to the people living there so they were taken care of. 3) Jesus gave his life up on the cross and Mary knew that it was in her place that Jesus was nailed to the cross.
Jesus gave everything for us so that we might have life in general and all the little things that come with it. Without Jesus giving, we would have nothing but death and a one way ticket to hell and eternal separation from God! Instead, because Jesus gave everything, we too have been given a choice to give as well. We can have an attitude like Mary and give everything we have to God and to others around us and look forward to the blessings to come in heaven. Or, we can have an attitude like Judas, choosing to keep everything for ourselves and staying far away from God and ending up with nothing in long run. Which will you choose?
