Who Is A Good And Faithful Servant?

WHO IS A GOOD AND FAITHFUL SERVANT?

Sunday, May 07, 2006 – AM

By Pastor Jim May

James 1:22-25, "But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass: For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was. But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed."

As I read this scripture I was reminded of something that I heard a long time ago. Every church consists of people who are in all stages of spiritual growth and maturity in their walk with the Lord. Today I think that we will look at a few of the types of people that we run across and see where we might fit into this picture.

I might add that not only do we see these folks in the church. If you look closely, you will recognize these same types of people wherever you go because they are always the same whether it is on the job, at home or shopping in the mall.

In times past I have taught some of you about personality differences by explaining to you about the mannerisms and behavior patterns of those who are sanguine, melancholy, phlegmatic and choleric. Those were interesting to me to say the least and knowing those characteristics that are part and parcel of these four basic personality types will often help you in dealing with them on an every day basis. Maybe sometimes it would help us to review them again.

But this morning, I’m not going to go into those types of personalities because what I want to show you incorporates all of them. No one type of personality is better than the other. All of them have strengths and weaknesses.

You can serve the Lord and be a soldier of the cross, no matter what you personality is like, as long as you commit your life to Jesus and obey the Word of the Lord. Of course you personality will have a lot to do with the work that you will do because it is all meshed together.

Today I want to show you 5 types of people who are in the church. There are 5 types, but only one of them will ever hear the Lord say those words that we all want to hear found in Matthew 25:21, "… Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord."

Only one of these types will ever accomplish anything great in their work for God. And only one type will ever know what it means to step out in faith and find that God is always waiting when they take that step out of the safety of the boat and into the waters of uncertainty in life, knowing that it’s either go all the way with Jesus or sink into absolute defeat.

The 5 types of people are what we will call - Wishers, Talkers, Dreamers, Dabblers and Doers.

First, lets talk about the DREAMERS AND WISHERS

A wisher is one kind of person that I really see a lot of in the church. They are the kind of people who always seem to have a far away look in their eye and they want things to happen but nothing ever does.

It’s like they are staring off into the vast expanse of the universe on a clear night and you hear them say, “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star. How I wonder where you are. Up above the world so high, like a diamond in the sky. Wish I may, wish I might, just have this wish I wish tonight.”

How many of you said that when you were a kid and you really did want something but knew it seemed impossible? It’s fine to live in a fantasy world when you’re young and immature, but there came a day when you had to grow up and face reality. You had to learn that nothing comes by wishing. Dreaming YES, but wishing NO!

Dreamers are the reason that we have most of the things we have. Dreamers thought of cars, planes, ships and everything else you enjoy in life. Somewhere in the heart and mind of a dreamer everything around us had a beginning, even in the mind of the greatest Dreamer of them all, Almighty God. One day in eternity past God began to dream of having a creature that would serve Him, love Him, and desire to be with Him simply because that creature would realize that God is a loving, caring, merciful and great God. In that moment of thought, our wonderful Lord devised creation of the universe and man to serve Him and finished His plan of salvation so that we could be with Him for eternity to come.