5.3.26 Sermon Notes “The Servant in You – LOVE”
“Disciple and Do the Servant in You”
God is calling us to something more significant than than “getting more volunteers” to do all this stuff.
He is calling us to be “Servants” ….
When Jesus comes to live in us by His Spirit He brings His heart with Him.
The heart of Jesus becomes the animating center of our being.
The heart of Jesus is a servant’s heart.
Matthew 20:25-28
25 Jesus called them together and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. 26 Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, 27 and whoever wants to be first must be your slave— 28 just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
Living as a Jesus servant in this world is the meaningful life Christ intends for us. It is the absolute best intention our savior could have for our lives … to live into our beautiful design as humans created in the image of God.
There is one place to start. One core foundational characteristic of the Servant Heart of Jesus that beats within everyone that calls on His name that identifies as a Jesus follower.
LOVE is the foundational virtue value and essence of the heart of God in Christ. LOVE
To quote Tyler Staton, from some of the resources we are encouraging you to engage with,
“The aim and destination of the spiritual journey is not work/life balance, personal peace, or even character formation (as an end in itself) but to become love — that my inner journey of formation would pour out of me actively in service to others. Love, in the Christian imagination, is different than in our modern, Western sense. It’s not just nice, warm feelings of goodwill toward “humanity" generally. But incarnate, embodied, practical actions of self-sacrificial service, as we see in Jesus.
That’s service: to willfully enter into the life of another, at cost to myself, that they might have more life.”
“Jesus, when asked what the most important command in Scripture was, gave a common, predictable answer: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. What was less predictable though, and set Jesus apart from the other rabbis of his day, was what followed: “And a second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus inseparably joined together love for God and people. The way I love others is directly connected, even revealing, of the true state of my heart toward God.
The spiritual practice of service is:
The expression of Christlike love through meeting the practical needs of another, especially those most in need of help.
John 13:12-17
12 When he had finished washing their feet, he put on his clothes and returned to his place. “Do you understand what I have done for you?” he asked them. 13 “You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord,’ and rightly so, for that is what I am. 14 Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet. 15 I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you. 16 Very truly I tell you, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. 17 Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.
34 “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
The spiritual practice of service is:
The expression of Christlike love through meeting the practical needs of another, especially those most in need of help.
1 John 3:16-18
16 This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. 17 If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? 18 Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.
1 John 4:7-12
7 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
These verses help me face one of the significant challenges of life as a “Servant of Christ” ….
I am prone to let the How? of doing spiritual practices (serving) out run the “why?” of doing (serving)!
Jesus always calls us back to letting the Why? take the lead.
And the “WHY” for any spiritual practices in the way of Jesus is LOVE……
Why serve? ….. LOVE …. from God overflows in love for God and others.
11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
The “WHY” must outrun the “HOW”. The “WHY” is LOVE!
If practicing the way of Jesus isn’t filling me to overflowing with the love of Jesus, I’m nothing more than noisy — religiously busy but out of tune with God’s redemption in me and the world around me. But if practicing the way of Jesus is deepening my own experience of God’s irrevocable love to the degree that I increasingly serve others with the same kind of love then my life is harmonizing with the renewal of the world.
Tyler Staton