Master 247: Then You Shall See
How does service fit into the Christian life? Lots of Christians will talk about the importance of service and plenty of Christians will engage in service, but do we really understand it?
That might seem an odd question to ask. "Do we really understand service?" What's to understand. You go out and help people. It's simple. Isn't it?
I certainly don't want to overcomplicate something that is simple, but I think that reflection reveals that service actually is naturally shot through with shades of complexity. A person who engages in community service voluntarily is different from a person who is required by a judge to perform the same service. When we hear about a wealthy CEO donating money or volunteering time--in certain contexts--we may wonder whether that is from a sincere desire to help or a sincere desire for a tax-break. And motivations aren't the only point of complexity.
Even people who sincerely desire to help others can become stressed out and weighed down by the logistics of doing so. How much organization is required to run a homeless shelter, coordinate volunteers for community events, run a day-care or baby-sitting service? Many people who set out to help people end up buried under the heavy burden of all the means involved.
And what happens when our best efforts fall short? When the teenager we've been counseling decides to commit suicide? When the addict we've been trying to help returns to his drugs? When we don't meet our goals? When we let down the people we're trying to help? Some people are very good at picking up and moving on--at standing strong under the weight of opposition or lack of help. But others struggle with that.
Plenty of people aren't troubled by any of these questions just because they never actually do engage in service. Maybe they would if they could, but their schedules are just too busy. Family, school, kids' sports, entertaining, hobbies, health problems, may all give the sense that there just isn't the time to reach out to other people and help them. Is that right?
These sorts of reflections prompt all sorts of questions: Are some motivations for service better than others? (And this is not just an academic question, for if there is an answer to it, we should try to adjust our lives accordingly.) Are some ways of going about service better or more effective than others? What is the goal or aim of service? (The answer to this question will have important implications for how we deal with apparent failure.) Is service the sort of thing that everyone ought to do? And why?
These have been just a few reflections to, hopefully, help to motivate this question--to help us see that there is something here worth investigating. Now I'm not going to take up all these questions. Some of these questions (like the question about proper means) can only be answered by considering particular cases. Instead, I want to reflect on a very general question: How does service fit into the Christian life? I won't try to give an exhaustive answer but just point to some things for us to consider.
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The church that I attend just completed a "weekend of service." On Friday, we hosted an event called "Summer Splash" on our campus. It's the last event in a two-week day camp for children with autism that's hosted by one of the larger churches in our area. We had over three hundred people (kids, parents, volunteers) on our campus with waterslides, water obstacle courses, wading pools, snow cones, popcorn, hamburgers and hotdogs. This is the second year that we've hosted this event as part of this camp and, we were told, it's the highlight of the camp for many of the kids.
On Saturday, groups from our church went to two homes, each belonging to elderly couples in our congregation. At one home, the group did a bunch of yard work and lawn maintenance--weeding, trimming, mowing. At the other, they painted and touched up the exterior of the house.
On Sunday morning, a group went out to one of the local elementary schools to paint the picnic tables and benches. Groups at the school and back at the church were gathering, preparing, and organizing school supplies for teachers and students. Gift sets of school supplies were prepared to give to children. Another group of volunteers, working with the local MOMS of the Military group, prepared "cool ties" for the soldiers and wrote letters of encouragement. A number of people also passed out fliers for a Del Taco fundraiser, the proceeds of which went to support Riverside Life Services, an organization that supports and resources women in crisis pregnancy.
--
At the end of the day, about fifty of the volunteers got together for a short service--a time of sharing, singing, prayer, and communion. It was during that time that a few thoughts about service crystalized for me and I'd like to share those now.
I raise the question, "How does service fit into the Christian life?" just because I'm concerned that a lot of people don't know the answer. Or if they do know the answer, they have a hard time applying that beneficially to their lives.
Whether or not they have ever been taught this explicitly, a lot of people have absorbed the idea that the Christian life involves something like working for God. People might not be able to articulate this thought, but the grip that it has on people's minds and imaginations is made clear by their behavior and attitude. Service, for many people, is frustrating--in much the same way that work is frustrating. We would rather not do it if we didn't have to. We are happy to get out of it if we can. Service is a burden and inconvenience. It always manages to crop up on my days off when I'm supposed to be relaxing from my job. Instead of doing that, I'm volunteering time, manual labor, effort and energy.
Notice the picture of the Christian life that emerges from considering these reactions of people. In our ordinary lives we have all sorts of responsibilities and concerns--job, family, bills, cleaning house, cooking meals, driving the carpool, maintaining the lawn, participating in community events, club or sports activities. And the Christian life is then conceived of as adding on a whole bunch of other things: Sunday morning church services, midweek Bible studies, prayer meetings, committee meetings, quiet times, weekend retreats, and also service and ministry projects. As if life weren't already busy enough, becoming a Christian seems to involve adding even more to the pile. Can that be right.
One of the ideas that I keep on trying to emphasize in my writing and teaching on Christian living is that service is not just something that we do. It's not just one more item on the list that God hands down to us from heaven. And it is not an end in itself. Obviously service does take time and effort and energy, but that's not the whole story. Hobbies all require time, effort, and energy. But the result of a few hours spent making crafts or playing games or hiking or whatever often is that the person is more energized and refreshed. Now are service projects the sort of thing that are more likely to energize people or more likely to drain people of energy? That depends on how you approach it. If you approach it like so many people approach their work, you probably will come out of it drained and empty. But (especially) if you're open to God's working through you, you can expect that energy and refreshment will follow. What was neat about this weekend is that that's what we saw.
As different people shared, during our celebration service, about their experiences of the weekend, we heard over and over about how people took away a great deal from the activities. A few people commented on the strong sense of unity that they felt watching and interacting with the various people who were working. Through working alongside people that, previously, some had only ever seen in church and never talked to, new relationships were formed. Both of the couples who were helped on Saturday expressed their deep gratitude and talked about the love that they felt and had received. One woman shared about how, in the course of the day's activities, she managed to break two sewing machines. The whole group of volunteers laughed together about what had happened, and despite the setbacks, a lot of good work was accomplished and people were uplifted. A few people drew our attention to the many different ways in which members of our church have served the community--encouraging us to celebrate and look beyond just the work of this one weekend.
My favorite comment came from one man who helped paint on Sunday. In the heat of the morning and amidst the hard work, he began to reflect, with gratitude, on the fact that Christ has delivered us from the necessity of earning our salvation. The biblical authors make clear that we cannot stand before God or in relationship with Him on the basis of merit. Our disobedience and rebellion against God have placed us under His righteous judgment and condemnation. From our estranged position, it is impossible for us to heal or repair that relationship. But God, through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, has opened the way for our reconciliation.
And that thought is exactly right: aren't you glad that Christ has delivered us from the necessity of earning our salvation. Sure we undertook some hard tasks and work over that weekend, but none of it was with the aim of meriting God's favor. What would it be like if that was what we were trying to do? Can you imagine? --that we had to do all that manual labor and time in the hot sun in order to get on God's good side. --that the only thing about that counted about that weekend was the fact that we accomplished things that counted on God's good list. --that when all was said and done, the real take-away value consisted just in our being one step closer to getting on God's good list. (Only 5,798 more good things to do.) Can you imagine? --what that would mean for the woman who broke those sewing machines. (Her chances of getting one more good deed to her name would have been shot.) A theology that insists that we must earn God's favor, merit his regard, work for His love, etc., etc. ends up draining so much of the richness and joy from these activities.
On the other hand, consider how much good we were able to draw from this weekend of service, in part because it wasn't just about earning God's favor. We were able to celebrate all the relationships that were built, the love that was communicated, the fun that was had, the experiences that were shared--all of this above and beyond the work that was accomplished. Even when the sewing machines malfunctioned, that didn't destroy the possibility for good being accomplished that day--because the sewing that needed to be done was not the only (or even the main) goal of the day.
What reflection on all these good things does is help us to see that service projects (within the Christian life) really are intended to be points of access through which God can pour His blessings into our lives. Service and service projects are so much more than just items on God's list of things that we have to do. They are opportunities for grace to move into our lives. When we're open to that possibility, especially when we are serving with eyes wide open--looking for what God can and will do in the midst of our work--sometimes even in spite of the hiccups and problems that crop up--, then we are in the best position to receive. If we are narrowly focused (as with tunnel-vision or blinders) on just the task, then unexpected problems will tend to frustrate us and we'll miss out on all the other stuff (above and beyond the mere "work") that God wants to give to us.
This is why those who have really cultivated a life of service will so often affirm that, when serving, the recipient of real blessing is the one who serves. So many of us go into service with the mentality: I'm going to help this person. I'm going to help this group. I'm going to bless this person. But if we approach service in the right way, we'll usually find that the person who serves is as blessed as the person who is served. "It is more blessed to give than to receive." That's really true. But it only works for those who recognize that giving is not just something that I do. Rather, it is a point of access through which God can pour His blessings into my life. Why should this be so? Because when we give and do so in the right attitude, we are coming alongside the work that God is doing. (This is at His invitation, of course.) To work alongside God is for Him to become involved in our lives. And God's presence in our lives is the greatest blessing of all. And as the blessed presence of God enters our lives, it manifests itself in all sorts of ways--in feelings of affirmation, in relationships built, in love communicated, and, yes, in work accomplished.
[I didn't think about this at the time, but as I continue to reflect. When we teach in the church about giving, we often go to Malachi 3:10. '"Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, so that there may be food in My house, and test Me now in this," says the LORD of hosts, "if I will not open for you the windows of heaven, and pour out for you a blessing until it overflows."' The problem with our common ways of thinking about this verse is that we do so in transactional terms. We imagine God to be speaking here of a transaction. You do this for me and I will do this for you. Bring the tithe into the storehouse and I will bless you. But that misunderstands how God works. You can even see the shadow of "earning" and "meriting" images infiltrating our thinking here. God does not work in this transactional way, fundamentally. When we bring our tithe into the storehouse, we come alongside the work that God is doing, we open up a point of access through which he can move into our lives; and as He moves into our lives, His presence, which is the greatest blessing of all, manifests itself in all sorts of ways. Psalm 37 and Proverbs 11, 19, and 22, speak of the good condition of the generous person. Is this so because God gives special rewards to the generous because of their deeds? Or is it just because generosity draws God into the life of that person?]
With this all in mind, consider this thought: if we do, indeed, believe that salvation is not earned, that our work does not merit God's favor, that service is just one more way in which our generous God can move into and through our lives--then why do we get so stressed out about service? This is especially relevant for those on the administrative/logistical end of things. When planning something like a weekend of service, administrators are likely to get all bent out of shape. They worry about whether they've accounted for all the details, whether there will be enough volunteers, whether the work will get done, and whether people will get along. They can become very impatient with volunteers who make mistakes, forget things, don't get the job done correctly, or otherwise fall short of expectations. Of course there's something to this. When engaging in service, we should try to do good work, be conscientious, attentive to and concerned for people--all these things are good. But the kind of stress and anxiety that so many go through seems to go above and beyond just caring for people. What's going on there?
Are we worried that failure will result in God's disfavor? Are we worried that people will be disappointed in us or angry with us? Are we worried that we will fail to measure up to our personal high standard of quality and accomplishment? The last point probably strikes closest to home. Can you imagine what it's like to finish up a monthly service activity and the most you can say is, "Well we were able to pull this month off. Now we've got to get ready for next month." Some of you can imagine that all too well because that's how you think. You slave away under the anxiety and fear of failure. When a project is finished well, the most you can say is, "Thank goodness this didn't blow up in my face." But of course, the next project might, and so there's never a let-up in the pressure and anxiety.
So many well-meaning Christians end up approaching service as if a job well-done lifted them just over the threshold of minimal acceptability. Anything less and they wouldn't have made it. The truth is that Jesus Christ has already carried us over that minimum threshold. Service, then, and all of our life with God is then just an opportunity for God to pour even more abundance and blessing and grace into our lives. The most colossal failure won't dropus below the line and, even when we do fail, those with eyes wide open will always find some good in what happened--because God was there all along and His presence is the greatest blessing.
Are you starting to get the picture?
What was so exciting about this weekend of service, for me, was that I actually got to see how God works in this way. In my teaching, I try to emphasize to people that service is more than just accomplishing the work. Service is more than just doing stuff for God. And through this weekend of service I saw that happen. It happened in the life of the church members and they were the one's talking about it. Whether they fully understood what they were saying and what was happening is a further question. That's part of the reason I blog about these sorts of things, to help draw people's attention to what is going on in their lives and to help them see that their experiences are not just random. Rather, they fall into an intelligible pattern.
One of the reasons that it's important to draw our attention to this pattern is that it allows us to make informed and intelligent decisions about our behavior. You see, Satan has a way of working on our minds. We hear about service opportunities or are asked to donate money or volunteer time and our first thoughts may be: "How inconvenient," "This is going to ruin my weekend," "But I wanted to do something else with that money," "But I volunteered last month," "I don't even know these people," "Why do they keep asking?" etc., etc., etc. These are the thoughts that come to us first, so often, and we forget all of the good that comes from service.
I've had this experience so many times. For two summers in high school I helped to lead neighborhood Vacation Bible School programs. Every morning I struggled to motivate myself for work. Every morning I questioned whether or not it was worth it to do this. I complained to myself about the inconvenience and worried about how the day would go. And at the end of every day I marveled at my recalcitrance just because the days went so well and were so full and good. For two summers, in Riverside, I helped with a two-week camp for kids with autism, hosted by one of the churches in our community. And on so many mornings I would ruminate on the inconvenience of the whole thing and consider skipping out. Yet every day was good. So many good things happened through that camp.
Yet it is so easy for us to lose focus, to see service as drudgery, to forget about and not even look for (and so miss out on) all the good that comes through faithful obedience, submission, and sacrifice. Have you experienced that? If we're to make progress in this area, we have to be able to make decisions based on more than just our immediate feelings--because our feelings will often betray us. We need to be able to recognize the truth and to act in light of that. And one of the most important truths that we need to internalize is that service really is a good thing.
Unfortunately we're so used to people telling us that things are "good for us" that really aren't. We're used to well-meaning but misguided people putting us through the dull, tiresome, inconvenient, tedious, banal, all the while telling us "it's good for you." When Jesus pushes us in that direction, His call is different. He's not just feeding us a line. He wants to give us life abundant.
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What a long post. And I could still go on. During that celebration service, I made brief reference to Paul's exhortation in Ephesians: "Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children; and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you, and gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma." (5:1-2) If I had had much more time, I would also have talked about Jesus' mission statement in John 5: "My Father is working until now, and I Myself am working." (v. 17) The last thing I would have done, and I'll wrap up here with that, is cite a letter from the second century in which one of the Apostolic Fathers shares with a non-Christian about what it means to be a follower of Christ.
This letter is written by an anonymous Christian whom historians have referred to as Mathetes, a word that just means "disciple". He was writing to Diognetus, defending the movement of Christianity. After explaining what Christianity is all about and how it is superior to the various pagan religions, he says this:
"If you also desire to possess this faith, you likewise shall receive first of all the knowledge of the Father. ... And when you have attained this knowledge, with what joy do you think you will be filled? Or, how will you love Him who has first so loved you? And if you love Him, you will be an imitator of His kindness. And do not wonder that a man may become an imitator of God. He can, if he is willing. For it is not by ruling over his neighbours, or by seeking to hold the supremacy over those that are weaker, or by being rich, or showing violence towards those that are inferior, that happiness is found; nor can any one by these things become an imitator of God. But these things do not at all constitute His majesty. On the contrary he who takes upon himself the burden of his neighbour; he who, in whatsoever respect he may be superior, is ready to benefit another who is deficient; he who, whatsoever things he has received from God, by distributing these to the needy, becomes a god to those who receive his benefits: he is an imitator of God.
[When you do these things, t]hen you shall see, while still on earth, that God in the heavens rules over the universe; then you shall begin to speak the mysteries of God; then shall you both love and admire those that suffer punishment because they will not deny God; then shall you condemn the deceit and error of the world when you shall know what it is to live truly in heaven, when you shall despise that which is here esteemed to be death, when you shall fear what is truly death, which is reserved for those who shall be condemned to the eternal fire, which shall afflict those even to the end that are committed to it. Then shall you admire those who for righteousness' sake endure the fire that is but for a moment, and shall count them happy when you shall know the nature of that fire."
Mathetes ("disciple"), Epistle to Diognetus (c. 130 A.D.)
Did you catch it? What does Mathetes tell Diognetus will be the result of his imitating God? He says, "Then you shall see, while still on earth, that God in the heavens rules over the universe." Notice, he doesn't say, "Then all the people you help shall see that God rules over the universe." Of course that is also true. But the thing he focuses on is that you (the one serving) shall see that God rules over the universe.
Again, this is why I so love hearing about what God is doing in other people's lives--because it reminds me and affirms that what God has revealed in His Word is true--that God really is present and active in this world. It's so easy, in the hurried frenzy of our every day lives, for the presence and promises of God to seem very distant and remote. But people's experiences of God working remind me that God really is present and active. They challenge me to step out and do more in faith. And service, again, is one of those points of access, through which God can enter into our lives, work, and in doing so remind us that He really is present and active. This has the effect of calling us out to do more, to step our in faith more, to submit more, and in doing so to enter more fully into what God desires for us and into fuller experience of His life in us.
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God is in this place,
And that reality, seen and understood by the grace of God in Christ Jesus through the work of the Holy Spirit, makes all the difference in the world.
That might seem an odd question to ask. "Do we really understand service?" What's to understand. You go out and help people. It's simple. Isn't it?
I certainly don't want to overcomplicate something that is simple, but I think that reflection reveals that service actually is naturally shot through with shades of complexity. A person who engages in community service voluntarily is different from a person who is required by a judge to perform the same service. When we hear about a wealthy CEO donating money or volunteering time--in certain contexts--we may wonder whether that is from a sincere desire to help or a sincere desire for a tax-break. And motivations aren't the only point of complexity.
Even people who sincerely desire to help others can become stressed out and weighed down by the logistics of doing so. How much organization is required to run a homeless shelter, coordinate volunteers for community events, run a day-care or baby-sitting service? Many people who set out to help people end up buried under the heavy burden of all the means involved.
And what happens when our best efforts fall short? When the teenager we've been counseling decides to commit suicide? When the addict we've been trying to help returns to his drugs? When we don't meet our goals? When we let down the people we're trying to help? Some people are very good at picking up and moving on--at standing strong under the weight of opposition or lack of help. But others struggle with that.
Plenty of people aren't troubled by any of these questions just because they never actually do engage in service. Maybe they would if they could, but their schedules are just too busy. Family, school, kids' sports, entertaining, hobbies, health problems, may all give the sense that there just isn't the time to reach out to other people and help them. Is that right?
These sorts of reflections prompt all sorts of questions: Are some motivations for service better than others? (And this is not just an academic question, for if there is an answer to it, we should try to adjust our lives accordingly.) Are some ways of going about service better or more effective than others? What is the goal or aim of service? (The answer to this question will have important implications for how we deal with apparent failure.) Is service the sort of thing that everyone ought to do? And why?
These have been just a few reflections to, hopefully, help to motivate this question--to help us see that there is something here worth investigating. Now I'm not going to take up all these questions. Some of these questions (like the question about proper means) can only be answered by considering particular cases. Instead, I want to reflect on a very general question: How does service fit into the Christian life? I won't try to give an exhaustive answer but just point to some things for us to consider.
--
The church that I attend just completed a "weekend of service." On Friday, we hosted an event called "Summer Splash" on our campus. It's the last event in a two-week day camp for children with autism that's hosted by one of the larger churches in our area. We had over three hundred people (kids, parents, volunteers) on our campus with waterslides, water obstacle courses, wading pools, snow cones, popcorn, hamburgers and hotdogs. This is the second year that we've hosted this event as part of this camp and, we were told, it's the highlight of the camp for many of the kids.
On Saturday, groups from our church went to two homes, each belonging to elderly couples in our congregation. At one home, the group did a bunch of yard work and lawn maintenance--weeding, trimming, mowing. At the other, they painted and touched up the exterior of the house.
On Sunday morning, a group went out to one of the local elementary schools to paint the picnic tables and benches. Groups at the school and back at the church were gathering, preparing, and organizing school supplies for teachers and students. Gift sets of school supplies were prepared to give to children. Another group of volunteers, working with the local MOMS of the Military group, prepared "cool ties" for the soldiers and wrote letters of encouragement. A number of people also passed out fliers for a Del Taco fundraiser, the proceeds of which went to support Riverside Life Services, an organization that supports and resources women in crisis pregnancy.
--
At the end of the day, about fifty of the volunteers got together for a short service--a time of sharing, singing, prayer, and communion. It was during that time that a few thoughts about service crystalized for me and I'd like to share those now.
I raise the question, "How does service fit into the Christian life?" just because I'm concerned that a lot of people don't know the answer. Or if they do know the answer, they have a hard time applying that beneficially to their lives.
Whether or not they have ever been taught this explicitly, a lot of people have absorbed the idea that the Christian life involves something like working for God. People might not be able to articulate this thought, but the grip that it has on people's minds and imaginations is made clear by their behavior and attitude. Service, for many people, is frustrating--in much the same way that work is frustrating. We would rather not do it if we didn't have to. We are happy to get out of it if we can. Service is a burden and inconvenience. It always manages to crop up on my days off when I'm supposed to be relaxing from my job. Instead of doing that, I'm volunteering time, manual labor, effort and energy.
Notice the picture of the Christian life that emerges from considering these reactions of people. In our ordinary lives we have all sorts of responsibilities and concerns--job, family, bills, cleaning house, cooking meals, driving the carpool, maintaining the lawn, participating in community events, club or sports activities. And the Christian life is then conceived of as adding on a whole bunch of other things: Sunday morning church services, midweek Bible studies, prayer meetings, committee meetings, quiet times, weekend retreats, and also service and ministry projects. As if life weren't already busy enough, becoming a Christian seems to involve adding even more to the pile. Can that be right.
One of the ideas that I keep on trying to emphasize in my writing and teaching on Christian living is that service is not just something that we do. It's not just one more item on the list that God hands down to us from heaven. And it is not an end in itself. Obviously service does take time and effort and energy, but that's not the whole story. Hobbies all require time, effort, and energy. But the result of a few hours spent making crafts or playing games or hiking or whatever often is that the person is more energized and refreshed. Now are service projects the sort of thing that are more likely to energize people or more likely to drain people of energy? That depends on how you approach it. If you approach it like so many people approach their work, you probably will come out of it drained and empty. But (especially) if you're open to God's working through you, you can expect that energy and refreshment will follow. What was neat about this weekend is that that's what we saw.
As different people shared, during our celebration service, about their experiences of the weekend, we heard over and over about how people took away a great deal from the activities. A few people commented on the strong sense of unity that they felt watching and interacting with the various people who were working. Through working alongside people that, previously, some had only ever seen in church and never talked to, new relationships were formed. Both of the couples who were helped on Saturday expressed their deep gratitude and talked about the love that they felt and had received. One woman shared about how, in the course of the day's activities, she managed to break two sewing machines. The whole group of volunteers laughed together about what had happened, and despite the setbacks, a lot of good work was accomplished and people were uplifted. A few people drew our attention to the many different ways in which members of our church have served the community--encouraging us to celebrate and look beyond just the work of this one weekend.
My favorite comment came from one man who helped paint on Sunday. In the heat of the morning and amidst the hard work, he began to reflect, with gratitude, on the fact that Christ has delivered us from the necessity of earning our salvation. The biblical authors make clear that we cannot stand before God or in relationship with Him on the basis of merit. Our disobedience and rebellion against God have placed us under His righteous judgment and condemnation. From our estranged position, it is impossible for us to heal or repair that relationship. But God, through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, has opened the way for our reconciliation.
And that thought is exactly right: aren't you glad that Christ has delivered us from the necessity of earning our salvation. Sure we undertook some hard tasks and work over that weekend, but none of it was with the aim of meriting God's favor. What would it be like if that was what we were trying to do? Can you imagine? --that we had to do all that manual labor and time in the hot sun in order to get on God's good side. --that the only thing about that counted about that weekend was the fact that we accomplished things that counted on God's good list. --that when all was said and done, the real take-away value consisted just in our being one step closer to getting on God's good list. (Only 5,798 more good things to do.) Can you imagine? --what that would mean for the woman who broke those sewing machines. (Her chances of getting one more good deed to her name would have been shot.) A theology that insists that we must earn God's favor, merit his regard, work for His love, etc., etc. ends up draining so much of the richness and joy from these activities.
On the other hand, consider how much good we were able to draw from this weekend of service, in part because it wasn't just about earning God's favor. We were able to celebrate all the relationships that were built, the love that was communicated, the fun that was had, the experiences that were shared--all of this above and beyond the work that was accomplished. Even when the sewing machines malfunctioned, that didn't destroy the possibility for good being accomplished that day--because the sewing that needed to be done was not the only (or even the main) goal of the day.
What reflection on all these good things does is help us to see that service projects (within the Christian life) really are intended to be points of access through which God can pour His blessings into our lives. Service and service projects are so much more than just items on God's list of things that we have to do. They are opportunities for grace to move into our lives. When we're open to that possibility, especially when we are serving with eyes wide open--looking for what God can and will do in the midst of our work--sometimes even in spite of the hiccups and problems that crop up--, then we are in the best position to receive. If we are narrowly focused (as with tunnel-vision or blinders) on just the task, then unexpected problems will tend to frustrate us and we'll miss out on all the other stuff (above and beyond the mere "work") that God wants to give to us.
This is why those who have really cultivated a life of service will so often affirm that, when serving, the recipient of real blessing is the one who serves. So many of us go into service with the mentality: I'm going to help this person. I'm going to help this group. I'm going to bless this person. But if we approach service in the right way, we'll usually find that the person who serves is as blessed as the person who is served. "It is more blessed to give than to receive." That's really true. But it only works for those who recognize that giving is not just something that I do. Rather, it is a point of access through which God can pour His blessings into my life. Why should this be so? Because when we give and do so in the right attitude, we are coming alongside the work that God is doing. (This is at His invitation, of course.) To work alongside God is for Him to become involved in our lives. And God's presence in our lives is the greatest blessing of all. And as the blessed presence of God enters our lives, it manifests itself in all sorts of ways--in feelings of affirmation, in relationships built, in love communicated, and, yes, in work accomplished.
[I didn't think about this at the time, but as I continue to reflect. When we teach in the church about giving, we often go to Malachi 3:10. '"Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, so that there may be food in My house, and test Me now in this," says the LORD of hosts, "if I will not open for you the windows of heaven, and pour out for you a blessing until it overflows."' The problem with our common ways of thinking about this verse is that we do so in transactional terms. We imagine God to be speaking here of a transaction. You do this for me and I will do this for you. Bring the tithe into the storehouse and I will bless you. But that misunderstands how God works. You can even see the shadow of "earning" and "meriting" images infiltrating our thinking here. God does not work in this transactional way, fundamentally. When we bring our tithe into the storehouse, we come alongside the work that God is doing, we open up a point of access through which he can move into our lives; and as He moves into our lives, His presence, which is the greatest blessing of all, manifests itself in all sorts of ways. Psalm 37 and Proverbs 11, 19, and 22, speak of the good condition of the generous person. Is this so because God gives special rewards to the generous because of their deeds? Or is it just because generosity draws God into the life of that person?]
With this all in mind, consider this thought: if we do, indeed, believe that salvation is not earned, that our work does not merit God's favor, that service is just one more way in which our generous God can move into and through our lives--then why do we get so stressed out about service? This is especially relevant for those on the administrative/logistical end of things. When planning something like a weekend of service, administrators are likely to get all bent out of shape. They worry about whether they've accounted for all the details, whether there will be enough volunteers, whether the work will get done, and whether people will get along. They can become very impatient with volunteers who make mistakes, forget things, don't get the job done correctly, or otherwise fall short of expectations. Of course there's something to this. When engaging in service, we should try to do good work, be conscientious, attentive to and concerned for people--all these things are good. But the kind of stress and anxiety that so many go through seems to go above and beyond just caring for people. What's going on there?
Are we worried that failure will result in God's disfavor? Are we worried that people will be disappointed in us or angry with us? Are we worried that we will fail to measure up to our personal high standard of quality and accomplishment? The last point probably strikes closest to home. Can you imagine what it's like to finish up a monthly service activity and the most you can say is, "Well we were able to pull this month off. Now we've got to get ready for next month." Some of you can imagine that all too well because that's how you think. You slave away under the anxiety and fear of failure. When a project is finished well, the most you can say is, "Thank goodness this didn't blow up in my face." But of course, the next project might, and so there's never a let-up in the pressure and anxiety.
So many well-meaning Christians end up approaching service as if a job well-done lifted them just over the threshold of minimal acceptability. Anything less and they wouldn't have made it. The truth is that Jesus Christ has already carried us over that minimum threshold. Service, then, and all of our life with God is then just an opportunity for God to pour even more abundance and blessing and grace into our lives. The most colossal failure won't dropus below the line and, even when we do fail, those with eyes wide open will always find some good in what happened--because God was there all along and His presence is the greatest blessing.
Are you starting to get the picture?
What was so exciting about this weekend of service, for me, was that I actually got to see how God works in this way. In my teaching, I try to emphasize to people that service is more than just accomplishing the work. Service is more than just doing stuff for God. And through this weekend of service I saw that happen. It happened in the life of the church members and they were the one's talking about it. Whether they fully understood what they were saying and what was happening is a further question. That's part of the reason I blog about these sorts of things, to help draw people's attention to what is going on in their lives and to help them see that their experiences are not just random. Rather, they fall into an intelligible pattern.
One of the reasons that it's important to draw our attention to this pattern is that it allows us to make informed and intelligent decisions about our behavior. You see, Satan has a way of working on our minds. We hear about service opportunities or are asked to donate money or volunteer time and our first thoughts may be: "How inconvenient," "This is going to ruin my weekend," "But I wanted to do something else with that money," "But I volunteered last month," "I don't even know these people," "Why do they keep asking?" etc., etc., etc. These are the thoughts that come to us first, so often, and we forget all of the good that comes from service.
I've had this experience so many times. For two summers in high school I helped to lead neighborhood Vacation Bible School programs. Every morning I struggled to motivate myself for work. Every morning I questioned whether or not it was worth it to do this. I complained to myself about the inconvenience and worried about how the day would go. And at the end of every day I marveled at my recalcitrance just because the days went so well and were so full and good. For two summers, in Riverside, I helped with a two-week camp for kids with autism, hosted by one of the churches in our community. And on so many mornings I would ruminate on the inconvenience of the whole thing and consider skipping out. Yet every day was good. So many good things happened through that camp.
Yet it is so easy for us to lose focus, to see service as drudgery, to forget about and not even look for (and so miss out on) all the good that comes through faithful obedience, submission, and sacrifice. Have you experienced that? If we're to make progress in this area, we have to be able to make decisions based on more than just our immediate feelings--because our feelings will often betray us. We need to be able to recognize the truth and to act in light of that. And one of the most important truths that we need to internalize is that service really is a good thing.
Unfortunately we're so used to people telling us that things are "good for us" that really aren't. We're used to well-meaning but misguided people putting us through the dull, tiresome, inconvenient, tedious, banal, all the while telling us "it's good for you." When Jesus pushes us in that direction, His call is different. He's not just feeding us a line. He wants to give us life abundant.
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What a long post. And I could still go on. During that celebration service, I made brief reference to Paul's exhortation in Ephesians: "Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children; and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you, and gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma." (5:1-2) If I had had much more time, I would also have talked about Jesus' mission statement in John 5: "My Father is working until now, and I Myself am working." (v. 17) The last thing I would have done, and I'll wrap up here with that, is cite a letter from the second century in which one of the Apostolic Fathers shares with a non-Christian about what it means to be a follower of Christ.
This letter is written by an anonymous Christian whom historians have referred to as Mathetes, a word that just means "disciple". He was writing to Diognetus, defending the movement of Christianity. After explaining what Christianity is all about and how it is superior to the various pagan religions, he says this:
"If you also desire to possess this faith, you likewise shall receive first of all the knowledge of the Father. ... And when you have attained this knowledge, with what joy do you think you will be filled? Or, how will you love Him who has first so loved you? And if you love Him, you will be an imitator of His kindness. And do not wonder that a man may become an imitator of God. He can, if he is willing. For it is not by ruling over his neighbours, or by seeking to hold the supremacy over those that are weaker, or by being rich, or showing violence towards those that are inferior, that happiness is found; nor can any one by these things become an imitator of God. But these things do not at all constitute His majesty. On the contrary he who takes upon himself the burden of his neighbour; he who, in whatsoever respect he may be superior, is ready to benefit another who is deficient; he who, whatsoever things he has received from God, by distributing these to the needy, becomes a god to those who receive his benefits: he is an imitator of God.
[When you do these things, t]hen you shall see, while still on earth, that God in the heavens rules over the universe; then you shall begin to speak the mysteries of God; then shall you both love and admire those that suffer punishment because they will not deny God; then shall you condemn the deceit and error of the world when you shall know what it is to live truly in heaven, when you shall despise that which is here esteemed to be death, when you shall fear what is truly death, which is reserved for those who shall be condemned to the eternal fire, which shall afflict those even to the end that are committed to it. Then shall you admire those who for righteousness' sake endure the fire that is but for a moment, and shall count them happy when you shall know the nature of that fire."
Mathetes ("disciple"), Epistle to Diognetus (c. 130 A.D.)
Did you catch it? What does Mathetes tell Diognetus will be the result of his imitating God? He says, "Then you shall see, while still on earth, that God in the heavens rules over the universe." Notice, he doesn't say, "Then all the people you help shall see that God rules over the universe." Of course that is also true. But the thing he focuses on is that you (the one serving) shall see that God rules over the universe.
Again, this is why I so love hearing about what God is doing in other people's lives--because it reminds me and affirms that what God has revealed in His Word is true--that God really is present and active in this world. It's so easy, in the hurried frenzy of our every day lives, for the presence and promises of God to seem very distant and remote. But people's experiences of God working remind me that God really is present and active. They challenge me to step out and do more in faith. And service, again, is one of those points of access, through which God can enter into our lives, work, and in doing so remind us that He really is present and active. This has the effect of calling us out to do more, to step our in faith more, to submit more, and in doing so to enter more fully into what God desires for us and into fuller experience of His life in us.
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God is in this place,
And that reality, seen and understood by the grace of God in Christ Jesus through the work of the Holy Spirit, makes all the difference in the world.
posted by Metaphysician_delta | 10:07 AM
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