Good morning from a little cooler Panhandle. I pray you had a great weekend. We observed the ordinance of the Lord's Supper yesterday and then had a church picnic at the lake last night. It was a great Lord's Day.
Developing a servant's heart why do we or should we do that, after all isn't that what the pastor is paid to do? Good try, but no! We are all called to be servants of God, just in different ways. Now to today's study – The Reason for Our Salvation, Part 2
Reaching the end of a job interview, the human resources person asked a young engineer fresh out of MIT what kind of a salary he was looking for.
"In the neighborhood of $140,000 a year, depending on the benefits package."
"Well, what would you say to a package of 5-weeks vacation, 14 paid holidays, full medical & dental, company matching retirement fund to 50% of salary, & a company car leased every 2 years...say, a red Corvette?"
"Wow! Are you kidding?"
"Yeah, but you started it."
A
servant’s heart is sorely lacking in our society today. God’s
people should have a servant’s heart.
If you remember last week I asked you three questions:
1. God saved me because
2. God’s purpose for saving me was
3. I am most like Jesus when I
We looked at the 1st question, God saved me because ... and I said the answer is because He loves us. Today we will look at the other two questions.
1. God’s Purpose for Saving Me Was to Bring Him Glory.
Many people seem to think that the only reason for salvation is so that a person might go to heaven when he or she dies. Eternal life is part of God’s forgiveness plan for us, and a good reason to want to be saved. When I was a teenager I heard it called fire insurance. But that is not the sole reason for our salvation.
We are saved so that we might be “redeemed”— a word that implies that we once were in bondage or slavery to something that was evil, but we have been rescued and set free from sin so that we might live a life of righteousness before God. If God’s only purpose for our salvation was so that we might go to heaven, He would be doing each of us a great favor by saving us and then immediately taking us to heaven.
God’s purpose for saving us is so that we each might reflect His nature. God wants us to be His people on this earth, doing the kinds of works that Christ Jesus Himself would do if He were walking in our shoes, through our world, during our lifetime. We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf: Be reconciled to God. (2 Corinthians 5:20)
God desires to make known His character through our personalities and giftedness. When we allow the Holy Spirit to work in us and through us, we become vessels of His love in action to others. God wants us to reflect His compassion, love, and mercy to others. And in so doing, we are His witnesses. We bring credit, honor, and glory to Him.
God does not save us in order that we might be part of an elite group of “good people.” He saves us in order that we might reach out to all people with God’s goodness. He does not put us in the church so that we might soak up several decades of good sermons, Bible conferences, prayer meetings, and seminars. He puts us in the church so that we might be of good use to those who are in need. He puts us in church so that we might function as His body, each of us using our gifts, talents, and skills as the Holy Spirit directs to help one another, and in the process, experience a refinement of our own spirits, souls, and minds. Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it. And in the church God has appointed first of all apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then workers of miracles, also those having gifts of healing, those able to help others, those with gifts of administration, and those speaking in different kinds of tongues. (1 Corinthians 12:27-28).
7 Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good. 8 To one there is given through the Spirit the message of wisdom, to another the message of knowledge by means of the same Spirit, 9 to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, 10 to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in different kinds of tongues, and to still another the interpretation of tongues. 11 All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, and he gives them to each one, just as he determines. (1 Corinthians 12:7-11).
This is an important point for you to consider. God did not save you simply so that you can say to others, “I’m saved.” He did not save you just so that you could fill out a church membership card. He did not save you just so that you could have the assurance that you are going to heaven one day. He saved you in order that you might live every hour of every day of the remainder of your life in faithful service and obedience to Jesus Christ. He saved you to go wherever He leads, saying and doing whatever He prompts you to say and do by the Holy Spirit, and engaging in whatever forms of ministry and service that He calls you to pursue.
Are you living your life in faithful service?
2. I Am Most Like Jesus When I Serve Others.
The foremost characteristic of the life of Christ Jesus was and is service. We are most like Him when we serve as He served. Many seem to think that a person is most like Christ Jesus when they preach like Christ Jesus preached, teach like Christ Jesus taught, and heal like Christ Jesus healed, or performs miracles like Christ Jesus performed miracles. They look only at the outward manifestation of a person’s witness and ministry.
They need to look beyond the outer manifestation to the motivation for Christ Jesus’ life. That motivation was always service. Christ Jesus preached, taught, healed, and performed miracles in order to help others, never to call attention to Himself. He poured out His very life so that others might be saved.
Time and again, Christ Jesus said to those He had healed or helped, “Don’t tell anyone what has happened.” The reason for this was that Christ Jesus didn’t want others to respond to Him as an earthly political savior. Christ Jesus didn’t want people to focus on Him, but, rather, to focus on our loving heavenly Father and on Christ Jesus’ role to serve humanity as Savior, Deliverer, and Redeemer. The thing for us to recognize is this: God has called us to serve others just as Christ Jesus served others. He didn’t save us or call us to service so that we might be exalted, praised, glorified, or put on a pedestal. He saved us so that we might serve others and in so doing, bring praise, honor, and glory to God’s holy name.
The good news is that any person who is saved can serve God and bring glory to Him. The nature of the ministry task or calling is not what is important; what is important is the motivation behind our service. God loved us so that we might love others. That’s what the Christian life is all about.
As you think about this, ask yourself these important questions:
•What do I expect from God now that I’m saved?
•On what grounds do I base that expectation?
•What do I expect from myself as a Christian?
•What does God expect from me as His faithful and obedient child?
Thanks for dropping by. I pray you are having a great day. And may our Lord and Saviour, Christ Jesus bless and keep you and yours.
Biblesurfer
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