The Servant Heart

Nov 17

David Stockton
Series: A Beautiful Heart

Good morning. It’s good to be with you guys. Thanks for coming.

We have a special announcement today. We’ve been praying for a while that the Lord would give us vision and direction for Living Streams. And something that’s come up time and time again and has really landed deep in our hearts—and it’s broader than just me, it’s our whole team—we really feel like the Lord is calling us to be a “sending” church.

We’ve been trying to figure out what that means. We’ve been trying to discuss it, pray for it, prepare for it, lean in to it. We finally arrived last year, at some point, at a goal that we want to send out fifty long-term missionaries by 2025. Long term meaning about a year or so, a year or more. We believe in short-term mission trips and all the experiences that can happen, but we really felt the Lord was wanting us to be a place where we cultivate missionaries—to be a sending church in that regard.

We’ve been able to do that. On the organizational side we’ve been planning, preparing, trying to set aside budget and all of that for that. At the same time, it’s been for me to get to know people, to sit with people and for them to say, “We just have this calling or stirring in our hearts about missions.” Or, “We’ve really been thinking about this place int he world a lot. Do you know anything about that?” And I would be like, “Ha ha. I know all about that.”

No, I don’t creep people out too much. But this is Brandon and Kari Gurney. Brandon and Kari have been around Living Streams for a while, been in the internship and on staff for a while, and have served us really well. And both of them, before they were Brandon and Kari, they were just Brandon…and Kari. They both had a little stirring for missions, and it’s sort of what brought them together in some ways as well.

But they’re feeling like it’s time. So we are going to be sending them out as missionaries. Why don’t you tell us a little bit about what’s going on?

Brandon:

Like David said (I’m a little sick so forgive my voice), Kari and I are going to be launching in 2020 into Cuenca, Ecuador. That’s a place that we’ve had some connections as a church from the last few years We’re going to specifically be working with their worship department and communications, helping them develop some online ministry to reach out to the surrounding areas that are sort of inaccessible to the gospel but there’s internet still there.

We’ll also be working with some Venezuelan refugees, and a brand new college ministry that a church down in Cuenca is going to be launching. So if you want to learn a little bit more about what we’re doing, how you can support us, how you can partner with us and pray for us, check out the address that’s on the screen right now: gurneysglobal.org. And we’ll also be hanging out in the courtyard afterwards so you can learn a little more about what we’re doing and how you can pray for us too.

David:

It’s a beautiful thing and it’s a little difficult thing too; because these two are a real treasure. They’ve served us really well. I’ve gotten really close to Brandon, in particular. We’ve been able to see him do some really neat things. Kari’s been growing in that as well and been able to bring a real sweetness. So, it’s funny because I’v been praying to the Lord that we’d get to send all the junkers out, but instead we’ve been having to send out the cream of the crop. You know we’ve got the Fritz family over in Italy, serving away. And I’ve been meeting with other families. This one’s hard for me, for sure. But let’s pray for them and bless them, as they’ve served us well. We’re happy to let them go and bless them as they go serve the body of Christ in another place.

Lord Jesus, we come to you and we trust you and we know that you are sovereign over all things. We know that you have plans in this world. We know that you are preparing and building and purifying a bride for yourself, that’s called your Church. And we pray that, as these two go, that they really would be able to strengthen the church in Ecuador. Lord, that they would be able to get underneath and lift it. That they’d be able to get behind it and push what you’re already doing in those places. We pray that they would be able to spread your word, your word that restores our souls. Your word that brings life and guidance and wisdom. I pray that they would be able to do all of that, not just with their words, but also with their lives, their example, their hands and their feet and their hearts, Lord. I pray that they would be really good at giving body and blood, just like you gave to us, Jesus. That they would go there and they would wash people’s feet—both figuratively and literally. And you would just help good testimonies to come, good fruit to come, and we’d all get to rejoice together. We do pray that you’ll care for them well and bless them as they go. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Thank you, guys. Thank you, church for all the support. Thank you for giving your tithes and offerings and gifts so that we can continue to forcefully advance the kingdom, as Jesus said, and be proactive in that way. It’s really a wonderful thing.

Who’s next? Who wants to go next? Some of you sitting in here, you’re going to be going. And I’m excited bout it. And we don’t know each other but we should. I’m looking around. I don’t know who you are. But you know. You and the Lord talk it out and then let me know.

We also have baptism coming up. If you have not been baptized, as Nacho Libre would say. Jesus himself was baptized, and he’s called those who follow him to follow him through the waters of baptism. It’s not just a cute little ritual, but it’s actually a real step of faith and solidifying in your walk with the Lord. If you’re ready to follow Jesus, if you’re ready to say, “Hey, I just want to go Jesus’ way and I want to let everything else go,” that’s all you really need to know. I mean, the rest you’ll learn more about as you go. If you’re interested, sign up for that.

We’ve got a Mexico mission trip coming up.

So, we’re in a sermon series called The Beautiful Heart. It was kicked off last week. The beautiful heart is the humble heart, the servant heart, the grateful heart and the generous heart. It’s so interesting to me. We’re going to be focusing on the servant heart today. As I came in today, I got the bulletin and I knew I was teaching on the servant heart, not a lot of other people did. I think we actually advertised the wrong heart online or something, but it’s okay. We’ll live. But as I walked in, I saw that we are spotlighting one of our staff members, Arthur Le. I just thought the Lord was smiling a little bit, saying, “ha ha,” because, as I was studying all week about the servant heart, you know, looking at the heart of Christ and looking in the Scriptures, I kept thinking about, “Oh, that sounds like Arthur.” On the good side of things. It was like, “Oh, I got a story from Arthur’s life that illustrates exactly what that is.” And then I come in and it was like, servant heart, here, we’re spotlighting Arthur. So if this message doesn’t work today, to help us understand the servant heart, just go find this guy and hang out with him a little while. Bam. Done. You’re going to get it. No problem. Arthur is a total joy and he’s teaching all of us what it means to serve around here.

To get us off on the right foot, the end goal of every Christian is to become Christlike. That’s it. If you what to follow Christ, yes, you get baptized. Yes, you invite him into your life. You make confession and then you follow him. And the whole goal from that point forward is for you to become Christlike. If you ever wonder what’s supposed to be happening, what it means to have good fruit coming out of your life, it’s Christlike. That’s the goal. Whether you’re Kanye or anybody else, the goal is to be Christlike.

It doesn’t matter where you start. It doesn’t matter how un-Christlike you might be, when you follow Jesus, he leads you into a place where you are becoming more like him, more into the image of Christ, more Christlike. That’s the goal.

The name “Christian” actually means little Christ. So what does it mean to be Christlike? This sermon series is all about that. We’re calling it the Beautiful Heart. Jesus had the beautiful heart. And it’s our attempt to answer that question.

We look at the heart of Christ, which is so beautiful. Some would say the heart of Christ is so beautiful it’s irresistible. Oh, how amazing and perplexing it would have been to spend a day with Jesus as he walked among us. To see. To hear. To feel the heart of Jesus expressed in humanity. I mean, you probably would have been, like, “Wow. This is incredible.” And, “Whoa, this is so weird.” Because it was probably so foreign to experience a heart like that.

But I believe Jesus’ heart is summed up well by something I picked up by familymatters.net. It’s actually grace based parenting. It’s this organization that’s trying to help parents parent better. One of the things they do is they say that you should teach your kids what true greatness is. The world is teaching them that to be wealthy, to be powerful, to be popular, those are the things that are really going to be great in life. But we should teach our kids what true greatness is. True greatness is a humble heart, a servant heart, a grateful heart, a generous heart. That’s what’s truly beautiful. I agree with that.

I’m just furthering it to say that I think this is what sums up the heart of Christ and what it means to be Christlike. So we’re unpacking that together.

They said:

A humble heart is a reverence for God and a respect for others.
A servant heart is a willingness to take action in order to help someone else. [Whether they like you or not, or are like you or not.]
A grateful heart is an appreciation for what you have and an acknowledgement of Who has given it.
A generous heart is a great delight in sharing with others what God has entrusted to you.
—familymatters.net

I like how Nathan Bentley highlighted the word “meekness” in his kickoff of the Humble Heart. I think that is a really great word. Strength under control. Powerful and gentle. Jesus himself described his heart this way. It’s always a real positive thing when you can build a sermon series and you can actually have Jesus saying, “Hey, if you want to know what my heart is like, I’ll tell you what my heart is like.”

We have a verse where Jesus actually describes his heart. He says, “To all who are weary and carrying a heavy load…” Anybody? Weary? Carrying a heavy load? Whether it’s your own or somebody else’s? No one? That’s amazing! Liars!

He said, “If you’re in that spot, come to me and I’ll give you pep talk.” Nope.

“Come to me and I’ll give you some construction criticism and help you with your problem solving.” Nope.

He says, “Come to me and I will give you rest.”

What an awesome song that came out of our worship team’s heart as they wrote that. Just resting in him. Resting in him. That’s really what we’re supposed to do. We’re supposed to abide, remain in Christ. And that alone will cause us to bear much fruit.

He says to link arms with him and learn from him, for he is gentle and humble in heart. Our God, when he described his own heart, he says it’s gentle and humble. And that’s just not what we celebrate. I mean, every song out there is talking about, “Look how cool I am. I’m so bad. I’m so awesome.” You watch these football players. They make about fourteen bad plays in a row, but they block one pass and they’re dancing all over the guy like they’re something so special. We’re like, “Whoa, that’s so cool. Look at their celebration.”

Yet, Jesus describes his heart as gentle and humble. He was not harsh or severe. He was not condescending or provoking. He was not disappointed or crotchety. He wasn’t in a hurry and he was not easily offended. Just like Americans. Just like me as a parent. No. The humble heart of God.

What’s so amazing about the humble heart of God is the humble heart of God is also in connection with the omnipotence of God. So powerful. Creator of all. And yet humble in heart.

When I first started worshiping Jesus with singing—it might sound weird, I mean, I went to church for a long time and never song—but at one point I was awakening to a relationship with Jesus, and I wanted to bless his heart and do things that I thought would please him—and one of the things I read in the Scriptures and I saw other people doing was singing. So I thought, “Eh, what the heck. Let’s give that a shot.” Usually, luckily at our church, it’s loud enough that nobody can hear you. But I just started singing a little bit. There was one song in particular that the lyrics were simple. It said, “O God, awesome in power, O God, gentle in love.” Those two lyrics together of awesome in power and gentle in love, it just endeared my heart to this God that I was beginning to learn about and know. How could someone be so awesome in power and yet gentle in love. Because every person I’ve known that gets power, their heart doesn’t go that way. It goes the other way, with power corrupting.

Yet God, who had all power, was expressing his power in gentleness and love and humility. And the more I got to know Christ, both studying his life, and then experiencing a relationship with him, it just got further and further in that same way. The humble heart of God is so beautiful.

Isaiah 40. I love the way a prophet who was kind of getting a picture, a word from God about this Messiah that was to come later on—the way he describes this God is:

10
See, the Sovereign Lord comes with power,
and he rules with a mighty arm.
See, his reward is with him,
and his recompense accompanies him.

And with all that power, and that mighty arm that he has…

11
He tends his flock like a shepherd:
He gathers the lambs in his arms
and carries them close to his heart;
he gently leads those that have young.

I love the way they describe the Messiah. So different from any other Savior that you could imagine.

In another place it describes Jesus as one who “a bruised reed he will never break and a smoldering wick he will never put out,”

Jesus, as he walked full of all that omnipotence that created the cosmos, he walked among us like a lamb with gentleness and humility. He didn’t break anybody. He didn’t hurt anyone. His humble heart was so beautiful.

So what does it look like to have a servant heart. I think the humble heart, once you cultivate the humble heart, it is expressed in the servant heart. Just like when you cultivate a grateful heart it is expressed easier in generosity. So the humble heart leads to the servant heart.

I came up with three points because it’s a good teaching tool, and I forget to do it all the time. But I remembered it this time.

A servant heart is selfless in its motives.
A servant heart is secure in its service.
A servant heart is sincere in love.

We’re going to unpack each one of those as we go. But before we do, I don’t want you to miss this. And I’m going to come back to this at the end because it’s that important. We are upholding these virtues. We’re trying to get a picture of the heart of Christ. As we look at it, we see it as beautiful. We see it as amazing. We see it as what the world needs today. We see it as so different from everything we see. Ultimately, if we’re honest, we see it as something different than our own heart. And we can start to feel a little bummed. Or challenged.

And the question comes, “Well, how can my heart, that is so worldly, that is so selfish, that is so unlike Christ, how can this old heart, this young heart, this hurt heart, whatever it might be, how can it form and change into a heart that is more Christlike?”

And the Bible is very clear on this. And I want to be very clear on this. The only way to become more Christlike is to be with Christ. You’ve got to spend time with Jesus. There are a lot of gurus out there that will tell you a lot of different things. Do some weird stretching. Climb mountains. Stare at your belly button. Whatever it is. You’ll get more in tune with yourself. No doubt about it. And it is good to get in tune with your own soul. But it is not going to form you into the image of Christ. There is only One who knows the image of Christ, and that is the Spirit of Christ. And when we are in the presence of Christ by his Spirit, we are formed. He rubs off on us. We are changed into his image when we are in the glory of the Lord.

And the trick is, you have to do it daily and you’ve got to do it for decades. Being a Christian is not just, “Hey, say a prayer and we’re good. We’ll check in every year or so, Christmas and Easter.” You’re going to have a very un-Christlike heart if that’s what you’re doing. You might be great at church, but you’re not going to be like Christ. It’s a scary thing to be good at church and not like Christ. It’s a daily spending of time in the presence of God, of Christ. And it takes decades. So that’s the challenge to us.

A servant heart is selfless in its motives. Let’s turn to 2 Samuel 17. We’re going Old Testament. We’re going to get another Old Testament character because so often these Old Testament pictures give us such a clear vision of what Christ is trying to teach us in the New Testament In 2 Samuel 17, we’re introduced to a few guys, and I want to highlight on in particular: Barzillai

27 When David [the king] came to Mahanaim, Shobi son of Nahash from Rabbah of the Ammonites, and Makir son of Ammiel from Lo Debar…

Anybody? Lo Debar ringing a bell? Anybody? Yeah? A couple of weeks ago. Mephibosheth. Lo Debar? Yeah. This is the same guy that took care of Mephiboseth before David called him to his courts.

…and Barzillai the Gileadite from Rogelim 28 brought bedding and bowls and articles of pottery. They also brought wheat and barley, flour and roasted grain, beans and lentils, 29 honey and curds, sheep, and cheese from cows’ milk for David and his people to eat. For they said, “The people have become exhausted and hungry and thirsty in the wilderness.”

So we have this picture. An introduction. One of these four characters in particular, Barzillai, because the Bible highlights him in the next couple of chapters. All we know is that David is in a place where, for whatever reason, he and all the people that are with him are exhausted, tired and weary. And these guys, including Barzillai, get together some supplies and they give to the refreshment of David and his men.

What is happening is David and the people are outside of Israel, across the Jordan river in Lo Debar area, which is without pasture. It’s the wilderness. It’s the desolate place. It’s like Arizona. Just kidding. It’s the desert. It’s way out there. And they were fleeing because David’s son Absalom, who all we really know about was that he was bitter because his father didn’t really deal with his family well. He had some daddy wounds. And he had really long hair. That’s all we know. And yet, he had basically cultivated a coup to overthrow David. He wanted to kill David. He wanted to overthrow David. He did some horrific things to David’s family.

David had to flee. And the people he could gather had to flee for their lives. Because Absalom had gathered all these men, and David, at the time, wasn’t willing to fight his own son whom he loved. So David had fled and had been run out of town. And people had been mocking him. People had been laughing at him. People had been saying, “See, this is what you get for the horrors that you’ve done.”

And so David is out there, feeling shame, feeling betrayed, feeling hurt. And literally had no time to get supplies for the journey. They had been running for their lives so they’re exhausted. And there were these men that came around, men that David had probably interacted with when he was younger and was running for his life from Saul. But they come around. They hear the king is in need and they come around and give aid to him and the people. And Barzillai in particular is mentioned because what happens is, they care for David and then, at some point, however long that period was, there was a war between David’s men and Absalom, as Absalom is pursuing David. And Absalom’s hair gets caught in a tree and he’s kind of hanging there. He gets killed and his men get overthrown. So David is now able to come back to Jerusalem and set up as king again.

As he’s coming back, it says in 2 Samuel 19:

31 Barzillai the Gileadite also came down from Rogelim to cross the Jordan with the king and to send him on his way from there.

So, for whatever reason, those other ones aren’t there anymore. And this is what I love about the servant heart. The servant heart is a thorough heart. All these guys came and basically said, “Here, we’ll help you out in this moment.” But it seems like the other guys went home. I don’t know that, but I do know that Barzillai stayed with David. He didn’t just give him a handout and then leave. He stuck with him. He cared for him. He made sure things were okay.

And even when David was going back, he said, “All right. Well, I’m going to go on part of the journey with you, across the Jordan. And then I’m going to send you on your way.” It’s like, “You came to my house and I’m going to walk you out to your car.” He was thorough in his service, this Barzillai.

32 Now Barzillai was very old, eighty years of age. He had provided for the king during his stay in Mahanaim, for he was a very wealthy man. 33 The king said to Barzillai, “Cross over with me and stay with me in Jerusalem, and I will provide for you.”
34 But Barzillai answered the king,

And this is pretty funny. First service was laughing a lot. See what kind of age we’re dealing with here.

“How many more years will I live, that I should go up to Jerusalem with the king? 35 I am now eighty years old. Can I tell the difference between what is enjoyable and what is not? Can your servant taste what he eats and drinks? Can I still hear the voices of male and female singers? Why should your servant be an added burden to my lord the king? 36 Your servant will cross over the Jordan with the king for a short distance, but why should the king reward me in this way? 37 Let your servant return, that I may die in my own town near the tomb of my father and mother.

So, here’s Barzillai, who’s basically like, taking care. He’s got a willing heart. He’s got a thorough heart. He’s selfless in his motives, because, here the king is basically saying, “Hey, I need people like you with me. You can sit at my table. You can live in the palace. We’ll take good care of you. You can be someone of esteem instead of being a person that lives out here in Lo Debar, that we all make fun of because it’s like Gila Bend.” (Sorry if you’re born in Gila Bend. )

And Barzillai looks at the king and says, “King, look, I’m good. I’m grateful. I didn’t do this to try and get in good with you. I didn’t do this to try and climb some sort of ladder. I know where I’m supposed to serve, king. I know what God has called me to do and it’s beautiful, even if you can’t see that, king. And he tells the king, “This is what I’m going to do. I’m going to take care of you, and I’m going to get you across that Jordan River. And I’m going to send you on your way with you need to get home, and I’m going to get back to the serving that I know I’m supposed to do. And if it’s small in your eyes, so be it.”

I just love the way Barzillai reacts here. On the other hand, he also says, “Why in the world would you try and reward me for something like this? This is what I do. This is who I am. It gives me pleasure to serve you. And ultimately, king, I’m not serving you to serve you. I’m serving you because I serve God. So why would you try and reward me for something that is a joy for me to do?”

That is a servant heart right there, you guys. We found it. That’s the servant heart. That is so un-American. We’re trying to climb every ladder. All of our giving has strings attached. And here’s this Barzillai, who knows what it means to serve. And he has to put the king back in his place and say, “King, what I’m doing is beautiful. What I’m doing is service. And it’s meaningful. And besides, you city boys, I don’t understand all that singing and dancing that you do.”

I love his attitude in all of this. It reminds me, honestly, my grandfather was a Colonel in the air force, my wife’s grandpa was in the army, career. Those guys just got it. They understood service. You would thank them for their service and they would just try and stop you. Because they didn’t do it so that someday they could tell the stories and be praised. They did it because they had a servant heart. This is what I see in Barzillai. He was someone who served with selfless motives.

The second thing: A servant is someone who is secure in their service. John 13 is another passage. It teaches us about how to serve out of security:

13 It was just before the Passover Festival. Jesus knew that the hour had come for him to leave this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.

Thorough in his service, as well.

2 The evening meal was in progress, and the devil had already prompted Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot, to betray Jesus. 3 Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God; 4 so he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist….and began to wash his disciples’ feet…

In John 13, John is basically recounting this story that is not in the other three gospels. Matthew, Mark and Luke were all written between 60 and 70 a.d. by those guys. John didn’t write until about another twenty or thirty years later. John was one of the people that was actually there, that got his feet washed. John is writing at the end, saying, “Hey, there are a few more stories that need to be told. And there’s a little bit of a spin I want to put on the stories of what I remember of Jesus.”

He really emphasizes the deity of Christ. So he has these basic elements of the story, and he inserts things like, “Jesus knew that it was time for him to leave the world and go to the Father. Jesus knew that he had come from God and was going to God. So whatever John is writing here, he’s recounting that moment where he’s sitting at the Last Supper with Jesus. He can feel the intensity of whatever is going on in Jesus’ heart. It doesn’t sound like they were too clued in on what was going on with Judas, but it was all happening.

John is writing the story about this moment where Jesus got up from the table, —and whether all of them kind of looked at Jesus when he did that, or if just John noticed that Jesus was doing something different—he’s remembering the look in Jesus’ eyes. He’s remembering the emotion that seemed to be expressed in Jesus’ heart and the pace at which Jesus moved through these steps. And John recounts everyone. It’s almost as if slow-motion was happening.

And John says, “Jesus, knowing that it was time for him to leave the world, knowing that the cross, the betrayal, the pain, the agony, the real test was coming, and knowing that he had come from God and was going to God, knowing that the Father had put all power in his hands to do whatever he wanted, he chose to get up, to grab a towel, and to wash these guys’ feet.”

That’s what he did with his power. That’s what he did in his most important moment. And there was something about what John was saying. Jesus had this understanding, this perspective. He knew he had come from God, he knew he was going. There was a security that Jesus had which enabled him to serve in a way that was so meaningful that John wrote about it years later, after living a life of service. And still today, all over the world, people are washing each others’ feet to show love and service to one another.

Down in Belize, just a few weeks ago, when we were with all the men at the retreat. There were over 60 guys, I felt like the Lord was saying, “Hey, let’s do some foot washing.”

And I was like, “Oh, this is going to be weird. They’re going to be like, ‘What? I’m not toughing that guy’s feet. Ugh.’”

But I said, “All right, guys. We’re going to do a foot washing.”

They were kind of like, “What?!”

Some of them knew, they had heard stories. Some of them hadn’t. So I tried to lighten the mood a little bit by saying, “Okay, now, we’re going to wash each other’s feet. And just because it’s going to feel a little weird, it’s not supposed to. When you hold a guy’s foot and you’re washing it, just don’t look them in the eyes, okay?”

They liked that a lot.

“And then there’s like a twenty second limit per foot. So, as you’re washing it, just don’t look them in the eyes and then make sure you don’t go over 20 seconds. Then switch to the other foot. Twenty seconds and it’s done.”

I was trying to ease it up a bit. It was a beautiful thing to see all of these guys that have a lot of father wounds, that have been hurt by a lot of their male relationships. It’s a tough, dog-eat-dog society and culture. And here they were, washing each other’s feet.

It’s all coming back to this moment where Jesus, out of his security, was able to debase himself, was able to say, “I don’t care what everybody thinks about me. I’m going to serve, because I’m so locked in with the way my Father in heaven feels about me.”

And how do you get that security? Well, same thing. You’ve got to be with Jesus. Jesus knowing where he had come from, knowing he was returning to God, and that’s what we need to do. We need to root ourselves in that security if we want to serve well.

And then last: A servant heart is sincere in its love. Really, there’s no better description of the servant heart, I think, than what happens in 1 Corinthians 13, when it is describing what love is.

Dallas Willard—we’re going to get a bunch of Dallas Willard next year as we try and grow in our understanding of who God is and what he wants—he says that love is to will the good of another. That’s the way he describes it. Basically that’s what love is. It’s not a feeling. It’s not something you can get. True love is when you are willing the good of another. That is what love is all about.

1 Corinthians, you guys know it:

I’m going to say it. Love is patient. Love is kind..I’m going to go through this thing, but a servant heart is these very same things.

4 [A servant heart] is patient, [a servant heart] is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.

I really think that’s a key. You know you have a servant heart when someone is treating you like a servant and it doesn’t bother you. It’s never happened in my life. No! When someone treats you like a servant, like, “Go get that for me!” And you’re like, “What did you say?” Again, it’s coming from a place of security. It’s not that you should just allow jerks to run over you and take advantage of you all the time. No, it’s when God’s calling you to love and serve someone, if they treat you like that, you say, “Okay. No problem. I’ll continue to serve you until you start to understand. Until you start to feel what patience and kindness really feels like. Until your heart can be softened by the love and service that I’m offering you. Just like my heart was softened by the love and service of Jesus to me.” So that’s what a servant heart looks like.

So how do we become more selfless? We spend time with the One who gave it all, who called himself the servant of all. How do we become more secure? We spend time with the One who is eternal, immoveable, unchanging, who is called the Rock of Ages.

How do we become more sincere in our love? We spend time with the One who is described as love and the Author of love.

How do we become more humble, helpful, grateful, and generous like Jesus? We spend time with Jesus. Daily and for decades. Daily and for decades. There is no quick and easy fix. It’s every day and it’s every day.

Let’s prepare our hearts for communion as we close—spend a little time with Jesus, allowing him to maybe highlight some things in your life where you’re doing well with this. Just allow him to search your heart and commend you for the things you’re doing well. But then, also, to bring to mind the things that maybe you’re not doing well in. You can spend that time confessing both your sin and mistakes, as well as confessing your forgiveness and wholeness.

We’ll all take this together in the end, but just hold on to the body and blood of Christ and spend a little time talking to Jesus.

Paul writes this to the Philippian church (Philippians 2):

5 In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:
6 Who, being in very nature[a] God,
    did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
7 rather, he made himself nothing
    by taking the very nature[b] of a servant,
    being made in human likeness.
8 And being found in appearance as a man,
    he humbled himself
    by becoming obedient to death—
        even death on a cross!

And Jesus, we do pause right here, as the world is spinning, as our to-do list is clamoring for our attention, we choose to pause everything, Lord, and to look into your face, and to see into your eyes and into your heart, and to say, “Thank you” for your body that was broken so that we could be made whole. Please fill us with your humility.

Let’s take the bread.

And Jesus, we thank you for your blood that flowed to wash away all of our selfishness. Please do that once again.

Let’s take the cup.

Will you guys stand with me as we close in a chorus and have a little time of prayer up front? If you need prayer for anything, we’d love to partner with you and go before the Lord. This is a lot of information. I’m excited that we have a little curriculum that’s going to be going out to all the Life Groups. You can unpack it a little bit more.

If you don’t belong to a Life Group, we’re going to be launching some new ones in February so you can plugged in. This is more important than enneagram, or Myers Briggs or your PDP report. Whatever you are will be expressed in the most beautiful way if you can get this stuff right. You won’t even have to worry about it.

Let’s just spend time putting the Lord on the highest place in our hearts.

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

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