My final paper is dealing with the subject of service and i argue that all believers should serve God and we are actually saved in order that we may serve. I show this by arguing from the bible that 1. God expects us to serve him 2. He has equipped us for service and lastly He will judge us on how we served Him.
Donald Whitney makes a very important point when he says “an 1860 San Francisco newspaper printed this ad for the pony express: “Wanted: Young, skinny, wiry fellows not over 1. Must be expert riders willing to risk daily. Orphans preferred.” [1] And then he later makes this comment “We need to be honest with the facts about the discipline of serving God. Like the Pony Express, serving God is not a job for the casually interested. It’s a costly service. He asks for life.”[2] This is a very good point to start from. If the Lord Jesus gave His life to save us from our sins it is only right that we should be willing to give all, even our very lives.
It is also important to note that service for the master is not always glamorous and glorious. It is not always before the eyes of men and it does not always receive the praise of the people. Therefore when we talk about serving God we are not talking about the self-exalting, it is not something we will naturally long to do and enjoy. Richard Foster is spot on when he says:In some ways we would prefer to hear Jesus’ call to deny father and mother, houses and land for the sake of the gospel, than his word to wash feet. Radical self-denial gives the feel of adventure. If we forsake all, we even have the chance of glorious martyrdom. But in service we are banished to the mundane, the ordinary, the trivial.[3]
This is what we are called to! And it is necessary that every believer knows and understands what they are called to, service is hard work, which requires our total surrender but is also a call to humble submission to whatever and wherever the master leads and calls us to.
Having established what service is and what it entails for our lives, we can now back up and examine each tree in the forest and really see the arguments for service. Why should service be required of the believer? One may ask. The answer is simply because God expects every believer to serve him. This is obvious from the numerous commands given in the scriptures to serve the Lord. The word “serve” or forms of it appear over 380 times in the bible! That says something. In order to drive the point home a sample of the verses will suffice. Paul eagers the believers in Rome when he says in Romans 12:11 Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord. Moses warns and exhorts the children of Israel in Deuteronomy 13:4 it is the LORD your God you must follow, and him you must revere. Keep his commands and obey him; serve him and hold fast to him. Paul challenges the believers at Galatia not to abuse their liberty but instead to use as a means of service when he says in Galatians 5:13 you, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love. The apostle Peter urges the saints to faithfully use their gifts to serve others when he says in 1 Peter 4:10 each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God's grace in its various forms. And lastly Joshua addressing the nation of Israel urges them to keep Gods commands, love Him and serve him when he says in Joshua 22:5 5 But be very careful to keep the commandment and the law that Moses the servant of the LORD gave you: to love the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, to obey his commands, to hold fast to him and to serve him with all your heart and all your soul.
It is quite clear from these verses that the Lord expects all those who follow Him to serve him with all their hearts, minds, strength and souls. A Christian who is not serving is a contradiction of terms, the essence of following to serve your master nothing more nothing less. We are expected to serve our master and also serve others.
[1] Whitney Donald. Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life, Pg 116
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