Serving God - Pastor’s Heart

Hi Folks!

As I shared in the last message, God is looking for those who will serve and worship Him. We first looked at how we can serve the Lord in a personal manner - to be there for Him, ready to love on Him and obey His every wish. But there are two other major ways that we can serve the Lord... the first being "serving in the Church", the second being "serving in the world". Today I would like to share some thoughts on how we can be serving the Lord through service to His own children - the Church.

As you can see from our scripture today, that loving people (i.e.; serving them), and in this case especially His very own children, is in turn loving the Lord. In fact if you want to have a little check to see how your love walk with the Lord is going, look and see how you are loving His children. Do you love the Church of Jesus Christ? Jesus is passionately in love with His Church, and if we are in tune with Him than we should be loving the people He loves also. Check the following scriptures out...

If you love Me, obey My commandments John 14:15 (NLT)

What is Jesus' primary commandment? …These things I command you, that you love one another John 15:17

He who has My commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves Me. And he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and manifest Myself to him.... If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him John 14:21,23

We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love the brethren... By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us, and we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren 1John 3:14a,16

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God, for God is love... Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another 1John 4:7-8,11

From these few scriptures only, it is easy to see isn't it? That our true love and service to the Lord is so much expressed in our love and service to His children, the Church of Jesus Christ. Serving in God's very own "household" is a service to the Lord Himself. I consider it a great privilege and honour to be serving God's people. These are the ones whom the Master has cleansed with His own blood and has prepared a place for them by His side for eternity. The Children of God are the apple of the Father's eye. Those that love and obey Him are ever before His face. Those that serve the Lord in the ways that He has chosen, are the ones who truly worship the Father in spirit and in truth. Remember, true service to the Lord is true worship.

Yes we can worship the Lord through music. I do and love it! But true worship to God is not singing a slow song (even though it can include that). We can be worshipping the Lord with beautiful music and song, but if we have not love... our worship is false and not from the heart. See 1Cor 13:1-3. This is one thing I feel really hurts the heart of our Father, a lack of love between His children. As we can clearly see from the Scriptures that if we truly are servants of God than we will be serving at least to some capacity in His household. We are seeing so many of God's children not getting along these days. Church splits are happening everywhere. There are many Christians who don't even like each other and are not about to try and lift a finger to serve in any capacity. Folks, this is not right! Jesus Himself has said, the greatest among you will be servant to all.

Our love for each other is to be a witness to this dying hurting world, that Jesus truly came and that He is real. The kind of love that we can express through true servitude to one another is so missing in the world at large. It is the nature of fallen man to be selfish and to always be on the lookout for Number "1" only. Notice the middle letter in sin... "i" - the big Me. My life, My family, My ministry, My vision, My goals, My dreams... My My My. If anyone gets in My way look out. You often hear this saying in the west, "you just have to look out for number 1, because if you don't who will?" This is not to be the case with the Church... we are to look out for the other fella's interest. We are to lay our lives down for each other. We are to not think of our self more highly than we ought but to think soberly, and give preference to our brother or sister.

It makes me feel happy inside when I see God's children serving each other because I know that when they are doing that, they are in fact serving the Lord. Heaven is full of people who are in love with each other and in love with their God. Everyone serves others and are happy and pleased to be doing it. We can be happy servants of the Lord here also through service to His children. The variety of ways in which we can be of service to one another is innumerable but I will mention just several here in case you have not been this way inclined in your thinking. As you will see there is something for everyone to be busy doing in the Lord's "House" as so long as you have a willing heart and mind.

Praying for one another, instead of being critical or judgemental
Ministering the life giving truths from the Word to each other
Ministry gifts of the Holy Spirit bringing health, hope and victory to His people
Encouraging each other through kind uplifting words of affirmation
Teaching and building up the Church (including children & elderly) - if you are called and gifted in this way
Ministry of helps, ie; music, drama, I.T.(important nowadays), transportation, advertising
Helping meet the needs of others through material blessings
Giving finance and substance to the work of the ministry
Acts of service to each other ie: helping around the home, helping in the workplace, helping in Church services
Arriving early to Church to help set up, staying behind afterwards to help clean up
Building the Church physical dwelling
Honouring Church eldership and leadership through serving them and obeying them joyfully
Greeting people and help making them feel welcome at fellowship meetings
Cooking for people, buying or making them clothes etc.
Cleaning the home and Church dwelling places
Praying for our Church leaders and helping them where needed
Or just plain "being available" where needed most

PS: If still unsure what to do in service to the Lord's people, ask your Pastor or group leader, as I'm sure they will find you something that you can do.

Please remember that to be great in the eyes of the Lord is not be seen necessarily by people. If what you are truly doing is as unto the Lord and not to men, then it doesn't really matter who's watching hey. We are serving our great Saviour Jesus Christ and to Him belongs all the praise honour and glory for all that He does and accomplishes through us.

Love each other with genuine affection, and take delight in honouring each other. Never be lazy, but work hard and serve the Lord enthusiastically Romans 12:10-11 (NLT)

Greek footnotes:
Vs 10 - with brotherly love
Vs 11 - but serve the Lord with a zealous spirit; or but let the Spirit excite you as you serve the Lord

David

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Serving in the Church