Part 2

Why Life’s Better as a Servant

Now I have your attention, I want to speak to you a little about this subject. Being, or having, a servants attitude has far greater connotations, In that this is a way of life. To make this point clear I’m not talking about the servants o ‘Downton Abby’. I’m talking to husbands, serve you wives, and wives serve your husbands. For you can’t be a servant of God, this without serving first.
Many of you know how long I’ve been married to Bet [23yrs for those who didn’t. Whilst doing this study I have become challenged, in as much as God said I needed to serve Betty better, “He asked me do I serve, or make me each day better servant for Betty?” I truly found myself wanting on both counts. Now after thanking God before breakfast .. for a roof over our heads .. A good bed to sleep on .. The very air we breath ..

I ask god how can I make/serve Betty in any way.
The best wife a man could pray for.
Fresh water & Food to eat...and so much much more.
Hence why I ask how can I make the day better.

Surely being a Minister/leader, you are there to serve? A ‘Minister’, is not just there for Sundays, they are not looking to just around during the and only giving sermons on Sunday, they are there t0 serve lead & comfort folk. They greatest leader of all was Christ Jesus. Always remember to inter lock together you can’t be a leader without the knowledge of how to serve, and visa versa.
Matthew 10:45 “For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve”

Its crazy to think how such a simple message does not get tough as much as it should. May be it would highlight their our short comings. When it shows clearly we need to be Servers to others just as He did . . .
Philippians 2:15 “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus”
. . . lets just pause here for a second .. “Let this mind” .. in other words to take on the same mind set as Christ Jesus, which can’t be a bad thing. Surely as Christians our attitude towards how we believe, should be one of a ‘Servant’, and sereve just as Christ came to do.
Philippians 2:6/7 “who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, 7 but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men” ..

He didn’t choose , nor look for the equality with God, instead He chose to be that of a servant. Jesus could have made His role far more powerful. For sure He had the power to do so. Instead his ..Humanity .. was ans is unparalleled, for He always shows His quality of having a modest, or low, view of His own importance. Christ, like humanity is manifest in the freedom of God’s Son to affirm the fullness of all God has placed in Him. We should be openly willing to look beyond our own interests, for the sake of others. How come is it in today’s society we think of ourselves too good to be servants, even thinking it is well below us . . .
V7 “but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant”
. . . it would be the CEO/ Owner of a major company shedding his fancy clothes, and becoming a regular ‘Joe Bloggs’, on the factory/shop/warehouse floor ..”of no reputation” .. so he saw what you did, heard what you did. Jesus, (and I’m paraphrasing here), was like ‘I don’t care what you think of me’. Unlike today we are consumed be our ‘image’, for some it’s all they can think about, ‘smile for perfect pic’ click goes the camera on their phone, from when they wake in the morning, till they close their eyes at night.

We should not let what others think about us ..”of no reputation” [V7].. How can you even contemplate being a servant, if your worried what other people think of you? The only one that should worry about is Jesus, so with humility in your heart is the only way to approach being a servant. . .
Philippians 2:8 “And being found in appearance as a man, . . . OK wait for this next part .. He humbled Himself and became obedient”
. . . so our call to humble ourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift us up. Surely humbling ourselves, opens us up to increased grace?

It’s been pointed out the major reason for NOT humbling ourselves to being a servant is the question of .. “What’s in it for me?” .. Commonly known as ..Self~centredness .. even .. Pride ..pops it’s ugly head and says ..’Woo Hoo everyone is looking at me’ .. ‘Ain’t I great for doing this1’ .. even to point opf lying to make themselves look~seem important. . .

Jesus humbled himself, even the Son of God.

Are you, also willing to humbling yourself?
Even to being more Christ like?
. . .It is time to humble yourself to what God has called you to be, are you ready? Don’t be scared as God will supply ‘ALL’ your needs, all He asks for in return is, humbled faith from us, the truth is can we do this?

John 13:12 “So when He had washed their feet, taken His garments, and sat down again, He said to them, “Do you know what I have done to you?”

As we have allowed for God to be taken out of our schools ~ Work ~ even our Courtrooms. The later meaning swearing on the bible means so little you might as well swear on a ‘cook-book’. In ?Hebrews it tells us to .. “give the more earnest heed to the things we have heard, lest we drift away” [Hebrews 2:1]. Just because we live in a technological World, there are so many distractions it takes/requires immense discipline to black them out, instead of letting Gods living World to dominate your life, and not your mobile phone ~ game boys ~ Xbox ~ Play stations etc.
[NLT]Hebrews 2:1 “So we must listen very carefully to the truth we have heard, or we may drift away from it”

Being a servant is far greater just washing feet. [John 13:15] is where Jesus explains His example .. “I have given you an example to follow” .. All Jesus wanted to do was getting His point over, in as much as Jesus example, they are to serve one another, as he had just done. Serving is so much more, much bigger than washing feet. I know I’m repeating myself here, I’m trying to get the old sticky penny to drop. What is serving I here you asking? Well .. Some of theses examples should know more than most .. Church Minister ~ Paster ~ Clergyman ~ Church Deacons ~ Ushers ~Evangelists ~ Christ Jesus our King of Kings Alpha & Omega .. Father God came to serve us, we have NO excuses to serve one another.

It is NEVER beneath us!

Prayer

Heavenly Father thank you for you living Word, in the coming week, place in our hearts humility, that we become more like yourself. With a willingness to humble ourselves to be better servants. That it profits us not, only those we are serving.

Accessing Inspired Wisdom

Proverbs 20: 27 “. .The spirit of a man is the lamp of

the Lord . .”

Luke 11 : 33/36 “. .No one, when he has lit a lamp, puts it in a secret place or under a basket, but on a lamp stand, that those who come in may see the light. The lamp of the body is the eye. Therefore, when your eye is good, your whole body also is full of light. But when your eye is bad, your body also is full of darkness. Therefore take heed that the light which is in you is not darkness. If then your whole body is full of light, having no part dark, the whole body will be full of light, as when the bright shining of a lamp gives you light. .”

When you see a blind person out, They know when the pavement (sidewalk) ends at the road, yet the for the most part live in perpetual darkness. I have always marveled at them and wondered how many of us could survive a single day in their shoes? How lucky are we that we can light a candle, or, just flip a light switch when darkness falls. Once we light the candle it shines light upon an area you are in and helps you see where to go so as that you don’t stumble thus fall over. It has the power to chase away the darkness, as the darkness can’t stand against it.

How many of you know or have sung the song, “I’m gonna lit this light of mine shine”?

Luke 11 v33 “. .No one, when he has lit a lamp, puts it

in a secret place or under a basket, but on a

lampstand, that those who come in may see the light. .”

God will use this ‘candle’ to guide us, in effect God will use our inner man to guide us. The following are some occurrences of real guides. . .

- The voice of the Holy Spirit is our conscience

- Feelings are the voices of our body

- Reasoning is the voice of our Soul

Because of being ‘born-again’ we have Gods Spirit & graces already within us. This is free for us to tap into as much as we wish, so that we can fully trust our conscience (or our Lord Jesus voice). All we have to do is . . pause . . and listen . . and there it is . . the voice of our Lord Jesus guiding us.

The next time we have a ‘hunch’ or, you a ‘gut feeling’. STOP, and listen, as Jesus is trying to lead us/help us, only a fool would ignore such clear signs. So don’t stop, thus ending up in a mess or missing out on an opportunity of a life time.

Trust in our Lord in order to begin to question us so we can receive what He has to freely . . give . . to lead us . . to instruct us. There is a parable which has found its way onto Birthday cards as a joke….

A man’s boat capsizes, a short while after he sees someone

on the beach. He starts waving franticly hoping this person

Will see him and get help, which the person dose. After which

a speedboat comes along and asks if they can save him. Only for

the man to decline, and tells them that Jesus is going to save

him, so the boat goes on leaving him behind in the water.

The Sea is getting a little cooler and more choppy as time

moves on, the guys is now calling out to his Lord God to save him. With that a large fishing vessel comes along, again they

call to the man asking if he wants to come on board? Yep

you guessed it, the man declines, again saying that his Lord

God is going to save him, so the fishing vessel leaves him

there. The Sea has now gone very cold and is rough, again he

calls out to Jesus to save him. He is getting weak now when he sees an helicopter looking for him. As they send a man down

to winch him up out of the Sea to safety the man waves

them away saying again the his Lord God is going to save him

and waves them away. With that the man drowns, and goes

up to Heaven, as he approaches the Pearly gates St Paul

is waiting for him. So he asks Paul what happened. To

which Paul says ‘you Were sent 2 boats and an helicopter

to save you, and yet you waved them away. What else was

He (Jesus) to do?

Psalm 95 v7 “. .Today, if you will hear His voice:
Do not harden your hearts. .”

(AMP)1 Kings 3 v9 “. . an understanding mind. . . and an

hearing heart. .”

What our Lord Jesus is trying to tell us is that no matter the bank balance, is that it cannot be bought by good deeds either. Though some may find what, is, needed is too difficult, for our Lord Jesus wants us to stop talking . . shut up . . be quite . . zip it . . say nothing. Simply by doing this we will find the answers to what ails us, when we take time to listen to Him, His grace will start to lead us by the Holy Spirit.

Now moving in the same direction as the Holy Spirit, we start to feel empowered to become better, with more completed questions as we’re not drowning out Gods voice. The more we soften our hearts we can have a more receptive/hearing heart. In fact we will have at last a fully working ‘hear heart’.

Before we go on I want everyone to STOP, I want you to get the hang of this . . to be linked up to . . wired together . . Hearts as one with Jesus.

#It’s time to stop whining, about what you

Don’t understand#

There are those who really don’t want to know the truth, about where they are going to end up, as there those among us, that the truth would be too much for them to fathom & accept.

John 10 v27 “. .My sheep hear My voice . .”

Hearing from our Lord Jesus is just as important as speaking to Him. So much so that once we truly know our Lord then the clearer & louder we will get to hear Him. We don’t always get to pick and choose when and where we hear from Him. You don’t need to be ready to receive when we do. But, just like a dry-sponge that soaks up the water, we do however need to act upon what He has said, for what He says is designed to pick you up and make you feel better about yourself. Or, it could be to deliver a message to someone you don’t know but who needs His words to help them. This is what I mean ‘to ready to act upon them’.

Since being saved since 1998, I can say “ I know Him “ so that it no longer surprises me in the various places He will talk to me. .

- Driving along in my car

- On the Train/Bus/Plane

- Even walking along with friends

. . All these places He has spoken to me and many more besides. Why? “. .When you hear Him, you will know Him. .”. Once you start to “. .Hear Him. .”, He can start to build you character up to with stand attacks.

It would be a miss of me not to you tell you to listen. Have you ever had something important to tell a friend on the telephone? but, was not able to because they would not just shut up. Well the same applies here, we have to remember to be quiet or, your gona miss what God has to tell us.

It has been said that to See & Hear are the most important senses we have but don’t use them properly. And so that many of you have a badly scratched record that keeps playing. .

- You aint worthy

- You’re not perfect

- Look what you did last night

. . here is a sobering thought that will help you move that scratched record on, no matter what you have done or are going to do. You will never stop God from loving you, why? because all your sins Past – Present – Future have been forgotten, washed away with love. This is due because Jesus has bought your sins and so paid the ultimate sacrifice upon the cross, something that gets forgotten by many Christians sadly.

“Jesus Never sinned, even so, he loved us

So much He owned our Sins for us.”

So many green eyed monsters like to try and put you down by saying this of Jesus love & mercies . .

· You don’t deserve to own His blessings

· How can you walk freely in His mercies

· How do I deserve to receive all the revelations He gives?

My paths cross sometimes with those who have back-slid for some reason, because they have beaten down by those who don’t them you to be happy. The worst offenders are those back-slid Christians who love to spout chapter and verse, and then twist the meaning, to make themselves feel good, or so they like to think. Some though I have found are back-slid because they never really knew Him, which is really sad. I once heard this prayer on TV, and so would like to share this in closing.

Gods Living Word

Friday, 22 July 2022