CHAPTER 4

THE CREATURE SERVES

A Christian man is the most free lord of all, and subject to none; a Christian man is the most dutiful servant of all, and subject to every one.

~ Martin Luther1

When the World Trade Center crumbled to the ground on that dreadful day of September 11, 2001, more than three thousand people died. But a few of those who were buried beneath the rubble miraculously survived the toppling of the towers. Two of these individuals were Will Jimeno and John McLoughlin, a pair of Port Authority employees who responded to the attacks and were on the bottom floor when the south tower began to fall. They raced to an elevator shaft and amazingly survived the one-hundred-story collapse around them, but were buried dozens of feet down in the midst of an array of rubble. Trapped without water, breathing smoke-filled air, both Will and John had little hope of survival.

Yet as they lay there, pinned under a mountain of debris, something was stirring inside an accountant in Connecticut they had never met.

Dave Karnes, who had spent twenty-three years active duty in the Marine Corps, was watching the scene play out on television just like the rest of us. But more than allowing it merely to trouble him, he decided to do something about it. He went to his boss and told him he wouldn’t be back for a while.

Dave went to a barber shop, asked for a high-and-tight haircut, then stopped by his home to put on his military fatigues, hoping the uniform would allow him access into the blocked-off area surrounding Ground Zero. He drove to Manhattan at speeds of 120 miles an hour and arrived by late afternoon. While rescue workers were being called off the wreckage pile because of danger, Dave was able to stay because of the clout and credential that came with his military uniform. Finding another Marine nearby, the two men walked the pile together, seeking to save the lost.

After an hour of searching, they heard the faint sound of tapping pipes and yelling. Will and John had been trapped for nine hours by that time, completely incapable of working themselves free. Yet in the midst of all the rubble, a Marine who earlier in the morning had been working a spreadsheet in Connecticut found them. Of the twenty people pulled from the heaped-up remains of the World Trade Center, Will Jimeno and John McLoughlin were numbers eighteen and nineteen. And all because Dave Karnes took off his suit, put on rescue fatigues, and stepped into the despair and darkness of Ground Zero.

In the same way (but to an infinitely greater degree), God took off His royal robes, stepped into our dark and depraved culture, and served us. We were buried in the depths and rubble of our own foolishness with zero chance of pulling ourselves out of our own sin. We were without hope until the Holy One clothed Himself in humanity to rescue us, to become sin for us on the cross:

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Phil. 2:5–11 ESV)

Our service must be grounded in this truth, in this gospel. The foundation of our service is built upon Christ’s birth, life, death, and resurrection for us. It begins and ends with Jesus—begins there because He is our original motivation and ends there because only in Him are we empowered to serve others.

Foundation for Service

The essence of Christian faith is not that we serve Christ but that He served us. In Matthew 20, the mother of James and John came to Jesus, requesting that her sons be allowed to sit at His side in the kingdom—one on His right, the other on His left. So Jesus turned and asked a question of them: “Are you willing to do what it takes to do that?” Both of them readily, rashly took up the challenge: “You know it!” Then Jesus said, “Oh, you’re going to pay the price, all right. But that honor is not Mine to give.”

At this point, the other disciples become indignant toward these other two. We would probably have been indignant too, right? “Why is your mom here, bro? You’re a grown man.” In reality, they were indignant not because James and John asked their mommy to request power and authority, but because they hadn’d taken the chance to ask the favor for themselves.

So Jesus responded by telling them to huddle up:

“You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave, even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Matt. 20:25–28 ESV)

Jesus was doing much more than simply giving out a moral command as a philosopher or a teacher offering a better way to live. He was giving the disciples the essence of the gospel: the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve, to give His life as a ransom for many. Jesus was saying, “I am here to serve you through My death.”

Jesus doesn’t need anything. He is self-sufficient. He doesn’t need advice, doesn’t need gas money, doesn’t need your help paying His bills, fixing His house, or making a difficult decision. Yet this all-sufficient, all-knowing, completely holy God stepped out of heaven to serve us through His atoning, sacrificial death.

Jesus was saying that His followers are to serve others not because it’s the right thing to do, not because we’d feel guilty if we didn’t, not because somebody else suggested it, and not because “causes” are the vogue thing of the day. We serve because Jesus has served us. His service should melt our hearts and cause us to serve others out of sheer gratitude to Him. That’s the appropriate response to His loving service of us.

Churches centered on Jesus continually remind their people of this.

As humans, we struggle deeply with receiving unconditional love. We want to know why someone loves us and what we’ve done to deserve it. Unconditional love frustrates our desire to earn and accomplish. It challenges our pride. Sure, we like being loved, but we also like knowing we’ve proved ourselves worthy of it.

When your girlfriend in tenth grade told you she loved you, you wanted to know why. Was it the cool rims on your truck? The nice way you treated her? Or was it just your overall awesomeness that made her feel so strongly toward you? You had to know what it was so you could continue to do it or be it. If your father told you he was proud of you, you wanted to know what you’d done to earn his favor.

If we’re not careful, serving can become a way we try to earn the love we’ve already received from God, to “pay Jesus back” for His generous grace. While churches preaching the grace of God would never suggest that serving or volunteering contributes anything to a person’s salvation, a subtle tendency among us leads us to believe that serving is a way to stay “in good” with God. Therefore, unless serving is continually and unapologetically connected to the gospel, it can become a burden, a manipulator, a guilt reliever, or a backhanded method we employ to just keep serving ourselves.

The Burden of Earning

As the movie Saving Private Ryan reaches its climax, some of us preachers sit on the edge of our seats looking for an epic illustration. The film seems to be leading to a great comparison of Christ’s sacrifice for us. Private Ryan (Matt Damon) has been pursued just as Christ pursues us and has been saved from death just as Christ saves us. The leader of the rescue mission, Captain John Miller (Tom Hanks), is sacrificing his life for Private Ryan. The moment is hanging right there. Wait for it . . .

But then as Miller gasps for his last few breaths, he grabs Ryan’s hand and says these final words: “Earn this. Earn it.” I just gave everything for you; now spend the rest of your life earning this moment.

We sit back in our chairs disappointed, because that one line radically ruins a great illustration. Even in the movie, these words seem to have haunted Private Ryan for the rest of his life. The movie ends by showing him as an elderly man, standing among the tombs of the men who gave their lives for him. And he is hoping he “earned it.” Evidently he spent his entire life under the burden of trying to repay the sacrifice that was given for him.

Serving as an attempt to pay God back for His grace is futile—not only because our best efforts would prove woefully inadequate in paying Him back), but because there is nothing to pay back. The gospel reminds us that the debt of our sin has already been paid in full. Acts of service, then, must not be unintentionally advertised as a means of restitution for what Christ has done. Believers who live with that burden will serve out of obligation as they drift from the grace of God. Churches who place that burden on believers are peddling a new law that enslaves.

Because of the gospel, we serve because our hearts are overwhelmed with gratitude. Because of the gospel, believers can serve in freedom and joy. If a lack of serving pervades a church culture, the answer is not to crank up the guilt and arm-twisting but rather to instill a new, intense focus and awareness on the gospel.

Motivation for Service

The gospel is not only the foundation for our service; it also radically purifies our motivation for service. In fact, serving others for reasons other than the gospel actually doesn’t make a lot of sense because of the philosophical contradictions beneath the surface.

Take, for example, the predominant worldview of Western culture today—the worldview of evolutionary process. In this thinking, the innate strengths and weaknesses of mankind best dictate what or who survives. So anytime help is extended to someone who is weak, this attacks the premise behind what is naturally best for mankind. Anytime a weak child or helpless person is served, the evolutionary worldview would maintain that humanity is assaulted because the weak are given an illogical, unnatural opportunity for extended survival. If it is really best for the weak to die so the shallow end of the gene pool can be cleared away, as evolutionary theory asserts, then serving others is hypocritical.

The human heart is immensely complex and deceitful. Therefore, a plethora of other motivations can claim to motivate our desire for service. In an altruistic society like ours that values volunteerism, for example, people (even believers) serve others for all kinds of reasons void of gospel motivation.

Some of us are motivated to serve because we value compassion. We see the terrible struggle someone else is facing, and it moves us emotionally. We imagine how life would be if we were in the same situation, so we do something out of sympathy, out of empathy. This sounds good at first. After all, Jesus once saw the harassed and helpless crowds and was moved by them (Matt. 9:36).

It is true that compassion often serves as a great starting point for service, but unless compassion is connected with something deeper, it is unsustainable. Because of our sinfulness, causes that appeal to compassion lose their impact as our senses are slowly numbed to the pain around us. Do you remember the first time you saw the commercial with the starving children? Do you still respond with the same sinking feeling in your gut? Compassion that’s only connected to human emotion quickly wanes in impact. Only compassion firmly connected to the gospel is sustainable.

Compassion linked to the gospel is compassion that goes beyond merely observing hurting people; it sees hurting people and realizes that Jesus loves them furiously. Ultimately, then, it’s not our compassion but the compassion of Jesus that fuels and sustains our desire to act on others’ behalf. When we remember how gracious and compassionate Christ has been to us, our compassion is as sustainable as our remembrance of the gospel. Without Him, compassion will slowly but surely devolve into a weepy moment that we forget as soon as the commercial ends or someone breaks the mood with a funny joke.

Some are motivated to serve because of guilt. Many people feel guilty for their over-indulgent lifestyles, so to alleviate the guilt . . . they serve. She thinks, “Buying seven Coach purses is fine as long as I donate my old ones to the homeless shelter downtown.” Dropping some clothes in the donation bag numbs a person’s self-awareness of his or her materialism.

Sadly, many church leaders unintentionally use guilt as a quick and easy motivator to recruit volunteers “into ministry.”

• “Serve one hour a week, and you’ll go home feeling awesome.”

• “Feeling empty? Well, just help once a month in the preschool area.”

• “You’ve lived for ‘you’ all week; live just this one hour for our students.”

Guilt-driven serving is the antithesis of Jesus-driven serving, because alleviating guilt is ultimately about the person serving rather than the person being served. The person who serves to remove the guilt surrounding his selfish lifestyle is really serving himself.

Guilt-driven serving is also found when someone feels guilty for an action and wants to “make it up to God” through “doing stuff for Him.” Gospel motivation is sabotaged when we feel like we’re doing God a favor when we serve. The gospel destroys guilt-laden service. The truth of the gospel is that we are not guilty, that all condemnation against us has permanently ceased in Christ.

Others serve out of sheer force. When we were growing up, we didn’t have to perform a certain number of “community service hours” in order to graduate. In many of today’s schools, however, students are required to “volunteer” for class credit. In some churches, youth pastors require students to complete a specific number of serving hours, like a judge passing out community service sentences to those charged with a DUI.

Have you ever called a customer service hotline just furious? Consider the poor guy who answers the phone. He has done nothing to you. He is not responsible for what was or was not in the box. He is simply operating under the policies that were set for him by someone higher up on the organizational food chain.

You chew him out about how he ruined your kid’s birthday party, and he’s making around $8 an hour to listen to you scream at him. He says things like, “Well, that cable can be purchased at our online store,” which makes you angrier because you already bought the product. He’s getting destroyed by you, and yet he continues to calmly serve you. Because it’s his job.

But what’s he really thinking? Do you think he’s wishing you a Merry Christmas? Do you think his motivation is empathy? “Oh, this poor guy. I’m hearing your story about not being able to pitch the game onto your massive theater wall so your buddies can watch it. I’m tearing up. I’m misty-eyed.” Do you think he is motivated by compassion? Do you think he feels guilty that you are not happy? No, he’s being forced. He’s serving others because he’s being forced to serve others.

But when he clocks out, he will not serve you with patience. When he clocks out, he will not wonder how he can help you. Forceful service is very temporary. It melts neither the heart of the person serving nor the person being served.

The gospel crushes force-driven service, reminding us that Christ wants our hearts when we serve, not merely our physical presence. He wants us to delight in Him as we join Him in serving those around us.

Sometimes we serve others out of pride. It’s a way to elevate ourselves above others who prove their selfishness by sitting on the couch. Prideful service is never private service; it’s always public service. Prideful service always results in the serving person feeling the need to give a testimony about their experience—to prove how “humble” they’ve been. When service is based on flighty compassion, guilt, force, or pride, God doesn’t react too kindly. When Israel, the covenant community of faith, was presenting sacrifices to God with hearts far from Him, God rebuked them:

Hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom! Give ear to the teaching of our God, you people of Gomorrah! “What to me is the multitude of your sacrifices? says the Lord; I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fat of well-fed beasts; I do not delight in the blood of bulls, or of lambs, or of goats. When you come to appear before me, who has required of you this trampling of my courts? Bring no more vain offerings; incense is an abomination to me. New moon and Sabbath and the calling of convocations—I cannot endure iniquity and solemn assembly.” (Isa. 1:10–13 ESV)

God was saying, “Do you really think I need bulls from you? Do you think this thing is about bulls and goats? If you need to feed Me, we’re in trouble here, aren’t we? If I need you to serve Me, then how would I ever be capable of serving you?” Service as an attempt to earn God’s favor is not only futile, it is repulsive to Him.

In the New Testament, Jesus similarly and aggressively targeted the heart. In the Sermon on the Mount, He said, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery’” (Matt. 5:27 ESV). One may reason that adultery is an act, right? It’s not an idea; it’s an act. “But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (v. 28 ESV).

Jesus was saying, “If you’re not committing adultery because of some sort of white-knuckled ‘I know it’s not right so I shouldn’t do it,’ then you’re not free. I have come to set you free from this. I have come to transform your heart so your actions are transformed, not because of self-will but because of a new spirit.”

He said the same thing about our temper: “You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder’” (Matt. 5:21 ESV). Now murder is an act. It’s not just an idea; it’s an act, right. “But I say to you,” says Jesus, “that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment” (v. 22 ESV). Do you see that Jesus and the Father are very interested in the motives that drive our actions? You can do the right thing with the wrong motive, and God will always call it sin.

But here is the truly remarkable thing: the gospel doesn’t just push us outward to serve; it even makes up for what we lack in that very act of service. How many times have you done something for someone else, thinking your motives were pure, only to realize later they were far from it? The really amazing news is that this is yet another situation for you to remember what God has done for you in Christ. God can still use what you did for His honor, all the while forgiving you for your selfish motives and using the realization of your true motives to conform you more and more to the image of Jesus.

Example and Highest End

Jesus is the beginning of service, the foundation and motivation of service, and yet He is also the end of our service—because He is both the example for serving and our highest purpose for serving.

Jesus is the most noble of all pursuits, the highest end imaginable. Serving for the sake of service is not the highest end. We must be careful not to teach people that the ultimate goal of Christianity is serving. Jesus is the ultimate goal, the highest end. Our serving must ultimately be grounded in Him, and for Him, our hearts deeply tuned toward Him. He is the example and equipper of gospel-centered service. We are incapable of serving for the right reasons, incapable of making any impact on others or on our culture without Him, without His power.

If you want to see Jesus-centered service in action, look to Jesus, who gave an unforgettable picture of authentic service to His disciples just before His death.

In John 13, we pick up on the story:

Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going back to God, rose from supper. He laid aside his outer garments, and taking a towel, tied it around his waist. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was wrapped around him. (vv. 3–5 ESV)

Think of how nasty our feet are today. Now multiply that grossness by about a billion, and you’re still not totally feeling the weight of this moment between Jesus and His disciples. No act was more demeaning in the first century than the wiping of a man’s feet. Dirty. Smelly. We’ll stop with the adjectives, but you know where we’re going. And yet Christ, the Son of God, took off His outer garment, took up a basin, filled it with water, and began to wipe the muck and mire off these men’s feet.

The equivalent would be to think of someone in power, someone well beyond you in wealth, status, and fame—the president of the United States, for example—being over to dinner at your house. After you get through eating, he quietly gets up, takes off his jacket, goes to your bathroom, and begins to scrub around your toilet. The next thing you do is to go in there to say, “Mr. President, what in the world? You don’t have to do this.”

But no matter how wildly you protest, he cannot be pulled away. He’s come here to clean the nastiest part of your house.

Jesus, whose power is well beyond any president or superhero in every possible way, stooped to the lowest rung on the ladder to serve His disciples. And Peter, who always had something to say, objected: “Lord, do you wash my feet?” (John 13:6 ESV).

You can’t really hold this brashness against Peter. He felt the weight of what was happening in the moment, and it made him entirely uncomfortable. Jesus understood, however, and patiently answered Peter’s objection this way: “If I do not wash you, you have no share with me,” which made Peter swing hard in the other direction and say, “Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!” (You’ve got to love this guy. You shall never wash my feet, he says. Then Jesus says, “Well, then, you can’t have any part of Me.” Wash all of me then!

Jesus went on to explain the meaning of His service:

When he had washed their feet and put on his outer garments and resumed his place, he said to them, “Do you understand what I have done to you? You call me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you. Truly, truly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him.” (John 13:12–16 ESV)

The culture in Jesus’ day (much like our own culture) was built upon the premise of power. The more powerful, wealthy, and talented you were, the less expectation was on you to lower yourself and help other people. Conversely, the less amount of power, wealth, and talent you had, the more you were expected to serve those who were blessed with more.

But Jesus wasn’t into this kind of power trip. He swam upstream against cultural views. His kingdom was and is the site of great rereversal. Just as everything in the universe was spun into chaos when sin entered the picture, Jesus reversed things again and put them in their right order. But because we have always lived in the chaos of sin, the kingdom of God feels backward and counterintuitive to us. In the kingdom, the hungry are full. The poor are rich. The mourning are blessed.

And the powerful are servants.

He said to them, “You’re right in calling Me Lord and Teacher, because I am.” Jesus was addressing Peter’s prevailing view that serving would cause Jesus to lose His stature as the Holy One. “I am beyond you. I am the Alpha and the Omega. I have always been, and I will always be. I can tell it to stop raining, and it will. I can tell it to start raining, and it will. I can tell dead people not to be dead, and they’ll listen. I can tell sick people they’re no longer sick, and any illness will leave them. And yet I do this to set an example for you—that in the kingdom of God, we don’t operate this way. We do not use our power or influence selfishly. We do not use our position to keep from serving those under us. Rather, we use that power, position, and ability to actively lower ourselves and serve those under us and around us.”

With Christ as our example, we mimic our Savior who turns the power system on its head.

The gospel is our motivation for moving outside ourselves for the sake of others. That’s what Jesus did for us, and we are to follow His example. We don’t serve others so we can toss an impressive, updated résumé before God. We serve others because we have been greatly served by Jesus. We imitate our Savior as we are being conformed into His image. As Christ emptied Himself of His authority and served us, we are to empty ourselves of any so-called entitlement and serve others.

Jesus washed His disciples’ feet. That’s a very practical, down-and-dirty means of service. But what does that mean for us today? How do we put this into practice? How do we challenge people in our churches to serve in light of the gospel?

Everyday Serving

A church that challenges its members to live as servants centered on the gospel invites people to serve continually in all the places where they live, for as long as they live. Serving is connected to the gospel and is to be encouraged in homes, neighborhoods, workplaces, and the church.

At home. If you’re married, your service must begin with your spouse. If you’re not married, it’s with your roommate. If you don’t have a roommate, maybe you should get a roommate—because other believers provide a sanctifying presence in our lives. When we live in close proximity to another person, such as in marriage, our selfishness is exposed on a daily (if not hourly) basis. Those closest to us are used by God to help transform us into the image of His Son.

People wonder why that first year of marriage is so often a train wreck, but here’s why: You may have thought beforehand, I was doing great living in a house by myself. Why should it be any different now? Well, you actually weren’t doing awesome before. You just didn’t have the luxury of someone pointing out your deficiencies. You were exercising the option to keep your sin private. But now it’s gone public. And though you probably didn’t see it this way at the time, the tension of that first year was good for you—a relationship with your spouse that was like iron sharpening iron, producing growth amid flashing sparks of sanctifying abrasion.

The gospel frames how our ministry at home should look. The apostle Paul told husbands to “love [their] wives, as Christ loved the Church and gave himself up for her” (Eph. 5:25 ESV). If a husband comes home seeking to be served, he will always be disappointed and the tension will build. But if he stops to remember, before he even gets out of the car, how Christ served him and gave Himself for him, this awe-filled reality will motivate him to serve his wife well. In the same way, wives are to respect and submit to their husbands out of respect for Christ. The service truly goes both ways. The gospel pushes both husbands and wives to place the other’s needs above his or her own needs.

In the neighborhood. Serving those around you can be manifested in simple, practical ways: pulling your neighbor’s trash cans on trash day when they’re out of town; helping them with home and lawn projects; just declaring yourself available if they ever need anything: “Seriously, I’m not just saying that. I mean it.”

Church folks who shut the garage door before they even get out of their vehicle do not send a warm servant’s message to those living around them. It’s hard to serve your neighbors from your living room. In God’s providence, He has placed all the people in your church in their specific neighborhoods, condos, apartment buildings, and college dorms. These people must be shown the connection between the gospel and their mailing address. They were placed in these residences to lovingly represent Christ by serving as He served.

In the workplace. Just as God in His sovereignty placed the people in your church in their respective homes and neighborhoods, He also placed them in their workplaces. A common misconception among Christians is that their work is not spiritual, that a regular 9-to-5 day cannot be sacred. If they’re going to do anything spiritual or ministry-oriented, it’ll have to happen around these occupied time slots. But this implies that everybody needs to be a full-time pastor of some kind if they’re going to be “spiritual” for the better part of the day and week. The misconception that normal work is not spiritual is both inaccurate and damaging.

Work is very spiritual. In fact, God invented work. Work was present in the garden of Eden prior to the fall of humanity. Adam and Eve were given responsibility to tend the garden, and their work was enjoyable and honorable to God. When sin entered the world, yes—work became tainted with sweat, difficult bosses, Microsoft Excel, and frustrating situations at the office, but the concept of work is still very spiritual. When we spend forever with God in heaven, we will have work and industry to accomplish.

So don’t ever give the impression that work is mundane and insignificant. God desires Christians to bring their best to their profession so the city and culture will benefit and its people will be served well. Martin Luther believed that all professions were sacred, that “God Himself was milking the cows the profession of the milkmaid.”2

In the workplace, believers are given an opportunity through the gospel to serve in several different directions—upward, downward, and laterally. Serving upward means consistently working hard, knowing you ultimately work for the Lord. Believers should be the best employees on the job because they realize their work is truly done for God’s glory. Serving one’s supervisor well is a means of serving Christ well. And if a believer works for another believer, he should serve that person even better (1 Tim. 6:1–2).

Believers who are supervising others are given the opportunity to serve downward. By treating employees well and fairly, calling out the best of their gifts, the supervisor honors his or her ultimate Boss in heaven, who sees everything that’s done on the job . . . and who is not impressed with the lines and boxes on the org chart (Col. 4:1).

Most believers are also given the opportunity to serve laterally, assisting the colleagues who work alongside them. Because of the gospel, believers should encourage and serve these who are equal to them in responsibility, without being a burden to them, without being the slouch at the office who must continually be bailed out by others. One of the best ways a believer serves those who work alongside him is just to do his job well (1 Thess. 4:9–12). That alone is more spiritual and gospel-centric than many people realize.

In the Church. Augustine once said, “The church is a whore, but she is still my mother.”3 Throughout history, the Church has pursued other lovers, chasing after control, power, and misplaced agendas instead of pursuing Jesus and His mission. The Church has committed numerous atrocities in the name of God, neglected to influence the world in which God has placed it, and sold out to a myriad of causes other than the gospel.

But as Augustine said, she is still our mother. Despite all the junk, she is beautiful because she is the bride of Christ. God is passionate for His Church, and He has gifted believers to serve His Church. Each time spiritual gifts are mentioned in the Scripture, they are immediately connected to serving others in the Church.

In Romans 12, the apostle Paul built the case that each person belongs to every other person in the Church and that each person should use his gifts according to the grace of God to serve others (v. 7). In 1 Corinthians 12, he devoted an entire chapter to challenging believers to use their gifts for the common good of others in the body (v. 7). In Ephesians 4, he reminded believers that pastors/teachers are to train believers for ministry so the body of Christ will benefit (vv. 11–12). And in 1 Peter 4, Peter commanded all believers to use whatever gift they have received to serve (v. 10).

After Jesus served His disciples by washing their feet, He told them they should wash one another’s feet (John 13:14). Because Christ served them, they were to serve each other, and He has placed believers in local churches today so we will serve our brothers and sisters. Wise church leaders will preach the gospel and provide opportunities for people to serve in response. Without such opportunities, people will live with all this frustrated, unused spiritual energy balled up inside them, and the Church will not be who she should be.

Jesus, even to this day, continues to wash our dirty feet. Like children who constantly come inside caked with mud, dirt, and filth, we come to Him every day with our sin. And yet He continues, with a towel around His waist, to wash our feet. The painful irony is not that we get dirty again but that many believers fail to put a towel around their own waist to wash dirt off the feet of others. Churches centered on Jesus constantly remind their people how Christ has served and continues to serve them. And this becomes the one, the only, the supreme impetus for serving others.