28 Days: Day 24

SCRIPTURE

• Matthew 20:26-28 (NIV) ²⁶ Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, ²⁷  and whoever wants to be first must be your slave-- ²⁸  just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many."

OBSERVATION

 It is not wrong to desire great usefulness for God, but we need to remember that God’s picture of success is not the same picture that the world has.  Too often we want to do God’s work and but we want to frame it in a worldly mindset. 

UNDERSTANDING

This servant mentality just flies in the face of everything we know in our culture.  Think about the language that we use to be the greatest in our culture.  You’re to climb to the top.  You’ve got to climb the corporate ladder.  If you want to be great, you rise to greatness, but in the culture of the kingdom, Jesus flips it around.  He says, “You really want to be the greatest?  You descend to greatness, serve others!” 

LIFE APPLICATION

So are you here at Desert Streams to serve or to be served?  Are you here to really be a part of what God is doing in people’s lives every week, or is it sort of a spiritual consumer idea where you get in, you watch the message, and then you are on with life?  A disciple of Jesus is a servant. So where are you serving?  How are you washing the feet of those in the family at DSC?  Are you a consumer or a contributor?  If you are not being a servant today is as good a day as any to start, ask God to show you where you can use your time, talents, treasures and testimony to serve.