(upbeat music) - Welcome back to the podcast. Today we have a trio of interesting emails to work through the next three weeks, Pastor John, as I look ahead on the calendar of questions on what's on the table to come. What does it mean to serve God? That's today, what does it mean to serve God?

Next week, as we serve God, what do we give him? Are we giving him anything that he doesn't already have? Does he need us? That's APJ 1956. And then a week after that, what does it mean to be spiritual? Spirituality, of course, is a squishy concept in the world today.

And we're gonna work towards a definition in APJ 1960. Interesting trio of topics, all at the foundations of what it means to be a successful Christian, living out the Christian life over the next three weeks. Some important questions ahead. So today, what does it mean to serve God? The question is from a listener named Amy.

Pastor John, hello, I was discussing the phrase serve the Lord with a fellow believer the other day. And I was wondering if you could clarify something for us. All over scripture, we are told to serve the Lord. In Psalm 100 verse two, it says to serve the Lord with gladness.

Deuteronomy 10, 12 says, serve the Lord with all your heart and all your soul. Joshua says, as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. That's Joshua 24, 15. And Paul in Romans 12, 11 also tells us to serve the Lord. But then in Mark 10, 45, Jesus says, the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve.

Christians throw around the phrase serve the Lord so often, but I'm not sure I know what that phrase means. Can you clarify this for me? - I think this is one of the most important questions a Christian can ask about living the Christian life in a way that glorifies God and does good to other people.

It gets at the utterly crucial issue of a right way of serving God that honors Him and blesses people, and a wrong way of serving God that dishonors Him and doesn't help people. This is not a marginal issue. We're talking about what it means to be a Christian moment by moment in real life.

So let's make it crystal clear that Amy is right that the Bible teaches almost everywhere that human beings are to serve God. And when the Son of God comes into the world, we are to serve Him. Old Testament, as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord, Joshua 24, 15.

And then Paul celebrates the Thessalonian converts because, quote, you turn from idols to serve the living and true God. So over and over again, Paul calls himself, he calls Christians servants or literally slaves of Christ and of God, Romans 1, 1. Ephesians 6, 6. Peter does the same, 1 Peter 2, 16, 2 Peter 1, 1.

It is unmistakable one biblical way of speaking rightly about the relationship to God that we have is to call ourselves servants or slaves of God and of Christ. That's right, she's drawing attention to that, and she should. Now, as soon as we say that, we must ask really pointedly, what's involved in serving God and what's not involved in serving God?

If we start serving God as though we could earn wages from Him or as though we could meet His needs or as though we could put Him in our debt and make Him our beneficiary, red biblical lights start flashing very brightly. For example, in John 15, 15, Jesus says to His disciples, "No longer do I call you servants or slaves, "for the servant does not know what his master's doing, "but I have called you friends "for all that I have heard from my Father.

"I have made known to you." And yet, in verse 14, so the preceding verse, He says, "You are my friends "if you do what I command you." Whoa, what kind of a friend is that? So the meaning of slave or servant is qualified and the meaning of friend is qualified.

We can't just assume that what we mean by servant or friend is what Jesus means by servant or friend. We have to listen. Or here's another bright, flashing red light. Acts 17, verse 15, "God is not served by human hands "as though He needed anything, "for He Himself gives to all men life and breath "and everything.

"So yes, serve Him, but not that way." Not that way. "Not as though He needed your service." Or here's another red, flashing light. Psalm 50, verse 12. God says, "If I were hungry, "I would not tell you, "for the world and its fullness are mine. "You call upon me in the day of trouble.

"I'll deliver you and you will glorify me." That was one of Smirjn's favorite verses. He called it Robinson Crusoe's text because that's what he quotes in the book. "Yes, serve God, yes, "but not by presuming to meet His need." He owns everything. He doesn't need your supply. We call on Him in need, not the other way around.

Here's another red, flashing light. She quoted, Amy quoted it. Mark 10, 45. "The Son of Man came not to be served." That's pretty clear warning. Not to be served, but to serve and to give His life a ransom for many. So He saves us. We don't save Him. He meets our need.

We don't meet His need. Here's one more flashing red light of warning about serving God in any old way that we think might be right. Romans 4, 4. Can't get much more basic than this. Paul describes how the Christian life begins. "Are we justified and put right with God "by working for God, earning a wage, "or by trusting Him to work for us "in our utter helplessness?" So here's the quote.

"To the one who works, "his wages are not counted as a gift, but as his due. "And to the one who does not work, "but trusts Him who justifies the ungodly, "his faith is counted as righteousness." So we did not get right with God in the beginning of our Christian life by serving Him for a wage of salvation.

He worked for us. He served us, not us, Him. He did the humanly impossible on the cross. So with all those red warning lights flashing in our face, we better not serve God that way, as though we could earn wages, as though we could meet His needs, as though we could put Him in our debt, make Him our beneficiary.

So here's what we need to ask. Well, how should we serve Him? You keep telling us what's all the bad ways. What is right service? And maybe the deepest and clearest answer is 1 Peter 4:11. This gets prayed over me every time I preach it at Bethlehem for years and years.

This was our go-to verse just before walking upstairs to preach. "Let him who serves serve in the strength that God supplies, "so that in everything God may get the glory "through Jesus Christ to whom belongs the dominion forever." So every effort expended in the service of God is a God-given effort.

That may be the most important sentence, so let me say it again. Every effort expended in the service of God, the right service of God, is a God-given effort. That's what must absolutely sink into our souls. Otherwise, we will always think of ourselves as bringing to God things that He doesn't have, as though we could meet His needs, which He doesn't have any.

He's not served as though He needed anything. The conception of service that dishonors God and will not help people because it points them away from God's all-supplying grace toward our own supposed self-produced moral efforts is serving without relying upon Him to serve us in our serving. All God-pleasing service is done in the moment-by-moment reliance upon God's service-enabling power.

Or to say it another way, the only service of God that pleases God is done through the glad acceptance of His undeserved service toward us and in us. And we see this in 2 Corinthians 15, 10. By the grace of God, I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain.

On the contrary, I worked, or you could say, I served more zealously than any of them. And then he adds, "Though it was not I, but the grace of God that was with me." So yes, we work. Yes, we serve. We have a master. We obey. But every baby step we take in obedience to our master is a gift of grace from Him to us.

Therefore, we should never think of our service to God as a way to repay Him in gratitude or for His goodness to us, because every step we take in that so-called payback is another gift from Him. And it takes us deeper into debt to grace, which is a glorious place to be forever and ever and ever.

We will never not be debtors to God's grace. For all eternity, with every act of obedience, glad obedience to the end of eternity, and it has no end, we will go deeper and happier into debt to the praise of the glory of His grace. So here's one last picture of this peculiar kind of service to God.

Jesus said, "No one can serve two masters. Serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he'll be devoted to the one and despise the other." You cannot serve God and money. So the question is, how do you serve money? That would be a clue.

Serving money doesn't mean doing things to meet money's need. You serve money by calculating all your plans, your efforts to benefit from what money promises you. Calculate your whole life to benefit from what money promises you. Your life revolves around trying to put yourself in the position of the greatest benefit from money.

That's also what it means to serve God. You serve God by calculating all your plans and all your efforts to benefit from all that God promises to be for you. Your life revolves around trying to put yourself under the waterfall of God's greatest blessing, positioning yourself for the greatest benefit God has to give, namely, Himself.

So I conclude, yes, God enlists us into His service, which means He calls us to have a part in accomplishing His purposes, not meeting His needs. And He accomplishes His purposes precisely by supplying the grace to our work, to do our work, because the giver gets the glory, the servant gets the joy.

And that's God's purpose for His world, His glory and the joy of His people in Him. - Amen. Yeah, every effort expended in the service of God is a God-given effort. We're not meeting His needs. Thank you, Pastor John. But we do give God things. We give Him things like praise.

We give Him thanks. We give Him glory. We give Him power. Give power to God. That's Psalm 68, 34. Give power to God. So how do we give God power? What do we give to God if we meet none of His needs? It's an interesting question to follow this one, and it comes up from a listener named Jeff next time.

I'm your host, Tony Reinke. We'll pick it up here on Monday. See you then. (upbeat music) (upbeat music)