((FREE)) Download The Humble Servant Season 6
Kimbra Koran
May the Spirit of God work powerfully in our hearts each day putting pride to death in us. May we no longer think selfishly of ourselves before others, but may we, by the power of the Spirit, consider other people more important than ourselves and their needs more pressing than our own. May the Spirit of God use us to powerfully reflect the humility and servant heart of our Saviour Jesus Christ so that people will be drawn to Him in repentance of sin, saving faith and daily obedience to the glory of God.
During prayer time I asked God how I could be more like Mary and how I can enjoy motherhood like my retreatmates do. I heard Him tell me that I needed to humble myself. I needed to meet my kids where they are and be more patient with them. I needed to come down to their level and be more empathetic.
This year as a leader I humbled myself to serve the women coming on the retreat. The want to serve was something I knew I wanted to do right after experiencing Stations of the Cross. I had a desire to share with other women what I experienced on the retreat.
In more modern times, it was mostly used by the British civil service, and that is where the rest of us borrowed it from. The main point here is that the public official was seen as a servant to the public; and was appointed, or elected, to work for that public.
What about another Executive Director (what is it about Executive Directors?), this time of the Uganda National Meteorological Authority (UNMA), Festus Luboyera, who insists that anybody in Uganda that wants to talk about the weather in public, has to get his permission first; is he a humble servant?
Do public servants go through some induction process before they take office, to make them realise that indeed they are serving the public and that is why they are in those positions? Or do they take office assuming that the public is at their mercy, and require the likes of us to give them respect instead?
Reblogged this on The humanist view and commented:
When you are a servant and you are subconsiously unaware that you are so you are constantly rude to your master, the tax payer who pays your salary, while you delude yourself about who your master is.
While it was an honor for Mary to be chosen as the mother of the Messiah, it was not without its heartaches and hardships. There is no record that she ever complained; rather she submitted to each new turn in her life as a servant of the Lord God, choosing to serve God in whatever way He asked of her. Being a servant is not always easy, but when we have the assurance that God loves us and is always with us, we can learn to choose to respond as His humble servant.
Thus we tend to think that parents either should (always) spank their children, or never spank their children; that pastors should be either strong aggressive leaders or humble servants of their sessions; either that God is absolutely sovereign, or that man is wholly responsible; either that wives should submit without exception to their husbands or that spouses should have unqualified equality; either that parents should not interfere with their teenagers freedom of expression at all or that they should exercise complete control over their teens activities, and so on.
Thus, parents who employ a laissez faire attitude toward their childrens social activities are as cruel to their children as those parents who smother their offspring with micro-managing every detail of their lives. What is needed, instead, is a godly balance, grounded in a humble dependence on Gods word blessed by the sanctifying grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. This alone will provide that wise and knowledgeable parental oversight of maturing children, combined with individually tailored liberties based on each childs demonstrated maturity and capacity for consistently responsible behavior.
The apparent paradox of the Christian soldier in Gods armor, and the humble bondslave of Jesus Christ selflessly following the Saviors suffering servant modelunless dealt with according to applicable biblical constraintswill tend to produce believers who follow either the aggressive and, for some, even pushy Christian warrior model or the humble (doormat?) Christian servant model. Both the servant and the soldier models are commanded in Scripture (e.g. Ephesians 6:10-20; Matthew 20:25-28; 23:11). But can they both be followed? Is it actually possible to live both models? The answer is Yes! However, we must add one strong qualification, namely that a God-honoring integration and application of both models is impossible if we look at one, or both, through secular or cultural filters. In our culture there is hardly any understanding of the biblical concept either of theocentric, God-defined soldiering, or theocentric, God-defined servanting. Having enjoyed the (sometimes spiritually painful) privilege of serving twenty-one years on active duty with the United States Navy, I am prepared to attest in any public forum, that a grasp of biblical soldiering or biblical servanthood is rare, even among professing believers who are members of the uniformed services.
Christ reinforced this luminous teaching of the Old Testament on three different occasions when He declared that He who exalts himself will be abased, but he who humbles himself will be exalted (Matthew 13:12; Luke 14:11, 18:14). The Holy Spirit inspired other New Testament authors as well to warn Gods people of this deadly and seductive sin. James 4:6: ...Therefore it says, God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble.
In the church of Jesus Christ, at the end of the 20th century, we have seen many heartbreaking examples of the sheep being misled and exploited by false shepherds who treat them more as servants to be exploited, rather than co-laborers to be cared for, nourished, taught and, yes, trained.
Now let us move over to the servant model. This is a nonnegotiable requirement for those who would serve Jesus Christ. Let us note that the verb to serve and the noun servant come from the same Latin root word servusa slave or serf. We cannot too often remember the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, But the greatest among you shall be your servant (Matthew 23:4) and you know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority over them. It is not so among you, but whoever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you shall be your slave; just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many (Matthew 20:25-28).
If you are following the Scriptural line of thought on biblical servanthoodfaithfulness to the master (the one in authority over the servant) becomes the cornerstone of God-approved service. The gospel of Luke is especially rich in servant concepts. That servant who knew his masters will, and did not prepare himself or do according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes. But the one who did not know it, and committed things deserving of stripes, shall be beaten with few. For everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required; and to whom much has been committed, of him they will ask the more (Luke 12:47-48). This, let us not forget, is part of Christs application insights at the conclusion of His parable dealing with the differences between faithful and unfaithful servants.
Now let us return to the military model. The truly effective military leader is not one who postures, struts, and abuses his authority, but one who humbly serves both his superiors in the chain of command (obeying with wisdom and alacrity) and his subordinates (by caring for them so they can fight effectively in the time of battle). When the final jury on military history reports in, it may well turn out that Joshua was the greatest military leader of all time. Not only did he lead an effective campaign, but he was noted for his personal righteousness. Unlike David, he was not self-corrupted in later life. But most important of all, Joshua knew how to submit to his commander-in-chief. The extremely brief but profound military-spiritual encounter between Joshua and the pre-incarnate Christ luminously underlines Joshuas leadership suitability and competence. He understood that unqualified submission to the Captain of the Lords Hosts (the permanent, greatest, and most significant military title in all time and eternity) is expressed by immediate obedience to his command. The command to worship took precedence over all other strategic, tactical, and logistical concerns. In my experience, most military men in the United States Armed Forces have forgotten that these great organizations are historically and legally referred to as the Military services. The military servant forces, if you will!
Here, then is the glorious principle which totally eliminates the apparent contradiction between the requirements of a militant Christianity and Christian service. Both realms of service to the King are to be grounded in a disciplined, conscious submission to the Master/Commander under whose perfect authority we serve. The same leadership qualities which make great military officers are those which make extremely effective overseers or stewards of the masters servants.
To further dissipate the artificial, secular and wrong either-or wall between the Christian soldier and the Christian servant, let us remember that as spiritual soldiers, we are ever to fight the enemies of the gospel with the same disciplined humility and submission to the lordship of Christ required in our treatment of believers.
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