(The following message has drawn from Rick Warren’s message “Shaped for Serving
God”)
Does your life hold significance?
Does your life bear importance in this world?
As we conclude this series entitled ‘The Call’… that is the question I want to help settle
this morning..
Significance - The quality of having importance or intended meaning (Encarta
Dictionary)
Potential illus (any one of three below)
1. In the opening clip from the film THE EMPEROR’S CLUB": Kevin Cline portrays an
instructor of Western civilization in a prestigious private school. In the opening scene
he begins his first day of class introducing a quote by a figure who had made a great
conquest in earlier centuries… and invited the students to find what they can about
him. But as they begin flipping through their books… he adds… they won’t find
anything. That despite his conquest of an ancient land… noting is known of him.
Why… he proposes?
> Because AMBITION WITHOUT CONTRIBUTION IS INSIGNIFICANT.
2. For three weeks, Elvis’ album of greatest hits has been the number one album in
the nation, 25 years after the guy died! Now in spite of enormous success, Elvis was,
according to friends, an unfulfilled and unhappy man. He died of obesity and drug
dependency at 42. And in an interview with his wife, Priscilla, she said this about her
husband: “Elvis never came to terms with who he was meant to be or what his
purpose in life was. He thought he was here for a reason, maybe to preach, maybe to
serve, maybe to save, maybe to care for people. That agonizing desire was always
with him and he knew he wasn’t fulfilling it. So he’d go on stage and he wouldn’t have
to think about it.” Elvis didn’t have a clue where to begin to look. In a sense, he was
lost.
3. Saw program on the tragedy that can accompany welfare… unique is that it was
focused on children raised on welfare provisions.
> Essentially…. The second great question of human existence…significance… was
often left unanswered.
Of course it’s not just an issue of employment or economics. Many who are well
employed can feel the same quiet question: Do I have significance?… a unique
contribution to make?
If the enemy of our souls can’t keep you from the security of
discovering God loves you… he’s equally intent to keep you from
knowing your significance…. that God includes you in His purposes.
> There’s bad news for the enemy… God has significance for you…
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Eph. 2:10
"For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good
works, which God prepared in advance for us to do."
You were created for significance…. to offer a unique contribution for the
purposes of God.
1 Peter 4:10 (LB)
“God has given each of you some special abilities; be sure to use
them to help each other, passing on to others God’s many kinds of
blessing."
Each of us… not just those in the front row… have been given special attributes
by God… favor in some special gifting….through which His grace to the world can
come.
> You have been given the potential to have significance…. and it lies in how
your gifts are used to serve others.
Simple truth is that: “My significance involves serving God by
serving others.”
Now the Bible has a word for this, it’s called “MINISTRY”.
… an often misunderstood word. When I say the word “minister” most people think of
priest, pastor. They think of somebody who wears those funny collars, or a robe, and
talks like [close to microphone, in a deep voice, drawing out the word] “GOD”, and you
know, that kind of stuff!
But in the Bible the word “service” and “ministry” are the same word. And in the
Bible “servant” and “minister” are the same word. The Bible says that every person
who receives the life of Christ within them is a minister.
Now, not every believer is a pastor, but every believer is a minister.
Ministry simply means using my shape to help somebody else in the
name of God. Any time you use your talents, your abilities, your background, your
experiences to help somebody else, you know what that’s called? Ministering. And
you know what you are? You’re a minister.
So all of us are called to ministry.
1. I’ve been created for ministry!
"For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which
God prepared in advance for us to do." Eph. 2:10
2. I’ve been saved for ministry!
"It is He who saved us and chose us for his holy work, not because we deserved it
but because that was his plan long before the world began..." 2 Tim. 1:9 (LB)
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Not saved to survive… or sit… but to SERVE.
3. I’ve been called into ministry!
"God, in his grace, chose me even before I was born, and called me to serve him."
Gal. 1:15 (GN)
"...You have been chosen by God himself--you are priests of the King... " 1 Peter
2:9 (LB)
4. I’ve been gifted for ministry!
“God has given different gifts to each of us.” 1 Cor. 7:7b (CEV)
As Job recognizes,
“Your hands shaped me and made me.” (Job 10:8).
We’ve borrowed a simple acrostic to note how God uses five things to shape you:
Spiritual gifts, Heart, Abilities, Personality, and Experiences. That spells ‘SHAPE’.
Those five things make you, and God uniquely shapes you, different from anybody
else in the world, for a purpose. And that purpose is to serve Him.
Spiritual Gifts Heart Abilities Personality Experiences
Now we’re not going to go into detail today on these five things (the spiritual gifts,
heart, abilities, personality, and experiences) because we cover them in our
upcoming Discovering Your Ministry class
> But I do want you to notice this, God made you unique and your uniqueness is
not for your benefit.
Now the good news is that God not only shaped us for such
significance, He gave us a model. He came to earth Himself and said “This is
how you do it. I want you to watch Me”. And so he came to earth in the form of a
man, Jesus Christ, and He said, “This is what I want you to do with your life”. You
were created to be like Christ, and what did Christ do while He was here on earth? He
served.
Matt. 20:28,
“Jesus said, ‘Your attitude must be like My own, for I did not come to be
served, but to serve’.”
Your SHAPE determines your MINISTRY, but your ATTITUDE determines your
MATURITY.
LEARNING TO SERVE LIKE JESUS
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Jesus, as the model of ministry, reveals four vital qualities…. Let’s quickly consider
these qualities and some challenges / barriers that they reflect.
1. Serving like Jesus means being HUMBLE.
Philip. 2:5-8 (NLT)
Your attitude should be the same that Christ Jesus had. Though he was God,
he did not demand and cling to his rights as God. He made himself nothing; he
took the humble position of a slave and appeared in human form. And in
human form he obediently humbled himself even further by dying a criminal’s
death on a cross.
It all began with humility…
Notice …‘Obediently humble’… he entered a state of responsiveness to the Father.
This connects to our first barrier.
1st Barrier: False humility - A self protective and self made disqualifying
of ourselves to avoid discomfort.
We disqualify ourselves based on our level of maturity or competence.
False humility is the subtle renaming of fear as ‘humility.’
False humility is really a self protective and self made decision to avoid
discomfort. True humility says “Yes” to God’s call.
The Bible includes the accounts of some who tried to disqualify themselves…
and God isn’t real impressed. There’s nothing humble about saying ‘no’ to God.
What we present is that we don’t want to be the perfoemer.
True humility understands what God understands… that isn’t interested in us
being on the stage… but rather he wants us to BE THE STAGE on which he
performs.
2nd Barrier: PERFECTIONISM – We become afraid of failure… and the
ideal quenches the real.
A second barrier to being used by God…is perfectionism. “When it’s all
just right, when things settle down, then I’ll serve.”
Eccl. 11:4 (NLT)
“If you wait for perfect conditions, you’ll never get anything done.”
Real servants, Christ-like servants, do the best they can with what they
have for Jesus Christ today. They don’t wait.
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The Good Enough Principle is this: It doesn’t have to be perfect for God to bless it.
That’s the truth. If God only used perfect people, what would get done in this world?
Nothing, zip, zero! We’re all a bunch of misfits. We all have weaknesses. We all
have faults. We all have failures. We all have handicaps. But guess what? God uses
us all. Why? Because God doesn’t use perfect people because there aren’t any.
There aren’t enough superstars in this world to get it done. God uses normal people.
It doesn’t have to be perfect for God to bless it.
God doesn’t use perfect people because there aren’t any.
If we look at what Paul describes of Christ we see another element critical in serving
God… it says he appeared in human form”… that is… he showed up! “
2. Serving like Jesus means being AVAILABLE.
One day Jesus was walking down to go to Jericho and some blind men
start yelling at him. And the Bible says this…
Matt. 20:30-32
“Two blind men shouted ‘Lord, have mercy on us! Jesus stopped
and called them. ‘What do you want me to do for you?’.”
Now I want you to circle the word “stopped”. Jesus stopped. If you want to be used
by God, if you want to serve God, you must be willing to be interrupted. Most of
Jesus’ ministry and most of Jesus’ miracles were interruptions. You think about
it. All the people he healed – the blind man, the lame man, the sick people, the
paralyzed man, the dead child – all of them were interruptions. His first miracle?
Interrupted at a wedding. He second miracle? Interrupted on the way to Galilee. It
says, “Jesus stopped”.
As Rick Warren says, ‘Many people like to follow the steps of Jesus… but you can’t
without following the stops of Jesus.’
The willingness to have life interrupted involves more than just moments in life…
it involves our whole plans for life.
> Jesus didn’t have a set plan and agenda that kept him from what
God the Father was calling him to.
There is a tendency that can run throughout life to think serving God will come
at another stage or season of life. When we’re a child… we think we’d better wait
til we grow up. When we’re young adults… we think we need to fulfill our big
goals and settle down. When we’re adults… we think we need to wait until we’re
not so busy with career and family. When we get older we think it might come
with retirement. And then when the later years come… it’s common to think
we’re too old to be of any use and that we should leave it to the young lives.
And all of this quenches the call of God. The Biblical testimony is one of God
calling all lives at all seasons… Samuel when he is a child…. Noah in his latest
years. And God said that the day we live in is the day in which His Spirit is now
poured out so that all will dream dreams and flow in His favor. (Captured in video
clip “Time to Serve” but choosing to describe rather than show media piece.)
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Now what keeps us from being available?
3rd Barrier: Self Centeredness - We try to find significance in what we
can get rather than in what we can offer.
Phil. 2:4 (Msg) - “Forget yourself long enough to lend a helping
hand.”
We hang this “do not disturb sign” on the door of our heart, “Do Not Disturb.” We
do it all the time. We say, “do not disturb”. “Don’t disturb my heart. I’ve got my goals.
I’ve got my safe little life going here, so don’t disturb me for the needs of other people.”
Matthew 16:25 (NLT)
If you try to keep your life for yourself, you will lose it. But if you give up
your life for me, you will find true life.
You know a lot of people spend so much of their time searching for self-esteem,
for self-worth, and significance. They want to feel good about themselves. But
they’re looking in all the wrong places! You don’t get your self-worth from
success, because there’s always somebody else who does a better job. You don’t get
your self-esteem from status. You don’t get your self-esteem from sex. You don’t get
your self-esteem from your salary. The Bible says you get your self-esteem from
service. Jesus said to give your life away in order to find it.
4th Barrier : Consumerism: Our connection to community is reduced to
what we can get rather than on what we can give.
One of the primary reasons that the experience of community and belonging is
hard to grasp today… is that we are so steeped in consumerism. We have come
to identify with being consumers rather than contributors. Without realizing it,
we have sold our sacred connection for the shallows of comfort… and the result
is that true community now eludes us.
Throughout today an interesting phenomena will take place… football
games…100,000 in the stands who desperately need exercise and 22 on the field
who desperately need rest.
The more dynamic the team… the more fans will watch.
The more a church provides…the more will tend to embrace passivity.
Similarly…
5th Barrier: Celebrity – Spectator Orientation: We allow our current
culture’s dynamic of living through the lives of others to replace the real
gifts we bear.
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Our celebrity and spectator oriented culture is one in which we create bigger than
life figures to then live vicariously through. Why?… because it’s a way to avoid
finding significance in real life.
Helen Keller - When she was 1 1/2, she was extremely ill, and she lost both her vision
and hearing.
She learned to read French, German, Greek, and Latin in braille! When she was 20,
she entered Radcliffe College, the women’s branch of Harvard University. She wrote
11 books, did research, gave speeches, and visited 39 countries on five
continents…before she died in her sleep in 1968.
Helen Keller -
“I long to accomplish a great and noble task, but it is my chief duty and joy
to accomplish humble tasks as though they were great and noble. . . For
the world is moved along, not only by the mighty shoves of its heroes, but
also by the aggregate of tiny pushes of each honest worker.”
Mother Teresa of Calcutta -
“Unless a life is lived for others, it is not worthwhile”
“We cannot all do great things, but we can do small things with great
love.”
They discovered the secret of breaking the barrier… of self-centeredness,
consumerism, and spectator orientation.
6th Barrier: Overload - We become overwhelmed by life’s demands.
We can all feel overwhelmed… for many it’s because they HAVE made themselves
available… and now need to refine their commitments so that they never lose
heart.
We need to seek God’s wisdom… build around your strengths… be creative and
efficient.
But for some others of us… many other commitments shut off our availability to God.
It’s a matter of taking on an investor’s mindset - What am I doing with my time that will
invest into the lives of others?
3. Serving like Jesus means being GOD FOCUSED.
To look at the life of Jesus is to see a life of constant relationship with God… never
sense that his life is flowing from those around him… but from the Father who he is
serving.
That is the quality that the apostle Paul discovered and declares for all of us…
Colossians 3:23-24 (TEV)
”Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as though you were
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working for the Lord and not for people. Remember that the Lord will give
you as a reward what he has kept for his people. For Christ is the real
Master you serve.”
7th Barrier: Resentment – We become bitter for lack of affirmation,
respect, and support.
If you find resentment in your hear towards those you serve… change bosses.
Learn from Jesus to be God focused in your serving.
4. SERVING LIKE JESUS MEANS BEING FAITHFUL.
Faithful. Now what does that mean? It means you don’t give up. You keep on
going. You don’t quit in the middle of your assignment. At the end of Jesus’ ministry
on earth, Jesus said this in
John 17:4 “I have brought you glory on earth by completing the work that You
gave me to do.”
Might want to circle that phrase: “completing the work.”
Do you hear the peace that Jesus has? It’s a peace that can so often
elude us… we never feel we complete anything. But he completed what he had
been given… and ended his earthly existence with peace.
Even more than peace… there is joy…
Matt. 25:21
“’Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few
things so; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your
master’s happiness!”
Those are the words every life can hear. Faithfulness that leads to fulfillment. They
are the words of a servant discovering their significance.
Notice… it all begins with the little things…. first steps.
1 Cor. 15:58 (MSG)
“Throw yourselves into the work of the Master, confident that
nothing you do for Him is a waste of time or effort.”
Notice “nothing”: that means it all matters, even the little stuff. Why? Because in
God’s book, there is no little service. He said, “Even if you give a cup of cold water in
my name to a child, that counts.” In God’s eyes, there is no little service.
Now if you’re going to learn to be a servant of God,
you must learn the difference between significance and prominence.
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On my body, my nose is quite prominent. But I could lose my nose and still live the
rest of my life, because while it’s prominent, it’s not significant. On the other hand,
if I lost, you know, my liver, or if I lost my heart, it’s not very prominent. You don’t see
it. But if I lost it, I’d be dead. And a lot of people think that if something is given a lot
of visibility, it’s the most important. No, that’s not true. In fact the stuff behind the
scenes is more important, God says. He says the parts of your body that you don’t
see are more important than the parts you do see! And the same is true in the Body of
Christ. It all matters. You see the fact is with our limited perspective, we can’t see
how our small acts have big consequences, but they do!
Let me give you a little quiz. Let’s see if you know these. Do you know the name of
the person that opened up the parking lots this morning? Do you know the name
of the person that greeted you when you were coming in? Do you know who is
teaching your children right now? Do you know the names of the musicians who
were here on this stage a few minutes ago? Do you the people who are managing
the sound and multimedia so that we can engage in this time together? Do you
know the people who restocked the restroom before you got here? Do you know
the people who stuffed the bulletin you’re holding? The truth is, all of them were done
by people just like you…. Servants of God and His people. And it’s all important.
> Very basic premise…. Everyone has a ministry and a mission.
I have a ministry in the body of Christ and a mission in the world.
Your ministry is your service to the body. Your mission is your service to the
world around you which God is reaching out to. I believe that as long as we define
commitments in ways that are flexible and in varying levels, that it is appropriate that
every person is ultimately called to contribute to the body (chose some ministry to
serve in) and to serve the needs of those in the community around us (choose some
missional expression). I truly believe that God has designed us to need BOTH, an
opportunity to contribute in our household (ministry) and an opportunity to reach out to
those who God wants to be reached by His grace (mission).
> Today is focused on making a practical step to embrace your contribution… in
some tangible form of ministry… even if you’re still not sure what your long term
ministry might be.
How will God use you? Well let’s just get real practical.
Let’s take out this little brochure that reads on the front, “Discovering My Purpose
in Ministry and Mission”. Walk through…
1. Choose one area of ministry from the list below through which you would like
to initially exercise your regular contribution to the needs of God’s
community.
Ask yourself…“Where might my niche be in serving others?”
Most of us aren’t sure yet… and that is why we want to create an opportunity to
just explore. All the opportunities to serve can be entered with an exploratory
commitment… generally 6 or 8 weeks… then you can see what you’ve discovered
about yourself. More often than not - You discover your gifts through ministry, instead
of discovering your ministry by identifying your gifts.
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2. Consider additional involvement in the some of the areas of ministry that are
less regular.
3. Clarify your S.H.A.P.E. for life ministry by participating in the Discovering
Your Ministry class.
You can turn this in today or you can take it out to the Ministry Fair and turn it into one
of the tables out there.
As we close this morning… series… the answer to the question: Does your life have
significance? is a profound YES.
Watching movie; Transformers… in classic Hollywood fashion… a more ordinary and
unpopular kids… discovers he’s at the center of saving the world. Pentagon trying to
get a hold of him… they need him… his gifts and car… and more. Imagine if last night
the Pentagon had called you…
> What we discover is that in Christ… and now by the Spirit… God called last night…
and many nights.God called. He wants your time, treasure, and talent.
