Disciples Go The Second Mile
Genesis 24:1-9 Matthew 5:38-48 Text Genesis 24:9-20
How many of us are “it must be fair” kind of people? We are not going to do anything unless its fair or we are treated fairly. We show up to do something for God and then get angry because not enough showed up so we had to do extra.
How many of you know we serve an unfair kind of a God, and we’re glad that God is not fair? Jesus told us the Father is not fair. He said, God causes the sun to rise on the evil and the good and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous unlike. God does not give us what we deserve, God always gives us more.
If we are going to allow the Spirit of God to work through us to reach others, then we have to be willing to be used by the Holy Spirit to do more than what is expected. In one of his sermons, Jesus said to the people if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles.
When Jesus talked about going the second mile, the people knew exactly what he meant. At the time he said walk the second mile, the Jews were under Roman authority. They didn’t have jeeps to ride around in back then, and sometimes the Roman soldiers gear would get heavy. They could force any person to carry it for a mile. You see under Roman authority, the Jewish person had to walk the first mile and carry that load. There was no arguing and fussing or whining about it.
That’s just the way life was. You were under their authority and they owned you for a mile. It did not matter that already had plans for the day. They’ve been yelling at you to keep up, and calling you all kind of names while you’re walking with this load.
So imagine there you are carrying this load for this person you are simply thanking God for the opportunity to serve. Now you know that once you get to the end of the mile, the person could not make you go a second mile. You would drop down his bags, and say “Solider, my mile is up and I’ll be leaving now”. As a joke he might say, “aw come on don’t you want to go another mile”. Jesus was teaching, shock the daylights out of him and offer to go the second mile and mean it.
You see for the first mile, he owned you and you had no other choice but to do what was asked. But in the second mile, you own yourself and you’re in control of how you’re going to let Jesus shine in you.
Jesus is saying the difference between the disciple and the wanna be is that the disciple goes above and beyond in walking the second mile, and does the little extra that causes the person that is over them to say, "Wait a minute. They don’t have to do this. They don’t need to do this, Why are they doing this?" When you do what’s asked, “and go the second mile”, it’s the “the second mile” that catches the person’s attention. It’s a way of impacting the world for Jesus Christ.
How do you honestly examine your spiritual walk today. Are you hoping God is going to make an exception for you because you’re not even trying to live right? Are you doing the bare minimum to be considered a Christian?. Are you fairly doing your part? Or Are you opening your heart to the Holy Spirit to go beyond what’s expected so that you can have an impact for Christ with your life.
Anyone going through life doing just enough to get by is going to miss out on a number of blessings and opportunities. God knows there are a number of things that can happen in the second mile, that we can’t see. The Holy Spirit may be waiting in the second mile.
A second mile person is a person who does what’s asked of him or her, and then does something above that on their own. You ask the person to vacuum the living room, she does it, and then straightens the furniture on her own. You ask the person to change your oil, he does it but on his own he checks your transmission fluid level, your antifreeze level, and your tire pressure on his own. That’s a second mile and a then some kind of person. How many of you are eager to tell others about second mile persons and then recommend them to others? As disciples, we want others to talk about us.
We want New Life At Calvary to be a second mile kind of a church. That’s why we do the hot meals we serve in the way that we do. We treat people as our special guests serving them. A second mile church is willing to risk more and give more, because it wants to touch others with the love of Jesus Christ.
In our New Testament reading, Jesus is telling us, do not settle just being an average kind of a person. Make an impact in this world for me, by shocking others by being a second mile believer. When was the last time someone amazed you by going above and beyond what was expected?
We find a woman in the Scriptures who had a second mile spirit within her and because of it she obtained one of the greatest of blessings in her life. The story is found in Genesis 24. We saw in our Scripture reading that Abraham wanted to get a wife for his son.
Abraham was the first Jew called out by God, and God had promised to make him into a great nation. Abraham waited a long time to have a son. He sent his servant to go and find a wife for his son Isaac from the land Abraham had come from.
Now the servant did not know he was on a mission to impact the world. He could have taken a short cut, grabbed a young lady and said how would you like to go marry a good looking rich man. He could have paid her to say that she was from his people and nobody would have known the difference.
But if he had of, he would have been changing biblical and world history, because there would not have been a Jacob and Esau. There would not have been the 12 tribes of Israel. There would not have been a David and a Jesus in his lineage. God was using this man to prepare a Savior for the world and he didn’t even know it. Some of the most significant changes you make in this world, you won’t know they’re taking place as they happen.
Genesis 24:10 Then the servant took ten of his master’s camels and left, taking with him all kinds of good things from his master. He set out for Aram Naharaim and made his way to the town of Nahor. He had the camels kneel down near the well outside the town; it was toward evening, the time the women go out to draw water.
Then he prayed, "O LORD, God of my master Abraham, give me success today, and show kindness to my master Abraham. See, I am standing beside this spring, and the daughters of the townspeople are coming out to draw water.
May it be that when I say to a girl, ’Please let down your jar that I may have a drink,’ and she says, ’Drink, and I’ll water your camels too’--let her be the one you have chosen for your servant Isaac. By this I will know that you have shown kindness to my master."
Before he had finished praying, Rebekah came out with her jar on her shoulder. She was the daughter of Bethuel son of Milcah, who was the wife of Abraham’s brother Nahor. The girl was very beautiful, a virgin; no man had ever lain with her. She went down to the spring, filled her jar and came up again. The servant hurried to meet her and said, "Please give me a little water from your jar."
"Drink, my lord," she said, and quickly lowered the jar to her hands and gave him a drink. After she had given him a drink, she said, "I’ll draw water for your camels too, until they have finished drinking." So she quickly emptied her jar into the trough, ran back to the well to draw more water, and drew enough for all his camels.
Let’s look again at verse 19, it says After she had given him a drink, she said, "I’ll draw water for your camels too, until they have finished drinking." The first thing I want you to notice about Rebekah is that she was willing to go above and beyond what was expected. She was a second mile kind of a person”. She was going to touch people’s lives and impact the world for the better.
You may say, big deal, I would have given the man a drink and gave his camels some water. But you see for you, it would be a matter of simply turning on a faucet. She had to get her water out of a well. Understand that a camel will drink between 20 and 30 gallons of water each. Eliezer had started out with 10 camels.
If she was going to fill up his camels, we’re talking anywhere from an hour and a half to 2 hours to fill up these animals.
This lady has committed herself for almost two hours to a perfect stranger who did far more than he had asked of her. Now at best, some of us might have said hello to the man. A few of us might have offered him a drink of water. Even fewer of us would have told him he could borrow our bucket to get some water for his camels if he wanted to, but I’m afraid to say how many of us would have committed ourselves in this fashion. It is usually not our goal to do the most of what we can and get nothing for it. We have been trained to do the least that’s expected of us and get the maximum benefit possible. Ever had someone tell you to quit working so hard because you are making the rest of us look bad.
Rebekkah thought all she was doing was volunteering to help a stranger out. She was actually changing the world by putting herself into God’s plan for her life. We may be begging God for a job, and God says first show me you’ll volunteer to work for me for nothing. Then see what I will do.
Rebekkah’s volunteering is going to lead to her becoming a very prosperous young woman in many ways. This one act is going to lead to more wealth than she could have imagined. Suppose she had said, “Excuse me, I know you didn’t ask me to do what I think you asked me to do.” If she had of had that attitude, then we would not be sitting in church today.
Living the Spirit filled life does not mean you’re out their walking on Lake Erie, or that you’re like the song, in right, up right, out right down right happy all the time. The Spirit filled life gives ordinary people power to do extraordinary things. It provides ordinary people with power to do ordinary things in an extraordinary way. Rebekkah received power to do some extraordinary hard work.
She said,’"I’ll draw water for your camels too, until they have finished drinking." God’s spirit will help you to do things just a little bit better and a little bit longer. Did you know that about 80 percent of being successful is just showing up faithfully every time you’re supposed to show up.
How should the Second Mile call work in our lives.
1. The first thing is that we are not to live our lives by the measuring rod. If we are living a life that is always measuring, we’re missing what God told us to do. Let me see he gave me a gift, I’ll give him one. They forgot my birthday, I’ll forget theirs. She didn’t help me when I was down and out, I’m not going to help her.
If you do exactly what you’re supposed to do and nothing more, you have not demonstrated that Jesus is in you. If Jesus had of only done what He should have done, he would have never made it to the cross. A disciple is called to do more that is expected of him or her.
2. The second thing is, we cannot walk the second mile, until we’ve walked the first. So many people want to do great things for God, without ever getting around to doing little things for God. Humble yourself to just talk to the person who is lost and show some interest in the person before you hit them with the gospel and get them speaking in tongues. Love the people around you on your job, before asking God to move you to another job.
Treat the other youth who are being laughed at and made fun of at school with respect and show them you care about them. Be bold enough to sit with them sometimes at lunch. If you do, you will change the world. Don’t just go through the grocery store line. Speak to the clerk. In six months you can give her a church business card, and she’ll know why you have been so pleasant all these months.
3. Extra blessings come from extra effort. When you and I put in the extra effort, we receive extra blessings. In a marriage relationship, if every husband and every wife were willing to walk the second mile or do what’s expected and then some, they can have a loving relationship.
A good marriage is one when the spouse does what he or she is supposed to and then some. A good student is a person who does what the requirements are in the class and then some. A good covenant partner is one who does what he or she is supposed to and then some. A good parent or child is one who does what he or she is supposed to and then some. Each time they do, they are changing the world.
What’s a disciple? It’s not the person with the big cross, or the nice button, or the one playing the Christian station. It’s the one that does what he or she is suppose to do and then goes the second mile.
Rebekkah had no idea, the simple statement, "I’ll draw water for your camels too, until they have finished drinking", would change her life forever. She didn’t know it would lead to a husband who was a man of faith and wealthy besides. She didn’t know she was going to be one of the great, great, great grandmothers of Jesus Christ.
Do you remember Jesus said that at the judgment he would say to some of the saints, Thank you for clothing me, thank you for feeding me, and thank you for giving me food. But the saints will respond, when did we ever do such things for you. We never saw you.
Jesus will reply whenever you did it for the least of these, you did it for me. When we do things on the second mile, that’s when we’re doing things for Jesus Christ. We do what needs to be done with a right motive, not to get something back. When you stand before Jesus Christ, are you going to be glad knowing that you were a second mile Spirit person in life. God will show you all the ways in which your openness to the Holy Spirit changed this world and impacted people’s lives.
Don’t despise the little jobs that you have you to do. Every evening, Rebekah went down to the well and did the very same thing; drew the water out of the well and took it back to her family. What a boring, menial task. But don’t despise it. God may have something coming your way down there.
Don’t wait for the big moments in life to decide you will go above and beyond and become a second mile person. I meet people all the time, who if they ever won a million dollars they’d give it all or half to the church. My friends if you’re not a tither now, there is no way you’re going to become a second mile giver simply because you got a lot of money all at once. The reality is the more money we have, the harder it becomes to give it away or to give it to the work of the Lord.
When the camels finished drinking, Eliezer the servant, took out a gold nose ring, and two gold bracelets of the highest quality to give to Rebekah. Later that day he gives her more gold, silver jewelry, and clothing. He gave expensive gifts to her mother and to her brother. Now for must of us, if we had seen what she was going to get before hand, we would have also offered to pour the water for the camels. But we don’t always see in advance what God has for us at the close of the day.
When God opens the door for you to make a difference, go ahead and make the difference. The Holy Spirit inside of you wants to use you
You can finish reading this chapter and see what a difference Rebekah’s willingness to do above and beyond made in her life. She wouldn’t have thought of finding a husband at that old well in a thousand years, but she did. Those of you who are praying for a mate, God knows how to answer your prayer. Be faithful where you are so that you don’t miss out when God sends a servant looking for you.
Our best example of going the second mile is found in Jesus himself. There was no need for Jesus Christ to go to the cross to pay for his sins, because he had no sins to pay for. He could have gone back into heaven at any time. The first mile he walked was to tell us the truth about God and God’s call upon our lives. But knowing the truth was not enough to change us from our desire for sin.
It was because of God’s love for us, and God’s desire to save us from our dark situation in sin, that Jesus took the second mile to the cross. Out of the second mile came our salvation. Out of the second mile came the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and out of the tomb. Jesus’ resurrection guaranteed that we can have eternal life starting right now, so there is no need to fear death or the coming judgment. We have someone who has already paid the price for our certain guilty verdict.
