You and Me: Friends and Children with a Servant's Heart

Ever get stricken by the pride of man? You don’t have to admit it to me, but at least admit to yourself…at times in your life, when you’ve done something and seen that it was good, you have had at least a little pride in what you’ve shown yourself capable of doing. Perhaps this has even hit you when you spoke the Truth of God and led someone to recognize Christ and commit to Him. Praise the Lord! That’s awesome, and we should be filled with joy! But be on your guard in that situation…it’s only natural for a human to immediately feel so joyful, which is initially rooted in God and righteousness, but then to be tempted to feel like you did something good or great. We start out in life so eager to please men—our parents, our friends, our bosses. Think about childhood and adolescence and see if that isn’t true. It’s even true in adulthood for most. Somewhere along the line, we see Christ for who He is by His grace, and we set out to change whom we are eager to please. When we seek approval of men and obtain it, we are filled with pride—that is 100% true. As we change what we seek, we must break this cycle. If we seek God’s approval, when we see He has done something good through us, we will have the same response that we had with men—pride. Now there is a real irony: doing God’s work, resulting in the cancerous sin of pride! How terrible. So how do we break out of that mentality? Firstly, we are already approved, only by Jesus’ intercession to the Father. There is no approval beyond that…we are loved, plain and simple. You cannot be more loved than by the Love of God! And you have received the Love that is so consuming that there is no greater approval to be found. The rest of our lives, we do not gain approval—we simply respond to the amazing rebirth with gratitude and love that pours from Him into us until we overflow into others. At that point, when we stop seeking approval of our Heavenly Father as we seek approval of men, we might begin to slay the tenacious Pride of Man. Consider this truth from Jesus himself, in talking with the disciples:

Luke 17:7-10 - "Suppose one of you had a servant plowing or looking after the sheep. Would he say to the servant when he comes in from the field, 'Come along now and sit down to eat'? 8Would he not rather say, 'Prepare my supper, get yourself ready and wait on me while I eat and drink; after that you may eat and drink'? 9Would he thank the servant because he did what he was told to do? 10So you also, when you have done everything you were told to do, should say, 'We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.'"

“We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.” This is for you and me as much as it was for the 12 disciples. I think we need to be reminded of this verse every time we see God do something for His Kingdom through us. He chose to do it through us and could have used anyone else…He chose us, we didn’t choose Him first.

Rom 5:8 – “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us."

1 John 4:10, 19 – “This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins…We love because He first loved us.”

We did nothing but have our eyes opened and see God as He already is and see what He is to be doing in us, then we watched as He poured forth from us with our eyes wide. “We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.” Loved servants, for sure. Even friends of God, with whom He shares not just the 'what' but the 'why' of His work:

John 15:15-16 – “I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. 16You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit—fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name.”

That is absolutely amazing. I think as friends of Jesus, we can still approach with the same unwavering attitude: “We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.”

What a glorious duty. I think when we get to the point of humility and actually declare that truth, we are never more joyful. Many are going to hear that verse by itself and immediately say, “Who am I? I am so unworthy.” Me too. But the focus of unworthiness isn’t rooted in guilt, it is revelation of God’s incomprehensible righteousness, glory, power, and mercy. If not applied to the heart as intended, you may feel sorry for your unworthiness and forget that you are a child of God, not just a servant (Rom 8:14-17, John 1:12, 1 John 3:1-2, for starters). We can have the pure attitude of a servant while being treated as God’s very children. That is a joyful realization, I believe. We can err with an attitude that is not joyful, begrudgingly declaring ourselves as servants, as if to be a servant of God was a low and joyless position. Realize that a servant in Heaven is higher than the highest position on earth! However, if that suddenly makes being a servant more doable, then we are still stricken with pride and selfishness. We have missed the entire glory and grace of God! How could we then take on this attitude: “We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty” if we seek the position through servitude, instead of serving God in gratitude?

So now that we realize that there is no guilt or dread in humbling ourselves to be servants, we can go right back to the conviction. We could have been tossed out like garbage, for before Christ’s blood, death, and resurrection, I was a garbage heap of a man, not fit for righteousness, and certainly not at all compatible with Heaven. But immediately upon receiving the Truth of Christ, God has made me righteous. God has given me the opportunity to give up my room in Hell, and take the position of a servant in Heaven. The same is true for you. We have not earned it. We can barely accept it, as it is so far beyond even the purest gifts of love possible from a mere human. So we say with joy, “We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty,” as we praise Him forever! Amen!