Musings on Gospel Servanthood
Philippians 2:1-4
The New Testament describes your status as a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ in several ways. Through faith in Jesus Christ you have received the grace of adoption as a firstborn son of God (Galatians 3:26-4:5). You are also a citizen of God’s kingdom. You are part of the kingdom of priests (1 Peter 2:9 and Philippians 3:20). You are also under the rule of God. You are no longer a slave to sin because you have been set free and are now a slave to God (Romans 6:1-10). Closely connected with this reality you are also to see yourself as called to be a servant of other believers for the sake of Christ. This is what Paul is teaching in Philippians 2:2-4. He is telling you that you are to see yourself as a servant of other believers. As we really seek to put this into practice in our relationships we will be working toward cultivating unity.
Yet being a servant is hard. To really consider others to be more important than you are is not natural. To look not only to your own interests but also to the interest of others is contrary to our latent self-centeredness. There is also a great deal of risk involved in doing this. If you take this to heart and really view others as more important – as VIP’s – and you put their interests before your own who is going to look out for your interests? Being a servant is a menial, hard and thankless vocation. It is lowly work. This is why you are told to put off selfish ambition and vain conceit and put on a humble mind – a humble view of yourself. It requires humility to be a servant of others. In fact the only way you are to view other people is in terms of how you might serve them. This is God’s way for our relationships, especially in our families and in the church. It is as each of us who know the Lord Jesus Christ serve in this way that we will see godly unity in our relationships.
Now there are three incentives that Paul gives us that should motivate us and enable us to obey this call to serve one another. We will look at the first in this post and the others in following posts. The first incentive toward being a servant is the reality of the Gospel’s impact on your heart and life. Has the Gospel impacted your life? Is your outlook toward life (your circumstances, possessions and people) shaped by the realities of the Gospel? Is your heart encouraged, filled with hope and strengthened by the fact that you are savingly united to the Lord Jesus Christ? Does this fact have weight in your thinking? The Gospel sets us free to be radical in our thinking and in our relationships. The Gospel gives us the power to take up the servant’s towel and really consider others to be more important than we are. The Gospel changes our hearts and gives us the desire to really put the interests of others before our own.
In Philippians 2:1 Paul points you to the impact that the Gospel should be having on your life. He does this to show you how deep and abundant your resources really are. You are indeed richly blessed in Christ and this fact should impact your view of your situation. Paul describes this impact and effect the Gospel should be having on your life by calling your attention to the following realities. He uses an “if” “then” argument. It goes like this.
“If you have any encouragement from being united to Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any partnership with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion…then take up the servant’s towel and view one another as VIP’s, whom you are called to serve.”
The Christian life is a call to really love other people, yet you do this not from a hole in the ground but from a mountaintop of grace. The sad truth is that for many who profess faith in Jesus Christ the thought of really doing what Paul describes here is just plain scary or at least inconvenient. We hold our life more precious than the Gospel, our time more precious than the Gospel, our property more precious than the Gospel, our dignity more precious than the Gospel, our money more precious than the Gospel. This leaves us with all kinds of excuses and objections against really serving others with selfless love. Paul knew this about us. He knew that we would naturally object to his appeal, so he calls our attention to the riches of the Gospel and the impact those riches should be having on our hearts.
He first reminds us of our union with the risen Christ. Our relationship with Jesus should give us tremendous encouragement to overcome the hardships and difficulties of being a servant. He then reminds us of Christ’s love for us – a love that is shared by God the Father. The love of Christ should bring great comfort into our hearts to heal the hurts and wounds that serving others can and do cause. He further reminds us of the fact that we are in partnership with the Holy Spirit. We have fellowship with the Spirit and this means that we are not alone in serving others. Serving others can be a lonely and risky business. Yet because of the Gospel we have a unique partnership with the Holy Spirit, who helps us serve. Finally, he reminds us that there should be within our hearts true tenderness of feeling and genuine compassion for the cares and grief of others. This tenderness and compassion is there due to the fact that it is the tenderness and compassion of God that moved him to love us in our sin and send his Son to serve us and hence save us. It is in the Gospel that we meet the tenderness and compassion of God. This fact transforms us and will not leave us unmoved by the burdens and troubles of others. You cannot really believe the Gospel and remain hardened toward the problems of your brothers and sisters in Christ.
This is the first of three incentives that should motivate you to obey the call to serve others. The Gospel’s impact on your heart and mind should be a reality to you even now. Its implications are very practical. It is meant not only to bring you to glory but move you toward others in selfless love and joyful service. Well, is it?
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