DAY THIRTY-THREE
THINKING ABOUT MY PURPOSE
Point to Ponder: I serve God by serving others.
Verse to Remember: “If you give even a cup of cold water to one of the least of my followers, you will surely be rewarded.” Matthew 10:42 (NLT)
Question to Consider: Which of the six characteristics of real servants offers the greatest challenge to me?
34
Thinking Like a Servant
My servant Caleb thinks differently and follows me completely.
Numbers 14:24 (NCV)
Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of himself.
Philippians 2:5 (Msg)
Service starts in your mind.
To be a servant requires a mental shift, a change in your attitudes. God is always more interested in why we do something than in what we do. Attitudes count more than achievements. King Amaziah lost God’s favor because “he did what was right in the sight of the LORD, yet not with a true heart.”1 Real servants serve God with a mindset of five attitudes.
Servants think more about others than about themselves. Servants focus on others, not themselves. This is true humility: not thinking less of ourselves but thinking of ourselves less. They are self-forgetful. Paul said, “Forget yourselves long enough to lend a helping hand.”2 This is what it means to “lose your life”—forgetting yourself in service to others. When we stop focusing on our own needs, we become aware of the needs around us.
Jesus “emptied himself by taking on the form of a servant.”3 When was the last time you emptied yourself for someone else’s benefit? You can’t be a servant if you’re full of yourself. It’s only when we forget ourselves that we do the things that deserve to be remembered.
Unfortunately, a lot of our service is often self-serving. We serve to get others to like us, to be admired, or to achieve our own goals. That is manipulation, not ministry. The whole time we’re really thinking about ourselves and how noble and wonderful we are. Some people try to use service as a bargaining tool with God: “I’ll do this for you God, if you’ll do something for me.” Real servants don’t try to use God for their purposes. They let God use them for his purposes.
Real servants don’t try to use God for their purposes. They let God use them for his purposes.
The quality of self-forgetfulness, like faithfulness, is extremely rare. Out of all the people Paul knew, Timothy was the only example he could point to.4 Thinking like a servant is difficult because it challenges the basic problem of my life: I am, by nature, selfish. I think most about me. That’s why humility is a daily struggle, a lesson I must relearn over and over. The opportunity to be a servant confronts me dozens of times a day, in which I’m given the choice to decide between meeting my needs or the needs of others. Self-denial is the core of servanthood.
We can measure our servant’s heart by how we respond when others treat us like servants. How do you react when you’re taken for granted, bossed around, or treated as an inferior? The Bible says, “If someone takes unfair advantage of you, use the occasion to practice the servant life.”5
Servants think like stewards, not owners. Servants remember that God owns it all. In the Bible, a steward was a servant entrusted to manage an estate. Joseph was this kind of servant as a prisoner in Egypt. Potiphar entrusted Joseph with his home. Then the jailer entrusted Joseph with his jail. Eventually Pharaoh entrusted the entire nation to him. Servanthood and stewardship go together,6 since God expects us to be trustworthy in both. The Bible says, “The one thing required of such servants is that they be faithful to their master.”7 How are you handling the resources God has entrusted to you?
To become a real servant you are going to have to settle the issue of money in your life. Jesus said, “No servant can serve two masters…You cannot serve both God and Money.”8 He didn’t say, “You should not,” but “You cannot.” It is impossible. Living for ministry and living for money are mutually exclusive goals. Which one will you choose? If you’re a servant of God, you can’t moonlight for yourself. All your time belongs to God. He insists on exclusive allegiance, not part-time faithfulness.
Money has the greatest potential to replace God in your life. More people are sidetracked from serving by materialism than by anything else. They say, “After I achieve my financial goals, I’m going to serve God.” That is a foolish decision they will regret for eternity. When Jesus is your Master, money serves you, but if money is your master, you become its slave. Wealth is certainly not a sin, but failing to use it for God’s glory is. Servants of God are always more concerned about ministry than money.