Colossians 3:12-13 So, as God’s own chosen people, who are holy, set apart, sanctified for His purpose and well-beloved by God Himself, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience which has the power to endure whatever injustice or unpleasantness comes, with good temper; bearing graciously with one another, and willingly forgiving each other if one has a cause for complaint against another; just as the Lord has forgiven you, so should you forgive. Amplified Bible
Our Love Connection
Servant Warriors, God has called us to serve others in a selfless way. We want a reputation for being humbly wise and compassionately forbearing. It is a difficult thing to do, serve others selflessly, because it goes against the grain of our human condition and it takes us way out of our comfort zone. A good choice to start every day with is to be determined to love in all situations that we may face today. God knows what love challenges we will face in each and every day, so our best bet is to connect with Him, heart to Heart and spirit to Spirit and be saturated with His love and truth. Jesus is our love connection, attached to Him we love well.
Our Love Appointment
Servant Warriors are growing towards having a heart completely surrendered to God’s ways. God has an incredible caring and giving nature. When we have a generous and kind heart, and we desire to serve God and serve others, we become wholly-holy His servant warriors. As God’s servant leaders, He will set us up to cross ways with many different kinds of people. These are God’s divine appointments for us and in order to be used by God in these divine connections, we need to stay connected to the heart and mind of Christ and persevere on the path of God’s love. The other routes we may be tempted by our enemy to take are those of offense, judgment, expecting a lot out of others and putting conditions on people. These thoughts will tempt us and they will divisively be made to seem quicker, easier, more comfortable to our flesh. The choice is ours. God’s love travels down a narrow path and He hopes huge for us, His servant leaders to make a choice for truth and love.
A Choice To Respond
It is hard to keep fleshed out when we are serving others, especially when we are servant leaders because we are serving and leading. It is easy to get disillusioned by someone who has dashed our expectations. People never do what you expect, they do what you inspect and that puts a servant leader in a very awkward position as they try to maintain their humility and servants heart as they lead others. When people let us down, we an get angry, as we lean into our human nature. Our choices are limited to two: react or respond. We could choose to react and walk away angry, it may “feel” the easier way than having to deal with the people who have let us down; or we could follow the temptation to isolate ourselves with an “I have to do it myself in order for it to be right” attitude, that is quicker than truly dealing with and confronting the real situation, getting to the heart of the matter; or we may choose to judge and speak angry assumptions in a very sarcastic and hurtful way, this is the broad path that leads to burnt relational bridges. What we should desire as God’s servant leaders, is to learn to respond out of a flesh that is self-controlled by God.
Expectations In Good Hands
Being a servant leader is a choice for sacrifice. It is difficult serving, using your time, talents, energy and emotions for other people. You are investing in them and it is natural to look for some kind of return. You expect Christians that you have added value too, to act like Jesus would act. One of the hardest scenarios for me is when I get the words of a Christian, who has irresponsibly spoken to a non-Christian, angrily thrown in my face by the non-Christian. As a servant leader, the offense from a Christian seems harder to bear than the offense from a non-Christian. I don’t have high expectations for a non-Christian as much as I do a Christian. In order to bear with others, I must learn to put all my expectations in Jesus’ hands.
Ephesians 4:1-3 Unity of the Spirit So I, the prisoner for the Lord, appeal to you to live a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called, that is, to live a life that exhibits godly character, moral courage, personal integrity, and mature behavior—a life that expresses gratitude to God for your salvation, with all humility, forsaking self-righteousness, and gentleness, maintaining self-control, with patience, bearing with one another in unselfish love. Make every effort to keep the oneness of the Spirit in the bond of peace, each individual working together to make the whole successful. The Amplified Bible
Work Out Your Salvation
A servant warrior has to check their hearts and bring the hidden expectations to the light of God’s truth. I do have expectations that a Christian will not speak divisive words that tear down others reputation, and especially not to speak them to a non-Christian. When this happens, and it is brought to my attention, I am disappointed and yes, I want to react in my flesh, instead of respond out of God’s love. I know this is a hot button for me that my enemy likes to push, so I have to guard my heart against it. I do expect a lot out of a person who calls themselves a Christian. I expect them to look like Christ in all their comings and goings, and I expect them to represent His Kingdom. But I find that my expectations tend to focus me outward at others and not inwardly at myself first. Am I perfect? No. The only ones salvation that I can work out is mine.
Truth In Love
Okay so I have shared my weakness with you, that it is easier to bear with a person’s bad choices that does not know Jesus, than bear with a Christian’s bad choices who does know Jesus. Now I will share with you what the Holy Spirit is teaching me. As a servant leader, I must walk as Jesus walks. Jesus is continuously forbearing, teaching and enduring with us as He is finishing what He started in us. The mercy of Jesus never stops pursuing it reaches farther than anyone could ever hope for or imagine. The Grace of Jesus extends past the surface to the deepest parts of our lives. Jesus loved even when He had been betrayed and hurt by others. His choice is love. Even as Jesus shapes us, adding value to our lives daily, He sees and hopes for the finished work in us and continues to steadfastly and patiently speak the truth in love. His choice is always love and it is founded securely on an unchanging and powerful truth.
Ephesians 4:13-16 This will continue until we all come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God’s Son that we will be mature in the Lord, measuring up to the full and complete standard of Christ. Then we will no longer be immature like children. We won’t be tossed and blown about by every wind of new teaching. We will not be influenced when people try to trick us with lies so clever they sound like the truth. Instead, we will speak the truth in love, growing in every way more and more like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church. He makes the whole body fit together perfectly. As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love. New Living Translation
A Good Choice
As a servant warrior, it is not all on me, I am not the one with the answers, I am not the solution, Jesus is the Way-Maker God. When I make it my burden to repair things and fix people, then I am not truly living like a Christian who is trusting Christ. It is my place as a servant leader to point people to Jesus, He is the way, the truth and the life, I am the little echo of His big voice. I am thinking, let’s just love everyone with God’s love that is enduring, full of grace, truthful and always reaching out with miraculous mercy. Why don’t we just be found in Him, His way, truth and life. We can do life with others in unconditional love, bearing with one another’s human condition only when we are found in Jesus first. We could even add value to others lives by giving of ourselves in a sacrificial way, but the only sacrifices that simply-significantly matter are those done in followship of Jesus as we are found in Him. We can’t really do anything that truly matters, without being. We must be connected to God’s heart of compassion to infuse us with a strength that leans us into the miraculous flow of God’s grace. We had a good model in Jesus Christ, Who was always adding the values of truth and love to others lives. A good choice for us would be to speak out of love and be undergirded by God’s truth that holds up everything, always and forever.
Holy Alliance
Confession is good for the soul and I think we all need to be real with each other, it keeps us accountable to one another: I confess that I have a stumbling block and it is my expectations of others. I have a tendency to lean into judging others instead of leaning into God’s Sovereign sway and this flips my anger into a prideful mode, making my exasperation, self-righteous anger. This does not please God. It seems like my unbalanced expectations get me in trouble at times. The Holy Spirit has quickened my understanding and shown me that the times I have ill feelings that rise within me is mostly because of Christians not acting like I expect them to act, which is like Christ, the one they follow after. I know this is a hot “annoyance” button for me, and yes, the enemy likes to push it. So I have to guard my heart against it and the Holy Spirit and His truth really helps me to do that. The Holy Spirit teaches me to take the feelings that rise up in reaction to dashed expectations, such as disappointment, and holy align it with the heart of God by lining it up with His Word. In holy alliance with the Word of God, I will act out of the compassion and the love of God, responding out of God’s truth, instead of reacting out of my fickle fleshly feelings. I need to stop chasing my feelings and choose to pursue love and truth more than I do my feelings, because this is the way that is spot-on, this is the way of real Kingdom living.
Weakness Undergirded With Wisdom
When I am serving God and serving others, I find I have various human emotions that rise up in me. I have found that my feelings are not right or wrong, they are just feelings, what makes anger that flares up in me wrong, is when I impulsively, react and act on that feeling of anger in a fleshly, hurtful way that devalues others. For me it is easier to bear with a person’s bad choices that does not know Jesus, than bear with a Christian’s bad choices who does know Jesus. I know that weakness is in me, so I undergird it with the strength of the Word, such as the one below, this is great piece of wisdom for me and I soak my soul in the life changing precepts of it.
Ephesians 4:26-31 When you are angry, don’t let it carry you into sin. Don’t let the sun set with anger in your heart or give the devil room to work. If you have been stealing, stop. Thieves must go to work like everyone else and work honestly with their hands so that they can share with anyone who has a need. Don’t let even one rotten word seep out of your mouths. Instead, offer only fresh words that build others up when they need it most. That way your good words will communicate grace to those who hear them. It’s time to stop bringing grief to God’s Holy Spirit; you have been sealed with the Spirit, marked as His own for the day of rescue. Banish bitterness, rage and anger, shouting and slander, and any and all malicious thoughts—these are poison. The Voice
Pray It Up
Lord Jesus, help us as Your servant warriors, to make a choice for love as we stand on and with Your foundation of truth. Let us be found in You, that we may be like You. You died our death, so we could live your life. I pray that we would be so much like You, in all of our ways, that we constantly glow the glory of Your Kingdom in and through our lives. Make us servants, like You, a Warrior Who served selflessly. You were a servant leader who walked completely out of a comfort zone, self sacrificially fighting the good fight of faith with truth and love. You made a choice for love when you laid down Your heavenly rights and came to us. There has never been a greater sacrifice made for the human race that changed so many destinies. Help us to choose truth and love and stay wholly-holy aligned with the wisdom and compassion of Your heart, so we can endure and bear with others, just like You do. Teach us how to add value to others lives, serving them in humility, not trying to fix them, but hoping huge in Your Holy Spirit to be the agent of miraculous change in them. Let it be so. God bless your Servant Warriors and may every word of this exhortation not return void, but do the work in our hearts that You intended it to do. AMEN.
I hope you enjoyed this meal at the Servant Table in the Bridegroom’s Café
Servant Warriors, it is time for us to be God’s Light in this dark world, to shine, to glow God’s Glory in our everyday lives. We need to make each divine appointment God has for us with His truth and love. We must open up our hearts to God’s preparation, so He can shape in us His characteristics, fleshing out all things us, all things of our worldly culture and putting truth in our spirits, so we can endure and bring Him great honor in this season of life. I highly encourage you to get a copy of The Bridegroom’s Voice and take this journey with Jesus, be fleshed out, prepared by His powerful truth so you may endure and bring God honor in times such as these. This is a God Adventure that will inspire you and change you forever. God bless you MUCH, KimberlyMac
