One day, when I used to work at Bethany College, the “editors” of the Egles’ Eye (the school newspaper), asked if one of the cooks would be kind enough to write something on servanthood for the newspaper. I guess people did not think to be good writers or did not have time, so I decided to do it. I wonder why they chose the cooks to write something on servanthood (maybe I am being sarcastic here). I haven’t had any Easter-like thoughts even though I probably should have, so I don’t have anything Easter-like to give you. But the small article I wrote for the Eagle’s Eye last year seems fitting. Here it is:

Jesus said that he didn’t come to be served, but to serve. (Mat 20:28). In Philippians, Paul said that our attitude should be the same as that of Christ (Phil. 2:5) and goes on giving us a picture of Jesus’ attitude: being God, He took the very nature of a servant; He humbled Himself and became obedient even if His obedience would lead Him to death. According to Jesus’ example two words describe what a servant is: humility and obedience. The Son of God, who deserves all praise, came down and was found washing the feet of His disciples. We need to realize what it means to be saved by grace and be humbled by the truth that I am not better than any believer, because all I have is Christ’s righteousness and that’s what they have too. The heart of a true servant is humble. As our hearts become humble because of the grace of God for us, our own self won’t count much and we’ll yearn for God’s supremacy in our lives, we’ll give ourselves to Him saying “We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty” (Lk 17:10). And what naturally flows from humility is obedience. Christ wasn’t simply doing things His own way. In the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus asked that the “cup be taken” from Him, but He kept on asking for His Father’s will to be done, not His. Jesus never dared to disobey His Father, He knew that God’s will was what needed to be accomplished. A true servant doesn’t only serve His brothers and sisters his own way. God sometimes calls His servants to do things they are not used to or calls them to places where they don’t want to go, but the one who has the heart of a servant will in humility obey God’s voice. It is clear that one isn’t a servant because one does the deeds of a servant. It’s all about the heart. Some are hypocrite servants who do the work required by God, but do it with wrong motives. And there are the true servants, those who are humble in heart and simply serve because they delight to obey their Saviour. Let us serve one another, not because it makes us “look good” before men, but because we were saved by the blood of the Son of God who left us an example of the attitude that should be ours: having a humble and obedient heart.