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Come, bless the LORD, all you servants of the LORD, who stand by night in the house of the LORD! Praise the LORD! Praise, O servants of the LORD; praise the name of the LORD. Let the steadfast love become my comfort according to your promise to your servant.

Remember these things, O Jacob, and Israel, for you are my servant; I formed you, you are my servant; O Israel, you will not be forgotten by me.

Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights; I have put my spirit upon him; he will bring forth justice to the nations.

You are my witnesses, says the LORD, and my servant whom I have chosen, so that you may know and believe me and understand that I am he. Before me no god was formed, nor shall there be any after me.

But get up and stand on your feet; for I have appeared to you for this purpose, to appoint you to serve and testify to the things in which you have seen me and to those in which I will appear to you. Of this gospel I have become a servant according to the gift of God's grace that was given me by the working of his power. I became its servant according to God's commission that was given to me for you, to make the word of God fully known. What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you came to believe, as the Lord assigned to each. For we do not proclaim ourselves; we proclaim Jesus Christ as Lord and ourselves as your slaves for Jesus' sake... and made us to be a kingdom, priests serving his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. If you put these instructions before the brothers and sisters, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, nourished on the words of the faith and of the sound teaching that you have followed.

Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honor. Whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant. Moreover, it is required of stewards that they be found trustworthy. Submit yourselves therefore to God. He has graciously granted you the privilege not only of believing in Christ, but of suffering for him as well. Do not lag in zeal, be ardent in spirit, serve the Lord. Render service with enthusiasm, as to the Lord and not to men and women... since you know that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward; you serve the Lord Christ... by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, holiness of spirit, genuine love...

Whoever speaks must do so as one speaking the very words of God; whoever serves must do so with the strength that God supplies, so that God may be glorified in all things through Jesus Christ. To him belong the glory and the power forever and ever. Amen.

Preserve my life, for I am devoted to you; save your servant who trusts in you. You are my God. I am your servant; give me understanding, so that I may know your decrees.

Psalm 134:1; Psalm 113:1; Psalm 119:76; Isaiah 44:21; Isaiah 42:1; Isaiah 43:10; Acts 26:16; Ephesians 3:7; Colossians 1:25; 1 Corinthians 3:5; 2 Corinthians 4:5; Revelation 1:6; 1 Timothy 4:6; John 12:26; Mark 10:43; 1 Corinthians 4:2; James 4:7; Philippians 1:29; Romans 12:11; Ephesians 6:7; Colossians 3:24; 2 Corinthians 6:6; 1 Peter 4:11; Psalm 86:2; Psalm 119:125.

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We conclude this book near where we started. Your aim in life is simply to be like Jesus. What was he like? He was a 'Servant King', as a popular Christian song puts it. You have the privilege - what an honour! - to be a servant of the king of all kings, and to serve him as you meet him in others.

Success, in Jesus' terms, is not being boss, lording it over others, but to be a servant. James and John were two of Jesus' followers who learned this the hard way. They wanted privileged thrones in Jesus' kingdom: one of them on the left side and the other on the right. The other disciples, naturally, were furious with them. Tempers flared, and there were angry exchanges. But Jesus said, 'You know that in the world those who are thought to be "successful" are those who "get to the top". They have power over others. But it's not to be like that with you. Whoever wants to be great must be your servant; whoever wants to be number one must be the slave of all. I did not come to be served, but to serve - and to give my life for others.' (Matthew 20:25-28). (And those on the right and left of the Lord in the moment of his greatest triumph were two crucified thieves!).

Later, these fellows revealed that they were very slow learners at this point. When they gathered to celebrate the Passover, none of them wanted to do the slave's chore, and wash the dirty feet of his friends. So Jesus gave them - and us - an object-lesson in greatness. He removed his cloak, took a towel, filled a basin with water, and started to move slowly around the group, washing their feet, and wiping them with the towel. Amazing: in Hebrew culture only slaves washed others' feet.

In that dramatic silence only the embarrassed breathing and the trickle of water could be heard. Here is God incarnate, stripping himself to wash the feet of his proud friends!

Ultimately, the cross itself was the supreme symbol of his servanthood. He served by giving his life for his friends (and that includes us!).

When I survey the wondrous cross, On which the Prince of glory died, My richest gain I count but loss, and pour contempt on all my pride...

Jesus did not give his followers a blueprint about how the church should be run; there is no specific organizational model for the institution of the church in the New Testament. But there is a dynamic one: servanthood! Greatness in the kingdom of Jesus is to be a slave of others. The Chinese have a proverb: the tallest bamboo bends the lowest.

The best Christians have learned this lesson well. A theological seminary built a new office block. The president insisted his faculty take all the spacious new offices, while he took a crowded old office in a back wing. The action was both sincere and symbolic, and made a profound impression on the students. Peter Drucker, the management expert, once wrote: 'The greatest time waster for most executives is a decision that has to do with someone's status. A move into new offices for example stirs up guerrilla warfare as to who gets which office.' (1)

Effective Christians are not merely those who know a lot about Christian doctrine or the Bible, but who are willing to serve others. Effective leaders are not merely those who have a following but humbly serve those they lead, helping them become the best they can be (even if that means they do 'greater works' than the leader!). In serving we become more like Jesus Christ.

Your calling is not to exalt yourself, but to exalt Christ. Theologian James Denney wrote somewhere: 'You cannot bear witness to yourself and Jesus Christ at one and the same time. You cannot, at one and the same time, convey the impression that you yourself are clever and that Christ is mighty to save.'

The ideal Christian may not be a great orator, or a charismatic prophet, or a generous benefactor, or a giant of faith. The ideal Christian, to paraphrase 1 Corinthians 13, is patient and kind, not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. The ideal Christian does not insist on their own way, is not irritable or resentful, does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. He or she is longsuffering, a true believer, is hopeful and endures anything. Whatever your titles or accomplishments or outstanding gifts: they are all passing away. Only faith, hope and love will last forever. And they are the marks of a true servant.

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I am like James and John Lord, I size up other people in terms of what they can do for me; how they can further my program, feed my ego, satisfy my needs, give me strategic advantage.

I exploit people, ostensibly for your sake, but really for my own sake.

Lord, I turn to you to get the inside track and obtain special favors, your direction for my schemes, your power for my projects, your sanction for my ambitions, your blank checks for whatever I want.

I am like James and John.

Kent and Barbara Hughes, Liberating Ministry From The Success Syndrome, Wheaton, Illinois: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., 1988, p. 49

Jesus taught a lot about service by washing his disciples' feet. In our highly urban culture where we wear closed shoes and socks and drive in automobiles, washing feet is not an especially effective way to express service. We read about what Jesus did; we get the basic insight that it is important to serve others; and then we try to interpret that in our culture. Maybe we read to an older person or mow somebody's lawn. For me, 'washing feet' might be to prepare coffee for my wife each morning.

Richard Foster, 'An Introduction to Spiritual Disciplines', La Vonne Neff et al (eds), Practical Christianity, Wheaton, Illinois: Tyndale House Publishers, 1988, p. 295.

Radical servanthood does not make sense unless we introduce a new level of understanding and see it as the way to encounter God himself. To be humble and persecuted cannot be desired unless we can find God in humility and persecution. When we begin to see God himself, the source of all our comfort and consolation, in the center of servanthood, compassion becomes much more than doing good for unfortunate people. Radical servanthood, as the encounter with the compassionate God, takes us beyond the distinctions between wealth and poverty, success and failure, fortune and bad luck. Radical servanthood is not an enterprise in which we try to surround ourselves with as much misery as possible, but a joyful way of life in which our eyes are opened to the vision of the true God who chose the way of servanthood to make himself known. The poor are called blessed not because poverty is good, but because theirs is the kingdom of heaven; the mourners are called blessed not because mourning is good, but because they shall be comforted.

McNeil, Morrison and Nouwen, Compassion - a reflection on the Christian Life, N.Y.: Image Books, 1983, p.31.

In an interview in the October 1983 issue of Northwest Orient magazine, Andre Soltner, of Lutece in New York, one of the world's premier restaurants, puts it this way: 'I am more than thirty years a chef. I know what I am doing and each day I do my absolute best. I cook for you from my heart, with love. It must be the same with service. The waiter must serve with love. Otherwise, the food is nothing. Do you see? Many times, I will leave my kitchen and go to the tables to take the orders myself. It starts right then and there. That feeling the customer must have is relaxation. If not, then his evening is ruined. Mine, too, by the way. How can he love, if he's not relaxed? People ask me all the time what secrets I have. I tell them there is nothing mysterious about Lutece. I put love in my cooking and love in the serving. That is all.'

Tom Peters and Nancy Austin, A Passion for Excellence, London: William Collins Sons & Co Ltd., 1985, p. 289.

We must face the modern situation honestly. The biblical image of servant is not popular. In the face of much bondage, much sickness, and much sorrow, there are many professionals who are eager to offer their services for a dear price and from the protection of a status lifted far above those served... Is there still a place for the servant? I fear that if there is not, our lofty civilization will swiftly degenerate. The social and economic proofs seem too powerful to deny... Agents of healing and deliverance are those who do not lord it over others, but identify with others in their joys and sorrows, successes and losses, recoveries and setbacks. But we have learned from our biblical heritage that such identification, and servanthood, does not grow out of heroic decisions, but out of personal deliverance from false gods and integration into the community finding true freedom in acknowledgment of the sole Sovereignty of God. The hero reaches down to save and further demeans the one in bonds. The servant of Christ experiences his or her solidarity with the one in bondage, a solidarity based on the awareness of God's love embracing both.

Earl E. Shelp & Ronald H. Sunderland (eds), The Pastor As Servant, New York: The Pilgrim Press, 1986, pp. 17-18

If it is true that people can grow, expand their capacities, jump higher, run harder, and compose greater music, that means that the ultimate leadership is servant leadership, for we will produce followers who will surpass us. Runners will become coaches - to train other athletes who will break their records. Executives will hire subordinates and motivate them so well that they may become their superiors. It is not easy to adjust to such a view of the development of leaders. So, when some people get to the top, they pull up the ladder with them. They cannot tolerate the ambition of the young, and see every subordinate as a potential rival. Such executives hang on by their fingernails in organizations until the last possible moment, and give their attention to fighting off rivals rather than nurturing successors. It is a foolish way to lead, inasmuch as we are always within one generation of extinction.

Alan Loy McGinnis, Bringing Out The Best In People, Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1985, p. 181

* Servants lead out of relationships, not by coercion. Servants don't demand obedience or submission. They meet their followers at the point of need. Servants have a common touch, maintain living contact, and demonstrate consistent concern for their followers. * Servants lead by support, not by control. Servants give from themselves rather than take for themselves. They love and lift others rather than manipulating them. * Servants lead by developing others, not by doing all the ministry themselves. Servants, whether clergy or laity, recognize that the kingdom of God calls for the full participation of all believers. All spiritual gifts are given by God for service to Christ's body (Eph. 4:11-13). * Servants guide people, not drive them. Volunteer organizations like churches require selfless leaders rather than selfish bosses or bullies. * Servants lead from love, not domination. Authority, in part, grows out of 'the consent of the governed.' Peter sounded this theme clearly: 'Tend the flock of God that is your charge, not by constraint but willingly, not for shameful gain but eagerly, not as domineering over those in your charge but being examples to the flock' (1 Peter 5:2-3). * Servants seek growth, not position. Servants aren't ambitious. They keep the growth and spiritual health of others paramount. Unlike Diotrephes, an ambitious leader in the early church who preferred to 'put himself first' (3 John 9), servants put others first.

Robert D. Dale, Pastoral Leadership, Nashville, Tennessee: Abingdon Press, 1986, pp. 34-35

Field-Marshal Montgomery reckoned there were seven key ingredients necessary in a successful leader in war, and all of them are applicable to spiritual warfare as well. The leader must:

1. Be able to sit back and avoid getting immersed in detail. 2. Not be petty. 3. Not be pompous. 4. Be a good picker of [assistants]. 5. Trust [subordinates] and let them get on with their job without interference. 6. Possess the power of clear decision. 7. Inspire confidence.

Ian Dobbie, 'The Leader' in John Eddison (ed), 'BASH' A Study in Spiritual Power, Basingstoke, Hants UK: Marshalls, 1982, p. 70.

It has been said of some religious leaders that they have an unusual ability to be able to strut sitting down.

Richard Lovelace, Dynamics of Spiritual Life, Downers Grove, Illinois: Intervarsity Press, 1981, p. 248.

Brother/sister let me serve you, Let me be as Christ to you; Pray that I might have the grace To let you be my servant too.

We are pilgrims on a journey We are travelers on the road We are here to help each other Walk the mile and bear the load.

I will hold the Christ-light for you In the nighttime of your fear I will hold my hand out to you Speak the peace you long to hear.

I will weep when you are weeping When you laugh I'll laugh with you I will share your joy and sorrow Till we've seen this journey through.

When we sing to God in heaven We shall find such harmony Born of all we've known together Of Christ's love and agony.

Brother/sister let me serve you, Let me be as Christ to you; Pray that I might have the grace To let you be my servant too.

Copyright 1977 Scripture in Song;

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Lord, make us strong enough to do what we should do calmly, simply, without wanting to do too much, without wanting to do it all ourselves. In other words, Lord, make us humble in our wish and our will to serve. Help us above all to find you in our commitments, For you are the unity or our actions; You are the single love in all our loves, in all our efforts. You are the well spring, And all things are drawn to you. So, we have come before you, Lord, to rest and gather our strength.

Michel Quoist, `We Have too Much to Do', in Gordon Bailey (Compiler), 100 Contemporary Christian Poets, Herts England: Lion Publishing, 1983. p.136.

O thou who has so graciously called me to be thy servant, I would hold myself in readiness today for thy least word of command. Give me the spirit, I pray thee, to keep myself in continual training for the punctual fulfillment of thy most holy will.

Let me keep the edges of my mind keen: Let me keep my thinking straight and true: Let me keep my passions in control: Let me keep my will active: Let me keep my body fit and healthy: Let me remember him whose meat it was to do the will of him that sent him.

John Baillie, A Diary of Private Prayer, London: OUP, 1963, p.81.

Eternal God, who are the light of the minds that know you, the joy of the hearts that love you, and the strength of the wills that serve you; grant us so to know you, that we may truly love you, and so to love you that we may fully serve you, whom to serve is perfect freedom, in Jesus Christ our Lord.

St Augustine of Hippo, cited in Tony Castle, The Hodder Book of Christian Prayers, London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1986, p.18.

Kings lord it over their subjects, but with us the highest must be like the lowest, the chief like a servant.

Who is greater - the one who sits at table or the servant who waits? Surely the one at table. Yet Jesus is among us like a servant. He came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.

So when we have done all that we have to do, we shall simply be servants who have done our duty.

Come to Jesus, all those whose work is hard, whose load is heavy, and you will be renewed.

A New Zealand Prayer Book, Auckland: Collins, 1989, p.117.

Lord, teach me to be generous. Teach me to serve you as you deserve; to give and not to count the cost, to fight and not to heed the wounds, to toil and not to seek for rest, to labour and not to ask for any reward save that of knowing that I do your holy will.

O divine Master, Grant that we may not so much to seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood, as to understand; to be loved, as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

A New Zealand Prayer Book, Auckland: Collins, 1989, p.109.

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A BENEDICTION. May the Lord Jesus Christ, who became one of us to serve us and to die for us, so enrich you with his example and his love, that you may serve and love him until your dying breath...

May his love mercy and peace remain with you always. Amen.

Endnotes:

(1) Peter Drucker, Drucker on Management, Management Publications Ltd, 1964, p.15.