Serving from sonship/daughterhood
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In an earlier blog, I mentioned “seat at the table”. I want to start here with serving because we don’t serve for something, we serve from somewhere. Let’s start with Jesus parable in Luke 14:
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““When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not sit down in a place of honor, lest someone more distinguished than you be invited by him, and he who invited you both will come and say to you, ‘Give your place to this person,’ and then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place. But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when your host comes he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.””
‭‭Luke‬ ‭14‬:‭8‬-‭11‬ ‭ESV‬‬
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From what I’ve seen serving in the local body for years is that we have glamorized certain things and we have neglected certain things. Let me unpack that. We have classified serving as what we do on Sunday, and let me drill into that even more, we have elevated and placed value levels on how visible that “task” is. For many years I got caught up in this. A mixture of my orphan heart and my pride made for a deadly mixture of striving. It created jealousy of others and an unrealistic striving and desire to achieve place and status that isn’t for me, or at least isn’t for me now and may never be. I was far from settled in my identity as a son, so serving was something that took place on Sunday morning in a building. While I agree that Sundays are a part of serving, the role on a Sunday morning that any of us might fill is just a small portion of the life of a follower of Christ living out of sonship and daughterhood. Serving out of our sonship and daughterhood means a settling in who God has made us to be and living out if that. As the desire for a microphone to prove my worth has faded, I’ve found myself excited and I’m awe of the fact that I get to encourage and love people. It’s not very visible. There are conversations that nobody will ever see or know about, but it is the joy of my life to get to tell someone what I see in their life and how God has them exactly where they are supposed to be. In my head, it’s trying to help alleviate an unspoken pressure we’ve inadvertently built into this life with Christ that makes us strive. There really is no 5 step plan for any of this. Fox always says “time, seed, and harvest”. Serving out of your sonship or daughterhood means that you find yourself among the people. It means you love and care for people. It is possible to complete a task and care nothing for people, but it is impossible to love and care for people and it not move you. As a son, my worth is not in what I do. There was nothing I did or could do to have earned to be Gods child. He wasn’t looking around going “I need to find some 5 tool players to build my body”. God isn’t blown away by whether I can make sure there is bass in the mix, but God delights in me just as he delights in all of his children , he sings over me just like he does all of His children.
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“The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.”
‭‭Zephaniah‬ ‭3‬:‭17‬ ‭ESV‬‬
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In the context of Zephaniah, this verse is talking to Israel, but we have been added to his family through Christ. God isn’t saying “ok Israelites over here and gentiles over here, now I’m going to rejoice over these Hebrews but you gentiles are just lucky to be here”, no!!! He has grafted us into his family through Christ. Which means whether you’re parking cars, preaching, rocking and praying over babies, faithfully praying for the body, and so on, God is rejoicing over you!!!! One of the most faithful men I’ve ever met is Darrell Caldwell. We probably don’t even realize the amount of fruit that we are living in because of the prayers this man has prayed on our behalf, and most people never even knew. God has blessed the way this man has served the body by laboring in prayer. He’s been a non-anxious presence that has loved people so well.
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Why does it matter to talk about this? It matters because our sonship and daughterhood release us into serving from a place of being accepted and loved, and not into a place of trying to earn acceptance and love on our performance and merit. It releases us to be the body part that God has made us to be and it releases us to celebrate our brothers and sisters as they walk in the revelation of sonship and daughterhood and are released as well. It takes the competition and sibling rivalry out of it. If it’s not built on what I can do vs what you can do, which turns into who does it better, then we can live lives that are settled, so WHEN, not if, when comparison comes knocking, we are so settled in the fact that we are loved and accepted on Christ’s merit, so instead of strife between myself and my siblings, I can be their biggest supporter. Let’s go back to our original verse:
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““When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not sit down in a place of honor, lest someone more distinguished than you be invited by him, and he who invited you both will come and say to you, ‘Give your place to this person,’ and then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place. But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when your host comes he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.””
‭‭Luke‬ ‭14‬:‭8‬-‭11‬ ‭ESV‬‬
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When dad comes and tells someone “friend, move up higher” we can recognize that it is God who promotes and elevates for his glory and his good, not because of how fantastic we performed. It removes the pressure between siblings, because we recognize that every gift comes from God, our place in the family comes from God, and if that’s true for me, the same is true for you brother or sister. This is the perfect place that we get to operate in several different scriptures:
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“for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.”
‭‭Philippians‬ ‭2‬:‭13‬ ‭ESV‬‬
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“Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful.”
‭‭Colossians‬ ‭3‬:‭12‬-‭15‬ ‭ESV‬‬
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“Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good. Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor.”
‭‭Romans‬ ‭12‬:‭9‬-‭10‬ ‭ESV‬‬
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We get to honor each other for the gifts, that God gave us, that are coming out of us, for Gods good will and purpose. This isn’t a competition to be Gods favorite child, this is a collection of people that God joined together for his good will and purpose, and that he has purposed to go into all the world. We get to celebrate when our brother or sister gets to love and serve people out of their gift and grace from God, no matter where they find their feet. After all my feet may only be in the building where the church gathers for 4-5 hours on a given Sunday, which leaves me 164 hours where my feet are elsewhere, just as equipped to love and serve people, right where God has me.
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