servanthood

Rich Nathan recently preached "A Different Way of Living: Servanthood". In that he offered some thought provoking points.

First; when people are asked to define a Christian, the answers will generally fall into one of four categories:

• Belief; e.g., Christians believe in a Triune God, Christians believe that Jesus died on the cross for salvation, etc..
• Religion; e.g., Christians celebrate such and such a holiday, Christians attend church once a week, etc..
• Political; e.g., Christians vote Republican, Christians are pro-life, etc..
• Negative; e.g., Christians are hypocrites, Christians are rule pushers

This is stands against a proper definition which is those that follow a way of life as taught by Jesus of Nazareth. In Mark 9 and 10, we see that the disciples are following Jesus on "the way". Chapter 10 closes with Jesus healing blind Bartimaeus. In that Jesus tells him to go on his way. Bartimaeus receives his sight and follows Jesus. In Acts 9, Christians are referred to as "the way". Jesus created a way of life.

Everybody follows somebody. All of us make decisions every day about what is important, how to treat people, and what to do with our lives. These decisions come from what we believe about every aspect of our existence. And we got our beliefs from somewhere. We have been formed, every one of us, by this complicated mix of people and places and things. Parents and teachers and artists and scientists and mentors - we are each taking all of these influences and living our lives according to which teachings we have made our own. Some insist that they aren't influenced by any person or any religion, that they think for themselves. And that's an honorable perspective. The problem is they got that perspective from . . . somebody. They're following somebody even if they insist it is themselves they are following. ... Everybody is following somebody. Everybody has faith in something and somebody. We are all believers. - Rob Bell, Velvet Elvis.

Nathan adds;

As a Christian I am trying to orient my way to live a particular kind of way.To be a follower of Jesus is to follow Jesus in the way of life that Jesus taught and modeled. The way of Jesus is different than the way of the world. Our problem is not that we need new political leaders, that we have negative self-talk, or that we have low self-esteem, or that we need to morally improve ourselves. Jesus taught us that our problem is that we are sinners and we need to be forgiven. We are captured by powers that are too big for us and that are too great for us and we need someone else [a hero] to set us free. Jesus came to do for us what we could not do for ourselves. He came to suffer and die to forgive us our sins. Jesus teaches us a different way of salvation than the way of the world. Jesus teaches us a different way of success than the world.

Nathan then notes that in Mark 8, 9 & 10, as Jesus is explaining His sacrifice, the disciples are arguing. Who will be the greatest in chapter 9? Who can sit at your right and left in chapter 10? Interestingly, chapter 10 ends with the healing of blind Bartimaeus. Shortly before Jesus predicts His death in chapter 8, Mark records the healing of the blind man at Bethsaida.

While I believe this is an historic account, I think it is recorded for metaphoric reasons. It's possibly an example of how we can be with Jesus and even follow Him yet still not see clearly. It's amazing how far a man can go, even seemingly following Christ, yet not fully knowing Him. The disciples walked with Him. He's talking about laying down His life. And through this their focus was on which of them was the greatest. They just don't have a clear picture of who He is.

This is how we are. We can go a long way on the road to following Jesus and still be blind to fundamental issues in our lives (Jer 17.9; We all know committed Christians who fall in some deep sin or simple bitterness and gossip, etc.. We speak condescendingly about other believers if they don't hold to some secondary doctrine.

This is not something we can fix ourselves. We need God to come in and heal us of our heart blindness. We need the power of the Holy Spirit to make us sensitive to the big things and to the little things that keep us from seeing Jesus clearly. We need Him to remove the things that cloud our vision.

We, like the disciples, are filled with selfish ambition (Mk 10.37; Jer 45.5). If we could see Christ clearly, we would walk more like Him and count others more significant than ourselves (Phil 2.3).

Bottom line - we are all on our way. Some of us seem to be on the way with Christ. Let none of us be deceived, we need to fix our eyes on Him and by His power see Him more and more clearly if we are to succeed in the journey as He desires.

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