On servanthood

By -
I was meditating on what I learned from the book of Mark a few weeks back. It was on the concept of servanthood as depicted in Mark. In particular, the concept was highlighted in the context of the disciples arguing over leadership and prominence and Jesus told them:
Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many. - Mark 10:43-45
My lecturer told us that in modern day leadership concept, leaders are taught to demand service from their followers while the Bible taught us that the leader needs to learn to serve others first.

Reflecting further, serving whether God or other people, as a spiritual discipline, is not just for those who are casually interested. While Christ's summon to service is the most spiritually grand and noble way to live a life, it is typically as pedestrian as washing someone's feet, according to Don Whitney. We must not be mistaken that serving is an option, because the worshipper of God is expected to serve as part of his worship unto God.

Without dwelling too much into the technical understanding of service, going back to my starting point, I was trying to relate this concept of servanthood to the increasing consumeristic nature of the church goers. It is evident even as I observe people looking at churches as if the church needs to meet their needs first above everything. This may include the need to look for a life partner, the need for intellectual stimulation (I would have condemned my own LG long ago if I need to depend on the church and my group to meet this need), the need for entertainment, the need for friendship etc.

But if let's say, we go back to this concept of servanthood, and everyone is willing to step up to serve one another, then wouldn't everybody's need be met eventually?

Comments

  1. yeu@nn4:47 PM

    Hey thanks bro for sharing this =) After so many years, I still learn something new many times when I read your posts. =)

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Parable of the 'Good Samaritan'

By -
Once there was this man traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among thorns, and the thorns spring up and choked him. And as he went on, he didn’t have money, and he met the Queen of Sheba, and she gave him 1,000 talents of gold and 100 changes of raiment. And he got into a chariot and drove furiously, and when he was driving under a big juniper tree, his hair caught on a limb of that tree, and he hung there many days, and the ravens brought him food to eat and water to drink, and he ate 5,000 loaves of bread and two fishes. One night when he was hanging there asleep, his wife Delilah came along and cut off his hair, and he dropped, and fell on stony ground. But he got up and went on, and it began to rain, and it rained forty days and forty nights, and he hid himself in a cave, and he lived on locust and wild honey. Then he went on ‘til he met a servant who said, “Come, take supper at my house.” And he made an excuse and said, “No, I won’t. I have married a wife, and I c
Read more

Of Teaching and Learning

By -
Image
Over the past two weeks, I was invited to attend a block class on "Learning to Teach." After two weeks of class, here are some reflections that I have. We thank God Bro Casey is a pretty humane teacher... :P  Firstly, teaching needs to meet the changing challenges of the 21st century. This is especially pertinent with all the advancements in technology as well as the worldview changes with the generation today. There is simply no room for the teacher to remain stagnant and not be able to keep up with times so as to engage their students and to facilitate learning. Applying to theological education and Bible school, we have to consider what kind of ministers we are training for the churches in the 21st century. If we are training ministers who are able to engage today’s generation, then we need to review the current methods of teaching and train ministers to be savvy in social media and technology and be able to make use of them in their ministries. Reflecting back on
Read more

Of Exegesis, Wedding Preparation and the Whole Lot of Things: Another Reflection

By -
Image
To those who know what happened, the past months since the start of 2016 had been very stressful to me. In the preparation to my impending wedding this coming October, my future father-in-law decided to throw a few spanners into the wedding preparation by declaring that he was not comfortable with me as a life partner to his daughter because I am a full time Christian worker and more importantly because I come from a different family background from her.  The latter means that there are certain practices in my own family which are unthinkable in his worldview on how a family should function. This led to intense tensions between Angelina and myself. To compound the stress, NT Exegesis class was not that easy also and the stress of meeting the deadlines mean that I sometimes did not have the time to reflect deeper into the situations I was facing in my relationship.  However, studying the text of Philemon 15-20 reminded me of the way we should conduct our relationship in Christ
Read more