So the first call is to serve God, but what exactly does that mean? If we look through the Old Testament, many of the calls to serve God come in the context of serving God in the Temple, or in and through the worship life of Israel. Priests were to serve God by offering the sacrifice. Stone cutters, weavers, goldsmiths and other workers were to serve God by building the Temple and making the items needed for worship. Singers were to serve God by singing and leading the people. So throughout the Old Testament serving God meant being involved in the worship of God and I think it still means the same thing today.
When we talk about serving God the first thing we are talking about is worshipping God, in fact Jesus said we are to worship the Lord our God and serve him only. So serving God begins with worship which is why one of the foundations of the church is corporate worship and we need to commit ourselves to this kind worship. Worship not only connects us to one another it is the beginning of serving God and so it is a priority of what we do as God’s people and just like in the Old Testament where people served God by giving their gifts and talents to worship, the same is true today. Worship needs everyone sharing their gifts and talents. We need people willing to lead in music, we need people willing to pray and work with our children and support the audio and video and we need everyone’s gifts to help support the Temple – of the physical building and grounds where we are able to gather together each week. So we serve God by being committed to the corporate worship life of the church, but we also serve God when we worship in private each and every day. Worship, and therefore serving God, also takes place when we spend time in prayer giving thanks to God and acknowledging his goodness in our lives. It happens when we set aside time to read and reflect on God’s word. Worship and service to God takes place when we stop trusting in ourselves and start trusting in God not just in what we believe but in how we live and how we are willing to give of ourselves.
So service to God is a core value of the church which is expressed in the worship life of the church, but from the very beginning service has not just been directed toward God, we have also been called to serve one another. Let’s go back and look at Deuteronomy 10:12-19. From the very beginning God has called us to love and serve Him by loving and serving those around us by helping them in times of need. It says here that God helps the widows, orphans and strangers by providing food, clothing and justice to those who are in need and God calls us to do the same thing. We are to love those in need the same way God does which means we are to physically and practically serve and help all those who are in need.
Jesus, however, takes this call of God to serve and makes it not just a core value, but a non-negotiable priority for his followers. Look at Matthew 20:26-28. The first thing we see here is that Jesus didn’t come to be served, but to serve and so if we are going to follow Jesus - service has to be at the core of our hearts and lives. We simply can not say we are followers of Jesus and not have service be at the center or our hearts and lives. We are to serve like Jesus, so let’s think for just a moment about how Jesus served. Jesus fed people, he healed people, he forgave people. Jesus offered hospitality to people not by welcoming them into his home because he didn’t have a home, but by welcoming people into his presence and including people as part of his team and family. Jesus served people by offering them hope in the midst of despair many times by calling for justice in the midst of unjust situations. Jesus also served people by saving them, literally rescuing us from sin and death and opening the door to eternal life. As he said, Jesus didn’t come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many and his life has ransomed us.
If we are to follow Jesus then we need to think about serving in all the ways that Jesus served. Jesus set an example of service that needs to be at the very core of our lives and our life together as a church, and Jesus outlines for us some of what that service is to look like. In Matthew 25 Jesus tells the parable of the sheep and the goats and in this parable it he says that we will be judged by how well serve others. Look at Matt. 25:34-41. So we are to feed the hungry, give water to thirsty, welcome and care for strangers, and those who are sick and oppressed, but this is not an exhaustive list – this is just the beginning. I think what Jesus is saying here is that practical and intentional service to others needs to be a core value of his people.
What is interesting is that in the last 20 years or so, serving people has become one of the core values and priorities of our culture. For example, many high schools and colleges now require some kind of community service for graduation. The world is catching up to what the church has known for centuries – service needs to be not just a part of our lives but a guiding principle or a core value of our lives. Serving people needs flow from who we are as people created in the image of God because we worship a God who serves, loves and cares for his people and we follow a savior who came not be served but to serve. So to say it simply – we need to serve God and we need to serve others.
You’ll find in the bulletin some next steps about serving and I hope we will use these ideas to either enter into the world of service or expand the ways in which we already serve. I have to say that one of the blessings of this church is that many of you have worked hard to make service a core value of who we are. We actively serve our community through work at the FaithCentre and food bank. We provide leadership for events like the CropWalk and offer our support for community projects like the day of caring. We also respond in service when we hear God calling –like today, we are providing a picnic for our new neighbors at Beaver Heights and Beaver Farms because we simply heard God calling us to reach out to our neighbors. Like the call of God to his people in the Old Testament, we are reaching out to welcome those who are strangers. We support disaster relief and mission work around the world and when we saw tornados in Alabama or flooding right here in PA, people immediately started talking about ways to help. This is all great - now we just have to keep going and follow through. The Mission trip to Alabama is coming up in October and we need to hear this call of God to serve and set aside some time to do this – or support those who are going to serve
More than all the big events we support like mission trips and the crop walk, I know that many of you serve in quiet ways all the time. We have people serve at the food bank each and every week. And you probably don’t know this because we never really talk about it, but once a month we serve a lunch at the soup kitchen in Bellefonte – teams of people just quietly make it happen. Every week there are teams of people who go to the FaithCentre to sort the mountain of clothes that never seems to go away. We have people who serve in the community through the Red Cross and PAWS and many other community service agencies and we have people who visit those in the nursing home, provide meals for people in need and serve our youth through the 5th Quarter.
What I’d like to ask us all to do is seriously pray about where God may be calling us to serve and then I want to invite you step up and commit yourself to this core value. If God is calling you today to serve in some way that is listed on this sheet, either serving God or serving others, then I want to invite you to check that off, sign your name at the bottom and during the last hymn or after worship come forward and offer that service to God by placing your sheet in the basket. If you check off one of the service opportunities through the church, then we will contact you later this week and help work out the details of getting you involved.
If you hear God calling you to serve in the community in some way and need help getting connected, we have people here who serve at many of these agencies and I know they would love to help you get connected and start serving, so all you need to do is write a note at the bottom saying you want more information about PAWS or the Red Cross or CentreCrest or CVIM and someone will call you.
It’s not enough for us to say that service is important if we don’t go out and serve both God and others, we need to make it a core value of our lives and keep it at the center of our life together as Faith Church. So now, Faith Church, what does the Lord require of us? Only to fear the Lord our God, walk in all his ways, love him and serve the Lord with all our heart and soul and to love and serve others.
