Hello and welcome to the Middletown Baptist Church podcast,
where we are proclaiming the truth to the world.
In this podcast series, we're going to be looking into biblical
words that have great significance to our faith.
The name of this series is called the Word of the Week, where
once a week we will dive deeper into these words that we are
familiar with in Scripture.
So come along with me.
Let's study the Word of the week.
Pastor Josh here.
The word of the week is gift.
We're continuing on in our series looking at the spiritual gifts
listed in Romans chapter 12.
And we started last week looking at the very first gift listed
here in Romans chapter 12.
And that was the gift of prophecy, the gift of proclaiming
the truth of God to those around us.
So the Bible spoke there of those individuals that are supernaturally
gifted to proclaim or to preach the truth of God.
That doesn't mean that everyone that preaches has this gift,
but we know that certainly some individuals are gifted by God
through the Holy Spirit to effectively proclaim the truth boldly
in faith.
And so the Bible goes on to tell us there in that verse In Romans
chapter 12, verse number seven, about the next gift.
And that is in the King James Ministry or service.
The word their ministry literally means to serve, to do things
for other people in the name of God.
And so the Bible says here Romans chapter 12 or Ministry, let
us wait on our ministering.
So basically, what it's saying here is if we're serving, focus on
our service and be patient in that service for the Lord to do it
for the right reasons.
There are many passages of Scripture that speak of this idea
of service.
We go back to our original passage that we started with in 1st
Peter, chapter 4.
1 Peter, chapter 4, verse 10, says, as every man hath received
the gift, even so minister or even so serve the same one to another.
And so the Bible commands us to serve one another as God has gifted
us.
And so this individual that has been gifted in the area of service
is going to naturally have a heart for serving others, naturally
putting themselves behind other people.
This takes a level of humility.
And so it says, even so minister the same one to another
as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.
If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God.
That would speak more to the gift of prophecy or the gift of teaching.
But then it says, let him do it as.
As God has given him the ability.
But then it says, really there in, in that passage, those that are
going to minister.
And so there's going to be people that are going to be proclaiming
the truth of God.
And there's going to be people serving possibly behind the scenes
and not getting noticed, maybe not even getting credit.
And so the Bible says it takes a level of humility to be a servant.
And Jesus gives us that greatest example of the servant in,
in many passages of scripture.
But one that really stands out to me is John 13, when he washed
the disciples feet there right before he would go to the cross,
knowing in in his deity that one fellow there would deny him and
another fellow would betray him.
But yet he still washed their feet and showed that servant heart.
And he even let them know that that was an example for them to follow.
We know that other passages of scripture, like Philippians chapter
two tell us that we should have the same mind as Christ did.
That it says let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ
Jesus, who being in the form of God, found that robbery to be
equal with God, but made himself of no reputation and took
upon him the form of a servant.
So Jesus took the form of the servant.
So therefore as believers we are called to do the same.
And may I remind you that these gifts of the Spirit are not
just for us to look at and say, well, you know what, I have
this gift, so I don't need to think about another gift.
No, even if you're not naturally or supernaturally gifted
in the area of service, all of us are called to look to not only
serve God, but to serve others.
I think of another passage of scripture that really highlights
this truth and that's in the book of Ephesians.
You know, a lot of times in our lives we are willing to serve
those that are easy to serve, or maybe we're even willing to serve
those that love us, which is a great thing, that's a natural thing.
But the Bible tells us to not only serve those that are easy to
serve, not not only to serve those that love us, that care for
us, but we are also to serve people that might be difficult.
We are to serve people that maybe have even wronged us.
And at the end of Ephesians, chapter 4, we see a very interesting
passage.
It's a passage dealing with the idea of putting off the old man
and putting on the new.
So, so getting rid of bad things in our life, getting rid of
the sin in our life, and then replacing that with godliness and
so putting off the old, putting on the new.
Well how do we do that?
Well, we allow the Spirit to take control.
It's not our hard work, it's not effort that allows us to sin
less in our life and to do more godly works.
It's the power of God working through us.
And so it's yielding to the Spirit, it's dying to the flesh.
And so to be a servant, to effectively serve, we must die to
ourselves, to our own desires, to our own wants, and even sometimes
to our own needs.
And so the Bible talks there in Ephesians chapter four about doing
good things in the place of evil.
And he gets to the very end there, Paul does in Ephesians chapter
four.
And he says, and be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving
one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.
And so there's this idea of being tender hearted, being forgiving.
And we know that as the Lord has laid out for us, that we are
to love our enemies, we are to show kindness to them, we are to
forgive, we are to forbear, we are to not necessarily overlook wrongs,
but we are to be willing to serve others that might not be easy
to serve.
And so that's the element of service.
That's the gift of service.
Someone being able to serve even when there's no praise, someone
being able to serve even when there isn't a earthly reward.
We know the Bible tells us that there is a heavenly reward for
that service.
And we know that as we serve, there might even be elements of praise
and there might even be elements of people noticing what
we're doing.
But ultimately we don't do that for people to notice us.
We do that for God to notice.
And ultimately we do that because we are servants of the King.
And so we do that because we love him.
So the way that I would word it is this.
The gift of service is a gift given to us to love love others as
Christ has told us to love others, to serve others as the Lord
has called us to serve others.
And we do that.
We, we love others because we love God.
We serve others because we love God.
And so the service to others is service to God.
And so we go back to Romans chapter 12 and we look at that passage
of Scripture and we see that one of those spiritual gifts is the
gift of service.
And so I would encourage you to think about and to pray about
what areas of service that you can display for the Lord, but also
to others around you.
Remember, the spiritual gifts are not there just for our own sakes,
but actually they're there to edify others, to build up others,
to bring glory to God.
So when we think about service from that perspective, it helps us
out immensely when it comes to those times where we're tempted not
to serve.
And so for those people that are gifted in that area of service,
hey, you know what?
You're.
You're not going to be as challenged as much as maybe some
other people are.
You're going to see the bigger picture.
You're going to understand that it's not about you.
You're going to understand that you don't need the praise.
You're going to be willing to say, hey, whatever I can do, I'm
going to do it.
How can I help you?
How can I lift?
How can I lift someone up?
The word, their service, literally in the Greek, is the word
that we get deacon from.
So, so we have the office of a deacon within the church, and that
that office is there to display service.
And so all of us are called to that area of service in our life,
whether we're gifted in that area or not, Whether we're in the
office of a deacon or not, we are all called to serve.
And so serve God and to serve others.
And so I would encourage you to think about that, pray about that,
and allow yourself to be willing to be challenged by God to
say, you know what, Laura?
Where would you have me to serve you?
Where would you have me to serve within the church?
Where would you have me to serve in my community?
Where would you have me to serve in my family?
Sometimes that's an area that we overlook.
But we.
We think about these areas of service, and then once God recognize,
or once we recognize what God has for us in the area of service,
we then need to be willing to follow.
We then need to be willing to commit and to put ourselves in a
place where we can submit to the Spirit.
Because all of these gifts are manifested by an obedience to the
Spirit, by a yielding to the Spirit.
If we are in our flesh, if we are acting in our flesh and responding
in our flesh, we're not going to be doing the things that honor
God.
We're going to be doing things that honor ourselves.
And so we can have the gift of service, but we serve so that we
can receive, or we serve for ulterior motives.
But when we're acting in the flesh, we are able to serve with
that agape love.
We're able to serve with humility.
We're able to serve with sacrifice.
And that's the exact way that Jesus gave us the example of service
in.
In the word of God.
And so I'm thankful for his service, and I'M thankful for my
opportunities to serve and I hope that you are as well.
Well, next week we're going to come back and we are going to look
at the gift of teaching and I hope that that will be an opportunity
for you to learn more about these gifts and hopefully discern
what gift or gifts that God has blessed you with in your faith.
And so thank you for listening here this week.
I hope that you have a wonderful Christmas and I hope that
you are able to celebrate that wonderful time of the year with family.
And let us celebrate the coming of our Savior, but let us
look forward to his coming again.
Well, we know that God loves us and we're thankful for that love
and I hope that you can rest in that here today.
Well, we'll look toward talking to you next week.
God bless you.
Take care.
We'll see you soon.
Hey, I really appreciate that you listen to the Word of the Week
podcast.
If you have any questions about the podcast or or about our
church, Middletown Baptist Church, you can find more information
about us on Facebook or YouTube or you can find the podcast
on NBCPodcast.org you can contact me directly at Josh Massaro
at middletownbaptistchurch.org stay tuned for future Word of the
Week episodes where we dive deeper into words that impact our
life according to scripture.
Thank you so much.
God bless.
We'll talk to you soon.