Be a Sacrificial Servant

Greetings to you all in the name of Jesus, our precious Lord. Just very thankful for this opportunity to worship the Lord and the beauty of holiness like we were singing. It's just such a good thing. Can everyone hear me? Is the speaker turned up just right or is there any special prayer requests? Let's pray. Stand those that can or want to. Oh God, we pray to you and come to you through your dear son the Lord Jesus Christ this morning and we just express our thankfulness for your mercy, your tender mercies and your kind lovingness and just how you in some miraculous way have brought us to you and you've brought us out of this dark world. Help us to make good decisions that would continue to build up our lives in you and pray that all foolishness and all vanity could be put away from us and that we could be more and more perfected in your image, in your likeness and in your spirit. We just want to lift up these men that different brothers have been reaching out to just pray for conviction on their hearts. James and Tyler, Chris and Jacob and John. Men that are in the world, they might be seeking you but might be in a bad situation. Just show them what their next step is and how they might draw closer to you. Just pray for the continuation of this day that it can be pleasing to you and all things and that we can edify one another and just be a pure spotless light for you. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. Yeah I'd just like to have a little something that would draw our attention to the important things of life. It's not going to be anything new that any of you haven't thought of but I just find some of the things that Jesus taught, I find them refreshing and then I find them challenging and so completely against the nature of man. It seems like we can just learn from them every day. The one I'm speaking of is in Matthew 23. It's that whole concept, that idea of the least becoming the greatest, the last becoming the first, things of that nature. Verse 11 says, but he that is greatest among you shall be your servant and whosoever shall exalt himself shall be amazed and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted. And what had originally got me on that thought was when I was reading Philippians chapter 2 and that's where I intend to read a little more. I believe this would be Philippians chapter 2 especially like verses 6 and 7 would be a pretty prime example of the completeness of that thought in Jesus' own life. I know he was speaking to us in these terms but it was not just some empty talk without anything to back it. It was completely backed with a surrendered life, sacrificial servanthood. I mean anything that you find along those lines Jesus not only taught it but he lived it in his own life. So Philippians chapter 2, I'll read a few verses there starting with verse 1. If there be any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any bowels of mercy, fulfill my joy that ye be like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord and of one mind. Let nothing be done through striving in glory but in lowliness of mind. Let each esteem other better than themselves. Let not every man on his own things but every man also on the things of others. Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus. And then these next verses is what I would think would be the, I mean you can just read through what he did there in the gospels and you can see these verses being fulfilled over and over. Who being in the form of God thought it not, King James uses the word robbery but it's more like thought it not something of pleasure to be called equal with God. I have another version here that makes it a little more clear in my mind. It says though he was God he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. And it seems like that thought gets expressed a lot in when we read through the gospels. There in John when he was teaching the disciples he said that he'll go to his father and then he made this phrase like his father is greater than him. And it just over and over he puts himself at a position of lowliness and of servanthood. He had all the rights of being the son of the creator and being a part of that Godhead. He still became like us and that's just such an encouraging thing for me to see how he reached out to us. So verse 7 says but made himself of no reputation and took upon himself the form of his servant and was made in the likeness of men. And being found in fashion as a man he humbled himself and became obedient unto death even the death of the cross. And then it doesn't um doesn't stop there and leave us without the end of it. It says I'll just read it. Wherefore God also has exalted him highly exalted him and given him a name which is above every name that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow of things in heaven and of things in earth and under the earth and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the father. And there's just so many verses that go with that so many things that Jesus did that just you can just see that the apostle Paul writing this was fully convinced that that Jesus did these things and and so am I I'm fully convinced that he he was not a man of of high reputation he didn't desire that he was he was one that would lead out in servanthood and self-denial. In second Corinthians 8 verse 9 it says for you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ that though he was rich yet for our sakes he became poor that you through his poverty might become rich. And those are that new verses right we've all read them or probably most of us here are very familiar with that but I just want to bring them out this morning in light of uh oh like it seemed like it's something that I needed throughout this week um and then when I came across it it was something like a um a strong reminder or something like a breakthrough you might might say um and I think that's a good thing I think of our um along the lines of of having those kind of moments um it could be called something else like a just such a fresh reminder of of God and what he did and then he teaches us these kind of things and then we're left with making a decision the right way or the wrong way um I when I read it this week I I had just gone through um well I guess I guess it's not wrong to be pretty open about child training and stuff but but still there's things I wouldn't just share all the way but sometimes you get to these places where it's just kind of gets you to where you just don't know don't know sometimes and then then you get these breakthroughs of of uh restoring relationships or or coming through you might say to your child or something like of that nature and I I think God does that with us sometimes where um where if we take the word in our and exercise ourselves in the word and we exercise ourselves in in good servanthood and sacrificial things I think God can have those breakthroughs with us where uh relationships are are restored and relationships are built up between us and him Matthew chapter 20 verse 28 28 says even as the son of man came not to be ministered to but to minister and to give his life a ransom for many Hebrews chapter 2 verse 17 18 says wherefore in all things it behooved him to be made likened to his brethren that he might be a merciful high priest in things pertaining to God to make reconciliation for sins of the people for that he suffered being being tempted he is able to help us that are also tempted now it's a beautiful thing just to think of that the godhead and then the the role that trickles all the way down to humanity and how beautiful it is when those things are just in tune and they're they're understood and they're being worked out in in families they're being worked out in all kinds of relationships that we have um co-workers or um families is what I'm ultimately thinking about is yes uh I guess kind of been on my mind I was as I was reading through this and how he he became um like one of us so he can so he can win all of us back to the father and I think in that way at least to some extent when we're in such a position if we have children and these children are born and just about utter ignorance and and things of of God and they have to be taught and here we are with this responsibility some ways like Jesus is for us and and so we we need to ponder on those things and make them a reality in our lives further down the verse 17 I'll read that yet yea and and if I be offered unto the sacrifice and service of your faith I joy and rejoice with you all for the same cause also do you joy and rejoice with me now let me just read that in a version that's maybe a little more clear um the thought being that there's rejoicing in and having offered like a pleasing off offering to God but I will rejoice if I lose my life pouring it out like a liquid offering to God just like your faithful service is an offering to God that's the phrase that I liked how that our our faithful service like our um self-denial and our not looking every man on his own things but every man and also on the things of others like those things are actually a pleasing offering to God it's um it's a good service there's uh this story I came across too I had I had to look it up again but I um sometime in my past I had remembered this and then I looked it up again uh a story of a sacrificial uh act someone that was in an airplane crash and maybe some of you know about this man um our island williams arlen williams was a passenger on flight um air flight uh 90 going they left uh some airport close to washington dc on a cold winter morning in 1982 they just did not reach altitude because of probably because of ice it was very icy morning came down crashed onto a bridge on 14th street there in washington somewhere of course hit motorists slid off the bridge went into the potomac river and there's this just there it was people were quickly pulling off trying to see what they can do to help and out of the 79 um people aboard 74 of them died um there was a few that escaped and were up on the on the wing of the of the plane quite quick there was a helicopter there with with the rope in the basket and there was this man always passing off the rope to the next person the helicopter made five trips to the land and came back the sixth time for the last and the sixth man but he was he was dead his name was arlen williams and of course like the world does they we need that bridge it's the bridge of arlen williams it's uh there's a monument there but but like he he did this thing that's very profound that's very um self self-sacrificing um it's one of those things that i question myself like i never was in a place like that just exactly what i would do our our first uh our first man wants to we want to live right we want to live and be happy and live live a long life and be prosperous and the lord and and then then we're faced with this moment like is it our life or is it is it ours like these men were strangers to him that he he would hand a robe off to they were just they were all just passengers on a plane and uh you know those those stories are fascinating to me i um i'm challenged by them anyhow i there's there's many more examples i didn't didn't intend to make a long speech on it but just something to draw our minds to to just to realize how how jesus he had all the riches of heaven but he he became poor here on this earth so that we can have that and that's just such a such a that's a greater sacrifice than passing the robe on to the next person if you're drowning in ice water like he he did anything and everything beyond that and and so that's the one that we that we want to be like that's the one that we want to follow we want to we want to take courage in that he let out like that and um just have to think of him as being lord and king yet he he humbled himself that you might say like the day of his establishment of his kingdom or at least kind of how i see it when the day that he rode into jerusalem on his humble animal um you might call it the day of his inauguration how different that is than than the world has that day you know when that day rolls around in january there's this big adu about this new guy gonna now sit on this the throne of his earthly kingdom and and so it's just it's a complete separate separate kingdom it's a separate from this world it's very obvious in his teachings in his lifestyle that it's it's very separate and that's why that's why the kingdoms of that the kings and the kingdoms of that time and the kings and the kingdoms up through age just could not they just could not co-mingle through wicked men and stuff things things didn't seem to co-mingle then after a couple hundred years but that was not how it started out um let us firmly strive after that kingdom so god bless you all feel free to make comments or corrections hello i want to say amen to the message and i guess the point was uh when is it when is it acceptable to make the necessary sacrifice so that someone else may live it seems like a topic that a lot of people have a very big problem with is uh is the discussion of food and when is it when is it acceptable to deny yourself and what is it not what is god willing to allow and if we would actually see the need i don't know if anybody's actually like truly just been starving hungry if we had that last piece of bread in our hand and we saw somebody else next to us dying of hunger or thirst or whatever would we find it acceptable to give it to them or to keep it for ourselves not sure that i'm not sure that there's a whole lot of people in this country that probably has experienced a lot of that kind of like handing the rope off so that someone may live anyways i appreciated the message and pray that god will give us wisdom on how to handle those things in that time i don't really have any comments or anything to add i was just blessed by it brother atlee thank you that i think at the beginning you summed it up well i found it both refreshing and challenging and good to think about how to how to focus on putting putting others first amen thank you brother atlee and um you know that servitude uh the greatest among you is the least i remember a preacher said over 30 years ago the only motivation that we need would be basically second corinthians five or have this not that was prolific second corinthians five of christ constrains us the motivation that jesus loved us and died for us that seems to be the um highest motivation we can have to serve one another you know we don't do it out of our own righteousness but the fact that he loved us and died for us simply asked us to do it is the motivation we need to be a servant and i think of that little song there in galatians 5 seeing fast therefore in the liberty where which christ has made you free and be not tangled again with a yoke of bondage verse 1 then verse 13 for brethren ye have been called unto liberty only use not liberty as occasion to the flesh but by love serve one another the lord be magnified forgive my singing thanks adelaide thanks robert for the song i i thought of a little song too that i a little children's song i don't think we've even taught our children this one i don't know who knows it but it goes j-o-y j-o-y j-o-y must be jesus first and yourself last and others in between no like anyway just thought of that maybe hey well i think about it i kind of uh i was actually just pretty convicted about about the um uh like putting others first like the man that passed on the road i tend to think i would do that because my intentions are to put others first what rob shared there i i i tend to think that i would give my last piece of bread to somebody else because my intentions would be to do that but i don't know what about the wee little things are the much smaller things than those two because i guess i'll just make a confession like you know this morning before these extra tents came it kind of looked like maybe there'd be a limited amount of shade for everybody and i just kind of kind of wanted to make sure i have a good spot that would stay shady and i should have made sure for that for everybody else first oh i just kind of kind of feel like i failed in real small things and how what makes me think that my intentions would carry me through on bigger things uh thanks praise jehovah in the highest all his angels praise proclaim him silent moon and stars on high. Praise him, O ye heavens and heavens, and ye clouds above the sky. Let them praise this dear Jehovah, for his name alone is high. And his land is glorious, exalted, and his land is glorious, exalted, and his land is glorious, exalted, far above the earth and sky. Let them praise this dear Jehovah, they were made at his command. And forever he established, his decree shall ever stand. From the earth, all praise Jehovah, all ye bloody dragons, all, fire, and hail, and snow, and vapor, stormy winds, a-near him fall. Let them praise this dear Jehovah, for his name alone is high. And his land is glorious, exalted, and his land is glorious, exalted, and his land is glorious, exalted, far above the earth and sky. All ye fruitful trees and seeders, all ye hills and mountains high, creeping kings and beasts and cattle, birds that in the heavens fly, kings on earth and all ye people, princes, raiders, judges all. Praise his name, young men and ladies, angels, men and children small. Let them praise this dear Jehovah, for his name alone is high. And his land is glorious, exalted, and his land is glorious, exalted, and his land is glorious, exalted, far above the earth and sky. Jehovah, heavenly Father, sing the angels with them gathered, blessing birds of heaven, such a refuge there was given. God, this world shall never perish, in his holy courts they perish, from all evil things he spares them, in his mighty arms he raises them. Neither life nor death shall ever, from the Lord his children sever, unto them his praise he showeth, and their sorrows all he knoweth. You bring the Lord in joyful numbers, your protector never slumbers, at the will of your defender, every moment of surrender. For he never, for he taketh, on his children their forsaken, with the loving word of Sonny, to preserve them pure and holy.