THE JOY OF SERVING GOD
Some may not understand how joyful it can be to serve the Lord. When I say
I joy, I am not talking about mere happiness or laughter, but a way of life.
When you have joy in your heart from being a faithful servant of God, it will
give you stability in your life that produces peace and hope.
Joshua certainly understood how joyful it was to serve God. As he told the people of his day:
Joshua 24:15
"And if it seems evil to you to serve the LORD, choose for yourselves this
day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were
on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land
you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD."
Joshua took great delight in serving God. Early on, he was
chosen to be the leader of the children of
David is another good example of a man who took great joy in serving God and especially worshipping Him. We can see this by his life and by the many praise songs he wrote in the Psalms. For example:
Psalm 21:1 The king
shall have joy in Your strength, O LORD; And in Your salvation how
greatly shall he rejoice!
Psalm 27:6 And now
my head shall be lifted up above my enemies all around me; Therefore I will
offer sacrifices of joy in His tabernacle; I will sing, yes, I will sing
praises to the LORD.
Psalm 32:11 Be glad in the LORD and rejoice, you
righteous; And shout for joy, all you upright in heart!
Psalm 122:1 I was glad when they said to me,
"Let us go into the house of the LORD."
These are just a few verses that express David’s joy in serving God. Notice, he found joy in knowing the strength of God and the salvation that He offers. As Christian, we should be full of joy when we think about all that God has done for us in the past, what He is doing for us today, and what He will do for us in the future. Can you image how life would be if God was not in our lives, or if He had not offered us salvation? It would be a pretty miserable life wouldn’t it?
When it came to David offering up sacrifices, he did not considered as a burden. Instead, he found joy in every opportunity he had to serve God. He understood that everything belonged to God anyway, and he was thankful for the many blessing God had given him.
Since David knew how great God blessings are, he told all the righteous to shout for joy.
As we read in Psalm 122:1, David loved it when it was time to worship God. We should have the same joy today. What can we be more thrilling or more important than coming the house of the Lord and worshiping our Creator? Our primary reason for coming together is to form the body of Christ and to worship God. Unfortunately, some Christians go to church for the social aspect of it. While there is nothing wrong with enjoying family and friends at church it should not be our main reason for going to church.
While we do not offer animal sacrifices to God, the New Testament does talk about some sacrifices that we can make to God.
Hebrews 13:15
Therefore by Him let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to
God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name. 16 But do not forget to do good
and to share, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.
When we sing praises to God and do good to others and share what we have with others it is considered a sacrifice that God is pleased with. We should have no problems as Christians making these kinds of sacrifices. In fact, it should bring us great joy to do what we can for the Lord.
We all know that Jesus is our best example of servitude. As Jesus said:
Matthew 20:28 The Son
of Man did not come to be served, but to serve,
Luke 4:8 'You shall worship the LORD your God, and Him
only you shall serve.' "
Jesus first priority was
to serve the Father, which included serving others because it is the Father’s
will that we serve others. You certainly never read about Jesus complaining
about what the Father asked Him to do nor do you see Him having a negative
attitude about the opportunities He was given to glorify His Father in heaven.
Instead, it was always a joy for Jesus to serve God and others.
If Jesus were like some
of us today, He would tell His Father that He did not have time to heal the
sick today because He to busy because He has to work 40 hrs a week, go the grocery
store and mow the lawn.
Jesus gives a great
description of what the Christian life is all about in:
Luke 17:7
"And which of you, having a servant plowing or tending sheep, will say to
him when he has come in from the field, 'Come at once and sit down to
eat'? 8 "But will he not
rather say to him, 'Prepare something for my supper, and gird yourself and
serve me till I have eaten and drunk, and afterward you will eat and
drink'? 9 "Does he thank
that servant because he did the things that were commanded him? I think
not. 10 "So likewise
you, when you have done all those things which you are commanded, say, 'We are
unprofitable servants. We have done what was our duty to do.' "
Once we choose to become a Christian, we become the Lord’s servants. As Paul tells us in:
Romans 6:16 Do you
not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one's
slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death, or of obedience leading
to righteousness?
We can either serve sin
or serve God. Of course the big difference between the two is one brings
salvation and the other brings eternal condemnation as Paul just pointed out.
Notice what else he says in the next two verses:
Romans 6:17 But God
be thanked that though you were slaves of sin, yet you obeyed from the
heart that form of doctrine to which you were delivered. 18 And having been set free from
sin, you became slaves of righteousness.
Those who have obeyed the
Gospel have a lot to be thankful for because we have beencleansed by the blood
of Christ, and we are no longer a slave to sin. We can know that we have been
saved and have the hope of eternal life in heaven. This is why we see the
Ethiopian Eunuch in Acts 8:39 and the jailor in Acts 16:34 rejoicing after they
had been baptized into Christ for the remission of their sins.
If knowing what
Christianity is all about and how God has made it possible for us to have
salvation does not bring joy to your heart and cause you to want to serve God,
then nothing will. Unfortunately, sometimes Christians lose their joy of
serving God and start viewing everything they do in and out of the church as a
chore instead of seeing it as another opportunity to use their talent for the
Lord.
When Christians get to
the point in their life where it is no longer joyful to serve God, then
something is wrong. As Billy Sunday said:
"If
you have no joy in your religion, there's a leak in your Christianity
somewhere."
A man by the name of
William Gurnall gives a valid reason why some Christians stop finding joy in
serving God:
"The reason why
many poor souls have so little heat of joy in their hearts, is that they have
so little light of Gospel knowledge in their mind.”
The further we distance ourselves from God and His Word, the less joy we will have in serving Him. If we do not make God’s Word part of our life and use it to remind us of His great love for us and how He has given His all for us, then it easy for us to take the blessing He has given us for granted.
If you ever find yourself feeling like serving God is more of obligation than joyful, then you need take a serious look at your life because you are in a bad place in your relationship with God. Serving God in or out of the church should always bring you joy even if you are suffering persecution for the cause of Christ. We can see this happening early on in the church in Acts 5 when the apostles were arrested by the Jewish council and they wanted to put them to do death, but notice what our text says starting in:
Acts 5:34 Then
one in the council stood up, a Pharisee named Gamaliel, a teacher of the law
held in respect by all the people, and commanded them to put the apostles
outside for a little while. 35
And he said to them: "Men of
Even though the apostles
lives were on the line, they did not worry about themselves. Instead, they
rejoiced about serving the cause of God, and they continued to preach the Good
News daily wherever they could. This is the same attitude that we should have
as Christians because there is nothing that should bring us greater joy than
serving God in anyway that we can.
Again, some may struggle
with the idea that serving God can bring about joy, but I read one survey that
said:
“Those who serve are more content and happy
with their life than those who do not serve the Lord and others.”
This survey just proves what the Bible has taught all along, serving God and others is a good thing and it has eternal rewards. Of course the main motivation behind our servitude is love. I am afraid the some view their Christianity as the view the jobs. They don’t really like their job, but they do it anyway because they need the pay check. In the same way some do what God tells them to do, not because they want to, because they just want to go to heaven. If we simply go through the motions of serving others or serving God without love, we are wasting our time. As Paul said:
1 Corinthians 13:1 Though
I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become
sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. 2
And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and
all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains,
but have not love, I am nothing. 3
And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my
body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing.
God has never desired that we serve Him because we feel like we have to. Instead, He wants to find joy in serving Him and others. So, if we are not motivated by our love for God, then as Paul said it profits you nothing. True joy can only be had when it comes from love. We learn all about love from God Himself:
1 John 4:18 There is
no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment.
But he who fears has not been made perfect in love. 19 We love Him because He first
loved us. 20 If someone says,
"I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does
not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not
seen? 21 And this commandment
we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also.
Even if a person has never experienced love, they can read their Bibles and see what love is all about. God has shown His love for us in many ways: He created us and all the beauty we behold on a daily basis, He has been involved in our lives since the day of creation, He created us with free will, He made a plan of salvation for us that we could choose to follow or ignore. One of the greatest expressions of His love came from Him offering up His only begotten Son so that we could have salvation.
Romans 5:8 But God
demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners,
Christ died for us.
We have no valid excuse
of not understanding what true love is all about. Since love motivated God to
give up His Son for salvation, think about what love can motivate you to do for
God and for others.
I want you to think about
your life right now. How do you feel about serving God in the church and
outside the church? Do you still find joy in serving or does is seem like a
burden to you? If it seems like a burden to you, ask yourself why? If you don’t
know for sure, I would suggest that you need to examine your prayer life and
the amount of time you spend in God’s Word. If you are not praying as you
should you may have become more dependent on yourself instead of God. If you
are not studying God’s Word as you should, you could be allowing the world and
its sinful ways to influence you and rob you of your joy of serving the Lord.
If you want to cure your
problem and find joy in serving the Lord, then I would recommend these same two
things. Start praying more and studying God’s Word more. You should pray to God
to help you have more joy in serving Him. When you put God’s Word into your
life on a daily basis, it will serve as constant reminder of all the wonderful
things that God has done for you and the promises He has made. It will help
change your attitude about serving the Lord.
We must all remind
ourselves from time to time about the commitment we made to God when we choose
to become a Christian. Sometimes it is easy for us to take the love of God for
granted and become lazy in our service to God, but we should always strive to
find the passion and the zeal we had for serving Christ when we became a
Christian because we are taught to remain faithful to God until death (Rev.
2:10). The Bible teaches us to persevere, press on to the goal, and to run the
race to win, but we have to have a willing spirit to do this.
So, let us never forget that finding joy in serving God is an essential part of our Christianity because it serves as an antidote to all the despair that surrounds us on a daily basis. Let the joy of serving the Lord be your strength this day and everyday.