We looked yesterday at the idea of the servant as leader and discussed how, for a Christian servant leader, the person that you are primarily serving is Jesus and that all acts of service to others flow from that. I want to think today a bit more about what that means. St Paul often described himself as the servant of Christ (see for example Romans 1.1). The Greek word used for servant is doulos and can mean that the servant is literally a slave. This is different to the Greek word diakonos from which our word deacon comes. The term diakonos means servant or steward, but does not imply the same level of slave like servanthood as doulos.
Paul mainly describes himself as doulos of Christ and the diakonos of the church (see 1 Cor 9.19 and 2 Cor 4.5). For Paul, his serving, or slavery to Christ takes precedence over his service of the church.
It is because Paul is first and foremost servant of Christ that he can serve the church so effectively. For example, because he serves Christ first he is able to rebuke the Corinthian church when it is not conducting itself in a holy manner. He loves the church but recognises that his service to the church has to flow from his love for Jesus. He is not free to decide what shape his service of the church should take and neither is the church. In short, it is all about Jesus.
As church we need to be constantly aware that we are the slaves of Christ and the servants of each other. As church we need to continually ask ourselves whether what we are doing is what Jesus wants us to. Points like these are often made when discussing the situation in churches which are perhaps traditional and have falling numbers in their congregation. But all churches, including modern, charismatic and numerically growing ones are quite capable of doing things that are not centred in Jesus and all churches are ultimately capable of going totally off the rails. All churches need to be constantly praying that they are led by Christ.
For prayer…
Think about Paul; the slave of Christ and the servant of the church. Ask Jesus that you are able to have the same relationship with him and his church.
John Martin-Jones
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