7: Iam aServant of Christ
Seven
I AM A SERVANT OF CHRIST
In his letter to the Romans, Paul introduces himself as “Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God” (Romans 1:1). In this chapter we will use Paul’s three-part self-description as our topical outline. We will see that:
• we are all servants of Christ Jesus
• we all have a divine calling from God to serve others in a particular role or roles
• we may eventually recognize that within our calling we have been set apart by God for a particular area of focus or specialty
Servants
The word translated servant that Paul used in Romans 1:1 literally means slave. Most of us associate slavery with the way it was practiced in the United States. But slavery in the Roman culture was not nearly as harsh or demeaning. For our understanding, therefore, servant is probably a better rendering of the word overall. We should also remember, however, that although slaves in Roman times were allowed to purchase their freedom, and many did, during the time they were slaves they were actually owned by their masters. In that sense, they were in a position similar to us, as we are “owned” by Christ Jesus.
If Paul begins his self-description by calling himself a servant of Christ, we should ask ourselves what he means by that statement. The answer is that Paul served Christ as he served others in the context of his calling.
It’s easy for us to imagine that in serving others through his ministry, Paul was genuinely serving Christ. But what about the vast majority of us who will never make any portion of our living from direct gospel service? As he goes about his work, can a Christian plumber say, “I am a servant of Christ”? Can a computer programmer, or a chef, or a bookkeeper? Paul gives us the answer to all such questions as he addresses slaves in Colossians 3:22-24.
Slaves, obey in everything those who are your earthly masters, not by way of eye-service, as people-pleasers, but with sincerity of heart, fearing the Lord. Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.
Note the three references to the Lord. The slaves were to work with sincerity, fearing the Lord. They were to work heartily, as for the Lord. And then Paul says, “You are serving the Lord Christ.” The slaves were to serve Christ through serving their masters. Any legitimate vocational pursuit can be pursued in this very same way. Anyone pursuing a calling from God can and should see himself or herself every bit a servant of Christ Jesus as was Paul the apostle.
Sad to say, I think very few Christians see their temporal vocations or professions in this way. They may be conscientious and desirous of doing their best, but they do not see themselves as servants of Christ in their work. They intuitively think only of those in vocational Christian work as serving Christ.
This was true of my own life when I was serving as a young navy officer, and later when I was working in manufacturing. I tried to do the best job I could, but I never thought of myself as serving Christ by serving my country or by serving the customers of my company. In fact, when I was working in industry, I was also serving voluntarily in the Navigators ministry, and it was only when engaged in some ministry activity that I thought of myself as “serving the Lord.”
The goal of this book, with its several answers to the question, “Who am I?”, is to help us find that our true identity is to be found only in Christ in all the various relationships that we have to him. Just as every believer is a saint, so every believer is, like Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus. This certainly includes our identity in the area that, for many people, consumes forty to sixty hours of their week.
What does it look like to serve Christ in the secular workplace? One of my favorite illustrations answering that question is from a retired automobile salesman. He had sold cars most of his adult life. At some point in that career he had trusted Christ as Savior. He said to me, “Before I became a Christian, I sold cars. After I became a Christian, I helped people buy cars.”
This man was telling me that, before becoming a Christian he was not concerned about the desires and needs of the potential buyer, but only about the commission he would receive if he sold the car. Likely he would try to sell more expensive cars because of the larger commission. But after he became a Christian, his primary interest was to help the potential customer find the best car for his needs and his budget. His motivation changed from serving himself to serving his customer. He had learned to serve Christ by serving people. I love this true story because it so beautifully makes the point that we can serve Christ by serving people, even in a business not particularly noted for that attitude.
What about those whose jobs do not bring them into contact with people outside of their work place? Consider, for example, the many office workers who never see anyone who benefits from their company’s products or services. How can these men and women serve Christ by serving people? In seeking to do consistently high quality work, believing that God will bless their efforts, and trusting that God is pleased with their work for the benefit of their company, they are ultimately serving Christ by serving the customers of that company. These are all ways in ways in which Christ is served through our service to others.
We serve Christ by serving people. We may be serving employers, customers, clients, patients, or even co-workers. Whoever it may be that we have an opportunity to serve, whatever our job or profession might be, we should see ourselves first as servants of Christ, and second, as members of our profession or work group.
If you make part of your identity, “I am a servant of Christ,” then at the end of the week, instead of saying, “Thank goodness it’s Friday,” you can say, “This week I had the privilege of serving Christ by serving people.”
As Christians, we really are servants of Christ far more so than we are employees—or for that matter, more so than we are spouses, children, or retirees. Every one of us should have an image in our minds of our real “business card”:
[Your name here]
Servant of Jesus Christ
Called
The second part of Paul’s self-description is that he is “called”—in his particular case, “called to be an apostle.” The verb called is passive, indicating there is someone who performed the calling. Obviously that someone is God, so Paul is saying that he has been called by God to be an apostle.
The Roman slaves to whom Paul likens himself in Romans 1:1 always had a job in the master’s household. The jobs varied from menial tasks to roles of significant responsibility. So when Paul introduces himself as a servant of Christ Jesus, he has in mind his calling—the specific job, or role, assigned to him. We know this because he continues to express himself in terms of his office and role as one called and purchased by God.
People in full-time Christian work today also speak of being called to their ministry. A minister—whether in a church or the mission field or a para-church ministry—should believe with a high level of confidence that he or she has been called by God to that position. I can tell you, for example, when and how God called me to serve with the Navigators.
Of course, ministers today understand that we are not called to be apostles as Paul and the twelve (including Matthias) were. Their calling was unique. God called them to be the founders of the New Testament church and the authors, either directly or indirectly, of all the New Testament. No one today has the authority or the divine guidance that they had. Nevertheless, in a more limited sense ministers are legitimately and actually called by God to his service.
Once again we must ask, “But what about those of us not active in vocational ministry?” Can we say that we are “called” by God to our particular role? For example, can the Christian physician say, “I am in this career because God has called me to it?” I believe the answer is yes, for three essential reasons.
If the Christian who is not a minister cannot claim that God has called him to his role:
1) It strips non-ministerial vocations of the inherent dignity that God endowed them with when he ordained work in the Garden of Eden.
2) It creates a huge group of second-class citizens in the kingdom of God. The Bible does teach that in eternity not all believers will be rewarded to the same degree. However, those distinctions will not be based on what role we were called to serve in, but on how we served in the position to which we were called (e.g., Revelation 22:12, 1 Corinthians 3:14-15).
3) It radically undercuts the concept of God’s providence—his directing and orchestrating of events and circumstances that seem to “point” us in a particular vocational direction. It suggests that calling someone to be a bus driver instead of a pastor, for example, is somehow a lesser expression of God’s perfect wisdom, knowledge, and power. It is not.
At the same time, we can identify at least one common difference in the sense of calling. The call to a non-ministerial vocation typically comes in the form of God’s providential guidance by which he brings together interests, strengths, and opportunities to “open doors” in such a way that walking through them is mostly a matter of wise judgment. In a call to church or para-church ministry, however, there is often present to a more marked degree a subjective element involving the person’s perception of God’s will. It may be something from Scripture that gets one’s attention, or it may be the “still small voice” of a thought in the mind, or perhaps a growing conviction that God is calling one. However the call comes, it must be subjectively evaluated and responded to.
In Psalms 139:16, David said, “in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.” David was saying, “God had a plan for me before I was born, which he will execute day-by-day throughout my life.” What was true of David is true for all of us. God has ordained some to be auto mechanics, some to be teachers, and some to be missionaries, and he will so arrange the circumstances and events of our lives that we will end up in the vocation to which he has called us.
I believe, therefore, that every Christian should have the privilege of saying, “I’ve been called of God to this particular vocation, and I am here to serve Jesus Christ by serving people.” This should be just as true of the custodian at the local elementary school as it is of a world-acclaimed heart surgeon, or a pioneer missionary serving in some remote area of the world. Such thinking can and should give a sense of dignity to our work, whatever it is. It can and should motivate us to do our jobs as best as we can, and give us the perseverance to keep going when the work is difficult or unrewarding.
Finally, in this matter of calling, there is the service of every Christian in the body of Christ. First Peter 4:10 says, “As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace.” Taken in context, Peter is telling us that every believer has a spiritual gift with which to serve in the local church or other ministries. We can think of this as a function or a role to play in the body. Christ has purchased every aspect of our life, and as such we belong to him not only with respect to our life in the larger society, but obviously with respect to our life in the body of Christ. God rules over our lives in each of these spheres.
The idea that each of us has a spiritual gift to use within the body is generally accepted among evangelical Christians, but it is not often emphasized. As a result we have large numbers of “consumer Christians,” people who are not involved beyond Sunday church attendance, and who therefore cannot honestly identify themselves as “servants of Christ Jesus” in the spiritual dimension of their lives. It is beyond the scope of this book to treat this subject in detail, but suffice it to say that all I have said about serving Christ and our calling in the daily workplace applies in principle to the exercise of our spiritual gifts in the body.
Determining one’s spiritual gift typically involves a process of “trying on” different roles such as teaching, administration, hospitality, and mercy. But certainly every Christian, with the possible exception of those who are young or new in the faith, should have the privilege of being able to say, “I know what my spiritual gift is, and by God’s grace, I am able to exercise it.”
Set Apart
The third expression Paul uses to introduce himself is that he is “set apart for the gospel of God.” He could be using this expression simply as a clarification of the word apostle—which would then be true of all the apostles—or he could be using it to emphasize the unique ministry God had given him as an apostle. I think it was the latter, for this reason: Paul was given his understanding of the gospel by direct revelation from Christ (Galatians 1:11-16), and he was given the task of explaining it clearly, as he does in Romans. Most of what we believe about the gospel today, and for that matter, most of what we know about our identity in Christ, comes from the pen of the apostle Paul. So I think Paul viewed his role as an apostle to be one of proclaiming, explaining, and defending the gospel, and that he was set apart for that special purpose.
What is the relevance of this to us today? Just this: someday you may find that you have been set apart by God for a specific task or role beyond the general category of your calling. I joined the Navigators staff in 1955 as a trainee. I assumed that after a year or two I would be sent overseas as a missionary. But after about a year, I was asked to become part of the administrative staff. I spent the next thirty-eight years serving in various administrative roles. So I can say that I was called to be a staff member in the Navigators, and was set apart for administration. During the last fifteen of those thirty-eight years I was spending more and more time in a teaching ministry, until in 1994 I transitioned completely into writing and teaching. Now I would say that I have been set apart specifically to be a Bible teacher within the Navigators.
I have a friend who was called by God to be in the insurance business and who eventually became a top executive in his company. He was the broker for the Navigators property and liability insurance, as well as for the insurance of several other Christian organizations. Some years ago he called together those of us who were responsible for insurance in our respective organizations and urged us to join together to form our own “captive” insurance company, in the same way large companies do. We did this with his coaching and his company’s assistance with the legal and financial issues.
During the first ten years of the new insurance company’s operation, the Navigators saved more than a million dollars, and other organizations the company served had similar results. This concept was so successful that a number of other Christian organizations and churches have now formed a second such company.
My friend retired several years ago, and all the member organizations of our company held a dinner to honor him. Even though I was no longer directly involved, I was invited to give a short talk of appreciation. I used Romans 1:1 as an outline of my talk. I said this man was a servant of Christ whom God had called to be in the insurance industry, and that at the proper time God had set him apart to pioneer the concept of captive insurance companies among Christian organizations. This had all begun many years earlier when, as an insurance executive, he sought to serve Christ by serving the companies that looked to him for their insurance coverage.
Someday you, too, may find that God has set you apart for a more specific purpose. Perhaps it has already happened. I encourage you to see this as part and parcel of your calling in God, and also as a special expression of your service to Christ through serving others.
In closing this chapter, I must note one more reason for referring to ourselves as servants rather than “slaves.” In the Old Testament era, leaders of the people such as Moses, Joshua, and David were called, “Servant of the Lord” (Joshua 14:7, 24:29; Psalms 89:3). The phrase was a title of honor, and we should esteem it in that same way today. Servant is thus an essential part of our identity, an essential part of who we are in Christ Jesus. We are servants of the One who is Lord of lords and King of kings (Revelation 17:14).
I am a servant of Jesus Christ. By God’s grace, I serve him by serving others in the particular role or roles to which, in his providential wisdom, he has called me.