God is the Center of Service (2)
Service contains many things, but what is important is that God is in it—the important thing is that God is the subject of the service, and He is the center of the service, and He is the goal of the service…
How do I prepare the lesson in the service?
My preparation for the lesson is my preparation of myself, so that God may dwell in it, and I carry God with me and bring Him into the class, and into the hearts and ears…
We do not separate the service from God. We do not say that we have 30 servants, for example, but rather God is the One who performs the service through the servants. And if God is not in these servants, then they are nothing.
- The servant is a person who is “a حامل الله (bearer of God),” who lived with God, and tasted God, and presents this taste to people: “Taste and see that the Lord is good.”
Service is the indwelling of God in the word. This word is transferred with all the power of God within it, from the servant to his listeners. Service reminds me of a beautiful image in the Book of Revelation that gives an idea about service: the scene of Christ in the midst of the seven golden lampstands, which are the seven churches. And in His right hand are seven stars, which are the angels of the seven churches. The right hand of the Lord moves in the service, and you as a servant are inside the right hand of the Lord.
Service is that you pour yourself before God and ask Him to put a word in your mouth to deliver to people. Say to Him: O Lord, I do not know how to speak. Give me a word from You. You are the One who can teach them, make them understand, influence them, and lead them. Lead me then and lead them. Guide me and guide them. I and they are sheep in Your flock; shepherd me and shepherd them. I want to learn with them, from You…
Sin is not مجرد knowledge. It is power and life. And the mistake of Adam and Eve was that they sought the tree of knowledge, not the tree of life… Service is a spiritual life that one person absorbs from another. It is grace working in a person for the sake of another. It is fellowship with the Holy Spirit and fullness of the Spirit. It is love and بذل (giving). And the love that is in you is what serves.
If you do not have love, then you are no longer a servant…
Service is to love people, to love their souls, and to love the Kingdom, which is the delight of people in God, and to share with the Spirit in building the Kingdom. Consecration, then, is a complete longing to work with God. And whoever has this longing, obstacles do not stand before him.
If consecration is a call from God to you, then God who called you is able to solve all your problems and remove the obstacles.
God is the center. He is the subject of the service, its goal, and the One working in it. Service is a حديث about the sweet story of Christ, and the manifestation of God’s love to people, and calling them to His love. Service is that you speak to people about God who loved them and created them, loved them and redeemed them, loved them and watched over their care, and went about among them doing good.
Speak about the beautiful attributes of God in the Scripture. In what do you speak to people as a servant?
Is it in ethics? Or in spiritualities? Or in theology? At what level are you?
Ethics is merely talk about virtue, which can be said by any person. The Stoic philosophers wrote about ethics and were not believers. As for spiritualities, it is a higher level, in which the work of the Spirit enters, not just external behavior. But theology involves God Himself. So when we speak about purity, for example, we do not speak about external righteousness like moralists, but we speak about the indwelling of God in the heart, and the transformation of man into the image of God.
Thus, how do you introduce God into the teaching of every virtue? We leave this subject separately.
Article by His Holiness Pope Shenouda III – Al-Keraza Magazine – Year Eight (Issue Thirty-Six) – 9-9-1977
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