Feb
19
Whose serve is it?
Posted by Champ Thornton at 10:57 amFiled Under blogdom
As a follow-up to yesterday’s post, here’s a good word from John Piper, who writes that God must never be served as though He needed anything.
What is the greatness of our God? What is His uniqueness in the world? Isaiah says, “From of old no one has heard or perceived by ear, no God has seen a God besides Thee, who works for those who wait for Him” (Isa. 64:4). All the other so-called gods make man work for them. Our God will not be put in the position of an employer who must depend on others to make his business go. Instead He magnifies His all-sufficiency by doing the work Himself. Man is the dependent partner in this affair. His job is to wait for the Lord.
“No Help Wanted.” What is God looking for in the world? Assistants? No. The gospel is not a “help wanted” ad. Neither is the call to Christian service. God is not looking for people to work for Him. “The eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show His might in behalf of those who heart is blameless toward Him” (2 Chron. 16:9).
God is not a scout looking for the first draft choices to help his team win. He is an unstoppable fullback ready to run touchdowns for anyone who will give him the ball.
What does God want from us? Not what we might expect. He rebukes Israel for bringing Him so many sacrifices: “I will accept no bull from your house. . . . For every beast of the forest is Mine. . . . If I were hungry, I would not tell you; for the world and all that is in it is Mine” (Ps. 50:9-12).
But isn’t there something we can give to God that won’t belittle Him to the status of beneficiary? Yes. Our anxieties. It’s a command: “Cast all your anxieties on Him” (1 Peter 5:7). God will gladly receive anything from us that shows our dependence and His all-sufficiency.
The difference between Uncle Sam and Jesus Christ is that Uncle Sam won’t enlist you in his service unless you are healthy and Jesus won’t enlist you unless you are sick. “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick; I came not to call the righteous, but sinners” (Mark 2:17). Christianity is fundamentally convalescence. Patients do not serve their physicians. They trust them for good prescriptions. The Sermon on the Mount is our Doctor’s medical advice, not our Employer’s job description.
Our very lives hang on not working for God. “To one who works, his wages are not reckoned as a gift but as his due. And to one who does not work but trust Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is reckoned as righteousness” (Rom. 4:4-5). Workmen get no gifts. They get their due. If we would have the gift of justification, we dare not work. God is the workman in this affair. And what He gets is the glory of being the benefactor of grace, not the beneficiary of service.
Nor should we think that after justification our labor for God begins. Those who make a work out of sanctification cry down the glory of God. Jesus Christ is “our righteousness and sanctification” (1 Cor. 1:30). “Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law, or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun with the Spirit, are you now ending with the flesh?” (Gal. 3:2-3). God was the workman in our justification, and He will be the workman in our sanctification.
Religious “flesh” always wants to work for God. But “if you live according to the flesh you will die” (Rom. 8:13). That is why our very lives hang on not working for God, both in justification and sanctification.
Sometimes Piper sounds like an emerging church advocate in being a bit “over the top” in trying to make a point
He is mixing too many things here. Paul chastised the Galatians for reverting to legalism after coming to salvation by grace. It’s right to condemn an attitude of trying to gain favor with God through our works. It’s right to condemn a works-orientation in salvation in the first place. It’s also right to say God doesn’t actually need anything from us.
It’s wrong, however, to extend that to saying God is not interested in our service. “Every act of grace demands a response”, it has been said. That response is not our of desire to repay, or do seek favor, but out of grateful love. And service of God is a theme throughout the Bible from the OT through the words of Jesus through the words of Paul and James – everything from “choose this day whom you will serve” to “you cannot serve both God and money” to “created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared beforehand” and on.
Our sanctification is absolutely based on the grace of God, but unlike our salvation, involves collaboration between ourselves and God (see Hoekema’s “Saved by Grace” for a good articulation of that).
There is a legalism, a drudgery, a “payback” approach to service that absolutely must be fought. But that doesn’t mean the baby out with the bath water. Service is absolutely central to who we are and what we are called to. In Paul’s words in Romans 6 we are slaves to either sin or righteousness – any way you look at it, we are slaves (servants). Or, in the words of the Bob Dylan song, “You Gotta Serve Somebody”
Hans
Thanks for the comment, Hans. I think we’re saying (or at least you and Piper are saying) the same thing.
It seems like the difference is one of emphasis. You can say, “Dependent service;” or you could say, “Serving dependence.” Perhaps also some people need to hear one emphasis more than the other.
I do believe, however, that service should (must?) follow dependence. Faith precedes works. Yet works (service) must follow (flow from) faith. So, it would seem that if service isn’t happening, perhaps faith (or unbelief, as the case may be) is at the heart of the problem. Thoughts?
Thanks again.