A prayer attributed to Saint Francis
“Lord, make us instruments of your peace. Where there is hatred, let us sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is discord, union; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy. Grant that we may not so much seek to be console as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.”
There is great need in the world. Yet it appears that much of the need in the world is ignored or inadequately addressed. So much of the attention and resources of people, communities, organizations, companies, societies, and countries is focused and directed in other directions.
We find a contrast in the nature of God and the pattern of God’s activity in the world, from creation through redemption. We find that God has a passionate and active concern for those in need, for those on the margins of life, for the neglected and the lost. We find that God goes to extraordinary lengths to love and to serve people.
Where do we stand in all of this?
“I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God – what is good and acceptable and perfect.”[1]
There is great need in the world
There are so many needs requiring so many resources and so many people in response. Whether through personal experience, through family or friends, or through awareness of contemporary conditions in this country and other countries, we all are acquainted with many of these needs.
However, the world seems to ignore these needs to a large degree, or to address them inadequately. There may be many reasons why this is the case, but an appraisal of various realities makes it hard to conclude otherwise. Consider where we put our money and other resources, how we spend our time, where we put people in need, how we raise our children, and many other indicators of how we organize and direct our “time, talent, and treasure.”
In view of all of this, the world needs a revolution. For a great many people in the world, the current system is not working.
In fact, the world has had such a revolution. It was a revolution like no other in human history, and the central figure of that revolution wants his followers to live out the revolution. The central figure was Jesus of Nazareth, and his revolution consists of salvation through suffering love. He is molding his followers – the Church – to be the vanguard of his revolution. He wants the Church to be characterized fundamentally and comprehensively by suffering or sacrificial love.
A consideration of God’s nature and his presence in the world up to and including Jesus shows us the revolution that God seeks in the world.
The nature of God and the pattern of God’s activity
Central themes in creation are God’s love and the goodness of creation. The goodness of creation roots in and stems from God’s love and God’s goodness.
However, as we noted, the world is in great need. Creation is fractured, marred, twisted, rebellious. It ought not to be this way – for God did not create people and the world to sin and to suffer – yet it surely is.
In response to the world’s need, the pattern of God’s activity is deep, recurring love for his creatures. This pattern of God’s love and activity constitutes “good news.” It is not sentimental, simplistic good news. The good news of God comes through suffering love. We see it epitomized in the Old Testament in the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 53, and in the New Testament we see it incarnated in Jesus.
While there are many, many threads of God’s good news (which consists of suffering, sacrificial love, and which is incarnated in Jesus) throughout the Old and New Testaments, here is a list of some key texts. Individually and collectively, they make a profoundly spiritual study for us.
- Exodus 22:21-22 (God’s care for the alien, the widow, and the orphan)
- Isaiah 25 (God as a refuge for the poor and needy; and the messianic banquet)
- Isaiah 35 (people made whole in an eschatological vision)
- Isaiah 53 (the Suffering Servant who heals by his sufferings)
- Isaiah 58:6-14 (a holy fast is to overcome injustice, to assist the needy, to keep the Sabbath)
- Isaiah 61:1-4 (to proclaim good news to the oppressed) – see Jesus in Luke 4:16-21
- Matthew 25:31-46 (serving Jesus in “the least of these”)
- Luke 10:25-37 (the good Samaritan)
- Luke 16:19-31 (the rich man and Lazarus)
- Luke 22:14-27 (the Last Supper and the dispute about who would be greatest)
- John 13:1-17 (the Last Supper, footwashing, servanthood)
- Philippians 2:1-11 (encouragement to love and serve because Jesus took the form of a slave)
As
We are to be transformed by the Holy Spirit and empowered by the Holy Spirit.
We are to be transformed into the image of Jesus – imitatio Christi. Our transformation is to be modeled on the example or pattern of Jesus.
We are to be transformed into faithful servants. See John 13:1-17. To paraphrase 1 John 4:19, “We serve because he first served us.”
This is not the status the world seeks or offers, nor is it the transformation intended by the myriad of self-help and self-potential programs that are popular today. Yet faithful servanthood embodies the character and role intended and incarnated for us by Jesus.
Becoming transformed
The question then for us is this: How can we become more like Jesus today than we were yesterday?
There are at least a few fundamental ways whereby we can grow as a community of service, more and more into the image of Jesus.
Growing in servanthood begins and ends in worship and prayer: worship of our loving and life-transforming God; prayer for others; and prayer for ourselves (e.g., for our ability to serve in love, and for our strength to serve faithfully).
In the power of the Spirit, through our prayer and obedience, we can reconceive and reinvent – transform – our regular perspectives and activities into instruments and opportunities of service. Everything we do can be done in service.
We can train our children to be people of service, to be servants. We can provide homes and a church with the servant values of Jesus. We can provide examples of service through our lives, and we can provide opportunities of service through volunteer efforts. We can encourage them to seek relationships, families, and careers built on loving service rather than self-centered competition and self-aggrandizement.
Another way – a possible way – represents more of a strategic option for a local church. This could involve focusing on certain service needs as a congregation or community. As individuals, we would still practice the two fundamental and general or comprehensive ways of service mentioned previously. But a local church could have a strategic focus for congregational service through a particular program or programs.
Conclusion
We have been trying to “paint a picture” of the Church, of what the Church looks like, or should look like. We have been trying to paint this picture because we must ask what kind of people God is creating, what kind of community God is forging. And we must ask so that we can grow more and more into that kind of community.
We know that the Church fundamentally lives in two directions. In one direction we live from God and for God. In another direction we live from other people and for other people. When we are living in God’s Spirit, these two directions are characterized by service. Hence, the Church in the Spirit is a community of service in a truly fundamental and essential sense. It is a servant community.
Consider these statements and petitions from the Litany of Penitence in the Ash Wednesday liturgy of the Book of Common Prayer.
"We have not loved you with our whole heart, and mind, and strength. We have not loved our neighbors as ourselves.
"We have been deaf to your call to serve, as Christ served us. We have not been true to the mind of Christ. We have grieved your Holy Spirit.
"Accept our repentance, Lord, for the wrongs we have done: for our blindness to human need and suffering, and our indifference to injustice and cruelty….
"Accomplish in us the work of your salvation;
That we may show forth your glory in the world.
What would it look like for a church to be known – to God, to the people around it, and to its own people – as a community of service? How would that please God, and how would it bear witness to those who do not know God of the sublime worthiness of God and the inestimable love that he shows us in Jesus and pours into our hearts through the Holy Spirit?
Let us pray for this to occur in our Christian communities. The prayer attributed to Saint Francis marks a good beginning for us.
“Lord, make us instruments of your peace. Where there is hatred, let us sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is discord, union; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy. Grant that we may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.”
[1] Romans 12:1, 2. (All citations from Scripture refer to the New Revised Standard Version, unless otherwise noted.)
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