Galatians 5.13-15
“For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ But if you bite and devour one another, watch out that you are not consumed by one another.”
These are important and powerful words. To believe in Jesus is to be liberated and set free. But as Paul says here, it is freedom for a purpose. It is freedom to fulfill the purpose for which God created us. It is not freedom to indulge your passions and impulses; rather, it is freedom to love and serve others.
Christianity is the great transformation. To believe in Jesus is to be changed. In Christ we are moved — we are transformed — from our old sin nature and to our new nature. In this Galatians passage, Paul emphasizes that freedom in Christ has moved us from self-centeredness to service to others. The Lord calls every Christian to have a servant mindset: “Whoever would be great among you must be your servant,” Jesus said, “and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all.”
Jesus himself set the example. “For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Mark 10.45)
Service or selfishness? That’s the battle.
Humility and service is a mindset, and it is something we must build into our lives as we walk with Christ. Apart from the Lord we are naturally self-centered. It is only through a deep connection to Christ and the transforming presence of the Spirit that we renew our minds and learn to serve others before self.
A service mindset is not soft and sentimental. It is not passive and permissive. Throughout scripture the prophets in the OT and apostles in the NT push and admonish and reprimand the people of God. Read Paul’s letters, and he is tough on us, but his motive is always to serve the Lord and to serve the Lord’s people. This should be our mindset in everything we do.
The command to love and serve one another is repeated throughout the Bible. It is an essential element — a core principle — of the Christian walk. It is how God designed all human relationships to function. It is essential for healthy relationships and effective teams, organizations, and societies. So much of life comes down to the attitude we have toward each other and how we treat each other. Look closely at any elite team, and you will find people bound together by uncommon commitment and sacrificial love.
Unfortunately, such relationships are rare. Which is why exceptional companies and elite teams are rare. In this passage, Paul admonishes us to use our freedom in Christ not to serve self, but to love and serve one another. What exactly does this mean? What does it look like in your life?
To serve others means at least three things:
#1: Do your job and fulfill your responsibility
“He served as sales manager for 15 years.”
“Thanks for your many years of service to our community.”
“Hello, my name is Amanda and I will be your server tonight.”
“He served on SEAL Team Six.”
To “serve” means to fulfill a particular role in an organization, on a team, or in a relationship. To serve others means to execute the responsibilities of your job at home and at work because people are counting on you. I fear we have over-spiritualized what it means to have a servant’s heart. We have allowed “serving” to become something fuzzy and soft, when a key element is very straightforward: Do your job.
Remember, as you do your job and fulfill the responsibilities of your role, you are serving the Lord: “Bondservants, obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling, with a sincere heart, as you would Christ, not by the way of eye-service, as people-pleasers, but as bondservants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart, rendering service with a good will as to the Lord and not to man.” (Ephesians 6.5-7)
#2: Seek the best interest of others
This is Paul’s message in Philippians 2: “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.”
This is the great battle, isn’t it? We naturally and easily think of ourselves first. Our habit is to pursue and protect our own interests. In Christ, that selfish attitude is turned around and transformed, and we are admonished to seek the interests of others. This means paying careful attention to the key people in our life, and providing help and support when they need it. But we can’t accomplish that if we are constantly preoccupied with our own agenda, which is why we are told to “look” to the interests of others. You will never see what you aren’t looking for.
#3: Act sacrificially
There are times when serving others means sacrificing for them; that is, giving your time or effort or money in order to help people. When we are motivated by the power of the kind of love that the Lord puts in our heart, we will serve others sacrificially. “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” (Philippians 2.5-8)
This is a high calling. The very same Jesus who emptied himself on our behalf calls us to serve others on his behalf. “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.” (Colossians 3.22-24)
