Recently, I came across a quote from Donald Whitney that spoke of spiritual disciplines as “ways we can place ourselves in the path of God’s grace and seek him.” It is easy to understand how reading God’s word, spending time in prayer, or regularly attending worship puts in you in the path of God’s grace where we can be expectant of God’s blessings. When it comes to spiritual disciplines, Bible study, prayer, and worship are not only kinds of disciplines that put you line to experience God’s blessings. Other spiritual disciplines include prayer, fasting, study, solitude, journaling, and evangelism.
Another spiritual discipline that often gets overlooked is the discipline of serving. Remember, spiritual disciplines put us in position to experience God’s blessings, but we don’t often speak of serving that way. We speak of serving in your local church or serving in your home or your community as a responsibility toward others, and certainly that is true, but serving is not only about the impact you have on others. When you serve, you receive a blessing.
Within the context of the local church, we encourage serving, but we often overlook service as a spiritual discipline. We speak of serving more as the goal once you have arrived at a certain level of discipleship rather than as a step along the way. But serving in your local church is a cheat code toward spiritual growth. Recently I got an email from someone in our church who is relatively new to their faith with these words, “The absolute BEST thing we ever did was jump into children’s ministry…it is the most basic level to understand as an adult and build on. Not to mention, while teaching the kids, you’re teaching yourself!!! What’s better than that?!?! I don’t think many people see it this way, but it’s so true.”
Service is a step toward spiritual maturity. You don’t need a master’s degree to teach children’s LifeGroups. You need to be willing, and along the way, you will grow. When you figure out how to explain that Jesus is the Son of God to 2nd graders, you are going to understand it better yourself. If you begin to greet guests each Sunday, you will build relationships on the front porch of your church that will open doors for you to pray and be prayed for. If you serve in your church’s AV ministry, you might discover how a well-produced video of your pastor’s sermon is a tool for evangelism and you might understand the message a little better by spending time editing it.
Serving within the church is not a burden, it is a blessing and it puts you in position to experience even more of God’s blessings.
You will find all sorts of reasons why you shouldn’t serve, but most of those reasons are obstacles in the way of the personal growth waiting for you on the other side and obstacles in the way of the blessing you get to be for others. So, get busy.
