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My name's Nick. I'm one of the pastors here at Point, and we want to welcome you. Glad that you're here today. Really thankful that we have the opportunity to worship God. I love the song we just sang. It's really just rich that God has given us the breath in our lungs to worship Him. And I was reminded last night I got invited to an ACL late night concert. Probably should not have gone, so if I sound a little raspy, it's because the little secondhand stuff that was floating around. But anyway, needless to say, we'll leave that alone. Interesting experience by far. And to watch people uh worship uh, you know, not God, but worship musicians and worship stuff. We were made for singing. We were made for worship. And it but but God is so honored when we worship him, when he's the object of our worship. And uh and so just really thankful that we get to worship God together this morning. Well, it is a it's an honor to be here every week and worship with you and to celebrate what God's doing. I want to tell you about a couple things. First off, uh, Alex and his team have just led us. I'm so grateful for them, so grateful for how they lead each and every week. He wouldn't tell you this, uh, he's he's too humble to tell you this, um, right, Alex. Uh but this week was a big week for him uh because they actually released an album uh through Austin Stone that he was a big part of. Uh and he sings on most of the songs and wrote most of the songs. And so that was uh a song or a an album called Only Jesus, which is one of the songs we sang second today. And uh really thankful for his gifts. He's a very gifted writer, very gifted musician, and just an honor that we have him every week to lead us in worship, to pastor and shepherd us as a congregation to worship God. And so uh if you it's it's actually an album that was made for families, for kids, but you adults will enjoy it as well. Great songs on there, uh, because some of the songs are recognized that we sing on Sundays here. We don't always tell you that he's written them, but he has written a couple of the songs that we sing on Sundays. And so you can actually go uh online to Austin Stone Worship or to iTunes or to Spotify if you don't want to pay for it. And uh, but but if you want to pay for it and you want to bless Alex, because I think he gets some like two cents out of that, um, you know, you can go and get it there. Uh a couple other things though, uh just to make you aware of, because we've got to move quick this morning. Next Tuesday, not this coming Tuesday, but the next Tuesday, the 18th of October, we have uh a team of people leaving from here going to Indonesia. We'll spend uh 10 days there. My wife and I are going along with uh 12 other people and a baby, and uh we will be over in Indonesia uh for roughly 10 days, and so I just invite you to pray for us. As a congregation, uh Point Community Church, as a family, we say that there's three ways we interact with God's mission, the mission he's given to us. You you can go, uh you can give and help those that are going, or you can pray. Uh we hope you do all three at some point that you would go. And sometimes going means going to your family and sharing the gospel. Sometimes it means going across the street, sharing the gospel. But sometimes if we take Jesus' word seriously when he said we should go to the ends of the earth, uh, we literally will go across the globe. We will get on an airplane, we'll fly to the other part of the world, and we don't take God there, right? He's already there, but we join him in his work there, and we share the gospel. And so we'll be sharing the gospel in Indonesia with Muslims and Hindus uh who are living there. Many of them have never heard the gospel, and so we want to ask that you pray for us. And if you're interested in contributing to that trip, there's still some fundraising going on for that. Uh obviously, it's not a cheap flight and a process uh to go. And so if you want to contribute, you can do that uh above in your above and beyond your normal gifts and stuff that you give to help support the work appoint. We just you can write on there, hey, I would like to support the Indonesia trip, and uh that would be a real blessing to the team as we finish out raising funds for that trip. So that's going on. We leave next Tuesday. Uh in fact, next Sunday night we have a prayer gathering that Harley will mention at the end of service, and we're gonna pray over the team at that prayer gathering next Sunday evening. One other thing is that uh we haven't done this before, but next Sunday in this service, I'm gonna do something that's a little risky. Just go ahead and tell you on the front end, I'm gonna speak on politics. But I'm not gonna speak on politics in the way that you think I'm gonna speak on politics, hopefully. Or maybe you you know our heart here. We're not gonna pump a uh a particular candidate. That's not the goal. But what should we as Christians do? And if you're like me, like right now, I'm just like, Lord Jesus, please give us somebody else. But anyway, I mean just be honest, okay? But here's the thing I'm not here to to talk about, you know, who you should vote for or whatever. I want us to say, what does Jesus say about politics and how should we as the church engage in that? Should we engage in that? So next Sunday morning, right here, uh I encourage you to come and to pray with us for our country. Because that is one thing we know for sure we can do is pray. And we can call on God, and we can know that God will hear us, and we can know that we can just trust in his sovereignty in the midst of the chaos and confusion and even depression uh that's come a little bit as we look at the craziness of our political system. So, that being said, um, we are wrapping up this series called Come to the Table Today. And so we're glad that you get to be here for the last Sunday of this series. Uh just so you can sort of be caught up to speed. Uh we've we've we've called the series Come to the Table, but it's really all about community uh because in the scripture we find that there's a lot of eating that takes place, a lot of tables where people join together and they experience God's goodness. We said the first week that food and eating is a reminder of God's provision, both physically, because we eat and we go, God provided that food for us. It's also a remind us of a reminder of his spiritual provision, that God has provided for us and not just our physical needs, but our spiritual needs, and that the the people of Israel, God's holy people, his chosen people, that were set apart uh as this nation of people who were to declare God's glory, they were given instructions to feast, to party, to celebrate, and to remember. One of the most uh probably well-known, of course, was the Passover mill, and we're gonna talk about that here in a second, uh, where they would they would celebrate uh God's saving them from the slavery in Egypt. And so that being said, um, we've been talking through the series about how we are called to connect in deep, meaningful relationships in community with one another. We hope that point is a place uh that you can come and you can connect below the surface. You don't just say, How are you doing? Fine, fine, fine, and then you just kind of move on. Uh, but that you literally have friends who know you and you know them and you're in their lives, and you're able to talk about what's really going on and what you really need in your life and be able to pray for and encourage one another. And we talked about how that we experience grace at the table. None of us belong at the table on our own merit, but by God's grace, he's invited us. Jesus has provided the uh the sacrifice, the price, he paid the price for the ticket so we could get in and be at the table and experience his goodness and his grace. And we talked last week about something a little bit challenging, which was having hard conversations at the table. Sometimes we have to have discussions that aren't easy. We have to say hard things, or we have to receive hard things at the table. But in community, because we love each other, we love God, and we're committed to one another, we can say those hard things with grace, and we can see growth. And that's the goal, is to mature and to grow up into who God's calls to be. Today we're gonna look at how we can serve at the table. How we can serve at the table. And I was thinking about this yesterday. We actually had a birthday party at our house for a couple of our girls, and we were in the backyard, and one of our friends came over and they brought their lab puppy. Uh I'm I'm like super jealous, and so I'm having to repent of that because I like I really want a lab puppy, and this is a cute little puppy. But that said, it spurred in my mind a time when I was served in a way that was really profound and kind of surprised me. Now, let me tell you a brief story. We actually had a lab at one point, and uh this was kind of what did that lab in for us. Um we uh we had this lab, and she was white, she was beautiful, her name was Jenny. We had her at our house, and some of our friends, we were going out of town, and we asked some of our friends, would you watch our dog while we go out of town? And so they did, and actually a couple of them tag teamed and we were taking care of the dog. And we got a phone call the day before we came home, and he said, the the man who was watching, he said, uh, man, I I went to your house to go take care of your dog, and I don't know what was going on or what happened, but your house is destroyed. Like the inside of your house is a total mess. He's like, I don't know if somebody broke in. It's like I I don't know what happened. And come to find out, one of the other people who was watching this dog with with us or for us, uh, she had accidentally left the back door just slightly open, and a storm hit, and so the dog busted through to get inside the house. She stayed out in the backyard, and she destroyed the house. Like she went all over the place looking for us. And she was an 85-pound lab, so she could do some damage. She got up in the beds, like rolled around and stuff. Uh, she got into our kids' diaper pails, shredded diapers all over the place. She got in the kitchen, she got her paws up on the counter, got mud all over the counter. I mean, she just made a total wreck of the house. She would go outside and use the restroom and come back in and destroy, uh, just over and over. So he gets there and he's just like, I don't know what in the world's wrong with your house, but and he figures it out. And so we get home, we're expecting like a total mess. And these guys had cleaned our house. They'd cleaned up all the mess for us. And so we walked into a house that was clean. And I remember thinking, like, man, they didn't have to do that. I mean, I'm glad they did, but they didn't have to do that, right? And so they just totally served us and surprised us. It was a simple act of service, but it meant a lot, especially coming home from a trip. The last thing we do is walk into a house that's just a total mess, right? Now, Jenny had to go find another home after that, but we we had this act of service, and it was such a blessing, it was such a gift. Well, you know, the thing is that serving really is a powerful way to demonstrate love and to care for others and to minister to others. And so we were ministered to in that way, and I'm sure all of you could think of an instance where someone has surprised you with an act of service, right? I'm sure all of you wives in the room would say, This week your husband surprised you with an act of service, right? This creates some awkwardness for a second. Okay. All right. So here's the deal. We want to serve each other. We want to be able to be a blessing to one another. We want to serve, but I want you to know that when we talk about coming to the table, the community of God's people, that we are invited to a place where we not only get our needs met, but we also meet the needs of others. Another way to say that is we don't only come to church and to the community of people we call the church, because the church is not a building and it's not a worship service on Sunday. It's a community, it's a collection of people, right? Or who we call ourselves a family. We don't come just to be served, but to become a servant. We don't just come to be served, but we actually come to become a servant. Now, I'm I'm sure most growth strategist people would say, well, you don't tell people like, come and serve, right? You if you want to grow a church, tell people to come be served. But I want us to understand that as a church, if we're going to be the church God's called us to be, we all have a part to play. We all participate. It's an all-play kind of thing. And so we as people, we come to the church, and yes, we will get served. In fact, if you're a guest here, we want to say that we hope you feel served. We hope that we host you well, we hope that you feel cared for, we hope that you feel warmly welcomed, all those things. We want you to be served. We also feel that if you're an unbeliever, if you've never put your trust in Christ, maybe you're exploring faith, maybe you're even anti-this Christian thing, but somebody drug you along today. We hope you know that we're here to serve you. We want to serve you, we want to bless you. We want you to feel like it's a safe place to not be okay. It's a safe place to ask questions, it's a safe place to just explore this thing called Christianity, the Bible, Jesus. What is this all about? We hope you feel served in that. But if you're a Christian, a believer, and this is your home church, and if you are a regular tender or member here, the hope is that you move from just being served to serving, to contributing, to ministering to. We like to say that we're not just consumers of a product, we're contributors to the mission. And we want to be that kind of a community because we believe, and I'll make this case for you today, that this is what Jesus has called us to is to serving one another. And so we want to be in that community. I want how many of you guys like to go eat really good food at really good restaurants? I love good food, right? We're Americans for crying out loud. We love food. We like to go get, and you know, if if you go to a restaurant and they serve you poorly, man, you let people know about it, right? Because you've paid money and you've like, you've gone, you've spent the money, you've spent the time, you go there and you expect good service. Now I love going to good restaurants. I love eating good food and uh and having really good service. And it's beautiful because you can walk in, you can eat, and you can leave. You don't have to do the dishes, right? You don't have to clean up the mess, because I like to cook, but I don't like to clean it up after I'm done. But it's a it's a beautiful thing. But I want you to understand that the church is not a restaurant. It's more like a family meal. And if I go to a family meal when I show up, we might eat good food, but I'm gonna play a part in that, right? I'm gonna help set the table. I'm gonna help prepare and take stuff to the table. I'm gonna, after this meal's over, I'm gonna help clean it up. Or my mom's like, you don't want to do the dishes, Jack, right? So it's like this is part of a family meal. We we can we contribute, we participate. The church is a place like that. We don't just come and eat the meal and walk away and say, hey, we we put our money in the offering plate. That was like the tip, you know, or whatever. And we we got our we got our goods and services and now we move on. No, as a people, and I'm doing I'm talking about the the believers in the room who've put your trust in Christ, you're a child of God, you have salvation, you have something to contribute. You have something to contribute to this family, to the table experience. We're called to serve. And I don't think there's any better place we can learn to serve at the table than looking at Jesus serving at the table at the Passover meal, at the Last Supper, the moment when he's on the cusp of the cross. He's right there, he's ready to cross over and experience the most horrific, heinous act that's ever happened when a innocent man, sinless man, experiences a brutal death on a cross for us. And in that moment, he does something that's really amazing. And so, John chapter 13, if you have your Bible, I want you to go there and we're gonna read this and make some just notes and observations from the text, and then we're gonna talk about just a couple things on the back end today, um, and how we can move from just coming, uh experiencing all the benefits without giving anything to. We want to learn and grow uh in that. So I pray I pray that God would use this in my heart today to grow me in my service and you as well. Here we go. John chapter 13. It's on the screen if you need it. There's also some Bibles under the seats. Before the Passover festival, Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world to the Father. By the way, Jesus was not surprised by the cross. You guys know that? He had a mission, he knew that was gonna happen to him, and he came and he did it anyway. So he knows he's gonna die. He knows this is happening. Having loved his own, who were in the world, the disciples, he loved them to the end. I love that. Jesus didn't just start with them, he started and finished with them, he finished strong with them. Now they deserted him, but he he loved them well. Now, by the time of supper, the devil had already put it into the heart of Judas, Simon, Iscariot's son, to betray him. That makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up a little bit. That this idea that the devil is messing with Judas, of course, in this betrayal that's about to happen. That's just a weird, a weird thought. We're not going to go there in depth at all, but just an interesting thought. Jesus knew that the father had given him, catch this. Jesus knew that the father had given everything into his hands, and that he had come from God, and that he was going back to God. Jesus was completely secure. Right? Jesus was secure in his father's love and in the sovereign plan that was unfolding before him. Jesus was completely secure. And notice what happens out of that security. So he got up from supper, he laid aside his robe, he took a towel, and he tied it around himself. Next, he poured water into a basin and he began to wash his disciples' feet and to dry them with the towel tied around him. Now let me say a couple of things here. If you've been in church at all, or if you've heard this passage taught at all, if you've read this passage before, uh you you already, without even understanding the culture, understand this is this is pretty significant, right? That Jesus is washing their stinky feet. For those of those, we just gave away these Jesus storybook Bibles to these parents and the parent child dedication. One of our kids' favorite stories is the story of the stinky feet in the in the uh the Bible, and it talks about this very story because these guys, I mean, back then they all wore Chacos, right? And so they all had these stinky feet, they were exposed to the nastiness, they were exposed to the stuff that was on the streets, their sewage system wasn't as great back then. They had a lot of livestock roaming around. So you get the point. When they they showed up, their feet smelled, all right? Think eighth grader, uh, but add some stuff to it, right? Um so here's the thing: these these these feet were nasty, covered with the nastiness of the world that they lived in and walked around in every day. And this task of washing feet, if you were in a uh a poor home or a just sort of an even an average home, you didn't have servants. And so it was your responsibility to wash your own feet, right? It was your responsibility to make sure your feet were clean because you were reclining at the table, is what it tells us. So those feet were near somebody's face while they're trying to eat their food, which just doesn't sound great at all, not very appetizing. But here's the thing you you washed your own feet. If you were in a wealthier environment, then they would have servants, and the lowest of low servants would wash the feet. But here's the thing: uh even in that environment, they wouldn't let the Jewish servants do this because uh unless they were, you know, either getting reprimanded or there was some sort of they were really trying to impress them because they didn't want these guys to be unclean, and there was all this stuff that would make them defiled and unclean. So, I mean, this is a task for the lowest of low in the totem pole, and probably for a Gentile, not a Jew, because they wanted to make sure and stay clean, and this was definitely not a clean job. You tracking? And here in this moment is Jesus. We're talking about King Jesus, the one we just sang about, only Jesus, is taking up a towel, and he's got a basin of water, and he's washing these nasty feet. Again, without even understanding the culture, we see how profound this is. But when you understand even more of what was going on, it's like, wow. Like Jesus? I mean, the last thing you would see is a rabbi washing his disciples' feet. The disciples wouldn't even wash the rabbi's feet. And here's this Jesus, this amazing Jesus, Son of God Jesus, washing his disciples' feet. I've heard this story so much that sometimes I just read them like, oh yeah, I remember Jesus washed his disciples' feet. Think about that. God made flesh humbly serving his disciples by rubbing their feet with a rag and washing their feet clean. Profound, huge. More we could say about that, but let's move on. He comes to Simon Peter. We love Simon Peter, don't we? He always brings comic relief and also makes us all feel better about ourselves. He says this. He says he came to Simon Peter who asked him, Lord, are you gonna wash my feet? Now he he says this really with indignance and like, uh uh, you're not gonna wash my feet, kind of that way. And we know that because what Jesus says, he says, What I'm doing, you don't understand now, but afterward you will know. That that is that is a scripture I feel like I live every day. God, how many times do I have to trust you and what you say is true, and I'm gonna obey you, and later I'll understand? Like there's so many times in our lives we don't understand, but we act in obedience because we know God's true, we know he's right, we know his ways are good, we do it, and later he shows us why. Man, if we don't learn to act when we don't know, like the whole thing, if we don't learn to act in obedience, in spite of the fact we may not see that the end result, we'll miss out on so much God has for us. We have to step out in faith sometimes, don't we? God calls us to do something, and he says, you know, I just think what what Jesus was doing in that moment, Peter didn't get it, but Jesus said, You will get it. And it's a good word for me, it's a good word for you today. Remember, Jesus knows what he's talking about. God's word is true. You can you can take it to the bank. It's it's going to deliver the promises that are there. So he goes on, and Peter, of course, says, No way. He says, You're not gonna wash my feet. Never are you gonna wash my feet, right? And Jesus replies to him, If I don't wash you, you have no part with me. Whoa. Okay, wow. Like this is strong, Peter. You better humble yourself, right? You better back down. I mean, previously Peter's made the confession that Jesus is the Christ, and the next moment he's saying, I'm not gonna let anybody hurt you, and Jesus calls him the devil, right? Calls him, calls him Satan, get behind me, in a sense. And so we we see here that it says uh Jesus says, If you don't wash, if I don't wash you, you don't have any part with me. And there's a lot of pieces this this conversation, this picture we're not gonna talk about today. But I want to continue to lean on this issue of serving. Simon Peter said to him, Lord, not only my feet, but also my hands and my head. So now he's like, all in. Hey, heck, if you're down there, go ahead and just wash all of me. Jesus, this is great. Might as well take full advantage of this bath I'm gonna get, right? And and so you can just see the humor of this, and you again watching. Peter as this unfolds. And so Jesus, of course, corrects him again, saying, One who's bathed, and we hope Peter's bathed, all right? One who has bathed doesn't need to wash anything except his feet, but he's completely clean. You're clean, but not all of you. Now he's kind of changed it from just an external cleanliness to an internal cleanliness because the next verse says, For he knew who would betray him. That is why he said, You are not all clean. And who's that? That's Judas. Now, what's really profound, think about this. Jesus is washing the feet of a man who's about to turn his back on him. Not just turn his back on him, but to stick a knife in his back and twist it and betray him and turn him over to the authority so that he'll go to the cross. Judas is in the room. And yet Jesus is still doing what? Loving him, serving him.

unknown 22:48

Man.

SPEAKER_00 22:49

Is that convicting anybody? You think about the people, well, Jesus, I'll serve the people I like and I love. But if you make me serve people that I don't like, people that are not like me, the people that are my enemies, now that's a whole nother ballgame, right? I mean, really, in many, this is just an incredible example of what service looks like in the face of the fact that this guy is a betrayer, and Jesus knows it. He's calling it out. Now, when Jesus had washed their feet, he put on his robe, he reclined again, and he said, catch these words. Do you know what I have done for you? And of course they don't fully know. But they understand like he's done something really incredible to stoop to that level. You call me teacher and Lord, and this is well said, for I am. So if I, your Lord and teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have given you an example that you should also do, just as I have done for you. I assure you, a slave is not greater than his master, and a messenger is not greater than the one who sent him. If you do these things, catch this, if you do these things, you are blessed if you do them. Serving like Jesus brings blessing. Serving like Jesus is gonna bring a blessing. That's what he says. If you do these things. So when I look at this passage, again, there's so much that we can't even get into this morning. It's just full of great truths about who Jesus is and what he's done. But this incredible scene, we see the puzzled, the puzzled look on the disciples, or we hear it in their tongue. We we can imagine what they had to have felt as Jesus was doing this. But this was not the first time they were puzzled by Jesus. I mean, they're puzzled a lot. He would tell these parables and they're like, hey, Jesus, what do you mean by that, right? They're trying to figure him out. They're trying to understand what he's doing. Once again, he's doing something, and they're like puzzled. And again, as I said earlier, much of the Christian life is spent trusting Jesus now and understanding later. But we know that Jesus in this moment is our example of what it looks like to come to the table and serve. At a very surface level, let's not miss that. That Jesus comes to the table and he serves. And he says to them, just as I have done for you, now what? Go and do likewise. I have set an example for you. I am showing you what it looks like to be my follower. We are called to be Christians, right? We'd say Christian, but think about it. It's Christian because we're trying to be little Christ. We're trying to look like our Savior, our Lord, our Master Jesus. We ought to look, and I can tell you with 100% certainty that we look most like Jesus when we're serving. We look most like the Christ that we see in Scripture when we are serving selflessly, humbly, even joyfully. We look like Jesus. When we're serving our enemies, when we're serving the least of these, when we are serving our spouse who's just been a jerk, we are serving like Jesus. When we serve a boss who is of total pain, we are serving like Jesus. And we look like him. We're never going to be Jesus. Our job is not to be Jesus, but our job is to follow Jesus and to mimic him. It's to follow his example, to live like he lived. Like John says, that we would walk as Jesus walks. If we're a Christian, that should be our desire to grow increasing measure day by day in maturity, to look more and more like Christ. And one of the greatest ways we do that is through serving. But I want you to notice when we look at Jesus as an example of service, just this verse that stuck out to me so strongly when it says, so he got up. This is verse 4. So he got up. For you and for me, maybe one of the greatest challenges we have in serving is getting up. And I'm going to talk about getting out of bed, though it may be getting out of bed. But getting up, getting up from a place of comfort. He just settled in. They just settled in. They're ready to eat the meal. And he gets up. You guys ever have this issue at your house when you get a meal all served and ready, and it's like, oh, we forgot something. Who's going to get it? I'm like, this is why I have six kids. All right. You guys, somebody go get the silverware, go get the napkins, right? That's the dad thing to do. Now I try to model for them. I'll get it. Just settled in. But Jesus got up. He got up from his place of comfort. I mean, think about this. Jesus is on the eve of the crucifixion. He knows it. It's not a surprise to him. If you and I are facing hardship, if we're facing difficulty, we know it's coming. Who are you thinking about? I'm thinking about myself. I'm thinking about what I'm going to have to go through. I'm thinking about the pain, the hardship, the difficulty. I'm thinking somebody else should serve me, right? And Jesus is totally opposite in this moment. He is completely opposite. He does not wait to be served. He actually gets up and he serves. He gets up. But notice what else he does? He takes off his outer garments. He takes off his robe. Now, maybe he didn't want to get them dirty on the stinky feet. Maybe it just was helpful to be, you know, have his hands free a little bit, but he takes off his robe. He takes off this outer garment and he prepares himself to serve. And in one sense, I was thinking that, again, metaphorically, you really think about how that we have to take off the things that sometimes are holding us back from serving. We have to take those things off. I don't want to misuse or abuse this text in any way, but I do think that in our lives there are things that are keeping us from serving. And one of them is, again, comfort because we don't want to get up. But then once we even get up, we have all these reasons, we have all these excuses, we have all these things that are holding us back from serving. But God, you know I don't have any time. But God, you know I don't have any money. But God, you know that I've got crazy stuff going on in my life. I don't have time and I don't have emotional capacity to help anybody else right now, God. And that reminds me of this story of the Good Samaritan. You guys know the story, right? It's one of the most famous stories Jesus tells when this young law giver, law follower is talking to him about what's the most important thing, and Jesus, of course, says, you know, to love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your mind, with all your soul, with all your strength. Love your neighbor as yourself. And this guy wants to justify himself, and he says, Who's my neighbor? Right? And in that moment, Jesus tells this story of a good Samaritan. And what's always stood out to me, especially because I'm I'm a pastor, uh, which means I'm a person just like you. I just have this position where God's called me by his grace and his goodness to be a part of leading the church, and so I'm no better than you. I'm not I'm not gonna get a free pass from sin card, right? But I listened to that story, and the first two that pass by this guy in need in the ditch are the pastor and the worship leader. If anybody knew that they should serve others, you would think it'd be the leaders in the church, right? What I'm telling you is that just because we see needs doesn't mean that we move towards those needs or meet those needs. And there's reasons. Sometimes there's fear, there's sometimes anxiety, there's sometimes concern, sometimes it's just flat out self-centeredness. This is going to infringe on my time. This is going to infringe on my space. And in that moment, Jesus, again, he shows us, he takes off his outer garment, he makes himself vulnerable. And what does he do? He then takes up a towel. He takes up a towel, he takes up a towel, and he takes a basin, and he starts washing. He takes these instruments that are there in front of these tools, these resources that are there to wash the feet. And again, I don't want to misuse this, but to understand that God does give us the resources we need to accomplish his work. He does give us the resources to serve others. This is not a sermon on generosity, but I want you to understand a principle that's very important if we're ever going to become generous people. If we're ever going to use the resources we've been given to serve and bless others. And that's this that the psalmist says, the earth is the Lord's and everything in it. The earth is the Lord's and everything in it. That means everything, guys. It doesn't mean some stuff, it means everything. That means your house, your cars, your clothes. It also means the things like your talents, your abilities, you, your body, was given by God. It is the Lord's. It ultimately belongs to him. And if you're a Christ follower, even though in 1 Corinthians 6, different context, but even says that our bodies were bought with a price and we belong to him, and therefore we should honor him with our body, right? But here's the point: if the earth is the Lord's and everything in it, then God has given us everything we have for his purposes ultimately. For his glory, for his service, for us to use those things to bless others. And some of us in this room are like, no, it's my stuff. I mean, we have this conversation with my kids all the time. Every, well, 200 times a day at least. I mean, I think I had it 200 times yesterday, where my son is like, it's mine. You can't play with it. And I go over there and I look him in the eyes and I say, Who owns this stuff? I do. Like, no, who owns this stuff? God does. God owns it. It belongs to God. He gives it to you, he lets you share it. He lets you, he shares it with you, and you get to share it with others. Huge principle. But I have the same problem. There's times where I don't want my stuff to be used to bless others, to serve others. And that's that's a that's a hard problem. We got to see God as the owner, and we can serve others. Jesus takes up the tools. We have to take up the tools. You guys in this room, many of you have been given talents, abilities, resources. Maybe uh God's blessed you in your work, and you've got finances, maybe you've got skill sets, you've got things that you can offer. And the scripture tells us that we have these so that we can build up the body. We can give and serve and bless one another. One of the beautiful things about the early church in Acts is the description where it says that they literally sold their possessions, they brought the proceeds to the apostles, and everyone's needs were met. Now that sounds crazy to us as Americans, right? It does. It doesn't sound like, oh yeah, like let's go sell my stuff and give the money to the church, and then they'll make sure everybody's needs get met. It doesn't sound like a good idea at all. But that's what they did. They were so committed to Jesus and to one another, and they also thought he was coming back, so they're like, we don't really need it if he's coming back. But here's the thing: we have been given the tools, we've been given the resources. In fact, some of you in this room, you've not acknowledged the fact that if you're a Christian, if you're a Christ follower, the Spirit of God lives in you and you have spiritual gifts. Some of you have gifts of teaching, gifts of wisdom, gifts of helps, gifts of giving. You have different spiritual gifts. And in 1 Corinthians 12, Romans 12, and other places, we find that those gifts are for what? To build up the body. So God's giving you tools, He's giving you resources. And Jesus, as our example, he takes these resources that are there. Again, he ultimately we know Jesus owns everything. He takes those simple tools of a towel, takes it up, and he washes the feet of his disciples. My prayer is that we would use what God's given us and be open-handed. Because I can guarantee you this that when you open your hand before God, we've talked about this before, God will use those resources to bless others, and you will be blessed in the process. Okay? We don't bless others so we're like, God, I'm gonna give to others so that you'll give back to me. Okay? But we give to others knowing that God will bless us. Um I can't remember where I very first heard it, but we've said this before on Sunday morning. It's a great reminder. When we are like this with our stuff before God, right? Our closed-handedness, the problem is that obviously God wants to use our stuff, stuff that He's given us as steward to bless others, but nothing can get out to be used to be a blessing to others. But also the problem is nothing can get in. And so God wants to bless us more, and he wants to give us the resources, and we're like, but it's my stuff, God. And we're tight-fisted before God. When we open our hand, we can release those things. God can use those things to uh to help minister to others, but also he can put more in to minister to more people, minister to the needs of others. So it's just a practical way we can remember how God can work in that. In Matthew 20, verse 26, it says this. Um two of the disciples, their mom approached Jesus and they're like, hey Jesus, when you get to heaven, can you make sure my boys are taken care of? Can you make sure they get to have some really good seats? They be near you. And I'm thinking she's she's probably going, if the boys are okay, then I'll be okay. You know, they'll take care of me, right? It's my mom. But she asks this question, and Jesus gives an answer. And he talks about this. He says, It must not be like that among you. He's talked about Gentiles and how that they lord it over, how the leadership lords it over. They try to be the ones in charge and calling the shots and being the great means to be the guy in charge. He says, it's not like that among you. On the contrary, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant. And whoever wants to be first among you must be your slave. As a Christian, as a follower of Jesus, our desire should not be, hey, how can we become great? So everybody looks at us and listens to us and follows our instruction and our commands. But how do we become the servant? Because that's where our true greatness is found. And in fact, he even goes on to say, just as the Son of Man, that would be Jesus, did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many. Jesus models for us what it looks like to truly serve, right? So Jesus is not only our example, he's our sufficiency. Jesus is not only our example to serve, he is our sufficiency to serve. I said a while ago that this job of washing feet was reserved for the lowest of low. You may tell you something else that was reserved for the slaves of Jesus' day. The cross. Crucifixion. Crucifixion was reserved for the lowest class. It wasn't for the wealthy, it wasn't for the ones at the top. They would get in trouble. They could go to jail, they could face trials and things. But whenever you were in the slave class, you could go to the cross. Why is that significant? Because we know that what Jesus is preparing for is the cross. You know, it's one thing to see the story of Jesus watching disciples' feet and really glean some things from it. But when you put it in its context and you understand what Jesus is about to endure, we are reminded of his great love and his great act of service. Jesus is sufficient in that, number one, he motivates us to serve by his own service. The reason I serve, hopefully, is because Jesus has served me. He's served us. Because truthfully, without him, I am a selfish, selfish wretch. My tendency is to only think about me and only think about what makes me comfortable. And when I understand what Jesus has endured to serve me, to love me, it motivates me, it compels me to want to serve. Jesus didn't just take up a towel. He didn't just lay aside his cloak and take up a towel. He didn't just get up from the table there and take off his robe and take up a towel. It says that he, this is Philippians 2, right? He was there on the throne room of heaven. And he gets up. He comes down to the earth and he takes off his royal robe in a sense. And ultimately he was stripped of his clothing. And he takes up not a towel, but a cross. He takes up a cross and he suffers and he is sacrificed in our place because of his great love. You see, because serving, serving is love displayed. Serving is love displayed. Notice what it says at the end of that Matthew 20 passage that I just read to you. The last verse in 28 says, just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a what? A ransom for many. Jesus is love displayed. His love for us is so incredibly great. In fact, John would say it this way: No man has a greater love than this that he would lay down his life for his friend. Jesus gave us the ultimate act of service. Now, when I talk about serving, we talk about this idea of getting up and ministering to the needs of others. Some of us in here are like, yes, I can do that. Let's go do that. Some are like, I can't do that. I'm just struggling. But I want us to understand that with Christ's help, with his motivation, with his spirit at work in us, we can serve. Serving others with pure motives is not natural. Some of you guys, you serve from a place of guilt. In fact, I think many of us serve from a place of guilt. Guilt in that we feel like we've done these bad things and we need to make up for them by serving. Or the church stands up and says, We really need you to serve. Okay, I'll serve. You keep saying it. I know somebody needs to do it. I'll serve. Listen, the goal is not to serve from guilt. The goal is to serve from grace. And we will never move from guilt until grace until we fix our eyes on the grace giver. Until we fix our eyes on the ultimate servant. And we see Jesus and we understand just how he has served us. Are you with me? When we understand how he has served us, we can't help but want to serve others. We can't help but want others to experience the same grace that we have received in Christ. We can't help but want people to know that God doesn't just love them in words but in action. We can't help but want them to see that God is not just this far off, distant God who doesn't really give a rip, who just kind of put this thing in motion and let it fly, but that he is engaged in our lives and it's through one another that we tangibly demonstrate the love of God to one another in serving. It's a beautiful, beautiful thing. That's what the church ought to be about. A place where we don't only come to be served, but to serve. Just like Jesus came not to just be served, but to serve. When we've received salvation, serving is a natural byproduct of that. Some of you in this room, you've never received the gift of salvation. In fact, let's be completely honest, you're still trying to earn your way to heaven, which, by the way, is a hopeless cause. You can't. Can't do enough good things or not do bad things enough to tip the scales in your favor. If you are a human being, you and I are hopelessly lost without Jesus. Are you hearing me? We're hopelessly lost without Jesus. We are devastatingly lost without Jesus. You can't do enough good things. You can't go to church enough, you can't pray enough, you can't be a good husband enough, you can't be a good dad enough. You cannot earn your way to God's grace. It is unmerited, right? And when we understand that God has given us everything in Christ as a free gift, I believe our hearts will be compelled to serve. To serve him and to serve others, to be moved to serve. And so if you've never received the gift of salvation, my goal is not to get you saved so that you'll serve the church. My goal is that you would receive the free gift of salvation. That you would receive this amazing grace offer from our God. And if you're a believer in this room and you're struggling to serve, my guess is that you've taken your eyes off the cross. My guess is that if you're really wrestling and you're having a hard time serving anybody else, it's because you've forgotten that Jesus has served you. And so this morning we need to refix our eyes back on Jesus. We need to say, Jesus, would you help us in this moment? Because right now what I'm thinking about is me. Would you help me think about what you have done? That you are the rescuer, that you are the redeemer, you are the one who sacrificed everything. Listen, I know life is hard. I know some of you in this room, your life has been very difficult this week. But because of Jesus' service, one day that's all gonna come to an end. One day we're going to be with Jesus, and all the pain and suffering you're enduring right now is gonna be over. Amen. Because he served us. It's Philippians 2. He became the ultimate servant. He obeyed his father even to the point of death on the cross so that we could have life. And not just life now, not just a bigger bank account now or a better house now, or but so that we would have eternal life and all the suffering and all the junk that we deal with will be over. And if that doesn't get you excited, then you're probably either not a believer or you have completely lost sight of Jesus. Because Jesus is our Savior, our serving Savior. Let's pray. God, thank you so much for who you are. Thank you so much for your grace. Thank you so much for your mercy. God, would you awaken our hearts? Would you remind us again of your great service? That you love us beyond we can even begin to imagine. And your word tells us that you didn't just tell us you loved us. You didn't just say it, you you acted on it by coming, Jesus, putting on skin and going to the cross. Jesus, I pray you would awaken your church, that we'd be the most serving, gracious people, not because we uh are guilty about it, not because we feel like, oh yeah, somebody's got to do that. But that we would do it because we love you. Because you first loved us. Father, I pray you would call us as your people to be people who love the way that you love, serve the way you serve. I thank you, God, so much for your grace. Thank you that even though we couldn't earn our salvation, we can have it as a free gift through our faith and trust in Jesus' finished work, your perfection, Jesus, and your sacrifice. And thank you also that by your resurrection, your power, we can now walk as servants with that strength that you provide. We love you, and we need you more than we can even begin to understand. We need you. Rescue us, Jesus from shallow lives, from vainglory, from empty, hollow things. God, rescue us. Set us free to serve. To be on mission in this little thing called life that's just a vapor. We love you. I pray so in your name, Jesus. Amen.