Sunday, October 20, LWML Sunday
“Ready to Serve”
Psalm 34:1-8; 1 Samuel 3:1-10; Philippians 2:5-11; Luke 1:26-38
Divine Service IV with Holy Communion
Hymns: #589 “Speak O Lord, Your Servant Listens”; “Serve the Lord with Gladness”; #934 “My Soul Now Magnifies the Lord”; #920 “Forth In the Peace of Christ We Go”
Dear Friends in Christ,
Grace, mercy, and peace to you, from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus, and from the Holy Spirit working in power in the world. Amen.
How’s your attitude? My mother used to look at me, with that look of hers, and say, “Sounds like somebody needs an attitude adjustment.” She was always right about that, too!
St. Paul, in Philippians 2, is also calling the people of the Philippian Church – and us, by extension - to adjust their attitudes. An ‘attitude’, by definition, is “a disposition, position, posture, or orientation.” The word comes originally from the world of art, where an ‘attitude’ is the position in which a painter chooses to place a particular object in a painting. In a good painting, the ‘attitude’ of the trees or objects in the foreground should draw the viewer’s eyes into details in the background.
‘Attitude’ in our day has come to refer to a mental or spiritual attitude - the direction one is looking, where a person’s thoughts are inclined. Our attitudes affect our behavior. Our attitudes, hopefully, are good, positive, and helpful; but they can also be ornery, unhelpful, selfish, or misdirected.
Why Paul is calling us to keep a constant eye on our attitudes is because we are sinners. We’re souls apt to stray, we’re wandering sheep, we’re easily distracted and tempted by the world and the devil to look in every direction but the one we ought to be looking. What Paul is reaching for, and what our Lord hopes to see in us, is a “servant attitude,” one where we look not only to our own good, but to the good of others - an attitude that excludes any kind of selfishness, self-interest, self-promotion, or any of those other “selfie” things we might be able to think of. I won’t say there’s no such thing as a selfish Christian, but I will say a selfish Christian isn’t a very good one. Attitudes are important.
Thank you, ladies of the LWML, for reflecting that servant attitude. LWML is Christ-centered and mission-focused, like no other organization in our Church that I know of. The statistics bear it out. Look at all the good work that gets funded just by the coins that are put in those little mite boxes. Go to lwml.org and look up “Mission grants.” Look at the good that gets done in Jesus’ name all over the world. The goal to help fund missions and service organizations for the coming year is 2.5 million dollars. That’s amazing. And it all starts with a servant attitude.
The LWML Pledge, which we’ll speak together in just a few minutes, sums up the Christ-like attitude we should all be reaching for. In fervent gratitude for what Jesus has done for us, we give ourselves to Him with everything we have. We’re obedient to Him. We serve Him willingly and even joyfully. We give Him our hands and our feet and our voices, all for the sake of telling the world around us about Jesus. We turn our eyes off ourselves and turn them out into the world and ask, “Lord, what can I do to help?” That’s gratitude!
Consider, if you will, that little boy Samuel’s attitude, that we read about in 1 Samuel 3. If you remember the story, Samuel’s mother – Hannah was her name – was childless. And she prayed to the Lord to give her a son; and she made a vow, a promise to God, that if He would give her a son, she would give him back to God to serve Him. God answered her prayer, and she named her boy Samuel, which means, “God has heard me.” And as soon as her son was weaned, she brought him to the Temple at Shiloh, and left him there to be of service to Eli, the High Priest.
Samuel, young as he was, already had a servant’s heart, and an obedient attitude. Eli the High Priest was old and going blind, and the Scriptures tell us he was getting rather fat. Young Samuel was obedient to Him, called him father, and looked after his needs. When Samuel heard that voice in the middle of the night, he assumed it was Eli calling for him, and he was quick to get up and see what the old gentleman wanted. Three times young Samuel heard that voice calling him, and three times he got up to go to his master. Eli finally understood who it was who was calling the boy, and told him to lie down and wait for the Lord to call again. Then Samuel heard the call of the Lord – a call that he’d hear his entire life – and his answer to God, young as he was, was the answer God hopes to hear every time He calls someone to serve Him: “Speak, O Lord, for Your servant is listening.”
God searches and looks and calls for people whose hearts are oriented, inclined, and open to serve Him. God worked a miracle in the life of Hannah, to give her a son who’d be a man after God’s own heart; and Samuel grew up to become the greatest prophet Israel had ever seen. He was Israel’s conscience and “attitude adjuster” for many years, and he was a mentor to Saul and then David, Israel’s first kings. Attitude matters.
In our Gospel reading, we meet another very young person, a young lady named Mary. Why did God, among all the women in the world, see fit to choose her to be the mother of His Son? Only God really knows the answer to that question; but it must be true that God saw in her the servant attitude He was looking for. Before she’d ever heard from mighty angel Gabriel or had a clue about what was going to happen, she’d already “found favor with God.” God knew her heart, and that her heart was right. She was inclined, oriented, willing to say yes, when and if God should ever call.
Otherwise, her life was going along as any young lady in Israel in those days should expect it to go. She was engaged, she was going to be married; she was looking forward, no doubt, to children and family and an ordinary life - until God sent Gabriel to Nazareth in Galilee to find her, and changed it all. She knew, she’d been taught since she was a child, that a Messiah was coming one day to Israel; but now she’d been told that she was going to be the vessel, the receptacle, the mother of the Holy Child.
She was troubled and afraid; of course she was. She even wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But she didn’t say no when God called her. She answered, “I am the Lord’s servant; let it be to me as you have said.” Like Samuel, Mary was a person with the right attitude, the right orientation, and a servant’s heart. She was ove-rshadowed by the Holy Spirit, and came to be with child by the Spirit, and had to explain that somehow to her husband-to-be. She gave birth to Jesus in a lowly stable, in a cow shed. And she raised her Son to be a man, and she stayed with Him until they pounded nails in His hands and feet and hung Him on a cross. Do you remember Simeon’s prophecy to her, when they brought the Holy Child to be dedicated in the temple? “A sword will pierce your own soul, too.” Yet she had a servant’s attitude through it all, an attitude that says, “Lord, it’s not about me; it’s all about You.” “Let it be to me as you have said.”
So let’s talk about your attitude. Where is your heart today? Where are your eyes pointing? What are you reaching for? To what is your soul inclined? Only you and your Lord know the answer to that question. I’m not the judge of anyone. I can only speak for myself and say, “It depends on the day.” I know that I constantly, daily, forever need to have my attitude adjusted; and if you’re honest, you’ll say the same.
St. Paul, in Philippians 2, has given us a litmus test, a measuring line, something to orient ourselves to, to help us keep our minds and attitudes on the right track. “Your attitude,” he says, “should be the same as Christ Jesus.” Oh, that’s a goal, isn’t it? To think like Jesus, act like Jesus, and be like Jesus? Aren’t we all called to be “imitators of Christ?”
Let’s look at Jesus’ attitude. (His attitude was perfect, of course, because He was pure and holy and without sin; we’re not aiming for perfection here, only trying to do better). Jesus was, and is, “in very nature God.” He was from the beginning, and before the beginning, the King of Heaven, the rightful occupier of Heaven’s high throne. He was Lord and Master, Creator, King, and Judge – all those things and more. He was in every way equal with God. He was God, He is God.
Yet His attitude, His inclination, His orientation, was to be willing to lay all that glory aside for the likes of us. He who was Everything willingly made Himself a nothing, a lowly human like us (which is what happened when the Holy Spirit overshadowed little Mary; we call that the Incarnation). He was the only Being in creation worthy to be worshiped, yet He “took on the nature of a servant.” You’ll remember He said, “I have come not to be served, but to serve, and to give My life as a ransom for many.”
He was “found in appearance as a man,” Paul says. There was nothing special about Him, as far as looks go, “Nothing in His appearance that we should desire Him.” Yet He performed miracles for the world to see – healing the sick, raising the dead, causing ears to be opened and blind eyes to see – and yet the powers that be in this world, being what they are, hated Him for it. Jesus knew when He came here that telling the truth was going to get Him killed. But He was obedient to His Father, even if it meant death on a cross. “Not My will, Father, but Yours be done.” His attitude, His mind, His heart was always on us, and never on Himself. He came here for our sakes, to pay for our sins, to win forgiveness on our behalf, no matter what the personal cost to Himself would be. “This is My body, this is My blood, given for you,” He said. That’s a servant attitude for you. That’s real love.
The good and happy result of Jesus’ obedience, even to death on a cross, was that God raised Him up again, at the Resurrection on the third day, and lifted Him up “to the highest place,” as Paul says – back to His throne in Heaven, back to His rightful place. (We call that the Ascension). Even there, His attitude, His orientation, His mind and His heart and His soul, is still directed always to us. He’s watching over us, loving us still, interceding and praying for us, and offering Himself to us in His holy Sacraments. And His good Holy Spirit is always in us and with us and beside us, guarding and keeping and adjusting our attitudes, and keeping us pointed toward home.
What should our own attitudes be? What should we be reaching for and praying for? What should we be praying that God will make of us? Pray that God will see in all of us a willingness to serve. Pray that He’ll bless us all with servant hearts, obedient hearts, hearts that will say, “Speak, O Lord, your servant listens,” and “Lord, let it be to me as You have said.”
Father in Heaven, thank You for daily and constantly working to adjust our attitudes, and for giving us all we need to “keep our minds and hearts in Christ Jesus.” Help us, Father, to show good and Christ-like attitudes to the world around us, that we may open ears and hearts to hear the Good News. May the love we’ve been shown be the love we give, until Jesus comes for us at last. We pray in His name; Amen.
LWML Pledge
In fervent gratitude for the Savior's dying love and His blood-bought gift of redemption, we dedicate ourselves to Him with all that we are and have; and in obedience to His call for workers in the harvest fields, we pledge Him our willing service wherever and whenever He has need of us. We consecrate to our Savior our hands to work for Him, our feet to go on His errands, our voice to sing His praises, our lips to proclaim His redeeming love, our silver and our gold to extend His Kingdom, our will to do His will, and every power of our life to the great task of bringing the lost and the erring into eternal fellowship with Him. Amen.
Hymn of the Day… “Serve the Lord with Gladness”
(To “Onward Christian Soldiers” LSB #662)
“Serve the Lord with gladness!” It is He alone
Who redeemed us sinners, Guides us as His own
To enjoy the blessings Of His love and grace,
Will at last in glory Meet us face to face.
Onward, then, for Jesus! Let this be our aim:
“Serve the Lord with gladness!” Glorify His name.
“Serve the Lord with gladness!” He gave us command
To proclaim His Gospel Now in every land
So that fellow sinners May, like us, be blest.
Leading them to Jesus, We can serve Him best.
Onward, then, for Jesus! Let this be our aim:
“Serve the Lord with gladness!” Glorify His name!
“Serve the Lord with gladness!” There’s no greater joy
Than to serve the Master, Work in His employ.
As we build His kingdom Angels, too, rejoice
Over every sinner Brought to hear His voice.
Onward, then, for Jesus! Let this be our aim:
“Serve the Lord with gladness!” Glorify His name!