Our Lord the Example of Extreme Service

Even as the son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give his life a ransom for many. Let’s pray together. Lord in heaven, we just come to you and wanna thank you once again for your word and for its great effect upon our lives. Lord, you said in your prayer in John 17, you will sanctify them through thy truth. Thy word is truth.

And I pray that you would, I ask you to please sanctify your people, myself included by your word, as we look at this scripture, help us Lord to understand it, help us to apply it in Jesus name, amen. The verse I wanna look at is verse number 28, but verse 28 doesn’t stand alone. Again, it’s in that context where the Lord is talking to them about leadership and he is really introducing something really radical, new, as compared to the leadership styles that they were familiar with, as mentioned in verse 25.

And so that’s kind of the context that the Lord is speaking here. And I want you to note in verse 26 and in verse 27, he says, let him be your minister. And in verse 27, it says, let him be your servant. This is a parallel, these two verses are parallel and those two words, minister and servant, match in the parallel structure. And that means that they mean the same thing.

When we say the word minister, we’re not talking about, in scripturally speaking, we’re not talking about a preacher or a pastor or something like that. What we’re talking about is a servant. Is a servant. And so I wanted to give you a definition of servant because it’s something, it’s a word we use a lot, but I wanna kinda bring it out in front of us because this is what all that verse 28 is about, is about being a servant, being a minister.

A servant is sent to serve, really, which is one who serves. A servant is one who serves. But to serve means this, to attend to the comfort or needs of another. The key being there, another. To attend to the comfort or needs of another. Now when we talk about serving, we can divide serving into two different parts. Serving God and serving other people. And in both cases, it means the same, the same basic, it has the same basic meaning, which is in serving God, we are attending.

We are living. We are concerned with fulfilling the wishes and desires, we call that the will of God. We are concerning ourselves with pleasing and doing his wishes as opposed to our own. That’s what it means to serve God. To serve God doesn’t necessarily mean we’re doing a certain activity. That’s all included in the idea that I am doing the Lord’s bidding, not my own. I am doing what he wishes, not what I wish.

That’s the key idea of a servant. So sometimes, and here’s the irony, is sometimes in religion, I’m speaking broadly, not negatively, but I’m speaking broadly here. Sometimes when we have activity that keeps us going, we serve in that way, we say we’re serving in that way, but really we’re doing it to fulfill our own desires. Not so much what the Lord wants us to do. And you say, well isn’t that one and the same?

It can be, but sometimes it’s not, right? Sometimes we do it for our own gratification, for our own satisfaction. That is, our own will and the will of the Lord and the Lord’s desires are far from our mind. How can a servant be called a servant if the desires of the one he serves are far from his mind? You see what I’m saying? And so sometimes, especially as ministries get larger and larger, which, I mean, we don’t have to worry about that anytime soon, but as ministries get larger and larger and larger, churches begin to develop machinery, right?

And people are expected to do certain things and they just do those things, and I’ve seen it in different places I’ve been, both myself and with my kids, that when that machinery’s going, people are serving, but there is a question as to why. And so to serve God means to attend to God’s will and wishes, not our own, right? To serve others, on the other hand, has the same core meaning, except that we attend not only to the desires and wishes of others, but especially and primarily to their, the definition says comforts or needs, to comforts or needs.

And again, that is in contrast to our own comforts and to our own needs. It’s the idea of putting one’s needs, putting another’s needs before your own. And so in that way, in that definition, to serve in the biblical sense is something that a husband should do to his wife, right? To serve in a biblical sense is something a wife should also do to her husband. And that doesn’t negate proper order in the home at all.

In this way, a husband, a wife, a mother, and a father, in a sense, serve their children. And that’s okay. In fact, the key to service is love. And when you love your child, you put your needs on the back and you put your child’s needs on the front. Same thing with a husband and with a spouse. Again, that doesn’t negate the proper structure and order of authority in a family at all.

But it is a truth that we can apply in almost every case in our life, right? So look at the verse 28. I wanna look at the various parts of this. The first one I want you to see is this. Even as the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, came not to be ministered unto, where He is the object of service. That’s not why Jesus came.

He says it plainly. So this is a life that is, a life that is lived so that others minister to my wants and desires and needs, is a life that is characteristic of the world. All right, we talk about the world and we always talk about music and dress and the entertainment. But really the world, under all of that, are philosophies and beliefs and values of the world that are much more profound and they touch everything, not just these kind of externals that are important.

It’s not that they don’t matter. It’s that under it are far more profound issues and one of those is this. I’m here for me. I’m here to have my desires gratified, my needs met. It is literally everywhere. Any place where human beings interact and talk about what they think and believe in their values, you will find this philosophy. It is at its core a worldly philosophy. Jesus came, He says, I came not to be ministered unto.

I came not to be ministered unto. If you and I try to buck that and we try to follow the example of the Lord Jesus, we will be ridiculed for it by those in the world. Just try it and see if you don’t have a family member or two or an acquaintance, somebody at your job that will mock you for the fact that you aren’t taking me time or you aren’t, what are the words they use?

I’m not kind of up on this, but you know what, go. Self care, right? And so I say that and somebody in the room is probably thinking, well does that mean I can’t go get my nails done or I can’t go get a haircut or whatever? No, we’ll get to that in a minute, but you know, it’s the kind of extreme version of that. Second thing I want you to see is this, verse 28.

Even as the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, now I’m gonna take out that part. I’m gonna take out the part that says not to be ministered unto, because I want you to get the whole complete sentence with the grammar. Even as the Son of Man came to minister. You see that? That’s the grammar. He came to minister. You know what, this is stating, this is stating the purpose of the life of the Lord Jesus Christ.

He came, that’s His incarnation. He came to serve. And not in, and we say serve, we’re not talking about this as kind of mushy-gushy serve, no, no, no. We’re talking about in the biblical sense. He came to attend to the needs of another. To His Father, to His Father, He was the one who was constantly concerned, not with His own wishes or will or desires, but that of another.

That service, the Father. But to others, to men, He was concerned about their needs. So He served, He lived for their needs. In fact, in prophetic scripture, you think Isaiah 42, verse one, Isaiah 52, Isaiah 53, the Lord Jesus, prophetically, is called what? My servant, My servant. Even prophetically, He was prophesied to do this very thing, to serve His Father, and so that’s what He’s called. Now again, it is important for us to understand that this was His purpose of life.

This was His primary objective. This is His reason for living and what motivated Him to do what He did at its base, right? Whether to God and then by extension to men, right? He says, the Son of Man came to minister. The Son of Man came to minister. The third thing I want you to see from this verse is this. The Son of Man came to minister and to give His life a ransom for many.

This states the second part of the purpose of the life of the Lord Jesus. And notice the second part is really an extension of the first. The first part is He came to minister. He came to serve both God and man. But when it says and give His life a ransom for many, He’s stretching that out and kind of fully defining. What does it mean to serve?

He came to minister. Well, what He did in this case is He connected the service with giving His life a ransom for many. You know what this is? This is extreme service. This is extreme service. So the Lord took the idea of service to its uttermost extreme. To its uttermost extreme. What do I mean by that? Toward the heavenly Father, what did He do? The will of the Father was His only concern.

And the Lord was, the Lord Himself, the Lord Jesus, was entirely at the disposal of the will of the Father. You know what that is? That’s service. But that service, even if, I say it’s to the uttermost degree, because when the Father said, I have a cross for you, He says, I am at your disposal. I am here for your will. He served His Father. But think about it toward man, toward us, toward His disciples, and then toward all mankind.

Our Lord subjugated and submitted and surrendered every wish, every desire, and every need of His own in service to the needs of others. When He gave His life a ransom for many, you know what He’s doing? He is accomplishing that thing that only He could accomplish because that was man’s greatest need. Man needed redemption. He needed a price to be paid lest he perish forever in hell in the lake of fire.

He must have that. That was His, at the top of the needs of man, at the top of the list, was redemption. He must have that or He would perish. And the Lord subjugated every desire or wish of His own to give His life, because you can’t have both. You either have life and your desires and wishes, or you give that up for the needs of mankind.

And that’s exactly what He did. He gave His very life for the needs of others, and in that way, served. In that way, served. Served. In that way, served. Now, notice the last thing in this verse I want you to see, and then we’ll look at Philippians very quickly.

In chapter, in verse 28, He says this, the first two words. Even as. Even as. Now, following the context, He’s saying, whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister. Whosoever will be chief, let him be your servant. And He says, even as. In other words, look at me. I am the example of what I’m talking about here. Look at me. Even as I did this.

Now, remember, the Lord Jesus, if there was anyone in the world who had a right to demand to be served, it was Christ, but yet He didn’t. The disciples are vying for power. The disciples are looking for opportunities to ensure that their fellow disciples serve them. But our Lord says, look at me. Luke 22, 27 says this, for whether is greater, he that sitteth and meet, or he that serveth.

Is not he that sitteth and meet, but I am among you as he that serveth. Now, if you would look at Philippians two, I would call this a parallel passage. Philippians chapter two. You see a lot of the same features that we’ve just looked at.

Philippians two, verse number three. Philippians two, three says this, let nothing be done through strife or vain glory, but in lowliness of mind, let each esteem other better than themselves. Now, you’re already seeing hints of the context. This is similar to what we see in Matthew 20, right? Because there was strife, there was vain glory. The disciples were seeking to one up another, seeking to establish a pecking order, seeking to make sure that they ended up on top of the pile, and others were serving them.

Others were serving them, right? And here, of course, in Philippians two, three, that’s not commended at all, rather the opposite. Look at verse four. Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others.

Verse four, very similar to what we saw in Matthew 20. It warns us of being concerned with only our own needs and desires, right? To only be focused and looking at my own stuff. The Lord says unambiguously, he says, we do not need to be looking only at our own needs and our own desires and wishes, but on the needs and desires and wishes of another. What this is, this is a basic foundational principle.

It is a foundational principle to service. Service begins with this, looking at others’ needs, desires, and wishes above one’s own needs, desires, and wishes. In other words, it starts with this. What do they need? Whether you’re looking at the Lord, or whether you’re looking at your brother or sister, or someone else, the question you ask is, what do they need? Not what do I need or want, but what do they need?

It is that I am thinking and concerned with the needs of others. First of all, we’re concerned with the will of the Lord Jesus Christ, right? And secondly, we’re concerned with the needs of other men, but in both cases, my own needs and my own wishes must take a back seat. That’s the key. Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others.

That’s not a verse that tells us to be busybodies. That’s not what it’s saying. The context makes that clear. Look at verse number five. Once that principle is established, and we’re asking the question, what do they need? What do they need? What’s their desire? Once that’s established, then we move to the next step, and we become persuaded that it is our job, it is my job, it is my duty, indeed it is my purpose to fulfill those needs, to provide those needs.

You see, that’s where service kicks in. So you have a foundation, and then you have action that follows based upon that. Now someone might ask at this point, if I do this, what happens if I’m misused? If I’m thinking just about that person’s needs and wants and desires, what happens if they misuse me or abuse that focus on their needs? What happens then? What if I’m treated like a doormat?

What if I’m treated like a servant? Maybe is a better way to put it. Well, I think I’ll say a couple things about this. The first thing I would say is, you have to accept that that might happen.

See, the thing is, it’s not possible to do the good of service to others without also opening yourself up to the risk that people will take advantage of that service, because they do, they do. If you humble yourself like a servant, if you treat yourself like a servant, expect that others will treat you as a servant.

I know that’s not welcome news, but it’s true. I think one place that this comes up a lot is in a relationship between a husband and wife. It really does. Husband and wives don’t get along. Neither one wants to serve the other when they’re at odds or something. Neither one wants to humble themselves and serve the other and think of the needs and desires of the other.

And so there’s this tug of war, because one is afraid that if they take the initiative and do that, that they’re going to then be mistreated and run over. So I say to you men, do it.

It is the duty of the leader in the relationship to set the example and to act first, do it. That’s our duty as men. That, of course, that doesn’t mean the wife has no obligation to do it. No, that applies as well. But if it’s gonna be one or the other, if I’m stuck with that, the man is the one who has the responsibility to act first.

And let your wife run over you if that’s what she does. Because it’s right to do. It’s right to seek her needs above your own. So that’s what you do. Even if that opens the door to mistreatment, because really that’s the only way to solve the problem. The second thing I’d remind you of this, if you’re afraid to be treated like a doormat or a servant, as the gays may be, remember that what the Lord says concerning others, he says that each one, both parties, should be thinking of the needs and wishes of the others.

This is the way the Lord intends it to happen. When both parties are seeking to fulfill the needs and put the needs and desires of the other before their own, it kind of eliminates the doormat effect. It does. Galatians 5.13 bears this out very plainly. It says this, for brethren, ye have been called unto liberty, only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another.

That’s reciprocal, that’s both ways. It works out peachy when both of those things are happening. It really does. A lot of issues of strife in a home, strife in relationships, in a church, whatever the case might be, are solved when Galatians 5.13 is put into practice. Now you look at verse five, he says, let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. Just like we saw in Matthew, it said, even as the son of man.

Here’s the example, Christ did it already. He set the example for us. Now he says, now you think like him. Now what did Christ do regarding, what was his mindset regarding service? We already saw that, right? That’s what we saw in Matthew. It was extreme. It was extreme. This was the way he thought. This was the way he lived. He served his father and he served those around him, and in particular, his disciples.

And so the Lord recommends to us that example in verse five, let this mind be in you. Is the mind of Christ concerning service, which is the context here, is that in you concerning others? That’s the question.

Verse six reminds us of this truth. That we saw in Matthew 20. Speaking of Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God, thought not robbery to be equal with God. It reminds us of this fact, that if Christ Jesus is very God, and he is, but as the son of man, he humbled himself to be a servant, then shouldn’t we, who have, I would say, far weaker claims to honor than he does, should not we then also humble ourselves as he did?

I mean, he had the right and the justification to demand others to serve him, but he didn’t do it. And if the one who had right refused it to set an example for us, so that’s the example we should follow. And so we go to verse seven, but made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant. So Jesus didn’t just act like a servant, he was in the form of a servant, he was a servant.

And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. You see this? His service, as we saw in Matthew, extends to every extreme. This is service of the Lord Jesus to the total exclusion of every thought of his own needs and desires. This is the example the Lord gave us, and I’m glad he gave us the uttermost example, right?

The uttermost example, I’m glad he did. In fact, him going to the cross, being obedient unto death. Why does it say obedient? It’s very simple. Think about this in the context of service. Why does it say he was obedient unto death? He was obedient because as a servant, his father, his father’s will was for him to go to the cross. And as a result, in his service, the father’s will was all that mattered, more than his own.

And he had his own, let this cup pass for me. He had his own will, and he put it aside. And he did the same thing for us. And so we might ask ourselves this, what about my needs and my wants? That’s something we haven’t talked a lot about, right? Is it a sin to take care of myself? Well, of course not.

Even servants have to take care of their own needs, right? That’s true. But those needs and desires take a second place to the needs of the one that you serve. All right, let’s pray together.