Service
August 11, 2019 | Mike Stancak
Passage: John 13:1-5
How do you feel about service? Most of us feel a sense of obligation. We don’t enjoy serving, but we don’t want anyone to know we don’t. Sometimes we feel guilted into service. At other times, when we actually do serve, it can go to our heads, as though by serving we become people others ought to acknowledge and, well, serve.
But we become humbled when we look to Jesus. In him we see service taken on as a way of life. And in the Cross we see the culmination of that life, ended in service to God and God’s people, given up to make up for our lives of inadequate service. But instead of being shamed by the example of Christ, it is in his service that we find the freedom from shame, and we encounter service in a new light: as the path to greatness
Join us Sunday as we continue our Gospel in Life series and consider how the Gospel shapes service.
Discussion Questions:
- What were your impressions from the sermon?
- How do you generally feel about serving? What keeps you from serving? What is most frustrating or exhausting about serving?
- How does the Gospel change our motivation to serve? (Reflect on how we are no longer motivated by shame and guilt, but by love and even glory)
- Do you struggle to accept service? Why do you think that is?
- Discuss as a group a way that you might be able to serve together?
Series Information
So often we spend our lives believing the content of the Gospel, but how does it really change the way we work, the way we consume media, the way we prioritize our weekly activities, the way we engage with friendships, or even the way we prepare to age and die? We believe that the Gospel absolutely speaks to all those things. We will be taking topics one by one and demonstrating the real, down-to-earth, practical ways the Gospel shapes our lives. This is Gospel in Life