Series: The Blessed Life. Week 4: The Heart of Serving
Acts 20:35. How do you live a blessed life? Where do you find a blessed life at? What is it about living the life of blessing? John 13:1-17
In John 13:17, Jesus is separating the difference between knowing something and doing something.
TRUTH: Serving leads to the path of blessing.
Everything in our culture points to: If you want to be happy, be self-indulgent. Live for you and go after the things that are going to make you happy.
BUT … At the end of pursuing self-indulgence, the only thing you have left is YOU. At the end of all of this pursuit of making myself happy is . . . another toy, another trophy, another experience . . . and we then we ask Is this all there is? There has got to be something more.
“Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.” John 13:17
- Blessed—the word means “happy”; it has the idea of God’s favor,
- Pattern of knowing and doing. Jesus knew (His identity), so He did. If you know, do! This is lasting joy.
The difference between the truth you know and the life you live is the amount of pain you experience.
- The TRUTH you Know
- The LIFE you Live
- The Pain you Experience
It is a cycle that we keep repeating. If we applied what we knew, then maybe the Blessed Life would stop eluding us.
KEY to the Blessed Life: Applying What We Know
What do we know?
- We know Jesus was a loving, humble servant.
No matter what you think of Jesus—you cannot deny that He was a loving, humble servant to those around Him. Jesus knew that Judas would betray Him, yet he washed his feet.
Application: We serve others in a loving, humble way.
Lead a life marked by serving.
You were created by God, for God. God’s image in you.
Jesus knows who He is, He knows where He is going, and He knows where He came from. He doesn’t have any confusion about His identity. And because of this He could serve others in a loving, humble way.
When we know our Identity, we are secure in who we are and can think more about others.
We serve others out of a confidence in knowing who we are.
- We know Jesus cleanses completely.
Bathed all over is a reference to salvation.
Paul said in 2 Corinthians 5:17
When we walk around our feet get defiled, get dirty by the world. Our feet need washing. We need forgiveness.
Application: So, we pursue holiness and closeness with God. We don’t pursue holiness to get God, but to stay close.
So if we were to sum up these 2 principles we would say that … Humility and Holiness are the keys to the Blessed Life.
Personal Happiness is not the goal; it’s a result.
This is completely counter cultural.
What Jesus teaches is, don’t worry about your personal happiness. Serve other people. Pursue intimacy with Christ. Pursue closeness with God. And when you do these things, you will have the Blessed Life.
So, ask this week who can I serve? Who is that one person outside of myself that I can really serve?
And how can I take a step towards closeness with God? Imagine if we (MSBC) became the place that served one another. Imagine if we became that place that, rather than thinking just of ourselves we thought about the other people around us more than we thought about ourselves. The reputation we would get.