The Fruit of Service is Service

Luke 17:7-10

⁷ “Will any one of you who has a servant plowing or keeping sheep say to him when he has come in from the field, ‘Come at once and recline at table’? ⁸ Will he not rather say to him, ‘Prepare supper for me, and dress properly, and serve me while I eat and drink, and afterward you will eat and drink’? ⁹ Does he thank the servant because he did what was commanded? ¹⁰ So you also, when you have done all that you were commanded, say, ‘We are unworthy servants; we have only done what was our duty.’ ”

The fruit of service is service.

Often we long for recognition for our service but can it be said it was truly service when we received even recognition as recompense.

I recently spent a week serving in a refugee camp doing the most menial work for the most forgotten, broken and despised people in our world today.  In that week, the Lord taught me that the fruit of service is – service.   

The heart of service is filled and satisfied by the act of service.

The God who, by his Spirit, is within us was satisfied even to give us his Son who did not come to be served but to serve and give even his life to reconcile us to the Father.

His eyes were not set upon the future honor of being by the Fathers side but instead upon the joy of enduring the cross.

How should we who call him Lord,  brother or friend expect our service to be something different?

If our eyes are set upon a crown will we truly be prepared to throw it down if we have not traveled the road to rightly receive it?

"We receive it because of what Christ has done for us", you might say. "By going to the cross and placing my faith in his resurrection". And yet can we honestly say we have picked up that cross and born it daily in service to the Father and others. Can we say our service was complete, not in a job finished but in ourselves given.  Is our service a complete offering of ourselves.

In this passage, the field hand became the cook, the Maitre 'd, waiter and busboy. His service was not finished until his master had retired. He could not say "my job is this let someone else cook". He seamlessly went from field clothes to fine apparel and back to kitchen apron. Our service in our kings household must not be determined by our interests or desires but by His.

We can not say “well that’s not my gift” for even our “gifts” are from Him to do works of service and He can change or add to them as He desires.

We can not say "I’ve put in a long day in the field, now the evening is mine to enjoy and do with as I desire". For in that, have we not turned our affections from him to something else which is our closest idolatry.

No, we must never let our religious pride blind us and our emotional appetites deceive us into thinking we somehow deserve any recompense for our service to Him to whom we belong. Until our affections are set upon him our hearts will cry out for our own recognition.

We can say “no, I long to hear, well done good and faithful servant” but we must remember those words come at a future occasion at a time of His choosing. Until then we must continue to be “good and faithful servants”.

The fruit of our service is our service. If we expect anything else than the fulfillment of our duty then we have obligated him to us.  When we are confident that he is a good, kind, generous Master then we will serve him completely with no concern for recompense and the fruit is f our service will be our service.