But he that is greatest among you shall be your servant.
Matthew 23v11
The Kingdom of God is not like earthly kingdoms. Earthly kingdoms have a monarch who lives in luxury with servants to do all the mundane tasks of everyday living. They are protected from the common people. No-one can just walk into the palace. Any-one who comes must first be invited and then escorted into the throne room. They never get to be alone with the monarch.
God’s Kingdom is ruled by a servant king. It is completely counter cultural. Nobody on earth wants to be a servant. The cultural ideal is to be the leader, the top dog, the one in command giving the orders.
The King above all other kings was not born in a palace, but in poverty. He lived to serve others, meeting their needs instead of expecting His needs to be met. He moved from place to place, so that He could be among the people, talking to them, ministering to them and enjoying their company. He made Himself freely available to anyone who called out to Him, and treated everyone as an individual. When alone with His closest friends, He knelt and washed their feet and taught them to do likewise.
He served mankind completely by being the One who “has borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows” Isaiah 53v4. It was not the angelic beings who did the work of salvation, it was the King Himself. He took upon Himself all the punishment that His treacherous, rebellious subjects should have suffered; the death sentence.
Instead of sending His armies of angels to win the battle for Him, He did it all Himself, and when He had finished everything that he needed to do to defeat His enemy and ours, He sent forth His messengers to tell every rebel that they are welcome as His subjects, and can come right into the throne room to stand before Him and ask for His help.
As followers of Jesus, we are called to serve. Jesus tells us to feed the hungry, to show hospitality to strangers, to clothe the naked, to visit the sick and those in prison. He tells us that in serving these people, we are in reality serving Him.
To be like Jesus we have to serve. Serve our spouses, our children, our friends, our community etc. Christianity is not a secluded, isolated life of private devotion. It is living in community with other born-again believers, serving the community we live in the way Jesus served the community of his day.
Greatness in earthly kingdoms is marked by how rich and luxurious your palace is, and how many servants you have. Greatness in God’s Kingdom is measured by how much we serve others.
