Foundation Verse

"Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there also will my servant be. The Father will honor whoever serves me." John 12:26

"But Jesus summoned them and said, "You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and the great ones make their authority over them felt. But it shall not be so among you. Rather, whoever wishes to be great among you shall be your servant; whoever wishes to be first among you shall be your slave. Just so, the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many." Matthew 20: 25-28

Why We Serve

In the BLD community, serving in a ministry is a positive way of nourishing the newfound relationship with the Lord. Luke 10:27 reads, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself." This was fully exemplified by Christ during His earthly life, when He emptied himself and assumed the condition of a slave. By following Christ and His teachings do we grow in our spiritual lives. Community life does not merely involve attending corporate worship and reading Scripture; it needs to put the Lord's precepts into action. This is what ministry work entails.

When we think of the Service Ministry, what quickly comes to mind is food service, cleaning, marshal duties, etc. Yet these are simply the tools in fulfilling the larger mission of the ministry, which is to bind the community together as one, instilling the value of righteousness, servanthood, humility and obedience among the members. The key word is love, selfless love that knows no bounds, the sacrificial love of Christ. In our new life in the Holy Spirit, we live the spiritual gifts and share the fruits through our work in ministry.

In the course of His earthly life, our Lord identified Himself with the poor and the outcast, revealing His divine love by coming to us as a servant. "He came not to be served, but to serve" (Mt 20: 28). Our communal norms embody the Christian ideals of self-giving and serving; by His grace, we experience joy in serving, of receiving while giving. Truly, we in the Service Ministry are happy to serve the Lord in others, recalling His words in Matthew 10:8, "Without cost you have received; without cost you are to give".

A REFLECTION

Jesus Christ is the example to be followed by all of us who want to serve our fellow men and serve God who has given us so much, including his only Son, to free us from slavery to sin.

The life of Jesus is an untiring service to men. He attends to us, teaches us and consoles us. Our Lord served for the sake of love and this is the only way He wants us to serve. In words intended not only for His apostles but for us as well, our Lord said, "Whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be a slave to all" (Mk 10:43-44).

Can we who wish to be his disciples also develop in ourselves the same disposition of heart that will inspire us to give ourselves unselfishly to those around us regardless of what our temporary status here on earth is? Being a servant demands much spiritual maturity, that we imitate Him Who is meek and humble of heart. The Lord teaches us that there is a special dignity to be found in helping and offering assistance to our fellow men, and this dignity is expressed in how ready we are to imitate the Master who came to serve and not to be served.

Jesus Christ has given us an example of humility when He carried out the task of a servant. He girded himself with a towel, poured water in a basin and washed the feet of the apostles. As we reflect on this tactfulness of the Lord, we are deeply moved to know that if we truly want to follow Jesus Christ and serve others effectively and worthily, we must be able to gird ourselves with the enabling virtues of humility, generosity, fortitude and cheerfulness. These virtues will enable us to put our lives at the service of God and neighbor.

To follow the ways of the Lord is not easy, but we are confident in the knowledge of the triumph of Jesus Christ. If we keep our faith in Him and follow Him, we have His promise that peace and justice, prosperity and abundance will follow always.