"If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them." -John 13:17
Before going to the cross Jesus took time to teach His disciples about service and the relationship between Him and them. After Jesus washed their feet He told them to do as He had done unto them, and that a servant is not greater than his master. (13:15-16) The next verse is what challenges us to keep His command to serve. He said "If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.", That is you know these things.. good, but unless you do these things don't expect to be blessed. The New Living Translation puts it like this "Now that you know these things, God will bless you for doing them."
Serving others and the blessing that comes from serving is something that the church needs to be reminded of today. You see today in the church the problem isn't hearing as much as it is doing. There is an abundance of hearers but few doers. The harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few. (Lk 10:2) It's almost as if there is an epidemic of spiritual quadriplegics, wherein there is no movement for the Lord from the neck down within many believers. There's a lot of nodding and Amens but few working men and women. No church is exempt from this but we must refuse to be numb and inactive, to the word of the Lord. You see we hear with our ears but we listen with our hands and feet! If what goes into my ears doesn't move down to my mouth, or to my hands and to my feet I am not listening but merely hearing. I refuse to be a spiritual quadriplegic because Christ has empowered me and you to not just hear but to do and be blessed in doing it.
Serving others and the blessing that comes from serving is something that the church needs to be reminded of today. You see today in the church the problem isn't hearing as much as it is doing. There is an abundance of hearers but few doers. The harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few. (Lk 10:2) It's almost as if there is an epidemic of spiritual quadriplegics, wherein there is no movement for the Lord from the neck down within many believers. There's a lot of nodding and Amens but few working men and women. No church is exempt from this but we must refuse to be numb and inactive, to the word of the Lord. You see we hear with our ears but we listen with our hands and feet! If what goes into my ears doesn't move down to my mouth, or to my hands and to my feet I am not listening but merely hearing. I refuse to be a spiritual quadriplegic because Christ has empowered me and you to not just hear but to do and be blessed in doing it.
- HOW DIFFERENT WOULD YOUR LIFE BE IF YOU "DID" EVERYTHING WITH THE SAME CAPACITY USED TO "HEAR" IT?
- “One hundred religious persons knit into a unity by careful organization do not constitute a church any more than eleven dead men make a football team. The first requisite is life, always.“- A. W. Tozer