Seven Rhythms: Serving (1 Peter 4:7-11)

As you all know, we’ve been walking through the seven rhythms from our 10-Week Journey this year, the ones on the wall, doing a deep dive on each one. The last few weeks, we have been talking about the rhythm of serving. So, today’s passage is 1 Peter 4:7-11. Let’s start with a story, and then we will jump into the passage.

When I was a young guy, I had a rotation of two different things that I would ask for for my birthday or Christmas. I would either ask for Legos, or I would ask for Nerf guns. And I remember collecting Lego Star Wars mini-figures and keeping them in a little Tupperware container my mom passed down to me, with each minifigure organized into categories, and with each of their weapons categorized in a separate compartment. My Legos were my pride and joy. And I also remember around the same time, there were these circles of kids at my school who would trade Legos with each other. And I still remember the satisfaction of having the exact Lego figure that my friend wanted, especially if he also had the one I wanted. On rare occasion, we were each able to fill the gap in each other’s collection. The beauty of those moments, trading with my friends, was that we were mutually benefited. It was a win-win. What he had, I needed, and what I had, he needed. And when I read today’s passage, I see something similar.

Let’s begin with a little context before we walk through the passage again. First Peter is written to a group of believers who, from the sound of it, are experiencing some of the first real persecution. So standing firm through suffering is a major theme in the letter. In the chunk right before this passage, Peter has just brought up the peoples living around them who are living so differently from this group of believers. And Peter reminds them that for a long time, they lived like these pagans, and that, quite frankly, they had lived enough of their lives that way. He lists activities like heavy drinking, sexual exploits, worshiping false gods, and pursuing all kinds of bodily pleasures. And he points out that now that these believers have declined all these terrible things, the Gentiles are surprised and are lashing out at the believers for choosing a different path. There’s an old dead guy who lived a long time in the desert, and people call him Anthony the Great. And this all reminded me of something he once said: “A time is coming when men will go mad, and when they see someone who is not mad, they will attack him saying, 'You are mad, because you are not like us.'" Sounds like what was happening in Peter’s day.

So that is where we begin today’s passage. Starting in 1 Peter 4:7 - “The end of all things is at hand; therefore be self-controlled and sober-minded for the sake of your prayers.”

So already, Peter is painting a very different picture with the believers than he did with the pagans. Rather than drinking and giving into whatever their bodies want, he encourages them to not listen to their bodies. Instead, he wants them to stand unswayed and sober, so that they can devote their time to prayer. He goes on in 1 Peter 4:8-9, “Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. Show hospitality to one another without grumbling.”

Here, Peter is likely quoting Proverbs 10:12, which says that while hatred stirs up bitterness and conflict between people, love covers all sins. And then he urges them to show hospitality without complaining. He goes on, and this part is what we are going to chew on for today from 1 Peter 4:10, “As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace:”

I remember circling this line again and again when studying this week. I felt like there was something really important here. But I didn’t really know how to say it. So, Peter is saying that we ought to use our gifts to serve one another. Easy peezy. But what I was hung up on was just how involved God is in the act of our serving. Peter says, “As each has received a gift…” We often say that people are gifted in something, and what we mean is that they just possess the ability to do something well. But Peter emphasizes that what we are gifted in, we ourselves have received from someone else. And the later part of the passage tells us who it is from: “use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace.” Our giftings are not for ourselves, and they are certainly not from ourselves. They are given to us by God, as one strand of God’s varied grace, to steward, to manage, to give to others.

Think of a millionaire who wants to donate large sums to different charities. He might hire someone to make sure the money goes where it is most needed. But does the manager that he hires get to keep the money? No! And does the manager get the glory for giving the money to charity? No! Really, he’s just a pass through. He’s only representing the millionaire. We are representatives of God, managing what He has given us, and giving it out to the people that it was meant for. And this is really important for us to remember when we talk about spiritual giftings. The spiritual gifts aren’t just cool shiny gadgets or tricks that make us interesting. Each of the spiritual giftings has been given to us for the sake of the Body. In other words, God gives us spiritual giftings so that we can give them to someone else. To say it stronger, we are failing if we aren’t allowing that gifting to pass through our hands and into the Body. If it remains with us, it dies with us, and we’ve failed.

Here’s another analogy. Imagine you get admitted to a hospital, and the doctor comes over to you, and diagnoses you with foot fungus. It’s gnarly if left untreated. But luckily, it’s easily treatable with a couple of pills each day. It would be easy for the doctor to just prescribe you the meds and send you on your way, but instead, there is something a little odd about this hospital. The doctor comes up to you and hands you some meds, and says, these won’t cure you, but they will cure someone else. And I’ve given someone else in this hospital your meds. While you wait for them to find you to give you your meds, go and find the person that needs the meds I just gave you. Pardon the strange analogy. It’s a little silly, but the Church is like this. The Church is like a hospital where all patients are also the nurses. And that is actually going to be my big idea for today: Every person in this room is a patient and a nurse. Every patient is holding someone else’s meds.

Think about it. The Church isn’t for people who have it all together. We each come into this place broken, needy, lost, confused, or lonely. In that way, the Church really is like a hospital. If you’re in the hospital, you’re there for a reason. You’re looking for healing. And if each of us are given some sort of role, a gifting, then we are like patients who have medicine that can’t heal us, but it can heal the next guy. Let me give you an example from my own life.

Many of you know Martye Haugstad, who isn’t here with us today, because she’s away visiting family. I’ve worked with Martye for years. I think Martye is an encourager. She has a gift for lifting people up. And I tend to be fairly self-critical. If you looked behind the curtain of my heart, you’d see I’m pretty hard on myself. So when Martye encourages me, it hits me probably more than she knows. What comes naturally to her helps heal an ache in my soul. And I remember once sharing with Martye how much it meant to me when she encouraged me, and in response she shared that she really appreciated the spiritual clarity I brought in my conversations with her. So, we each were giving each other a medicine that the other one needed. When we were serving one another, it was a win-win. We are each patients that have been given each other’s prescriptions. And the Church is filled with those sorts of relationships.

Now, you might be wondering, why on earth would God set the Church up this way? It seems so counterproductive. Why not just give each patient what they need and send them on their way? Well, I believe what God is doing is addressing a much deeper problem that affects all of us. And to unearth that deeper problem, I want to look at a series of Christian thinkers who all had the same idea about what was really screwed up in humanity.

The three theologians that are of interest are Augustine of Hippo, Martin Luther, and Karl Barth. Augustine was the first to describe our fallen, sinful nature as actually a curving of the human in on themselves, with Luther and Barth developing the idea even further. Augustine argued that the root of all sin is self-concern, selfishness, stemming from pride. So, where God creates humanity and calls humanity to be reflections of His love to one other, we instead turn in on ourselves, reflecting only ourselves back to ourselves. Imagine if you had a mirror and you were able to bend it inward, so that all it was reflecting was itself. Sure, it might be cool to imagine what that might look like, but we also have to come to terms with the fact that the mirror is no longer acting as a mirror. In the same way, humanity stopped reflecting the love of the Creator, and so we no longer loved God, and slowly began turning against our neighbor. We can see this as far back as Genesis chapter 3.

God creates the whole of the world out of a deep generosity. God was not turned in on Himself. Even before creation, God’s inner life is made up of three Persons who belong to one another. The Son is the Father’s Son, the Father is the Son’s Father, the Spirit is the Son’s Spirit and the Father’s Spirit. They belong to one another. And so creation, the world, the sea, the stars and moon, and everything else God created, is just the result of the same love, spilling outside of the Trinity’s loving embrace.

And, even further, once Adam was created, God could see Adam longing to give himself to someone else, and longing to receive someone else. So, He brings along Eve, and now, the two humans can give themselves to each other. But, once the serpent slithers onto the scene, we see a deep temptation that exists in the very heart of humanity.

The serpent comes along, tempting Eve by saying that she and her husband could be like gods, that God was keeping something back from them. He was inferring that God was keeping them small so He could be big. The serpent suggests that life is a zero-sum game. If you’re not familiar with zero-sum games, it's when you have a game in which, for one person to gain, another has to lose. It’s not a win-win. It’s a win-lose, or a lose-win. So the two cannot win together. They are competing for the same territory, the same prize, the same resources. A good way to think about this is military conquest. When one nation rises up to take land, they are usually taking it from another nation. Where one nation wins land, another nation loses land.

This is how the serpent sees the world. Humanity and God are at war, competing for the same thing. Only one of them could be divine, so God lied to the humans to keep them from taking the throne and knowing good and evil. And as soon as Eve and Adam eat of the fruit, they become self-concerned in a way they never were before. They notice that they are naked, because their nakedness could leave them vulnerable. They become paranoid that someone is out to get them. And so they hide themselves from God and from one another.

Thus begins a life of survival and competition, a life that feels like a zero-sum game. And after this point, whoever is great and mighty among the humans, the kings and tyrants and warlords, are also the ones that look the most like the serpent’s distorted image of God. They are the ones that, through lying, cheating, oppressing, and conniving, keep the throne for themselves. But these tyrants are driven by a lie. They are mirror’s curved in on themselves. They are patients trying to prescribe their own medication. And in the end, that is also what was wrong with the pagans Peter describes in the beginning of the chapter. They are patients trying to prescribe their own medication. They are trying to live like they are god over their life as much as possible. So they abuse their own bodies, and follow every whim and passion, and worship every god that might just give them what they want. And the irony is that in the end, they look more like slaves than gods. And really, this is what all humans tend toward. This is where you and I will go too, if left to our own devices. We are curved in on ourselves by nature.

So what does this have to do with spiritual gifts? Why did I take you on this long trip? Because this is the root of what God is trying to solve in you and me. This selfishness, this curving in on myself. I was never made to love myself like this. I was meant to love God and care for the people around me. I was meant to let them care for me too. That’s what I was made to do. But I cut myself off from their love, and I choose to love myself instead. This is the sickness of the human condition.

So here, God has this group of people called the Church that, as Peter says, are supposed to love each other above all else. So how does God get this group of people who are so used to being curved in on themselves to open out and learn to receive love from God and from their brothers and sisters? Well, a great way to get them opened up is to hand them the medicine that their brother or sister needs, and to say, “Go give it to them.”

And God Himself modeled this to us, both in His ministry to Israel and in the ministry life of Jesus. Think about how often David sings about God providing what he needs, like in Psalm 54:4, “Behold, God is my helper; the Lord is the upholder of my life.”

And Psalm 121:1-2, “I lift my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth.”

And think about the long days that Jesus spent in towns and villages healing the sick, teaching the confused, giving to the poor. He Himself says that the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, using the same Greek word that Peter uses in talking about us serving one another. Jesus, the Lord of Life, offered Himself as a servant. He pointed to service and called that true life. He said it was better to give than to receive. So, He shows us what it means to serve, to love the people around us. If you think about it, He’s been loving us all since before we were conceived. You could say He's a master at giving Himself to us. And Jesus teaches something that the serpent could never understand: it is better to give than to receive.

So again, back to the question at hand, why does God give us the medicine that our neighbor needs? I think Peter is thinking of our spiritual giftings as the training wheels we need as we learn how to love again, as we learn to open ourselves outward. Spiritual gifts teach us to pay attention to someone besides ourselves. When you take the time to take a new believer out to lunch, or decide to share a word of encouragement with someone who is hurting, or spend the time crafting a Bible study for your small group, or invite someone who doesn’t have a place to stay to crash at your place, its like you are unbending the mirror, and reflecting God’s love the way you were made to be. The spiritual gifts are God’s way of binding us together in love.

I got to see this up close and personal the last few years of my life, working here at the church. For those of you who don’t know, I used to be our youth pastor here at Sonrise, and in order to effectively run a youth ministry, I found you need most if not all of the spiritual gifts present. You need people willing to help and serve. You need people willing to teach, people willing to encourage, people willing to lead, people willing to shepherd, people willing to organize, people willing to be hospitable, people willing to give to the ministry. On and on. And it took me about two weeks to figure out that I had one or two of those gifts. So out of the dozen or so gifts we needed, we had one or two accounted for. I needed help.

But as time went on, I found that my good friend Andy had a heart for hospitality and was an excellent leader. So, Andy made it his mission to get the attention of the room, to lead kids into spiritual moments, and to make kids feel more at home in the space. He would come up with the silliest games, he would tell vulnerable stories, and he would bring decorations for all our major events. Then, I found out that Adrienne was an excellent servant and had the gift of faith, and so she served in several small groups and led the high school girls. She was so faithful, showing up to nearly every youth event we ever held, and she modeled a real living relationship with Jesus for our kids by sharing her honest questions and her even more honest confidence in Jesus.

Then, I found out that Paul had the gift of mercy and teaching. And I got to see him take kids down to Portland to serve the poor, and got to watch him shepherd kids into a sacred time of communion each Sunday, handing each student a chunk of bread to dip in the cup, speaking a blessing over each one. And that was just a few of them.

I got to see Kara develop systems for taking attendance and printing flyers to keep everyone updated on what was happening. I got to see Josiah, Jess, Raymond, and Chris lead the students in raw, honest worship. I got to see Mike, Audrey, Tyler, and Kalynn develop deep trust with young guys and gals and shepherd them in their walk with Jesus. I got to watch Tom, Mary and Carl set a table for our students by serving them food at big dinners and retreats. And in those three years of youth pastoring, I’m proud to say I was responsible for so little of the actual ministry. When our youth group was flourishing, it was because of the humble servants who took what God gave them and offered it to the people that needed it. They took the prescriptions God gave them and found the patients that needed them. And the coolest part was getting to watch a few of the students learn by example that it was better to give than to receive, and to see them develop a passion for passing out the meds God handed them too.

Until I started serving in the church, I didn’t get the appeal of church. Church isn’t about going to a spiritual Ted Talk each week and then going home. It isn’t even about sharing and laughing for a couple hours in a small group around a living room coffee table. Those things are good, but they’re not what it’s all about. It’s about falling in love with the people that God loves. It’s about learning to reflect the love that God shines on you. As Peter says, above all else…above ALL else, keep loving each other earnestly. And the way God teaches us to passionately love each other is by giving us gifts that are meant for the guy across the room. The Church is a hospital where all the patients are also nurses. God has equipped someone here to heal your aches, and God has handed you the medicine to heal someone else’s aches.

So, dream with me for a second. I know it feels safer to remain at a distance from the trenches of servanthood. It’s much easier to remain in the shadows. But God wants to unbend your mirror. He has placed in your hand a pill bottle that someone else desperately needs. Maybe you’ve just got a passion for the Scriptures and there are some people who could use your guidance. Maybe you’ve got a knack for navigating those complex relationships and you could help some folks discern their next steps in turbulent situations. Maybe your heart just aches for the poor and you could get a couple people together to make sandwiches or hygiene kits for the folks on the streets. Maybe you care a lot about foster care and you could open your home to help babysit for a family with foster kids.

You don’t have to found a ministry from scratch or change the world. But someone in this room needs what God has put in your hands, and it is your responsibility to pray and follow God’s nudges in finding out who they are.

I know we just had a ministry fair last week, but we are planning on hosting another one in September for anyone who missed out or couldn’t find a good fit last time. If you want to try your hand at serving without any commitments, I highly recommend you join our 10-Week Journey which is starting up in a few weeks. I am leading a group and I know that everyone who goes through that Journey will get a chance to go out and serve with a group they’re familiar with. It could be a good opportunity to put your feet in the water before taking the plunge. Whatever you choose, please remember, every person in this room is a patient and a nurse, and there are people who need the medicine that God has put in your hand.

Life Level Application

1. What spiritual gifts seem most alien to you? (see Rom. 12:6; Eph. 4:11-16; 1 Cor. 12:4-11)

2. Which ones do you think are most common in our church?

3. What tends to get in the way of you serving more?

4. What’s a gifting you feel like you might have received from God?

5. What’s an example of a “medicine” that God has given other people in the church that heals you?