In this brief letter, I’d like to share with you two things about what it means to serve. First, and most important, of these is that Jesus embodied what it means to serve. By word and deed, Jesus poured out His very life to serve and save, always for the benefit of the one served and always to the glory of the Father. By contrast, language (at least the English language) labors to narrow the meaning and definition of the term. Culture subverts the concept by connecting it to citadels of military and economic power. The service industry tends to make service transactional, something to critique or reward.

My second point is the observation that service happens in the context of community. How can we serve in spiritual isolation, away from Christian community, disengaged with church fellowship? I ask because post-pandemic Adventist churches are struggling to recapture their attending audiences. Not everyone has returned to church. Of those who’ve returned, fewer have reengaged their volunteer roles and positions, which means we’re also struggling to recapture the ideals of service within our church and with our outreach ministries.

Mark 10:45 (NIV) says, “even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” This Messianic reference to Daniel, contextualized by the use of “Son of Man,” tells us Jesus is a radically different figure than the Messiah was expected to be. This Jesus isn’t about conquest, accolades, power, fanfare, and the luxuries of having people meet His every need. This “Son of Man” Messiah came to serve to the point of redemptive death! Jesus embodies love and pours Himself out as an offering that all might live life abundantly.

Jesus took the role of a common household servant and washed the disciples's feet when it was their failure to hire a Shabbat “goyim,” a non-Jewish servant who could perform acts of service and work on Sabbaths as a non-Jew. In doing so, He modeled something extraordinary! This wasn’t service born of position, reflective of status, wealth, or a deep sense of unworthiness. This was service given in order to demonstrate the kind of kingdom and power and community Christ had come to live out. The greatest would serve the least, not to prove an alternative sort of greatness, but because that’s the way things work in God’s universe. There is no other way. We who claim Christ must pour ourselves out in acts of self-sacrificing love and service to and for the world God so loved.

Perhaps reengaging the prophetic imagination that foresaw a self-sacrificing Messiah might relate to post-pandemic reengagement with service in the form of servant-leadership to a post-pandemic church. Might following Jesus actually require service to the body of Christ and the God-loved world? I believe this is clearly the case. Our mission isn’t to herald a soon-to-come Christ but to embody love by pouring out ourselves in service to a dying world. This embodiment of love is taking on Christ—His yoke, His cross. It’s following Him.

There’s no other true path. We, like our Lord and Master, must be “meek and lowly in heart” (Matthew 11:29, KJV). It’s only in taking up Christ’s burden that we can experience His rest. Can we pour out our lives for something much greater in return?