Serving the Lord Rom. 12:9-11 CLICK TITLE FOR AUDIO

Serving the Lord is the duty and the privilege of every child of God. Why wouldn’t we want to serve him?  He saved us from hell.  He forgave us all of our sin and remembers nothing that we ever did against him.  He has made us accepted in the beloved.  He has given us abundant life.  We have joy, peace, gladness, goodness and a brand new life in Christ.

The Lord says, “You trusted me with your soul; trust me with your life. In other words, he wants us to serve him.  This is like a colt that has never been ridden.  He saddles us and he takes the reins and we go where he wants us to go and we do what he wants us to do.

When we awake each day, our first conscious thought should be, “I have a Master.” We are here to do exactly what he wants, when he wants it, the way he wants it.  Truly we should be eternally grateful for the opportunity to serve him after all that he has done for us.

But for most Christians, serving the Lord is not like this. Their concept of serving the Lord is totally different.  So, we need to examine some of these concepts so that we can keep from serving the Lord the same way. You are to be:

Serving the Lord not the Lord serving you – Ps 23:1 – “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want” – it doesn’t read, “The Lord is my servant I shall not want” – honestly, I talk with some Christians and you can tell that they think the Lord is there to serve them.  They cry out to the Lord for help when they need him but the rest of the time they act like he’s not even there.

Serving the Lord not serving sin – Rom 6:16-22 – there are Christians who still struggle with the same sins over and over and that’s because they serve sin rather than the Lord – they serve their music, they serve their lusts, they serve their affections – they don’t serve the Lord – they may show up to church but when their sin beckons they’ll be gone and they’ll be defensive when the preacher preaches hard against their sin.

Serving the Lord not serving your belly – Rom 16:18; Phil 3:19 – they look like they are serving the Lord but they aren’t – they are calling the shots – they are fulfilling their own motives, their own goals, their own aspirations, their own objectives – many modern preachers serve their bellies – they so what they do because that’s what they want to do.

Serving the Lord not serving money – Matt 6:24 – they may talk a good line and they may give big offerings to their church – but their master is their money and so they serve money rather than the Lord – their “hatred” of the Lord may not be apparent since they talk about him and go to church – but they don’t do what he says – they do what and go where their money demands.

Serving the Lord not serving men – Eph 6:5-8 – there are men who serve the Lord in their churches and then they serve men in their businesses – you are to serve the Lord in every capacity of your life – that way if you have a bad boss, you can still serve faithfully because your service is to Jesus and not to men – and you can be as faithful to witness at work as you can be at church.

Serving the Lord not serving religion – Mk 7:5-9; Matt 7:21-23 – folks that serve religion are doing religious things but they don’t know the Lord and he doesn’t know them – athletes making the sign of the cross are good examples – a person serving religion does good to get saved – a person serving the Lord gets saved to do good – you can’t get to heaven by serving the Lord with good works.

Conclusion: Analyze your life and see whether you are serving yourself, your money, your religion, or your sin and make the necessary changes.  You will never fully appreciate the fullness of the joy of the Christian life until you are serving the Lord instead of yourself or something or someone that owns you.