Welcome to the Liberty Baptist Sermon Archives.
The message you're about to hear was preached at Liberty Baptist
Church in Easton, MA. You can find out more about us
or contact us at my libertybaptist.org or just look
us up on Facebook. And now we hope that this
message from God's Word will be a blessing to you.
Well, again, we're in Mark chapter 10, and I alluded to
just a few moments ago, not just in the introduction but also in
the song as well, that we're going to look at the fact that
Christ is servant. Now, this might be the most
startling of all of the titles of the messages we've looked at
so far. And I was talking about actually
this morning with the men during men's prayer, because when we
consider that Christ is omnipotent, we remember looking
at that last week, the idea that Christ is all powerful.
That doesn't surprise us. We know that Christ.
Is all powerful. We're not surprised of the fact
that Christ is healing. We know that through the Gospels
that Christ is the healer. In fact, we're not even really
surprised that Christ is meek. Well, we might be at first, but
that's because we don't understand often times what true
meekness is. But we understand that it's
power under his control. Of course, it just makes sense
that Christ is healer as well, or rather, Christ is meek as
well. But yet you get to the place
where we say Christ is servant. And we got to stop for a moment
ago. What the fact that Christ is a
servant because it doesn't seem like omnipotence and meekness
with power being under control would seem to go together with
the fact that Christ is a servant.
But yet, as we're going to see from Mark chapter 10 this
morning, the concept of Christ being servant is not something
that someone else has laid upon Jesus Christ, but rather
something that he is going to communicate to us through his
own words. And those red letter words that
we're going to find in the book of Mark in chapter #10 that
Jesus reminds us that he, he is a servant.
And this morning, as we see the fact that he is the servant of
all, we need to be reminded that the servant of all is calling us
to servants, That the servant of all, Jesus Christ is also
calling. Us to live the servant's life as
well. For truly, if he can live the
servant's life, we should be able to live the servant's life.
So let's all stand together again.
Mark chapter 10, beginning in verse #42 And as always, we'll
read a shorter section, focus on what the word we're looking at
is, and then we will broaden our scope to be able to understand
why Jesus is even saying this in the 1st place.
Mark chapter 10 beginning in verse #42 As soon as I get there
and I am there, all right. The word God says, but Jesus
called unto, called them, rather than understanding them, being
the disciples to him, and saith unto them, You know that they
which are accounted to rule over the Gentiles, exercise lordship
over them, and they're great ones, exercise authority upon
them. But so shall it not be among
you. But whosoever will be great
among you shall be your minister, and whosoever of you
shall be the chiefest shall be servant of all, for even the Son
of Man. Came not to be ministered unto,
but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many.
Let's look again at verse #45. For even the Son of Man came not
to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give his life a
ransom for many. That word ministers often
communicated just as the idea of, well, what I do as a
minister, a pastor. But it really gets down to the
idea of being a servant. And in that case, we're all
called to be ministers and we're all called to be servants of
Jesus Christ. For if the servant of all can be
a minister, that we must be ministers and servants as well.
Why don't you be seated as we pray together?
Heavenly Father, we do thank you for this morning and I do thank
you again for the opportunity to preach and understanding what a
privilege it is and what a responsibility it is to be able
to stand behind this desk. I pray that you give me the
words to communicate the words of life, the words of healing,
or this comes from your gospel. Be at the same time to
understand that that gospel comes through a Christ who was a
minister who gave his life as a ransom for many.
And Lord, may we focus on this, dwell on this, and may it change
us this morning to be the servants that we are called to
be. And we ask it in Jesus name and
Amen. Mark 10 verse 45 has been called
the key to the book of Mark, and some could even argue that it
would be the key to the entire gospel as well, where it says
for even the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to
minister and to give his life a ransom for many.
And in that short sentence, in that short verse, Jesus tells us
three different things. He says what he didn't come to
do. He says what he did come to do.
And why he came to do it. And all three of these are.
Important for us to understand not just the gospel, but our
relationship with the gospel as well.
First of all, he said what he didn't come to do.
Well, what is that? For even the Son of Man came not
to be ministered unto. If there was anyone who deserved
to be ministered unto, it was Jesus Christ.
Why? Because he is the Son of God.
Why? He is God the Son, the Son of
God, God the Son, the triune God in the flesh here on this earth.
If there is ever anyone who should have been minister,
ministered unto, it was Jesus Christ.
But what does he say? Right after the chute?
He says this I didn't come to be ministered unto.
So he says, this is what I did not come for.
But then he says in a very brief phrase, what He did come to do,
and that was but to minister. The idea of the contrast that
the Creator of all things came to serve His creation.
Let's just stop about that for a moment, because it is.
And a lot of times we get to this place where we just are
used to the fact that Jesus did what He did.
And certainly it should be something that we dwell on in a
way that becomes commonplace. But even as we commonly dwell
upon it, it should never become a common thought in our life.
The idea that we just get used to the fact that the Creator of
all decided to dwell with mankind and literally minister
to that same mankind is something that ought to blow the
mind of mankind if He really dwells on it for any length of
time. He says I didn't come to be
ministered unto even though He deserved that ministration.
However He came to be a minister and then He said why He was
ministering? What was that reason to give His
life a ransom for many? The word ransom for many needs
special attention. That word ransom, it comes from
the Greek word lutron, which is the price for redeeming the
ransom paid for slaves. There was a price that would
need to be paid that was often talked about with slavery, that
there would be this idea, this concept of someone who had been
enslaved and a price would need to be paid to free them.
Julius Caesar, at one point, before he was the first, Caesar
was attacked by pirates on a ship and was held captive.
During that captivity, he was told that he had to raise funds
to be able to be freed. And so he had those who were his
associates, those who believed in him and his leader.
Leadership ability and they raised what the called what we
would call the ransom to be able to pay so that he would be
freed. By the way, when he was freed,
he ended up killing all the pirates who took him.
And so there's a whole different story that probably doesn't want
to take us in a direction that we're going here with our text,
but that is that is literally what happened.
The idea of a ransom is something that Jesus is
presenting to us for us to understand because it helps us
to understand not just why Jesus did what he did, but also the
predicament of which we have. Well, who is the one who's in
captivity? Who is the one who has judgment
laid upon them? Who is the one that has no hope
for eternity? Friend, that's you and that's
me. This is where we are and we need
someone to pay the ransom. And here's the problem, not many
people want to pay the ransom. And even if they could pay the
ransom, they couldn't pay. Only Jesus has the ability to
pay through his precious. Blood.
How do you remember the old song, that old folk song?
Charlie and the MTA? They may remember that.
There's a few of you that do. All right.
I do. I didn't hear, I've never heard
of it till I moved up to Boston for obvious reasons.
But the story was based on the fact that there's this guy named
Charlie back before he was even called the MBTA and he's riding
down on the Green Line. I think it's going down to
Leechmere or something like that and he has enough money for the.
Fair. But back then you also had to
have a token for the exit fair as well.
Well, Charlie went down to the green line and he had a token
for the fair, but he had no token for the exit fair.
So what happened to Charlie? You just kept riding around on
the MTA over and over again, day by day because he couldn't get
out. You know what the interesting
part about that song is? Somewhere near the end where it
says that his wife came down every.
Every day and gave him a sandwich and a bag of lunch.
And I'm thinking, you know what, if his wife really loved him,
why didn't she give him a token to get him out?
Forget the sandwich. Put a token in that bag.
Lady, I want to get out of here. There's a lot of people who are
just like that. They're trapped and there's
nobody that can pay the ransom. There's nobody that wants to pay
the ransom. Nobody even understands what the
ransom is, but there's Jesus Christ that here we are.
We're riding around in the endlessness of life and we don't
know which way to go and we don't know which way to turn it.
Here's people who try to give us the advice of self help.
Maybe that will get you out. And here's the someone who will
give you the advice of false religions and maybe that will
get you out. And there's some people who will
give you the advice of just trusting the God within you and
maybe that will get you out. And that's just the same as
someone coming down and giving you a sandwich and having you
keep riding around and. Circle but nobody wants to help,
but there's Jesus Christ who gave his life as the ransom for
many. By the way, we believe in a
whosoever gospel and Jesus believed in a whosoever gospel
when it talks about many who is that many people?
Well, the many people of the all people who ever lived.
That's many people. That's all whosoever gospel we
believe. Don't get worried because it
says many how many people lived on this earth?
Many and Jesus died for them all.
Amen. He gave his life a ransom for
many. He paid the money he paid, or
rather He paid the ransom of which we could not pay.
How did He pay? Well, first Peter one verse 18
and 19 say, for as much as you know that you were not redeemed
with corruptible things as silver and gold from your vain
conversation, retrieved by received by tradition from your
Father's, but with the precious blood of Christ as of a lamb.
Without blemish and without spot, that is what the ransom
was paid with, not with silver or gold.
Corruptible meaning this it goes away, but with the precious
blood of Jesus Christ. And what's amazing about this is
Jesus didn't just do this for the people who loved him.
In fact he did it for the world who did not love him.
You say, well I love Jesus and my answer to that would be you
love him now, but you didn't always love him.
I didn't always love him before we knew him.
First John verse four, or First John chapter 4 verse 19 says we
love him because He first loved us.
Romans 5, verses 6 through 9. For when we were yet without
strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.
For scarcely for a righteous man will one die, yet for
peradventure a good man, some would even dare to die, but God
commendeth. God showed His love toward us in
that why we were yet sinners, even knowing who we were.
Christ died for us much more than being now justified by His
blood. We shall be saved from wrath
through Him. Some of us have been in
situations before where perhaps debts have started to mount up,
where there was difficulty in being able to pay those debts
that start to accumulate through credit cards or through loans or
whatever it might be. And you get in those situations,
what do you have to do? Well, I've always been told that
if you have a income problem, your income needs to go up or
your outgo needs to go down. And when it comes to debt, all
you got to do is get your income up.
So what do you do? Maybe start working nights,
maybe start working overtime, maybe find a second job.
Maybe you get a side hustle. That's what they call that
today, going out and do an Uber or those kind of things.
Maybe that's what you need to do and you do that because you need
to be able to get yourself out of that financial hole.
But imagine that you did that. You work nights, you worked
overtime, you worked a second job, you worked yourself down to
the bone, not just for days or weeks or months, but for years.
But you didn't do it for yourself, you did it for
somebody else. How many people would do that?
I'd say very few. Let me ask you this, How many
people would do that for someone that actively hated them?
Nobody do that. Nobody in their right mind would
do that. Be it.
Jesus endured hardship of which this world has never seen before
and this world will never see again.
The brutality. Of the cross.
And yet he did it. The Bible says in Hebrews
chapter 12 verse 2 for the joy that was set before him.
Not the joy of the pain, not the joy of the suffering, not the
joy of the mocking, but the joy of having restoration with
mankind because he was able to pay the ransom.
This is what our servant did for us.
This is what he came to do. He didn't come to be ministered
unto, but he came to minister. And why do you do it?
To give his life as a ransom for many.
And listen, if that was the end of the message right there,
praise the Lord, but you're not that lucky.
You're not even close to. That lucky you, say pastors. 20
minutes left. You go circle around for 20
minutes. I got plenty more.
Like they used to say, I got a lot of MO.
I can go for a while all right? But there's there's a couple
things that you have to understand because really we
need to kind of plant a flag here for just a second and
remind you the Bible says you must be saved and that you must
be born again, that you are a Sinner, that judgment is real.
Did you see that word wrath? That the wrath of God abideth on
you if you don't know. Jesus Christ, your Savior,
because you have a penalty to pay that you can't pay.
You can't work enough nights, you can't work enough weekends,
you can't work enough overtime, you can't work enough Grubhub,
Uber, or whatever you want to call.
It to pay for the sin debt that's upon your life In fact,
you can't work at all to pay the sin debt of your life because
the Bible says that salvation is the gift of.
God not of works. Best any man should boast if you
work for your salvation, you can be proud of what you earned and
what you achieved look at the salvation that I have achieved.
But all we can do is say, look at the salvation that God has
given me, that I am undeserving of, that I am but a worm.
But. I'm to dust, but he took pity
upon me. He brought me up out of the pit,
out of the miry clay Psalm chapter 40, set my feet upon the
rock and established my goings. This is what God did for us.
And if you don't know where you're going to spend eternity,
you may have been coming here for months or even years, and
you just still, maybe you would just try to put this part of the
message out of the way. You like the parts where I'm
funny and there's a lot of those.
Amen. But you, that wasn't one of the
funny parts, all right. I wasn't expecting you to laugh
there. There's a lot of parts where
there's places that maybe make you feel good inside and helpful
for you, but you just want to put away this idea that you
don't know where you're going to spend eternity.
You cannot take just part of the message and focus on that,
because the parts that you like about the message, the parts
that encourage you, the parts that help you, the parts that
motivate you are only dependent upon the fact that you need to
be saved. Because there's not enough
motivation in this world to be able to have you pay the ransom
yourself. Only Jesus paid that ransom.
And so you could try to put it off to the side as much as you
want. But the fact of the matter is,
you will be presented with the fact, And we saw in Revelation
Chapter 20 on Wednesday and Revelation chapter #21 that if
you refuse to be confronted with this idea, this reality of the
Lake of Fire, you will be confronted with the reality of
the Lake of Fire once you were at the Great White Throne
Judgment, and it'll be everlastingly too late to do
anything about it. What do you need to do?
The ransom's been paid. You just need to accept the free
gift of salvation. When ransom is paid, when a
pardon is given, it still must be received, still must be
accepted. We talked a few days ago during
our Soul Winning conference about the idea that particularly
during Civil War times, there were issues and times when
Abraham Lincoln would issue pardons for men who had done
certain deeds, maybe had been on gallant on the battlefield, but
yet for some reason had received a pardon to spare their life.
And they refused it because they said I deserve that which I'm
about to receive. A pardon is no pardon if it's
not received, and a ransom is not your ransom if it is not
received. So you must receive the gift of
salvation today. You must trust in Jesus Christ
as your Savior today. But as usual, we have to ask
ourselves this question. It's incredible that Jesus said
that. The amount of truth in just
verse 45 is immense. But why did he say it?
Where did this come from with his walking down the road one
day and all of a sudden he turned around and he said, let's
talk about ServiceNow. There were times that he popped
some questions on the disciples just like that.
But in this case, this was precipitated by a conversation
that took place that showed the disciples truly didn't
understand what ministry and service was all about.
So what I need you to do is I need to go back up to verse #25
we're going to stay in Mark chapter 10.
Actually, I want you to verse 35.
Don't go to verse 25. Verse #35 and let's review this
because as we've done before, we kind of focus on the word.
We focus on what the characteristic is, but then we
broaden our scope to see why is this here?
Why is this even a discussion? Because as we broaden, it helps
us to understand how this applies to our life.
Verse #35 says And James and John the sons of Zebedee, come
unto him again, being Jesus, saying, Master, we would that
thou should US do for us whatsoever we shall desire.
Now this is a bold statement to make to Jesus Christ right off
the bat, but I will tell you there is something that is not
found in the book of Mark that is found in an adjoining passage
in Matthew chapter 20. And that is the fact that it is
not just James and John who are approaching Jesus Christ.
It is also their mother. Now James and John probably
thought, you know, maybe Jesus isn't going to hear this request
as well, but I bet he'll say yes to our mother.
This ought to tell you this is a bad start right here.
This is when you're trying to manipulate Jesus Christ, say,
well, he couldn't say no to an old lady.
It's not a good start. And it says, And he said to
them, What would ye that I should do unto you?
And they said unto him, Grant unto us that we may sit one on
the right hand, and the other on thy left hand, in glory.
Now there's a fundamental problem with what they are
asking here. One, they are asking for
something of which they have no understanding of, because
they're talking about glory. We could even put it this way.
They're talking about the Kingdom, but yet they don't even
understand what the Kingdom is. In fact, you're going to get to
Acts chapter one, verse 6, and Jesus is ascending into heaven
and they're still asking is it time for the Kingdom?
And they do not understand the concept of the Kingdom that is
to come as they should. So they're asking for something
here. They do not know the time, they
do not know the place, and they don't even know what they're
asking for. And it says next in verse 37.
Verse #38 rather, But Jesus said unto them, You know not what you
ask, Can you drink of the cup that I drink of and be baptized
with the baptism that I am baptized with?
Now he's Speaking of the suffering that is to come to
baptize, to be immersed in the suffering that is to come.
Can you drink of the cup of suffering of which is to come,
that cup of suffering that Jesus even prayed in the garden that
it could pass from him? But nevertheless, not my will
Father, but your will be done. And it says are you able to
Verse 40 sit on my right hand and on my left hand.
It's not mine to give, but it shall be given to them for whom
it is prepared. Now this conversation was one
that showed these two men were concerned with what leadership
and not service they were wanting to serve.
They were wanting to be served. They had some fundamental
misunderstandings. Now this is bad enough, but look
at what it says in verse 41. And when the 10 heard it, they
began to be much displeased with James and John.
I bet they weren't because here's in James and John behind
their back going to Jesus and saying basically when it comes
to glory, when it comes to Kingdom, could you make sure
we're ahead of the other 12 or the other 10?
Now they're going to be ahead of one of them, that's for sure,
because one of them was the devil.
But there's nine others that definitely had some issues with
what's being said. I can only imagine.
I wish the Bible had told us. I would love to ask the Lord
when we get to heaven someday. What did Peter?
Have to say about this. Perhaps it's not recorded
because we should know what Peter said about this here in
this life, because it probably wasn't good.
James and John, the sons of Thunder, please put us on your
right hand and on your left, and Jesus says, do you think you can
handle? It they say we can handle it,
but they don't know what they're handling, They don't know what
they're talking about, and they're asking a fundamentally
flawed question because we understand from what we just
read in verse 45, they're called to be servants, not to be
served. And so Jesus has to get the
disciples. That's why he tells them all to
come to him. And he says, you know, that
they, which are accounted to rule over the Gentiles, exercise
lordship over them and they're great ones, exercise authority
upon them. He says this type of thinking,
boys, it comes from the world. What you guys are talking about
right now is exactly the way the world thinks.
You ever wonder why people pay, why people donate?
People give billions upon billions upon billions of
dollars to be able to win a presidential race, of which the
salary costs only $250,000 a year.
Why would people pay billions and billions and billions and
billions and billions of dollars donations, all of that?
Because it's all about power. You know, I'm not talking about
politics. I'm just talking about the
reality of the situation. That's just all about power.
And here's what Jesus says. Say you're thinking like the
Gentiles think. You're thinking like the world
thinks. Your thought process as a
believer is fundamentally flawed.
And he says it in this phrase in verse #43 but so shall it not be
among you. He says let them think that way,
but you think differently. They're going to think that way,
but you think differently. But whosoever will be great
among you shall be your minister, and whosoever you will
be the chiefest shall be servant of all.
Jesus is asking to do the exact opposite of what their flesh
wants to do. What does their flesh want?
Their flesh wants to be at the top.
And Jesus says if you want to be at the top, be at the bottom.
If you want to be served, then you just need to serve.
Now coming from Jesus, that could be something that maybe
they would be even offended by. Well Jesus, who are you to give
us this kind of teaching? Why would you ask us to do
something like this? Nobody teaches this way.
But then in verse #45 Jesus gives them the kicker.
He says, you may not think this is the way to live, but I'm
telling you this is the way that I live.
And if I can live this way, I came not to minister unto or to
be ministered unto, but to minister and to give my life a
ransom for many. It's as if Jesus saying, if I
can do this, you don't think that you can do this.
If I can come and serve my own creation that will by and large
reject me, then you think that you have a right to do that
which is above even that which I am doing.
It's lunacy, but yet Jesus makes clear this is what He was called
to do and what we're called to do.
That last part is important. It's what we're called to do.
So you thought this was just about the disciples?
He called the disciples to come. He talked to them, but no doubt
He's also speaking to us today. The idea of servanthood and
ministry is not just for rugged fishermen some 2000 years ago,
but it's the calling that the Lord has placed upon us today as
well. For certainly if Christ was a
servant, then we must be servants as well.
But Pastor, you say if I serve like Jesus said, that I'll never
get anywhere in life, I'll get run over, I'll get abused, I'll
never get ahead. And certainly there'd be many
that would think that. And I would agree with you
except for the fact of, well, I'd answer by saying this, it
depends on what you define as getting ahead.
Do you define it the way James and John we're trying to get
ahead, which was trying to bypass 10 other disciples and
all other believers and to become sitting at the right hand
and the left hand of Jesus? Do you define as the Gentiles,
as Jesus said, as he talks to the disciples, which of the
Gentiles exercise leadership and lordship over all?
This is what they want. If you define that as getting
ahead, then yes, as a servant of God you will not get ahead.
But what does he do? He readjusts their thinking of
who he is to remind us how who he is effects Our Calling.
He says I want you to be reminded who I am because who I
am should make you rethink how you are called and what your
calling is to this world. That is to be a servant.
In essence, he's saying if I can serve.
You can serve. Jesus was the one who washed the
disciples feet. Jesus was the one who fed the
5000 and by the way, that 5000 with 5000 men when you had women
and children, it likely was well over 10,000 that he served and
that he fed. Jesus was the one who healed and
touched the leper, the one who was physically and spiritually
compromised, but yet Jesus reached out to him.
Jesus is the one who calmed the storm when he was trying to rest
but yet saw the needs of the disciples.
Jesus was always serving. You find Him in man, Matthew and
Mark and Luke and John, and all He ever did was serve and serve
and serve all the way to the cross, when He gave His greatest
act of service that He ever gave and that mankind will ever see,
and that is to give His life on the.
Cross so that we could be saved to give his life a ransom for
many. So I ask you, what do you have
to give up compared to him? So I got a lot to give up
Pastor. I mean, he gave up the
prerogatives of glory, proximity with the Father to spend around
33 years with people who by and large didn't listen to him and
it crucified him. But if knowing the end from the
beginning as He did, may I remind you that Jesus in his 33
years was not on the edge of His seat wondering what would happen
next? You know, I'm not trying to be
sarcastic about it. I'm trying to remind you it
wasn't as Jesus was walking around during His earthly
ministry and was wondering what was ahead around every corner.
Jesus knew before the beginning what the plan was, and yet
knowing what the plan was, was willing to do it and knew that
He'd be mistreated and mischaracterized and ultimately
give his life on the cross. But how can we understand this
further? You're called to be a servant.
I'm called to be a servant. How can we understand this
further? There's a text that we have to
go to this morning. I mentioned I believe on Friday
night. There's a text we have to go to
today because I really governs the way we understand the mind
of Christ and how we are to be able to have that mind of
service ourselves. So if you would turn to
Philippians chapter #2 we don't have to go back to Mark chapter
10. You don't need to hold your
place there. Philippians chapter #2 For some
of you, this is a foundation, foundational set of verses.
You've read this many times. I'm always reminded there are
new believers that are with us. There's some who are younger in
the faith. And I want to reintroduce you or
rather to introduce you to some of the foundational passages of
the Word of God. What we're about to read right
now, new believer, is 1 of what I would call the foundational
passages of the Word of God. Who is Jesus and how does it
affect how we live, particularly in this area of service?
Let's start verse #1 it says Philippians 2 verse one.
If there be there for any consolation in Christ, if any
comfort of love, any fellowship of the Spirit, if any bowels and
mercies fulfill ye, my joy that ye be like minded having the
same love being of 1 accord. Of one mind, he's talking to the
church and he's saying this. I want you to be have the same
love be of 1 accord, of one mind.
He's saying this. You need to have the right
mindset as a church and as a church.
Liberty Baptist Church today, we're not the Church of
Philippi, but we are a church that should also have the same
love being of 1 accord and one mind.
This should be the most harmonious place on the.
Planet at least tied with other Bible believing churches.
Often that's not the case. I thank the Lord for the
wonderful unity that God has given us at liberty, but at the
same time, we must guard ourselves because this is not
what the world wants us to have, certainly not what Satan wants
us to have. Let nothing be done through
strife or Vainglory, but in lowliness of mind, there we go,
lowliness of mind that we could start to see something forming.
When it comes to service, let each esteem other better than
themselves. Isn't service about the fact
that I see your needs to be more important than my own needs?
Look, not every man to his own things, but every man on the
things of others. Now maybe you'd get to verse #4
and you'd say, how is this even possible?
How could I even get to the place where everyone else's
needs are more important than my own?
Well, that's where verse 5 opens up and again, if you're in the
habit of marking your Bible, you could just underline from verse
5 and verse 10 and don't stop. In fact, I just take out a
highlighter and highlight till it runs out of highlighter
because that's what we're looking at in the Word of God
right now. It's that good.
Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who,
being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be
equal with God. That talks about the deity of
Christ, but made himself of no reputation, took upon him the
form of a What's that next word, servant, and was made in the
likeness of men. Being found in the fashion of a
man, he humbled himself, became obedient unto death, even the
death of the cross. Wherefore God has also highly
exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name,
that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow.
Of things in heaven and things in earth and things under the
earth. To be able to from verse 6 to
verse 8 truly to understand how low Jesus Christ brought himself
to be to this earth is unbelievable.
That yet is 100% God and 100% man.
All God and all man at the same time came to this world, humbled
Himself as a fashion of man, became obedient unto.
Death. Look at He was not forced to
death, he was not tricked into death, A Judas did not put him
in a corner and there was no way for him to be able to extra
extradite himself. This is not checkmate placed
upon Jesus. He became obedient to that which
his Father had even the death of the cross.
Consider what the psalmist said about God and His greatness.
Psalm 113 verses 4 through 6. The Lord is high above all
nations, and His glory above the heavens, who is like under the
Lord our God, who dwelleth on high, who humble with himself to
behold the things that are in heaven and the things in earth.
Contrast those words to and being found in fashion as a man,
he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the
death of the cross. This explains what kind of
minister he was. This explains his mindset.
But what does that have to do with us?
Go back to verse #5 will you read it with me?
Let this mind be in you. Well, let's try that again.
Let's just pretend I just said, will you read that with me?
OK, good. All right, will you read verse 5
with me? Let this mind be in you, which
was also in Christ Jesus. Read it again up to the comma
and stop. Ready.
Let this mind be in you. Stop.
What's this message about? Could you summarize it in one
sentence, Pastor? If I was to summarize it, I
would let the Word of God summarize it and it would be
this, let this mind be in you. What are we to do?
Let this mind be in you. Now let me make some application
and we'll be done. Just say there's some of you
that are probably thinking, oh, pastor, I know what I know what
this message is about. You need more people to help out
the church. And so this is one of those
messages where you know you. Just afterwards, you can say,
oh, if people want to help clean up, how many people want to be
greeters? How maybe you want to go in the
parking lot. And guess what?
We need people to help clean. We need people in the parking
lot. We need people that are
greeters. We need people to help with
visitation. We need people in the nursery.
We need junior church workers and Sunday school workers and
helpers. We need all that.
We need all of that and more. But that's really not what the
thrust of the message is about because we can be busy around
the church doing all of those things and more, where everybody
has an agenda that's filled with this and that going here and
there, doing all the things at the church and everything is
field. We don't need any workers
because everybody's working. But yet that doesn't mean that
we are truly servants at heart. Because really, if we want to
solve the problems of having enough people at church doing
that which is needed, or problems of being servants in a
home or servants in a workplace or servants at a school, what we
really have to do is this. We have to address.
Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus,
because otherwise we just get you performing for the sake of
performing instead of really getting down to the heart of I
want to serve because I want to be like Jesus.
I want to serve because I want to think like Jesus thinks.
Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.
It's not just about the church. Sure, we need help with the
church. I can't imagine a time when we
didn't. Need help with the church but
it's so much. More than the church.
Husbands, you know what your wife needs.
She needs you to be a servant. Oh, Pastor.
OK, I know what the proper order is biblically, pastor, that the
man is the head, that he is the one that is in charge and he is
the one that takes care of the little woman.
All right. And like it's often said that
the man may be the head, but the woman is the neck that turns the
head. Amen.
Some I'll give you a minute. Let that roll through.
All right, go through one more time with that one.
Is there a biblical order to the family?
There is. That doesn't mean that there is
a difference in value because the man and the woman are of the
same value. Yet God does assign positions of
authority. So yes, Sir, you have authority
in the home. Checkmate, you got me.
But who else had all authority? Hold on a second, was it Jesus
and he decided to be a servant to those that he led And if we
are to in our marriage relationships, Ephesians chapter
5, go home and read it yourself if you'd like.
We are to be that which is like Christ in the home.
No, no, I'm not trying to give you weird theology.
I'm just telling you that we are to be His representative in the
home. Then what are we to do?
Well that we are to be the chief servant in the home and that's
not popular teaching, but it's Bible was first Peter 37 say
likewise he husbands dwell with them according to knowledge,
giving honor unto the wife as unto the weaker vessel.
Whoa, hold on, pastor, the lady say the.
Weaker vessel. Haven't you heard of feminism,
Pastor? Oh, yeah.
Yeah, Ralph and I've. We've heard of feminism.
I'll tell you what he he'll tell you about after church if you
want to. But I would tell you this.
Is the woman the weaker vessel? The Bible says yes, but does
weaker mean of less value? In fact, I could make an
argument that a lot of things that are quote UN quote weaker
are actually a very high value. But the God understand there's a
need for protection and then he's an honor and of love in a
very unique and special way. And Sir, God has called you to
be that servant to your wife. Wives, God has called you to be
a servant as well, to serve your husband, to serve your family.
Ephesians 524 Therefore, as the church is subject unto Christ,
so let their wives be subject unto their own husbands.
And everything get not popular today.
Get the Bible gives us the order for life.
And really the way it makes sense is if the husband serves
the wife and the wife serves the husband, doesn't it just kind of
work itself out? This is what God has called us
to do. So I'm not going to serve her
until she serves me. Maybe you ought to start and do
your part and not worry about what other people are doing and
got to work out the rest. Matthew Henry put it this way,
and I love this. The woman was made of a rib out
of the side of Adam. Not out of his head to rule over
him, not out of his feet to be trampled by him, but out of his
side to be equal with him, under his arm to be protected, near
his heart to be beloved. I believe that's what God has
intended to have in the home. I don't care if it's popular out
there. I don't say, well, the world
doesn't like that. Well, the world doesn't like
anything in this book, to be quite honest with you.
So I'm not going to change this to make them happy, because if I
change it to make them happy, they're going to be unhappy with
the rest of the stuff in the Bible.
So why don't we just believe the Bible?
Young people, God served you to called you to serve your parents
and your teachers well. I'm, I'm very busy.
I, I don't know I can serve my parents well.
You, you, you can find some time.
I don't know if I could serve my teachers.
That's not what that's not what students say.
That's that's what teachers pet does.
No, that's what someone who's trying to be like Christ will
do. You're trying to be a servant
employees. God's called you to give an
honest day for an honest wage. You.
Need to be the best servant that you can in the office or in the
job site. The Christian ought to be the
hardest worker at every job. The Christian ought to be the
most honest person at every job. The Christian ought to be the
one that everyone in the workplace can say, that is
someone who understands what it is to be an employee.
Why? Because they understand how to
be a servant. Colossians 322 Servants obey in
all things your masters according to the flesh, not with
eye service as men pleasers, but in singleness of heart, fearing
God. You see, service isn't just
something that we do at church, it's a life.
And if you only serve when you want to, you're really serving
yourself more than you're serving others.
I even challenge you, the places that you enjoy to serve.
If you only serve and the places you enjoy serving, are you
really serving the way that God intends you to?
Because service is about, I'm going outside of my comfort
zone, trusting that the Holy Spirit will help me with that
which He's called me to do. This should be something we do
on a daily basis, serve even to strangers.
We show deference in all things. Letting someone ahead at the
checkout, holding the door for somebody that's behind you,
offering your seat to someone who is elderly, listening
without interrupting when someone else is speaking,
allowing someone else to merge into your lane and traffic.
I know I had a hard one driving that one too.
Take the less desirable task so someone else won't have to do
it. If there's one piece of pizza
and two people, you don't have to be the one to take it.
This is what services. But you see our mindset.
There's one piece. I'm kind of edging my hand up
like Diane, you don't want that, do you?
You don't want that, do you? What is that?
Service is something of the mind before it's something of the
body. Let this mind be in you, which
was also in Christ Jesus. And when you know who you serve
and why you serve, it changes everything.
Let me give you this illustration.
We'll be done. I read this many years ago.
It's it's so good. John Kenneth Galbraith, in his
autobiography A Life in Our Times, illustrates the devotion
of his family's housekeeper named Emily Gloria Wilson in
this way, he said. It had been a wearying day, and
I asked Emily, his housekeeper, to hold all telephone calls
while I had a nap. Shortly thereafter, the phone
rang. Lyndon Johnson, the president,
was calling from the White House.
Get me Ken Galbraith. This is Lyndon Johnson, she
responded. He is sleeping, Mr. President.
He said not to disturb him. We'll wake him up.
I want to talk to him. No, Mr. President.
I work for him, not for you. When I called the president
back, he could scarcely control his pleasure.
Tell that woman I want her here at the White House.
Why? Because she understood who she
served. Who do you serve?
One higher than the President, the King of Kings, and the Lord
of Lords. How many of our problems will be
solved if we would just let this mind be in you, which was also
in Christ Jesus, the servant of all is calling us to service.
Will you answer? Thank you for listening to the
sermon from the pulpit of Liberty Baptist Church.
If this message was a blessing to you, or if there's any way we
can serve you, please let us know by contacting us at
info@mylibertybaptist.org. Or you can visit us this Sunday
at 800 Washington St. in Easton, MA.
May the Lord bless you as you grow in His Word.