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Servants Are Faithful in the Small Things

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by Rick Warren

“Unless you are faithful in small matters, you won’t be faithful in large ones. If you cheat even a little, you won’t be honest with greater responsibilities.” (Luke 16:10 NLT)

Servants do every task with equal dedication. Whatever they do, servants “do it with all their heart” (Colossians 3:23).

The size of the task is irrelevant. The only issue is, does it need to be done?

You will never arrive at the state in life where you’re too important to help with menial tasks. God will never exempt you from the mundane. It’s a vital part of your character curriculum. The Bible says, “If you think you are too important to help someone in need, you are only fooling yourself. You are really a nobody” (Galatians 6:3 NLT).

It is in these small services that we grow like Christ.

Jesus specialized in menial tasks that everyone else tried to avoid: washing feet, helping children, fixing breakfast, and serving lepers. Nothing was beneath him, because he came to serve. It wasn’t in spite of his greatness that he did these things but because of it, and he expects us to follow his example (John 13:15).

Small tasks often show a big heart. Your servant’s heart is revealed in little acts that others don’t think of doing, as when Paul gathered brushwood for a fire to warm everyone after a shipwreck (Acts 28:3).

He was just as exhausted as everyone else, but he did what everyone needed. No task is beneath you when you have a servant’s heart.

Great opportunities often disguise themselves in small tasks. The little things in life determine the big things. Don’t look for great tasks to do for God. Just do the not-so-great stuff, and God will assign you whatever he wants you to do.

There will always be more people willing to do “great” things for God than there are people willing to do the little things. The race to be a leader is crowded, but the field is wide open for those willing to be servants.

Sometimes you serve upward to those in authority, and sometimes you serve downward to those in need. Either way, you develop a servant’s heart when you’re willing to do anything needed.

Love Finds Meaning in Sacrifice

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by Jon Walker

“Live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.” (Ephesians 5:2 NIV)

When Mary used her hair to rub perfumed oil down between her Savior’s toes, the disciples only whiffed the aroma of waste: “This perfume could have been sold at a high price and the money given to the poor” (Matthew 26:9 NIV).

But Jesus suggested such a great sacrifice leads to great influence: “I tell you the truth, wherever this gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her” (Matthew 26:13 NIV).

Perhaps Jesus could smell the sweet fragrance of Mary’s sacrifice because he knew that love finds meaning in sacrifice: “We understand what love is when we realize that Christ gave his life for us. That means we must give our lives for other believers” (1 John 3:16 GW).

Perhaps, in Mary, Jesus could smell “a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God,” a life “poured out like a drink offering” (Ephesians 5:2; 2 Timothy 4:6 NIV). We become living sacrifices when we no longer see the waste of giving to others; instead, we see the gift we give to others.

The Holy Spirit presses us toward radical transformation, where, instead of seeing sacrifice, we see opportunities to love; instead of seeing perfume wasted on the floor, we see ourselves like Jesus, prepared for burial, ready to be “crucified with Christ,” so that “I no longer live, but Christ lives in me” (Matthew 26:12; Galatians 2:20 NIV).

You may be hitting one of those “I can’t, but God can” moments, but our brother, Paul, reminds us that God gives us the grace required to become living sacrifices, and he places the Holy Spirit in us to create us holy and pleasing to God.

“Live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God” (Ephesians 5:2 NIV).

Live Relaxed in God’s Grace

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by Rick Warren

“As a father is kind to his children, so the Lord is kind to those who honor him. He knows what we are made of; he remembers that we are dust.” (Psalm 103:13-14 GN)

God understands you completely. He’s fully aware of your humanity. He knows your faults, fears, failures, and frustrations. He doesn’t expect you to be Superman or Superwoman.

If you’re a parent, do you love your children at every stage of their development, or are you waiting until they’re mature to love them?

The point is, God loves you at every stage of your development, so you don’t have to have unresolved guilt and unrealistic expectations. Listen:

  • There is nothing you will ever do that will make God love you more than he does right now.
  • There is nothing you will ever do that will make God love you less than he does right now.

God’s love is unconditional. It’s not based on what you do or don’t do.

I like to think of it like this: I have three kids. All of them had to learn to walk, and all three of them went through the same process: They’d take a step; they’d stumble. They’d get up, take two steps, then stumble. They’d get up and take a couple steps and fall again.

As their father, what was my reaction? Did I scold them? “What are you doing stumbling? You’re a Warren. Warrens don’t stumble! You can do better than that.” Of course not! How silly! But a lot of us think that’s how God treats us. We think that every time we stumble, God says, “Get up! What are you doing, you dummy?”

The Bible teaches us that, “There is no condemnation now for those who live in union with Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1 TEV). What does that mean? Let’s say I take a card and write every single thing I’ve ever done wrong on it — all my sins, faults, mistakes, all the skeletons in my closet, all the shameful acts and thoughts and memories and temptations. Then I put the card in a book and close it. You can’t see the card anymore; you can only see the book. That’s the way God sees us when Jesus is in our lives. He no longer sees our sin; he sees Jesus at work in our lives.

When you come to Christ and say, “God, here’s my life. Everything I’ve ever done wrong, every time I’ve ever made a mistake, all those stupid things I’ve done. I want to put my life in Jesus Christ,” Jesus wraps you with his love. God looks at Jesus and sees that Jesus is perfect; he doesn’t see your sin. That’s what it means to relax in God’s grace.