The Alternative

Dr. Tony Evans: Most people do not live a life based on grace. They live a life based on either merit or they live a life based on human effort. But Dr. Tony Evans says there's no limit to what we can accomplish when we depend on God's power instead of our own. And when He gives you what you do not have, you can pull off what you could not do.

Guest (Male): This is The Alternative broadcast, featuring the timeless biblical teachings from the archives of Dr. Tony Evans. When you review a business online, one of the things you rate is the quality of their service. Today, Dr. Evans will tell us about some important biblical benchmarks that measure how well we're serving the Lord. Let's join him.

Dr. Tony Evans: I want to talk about seven brief things related to serving Christ. The first thing is that we must serve Christ sacrificially. Jesus says in John 12, "The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains by itself alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. He who loves his life loses it, and he who hates his life in this world shall keep it to eternal life. If anyone serves Me, then let him follow Me; and where I am, there shall My servant also be. If anyone serves Me, the Father will honor him."

He says on His own way to the cross, by way of agriculture, that a grain of wheat in order to produce something must die. It must die in order for shoots of grain to come up out of the ground and produce all of the flour and all of the foods that we benefit from. In other words, productivity comes through death. It is because even Christians do not fully understand the cross that we still live for ourselves. Jesus Christ died that He might take us in a whole new direction.

Secondly, we must serve Christ authentically. None of us serves Christ perfectly, but all of us can serve Christ authentically. All of us have bad days, but all of us can turn those days around so that we are authentic servants of Christ. In Acts chapter 20, verse 18, he says, "And when they come to him, he said to them, you yourselves know from the first day that I set foot in Asia, how I was with you the whole time, serving the Lord with all humility, with tears, with trials, which came upon me through the plots of the Jews; how I did not shrink from declaring to you anything that was profitable and teaching you publicly and from house to house."

He says our ministry was authentic. It was real. We're not just to serve God because it's the job, but to serve God because He deserves to be served, and we ought to serve Him authentically. Thirdly, we ought to serve Him enthusiastically. We saw it already when we read 100th Psalm, serve the Lord with what? Gladness. The New Testament repeats this in Romans chapter 12, verse 11: serving the Lord enthusiastically, not lagging behind in diligence, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord.

In other words, there ought to be some pep in your step. When you serve men, if they're paying you enough, you'll find steps that you don't have. You'll make them. You'll be doing hop, skip, and jumps if you have to, if the reward is great enough. Now, what will keep you from serving Him that way? Forgetting who He is. You're serving the Lord. It is when you serve men and men don't treat you right that your service goes down. But the Bible says you serve the Lord Christ, and your ultimate reward doesn't come from men, it comes from Christ.

Next, fourthly, we must serve the Lord relationally. In other words, don't let what you do for God outpace your walk with God. Maintain the relationship while you do the duty. We ought to serve Christ relationally, keep the relationship going. Being in His presence, sitting at His feet, spending time in His Word, time in prayer. As you move through the day, stay in contact with Him and cultivate the relationship.

Next, fifthly, we must serve Christ expectantly. Luke chapter 12, verse 37. Let me start with verse 35. "Be dressed in readiness and keep your lamps alight. And be like men who are waiting for their master when he returns from the wedding feast so that they may immediately open the door to him when he comes and knocks. Blessed are those slaves whom the master shall find on alert when he comes. Truly I say to you, that he will gird himself to serve and have them recline at the table and will come up and wait on them." Now, that's a deep verse.

He says, be like servants who are waiting for their master to come back from the wedding. So a master goes out, he marries a beautiful young lady, and he brings the lady home. Well, if you were the master of a house in Jesus' day, the servants better not be sleep when you get home. They're there to serve you. So you open the door, you help him and introduce the new bride to the home, you have a meal prepared for them, you waited on them. Okay? And since you didn't know when the wedding was going to end and when the wedding would be over, you were ready at any time. There was no time when you were not ready because you lived every moment in anticipation of the master's return home.

What He is saying is, Jesus is the Master, we are the servants. He is saying, expect me at any time. Since you don't know what time I am coming home—and there are two ways that that could be applied: when I return to take you to myself, or we could apply it when He calls you home, none of us knows when we will meet the Master—He is saying, be ready at any time and be ready at all times for the Master's return. And here's the promise: if you are expecting me when I show up, if Jesus Christ told you right now, I'm coming for you in the next ten minutes, would you say, Lord, not ready?

Well, if the answer is that you're not ready, then that means we've got to get ready. And getting ready has to do with our serving Him in a way that pleases Him. And He says, if you are expecting me—that is, living in light of my return—when I return, I will turn the tables and I will serve you. In other words, what God is talking about are the great rewards that will come to His people in the kingdom of God for those who faithfully serve Him.

And this doesn't just have to do with the big names and the big preachers and all of that. It has to do with anybody who is faithfully serving the God and living in light of His coming. No matter how big, quote-unquote big, or small, quote-unquote small, if you are faithfully living in light of His coming, serving Him in light of His coming, then you are in for a grand reward, not only in eternity, but honor here in time as well.

So we ought to serve Christ expectantly. Then we are to serve Christ dependently. First Peter chapter 4, verse 10. "As each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. Whoever speaks, let him speak as it were the utterances of God. Whoever serves, let him do so by the strength which God supplies, so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen."

He says that we are to serve one another, which is a way of serving God. When we serve one another, when we use our gifts to minister to one another, we are to lean on God's strength. Now, what does it mean to lean on God's strength? Well, he says it in verse 10. It is to live your life based on grace. He calls it at the end of the verse the manifold, which means many-colored, grace of God. Living a life based on grace.

To live a life based on grace is to live a thank-you kind of life. It is to come to God and say, "I want to thank you that you have provided me with what I need to enable me to do what you want me to do." Many times to serve Christ means coming to Christ and saying, "God, I don't want to do what you want me to do," because He already knows you don't want to do it. "I don't feel like doing it. I'm not motivated to do it. So if I'm going to pull this off, if I'm going to do what you ask me to do because I don't want to do it, don't think I can do it, don't feel like doing it, I am going to need you to give me what I don't already have on my own. You've got to work in me and give me something I don't naturally possess."

So I am now dying to myself, going back to that crucifixion concept, and I am laying down on you to equip and enable me to pull off what I don't already possess, or I'm resting on grace. What grace does—and that's why Peter says earlier, "May the grace of God be multiplied to you"—when you rest on grace, His supernatural, undeserved enablement, then what He does is supply it to you. He gives you what you do not have. And when He gives you what you do not have, you can pull off what you could not do. Most people do not live a life based on grace. They live a life based on either merit or they live a life based on human effort.

Now, you do have to have effort. You do have to do things. God is not going to do it for you, He's just going to do it through you. And He does it through you as you seek to obey Him, leaning on grace. That's why He says in verse 11, "If you're going to serve, serve by the strength which God supplies." Finally, and most interestingly, we are to do it selflessly. This sort of takes us full circle back to the sacrificial concept, but I want to look at it a little closer. Selflessly.

Some people live cafeteria-style lives, self-service only. They live their lives only for themselves. Now, let me tell you a secret: if you live your life only for yourself, you will not and cannot be blessed of God. God's whole agenda was serving everybody else. That's why He died, so that everybody else could be saved. So if you are a selfish Christian, then you render your service from God null and void. That's why He talked in first Peter about serving one another, because your service to Christ must work itself out to benefiting somebody else. Or if your service for Christ only benefits you, then you are a selfish, not a selfless servant.

Guest (Male): Dr. Evans gives a deeper look into the heart of a Christian when he returns in just a moment. First, though, I want to tell you about an inspiring and unique book from Tony. It's called Experiencing Israel. Through stunning photos and insightful commentary, you'll get to relive one of his recent trips to the Holy Land. You'll walk in Jesus' footsteps, seeing what He saw, going where He went. Tony will teach you about the history, the geography, the customs, the people, everything you need to know to bring a whole new dimension to your Bible study time.

This hardcover, coffee table-style book will be a keepsake you'll want to display, as well as a resource you'll want to consult over and over again. It also makes a terrific gift. We want you to have a copy of Experiencing Israel as our gift. All we ask is that you make a donation to help us keep Tony's teaching on this station. Your contributions are the only way we can continue our outreach on radio and TV, our work with pastors, their families, and with local congregations. Contact us today, let us know you can help, and we'll send you the book along with all eight lessons in Tony's current series, Pursuing Christ. This special offer expires this week, so visit us today at TonyEvans.org for details, or call our resource center at 1-800-800-3222. Well, let's hear more now from Dr. Evans on the wisdom of serving Christ.

Dr. Tony Evans: When you have a servant's heart—that is, you seek ways to serve others—now, every individual can't serve every other individual because then you couldn't live that way. But every Christian can serve somebody. See, you can't serve everybody all the time, but you can serve somebody some of the time. He says, the higher you want to go up in clout, the better service you must render.

If you look at the American marketplace, that's how it's built. It's built on service. If you go to a filling station or you go to a grocery store and they give you bad service, then what's your attitude? "I'm not coming back here again." Because, you know what? Your patronage is driven by service. The better the service—oh, those people serve you so well, those people are so nice—and you'll choose between A proprietor and B proprietor if both have the same goods and the same quality based on the level of service.

We are a service industry now, and everybody's trying to outdo everybody else by service. They're offering you this club, this benefit, this free club, this higher service, this higher status. They're all offering you ways where they can serve you more. Why? Because they want your business. They want to be greater than their competition. Well, that's precisely what Jesus is saying. So here's the question: who have you served lately? What thing have you done for somebody else to better them, to enhance them, to help them, to encourage them? Because when you do that, God takes notice of it and, guess what? What goes around comes around. When you are a servant, He makes sure that you are served.

In our families, here's what we should do. This would be a good exercise for families here: have an out-serving-one-another contest, where looking for ways to serve one another and not just looking at ourselves. So, He's saying the more of a servant you are, the greater you are in God's eyes. Look at the prime illustration of that in John 13. Here is the optimum model of service: Jesus Christ Himself.

During the supper, verse two, the devil had already put into the mind of Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon, to betray Jesus. Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands and that He had come from the Father and was going back to the Father, rose from the supper, laid aside His garment, took up a towel and girded Himself. Poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples' feet. You've got to be kidding.

It was the custom of the day that when you went to someone's house for dinner, a servant would be at the door with a towel, sort of like they do in expensive places where the towel is across the guy's arm and they're there to service you, wipe your hands, that kind of thing. Well, they would have a servant at the door to wash the feet of the guest because the people wore sandals, so their feet would get dirty as they walked through the dusty roads of Rome.

Jesus Christ gets up—none of the disciples get up, mind you—Jesus Christ gets up and Jesus Christ puts on a towel, a robe, a servant's robe, and washes His disciples' feet. How could He do such a thing? Well, number one, He knew who He was, verse three. He said, "I know the Father's given me all things." When you know who you are, you don't have to worry about coming down lower. It's when you don't know who you are that you've got to keep propping yourself up. So if you have to talk about you, you have a bad self-image.

So Jesus knows who He is. He's totally secure, so He doesn't have to bother Him to do this. And yet He's not forced to do it; He gets up and does it Himself. Well, you know old Pete. Peter's always got something to say, right? Verse six: "Simon Peter said, Lord, you wash my feet? This is backwards. It's not supposed to be happening like this." Jesus said to him, "What I do you don't realize now, but you will understand later." Peter said, "Well, never shall you wash my feet. You're God. I'm a man. You washing my feet?" Jesus said to him, "If I do not wash you, you have no part with me." Now, watch this now.

Wash your feet? Well, your feet's your walk. That's how you get from one place to another, right? It's your walk. He says, "If I don't clean up your walk, you have no part with me. I've got to keep your walk clean." See, when we walk in this dirty world, it rubs off on us. And you can start your day clean, but by the end of the day, your feet get dirty. We live in a dirty world. And when you walk in this dirty world, your feet are going to get dirty. He says, "That's why you've got to let me be close by to wash your feet, Peter, so I can keep your walk clean."

Okay, now watch this. Well, Peter said, "Well, if that's the case, Lord, not my feet. Give me a bath." So now you know why the Lord loved Peter, because Peter's heart was right. He didn't know what to say, but his heart was right. He said, "Give me a shower. Wash me from the top of my head to the bottom of my feet, because I want to be close to you." They said, "Peter, now you went overboard again." He said, "He who is bathed only needs to wash his feet. You don't need to take another shower. I've already washed you with my blood. I just need to keep your walk clean." You've already been saved, I just want your walk to stay clean. Because our walk gets dirty, doesn't it? Our walk gets sloppy. And He wants to keep our walk clean.

For He knew the one who was about to betray Him, and for this reason He said, "not all of you is clean." And so when He had washed their feet and taken the garments and reclined at the table again, He said to them, "Do you know what I have done to you?" And they said, "Well, tell us, what have you done?" Verse 14: "If I then the Lord and the teacher washed your feet, you also should wash one another's feet." How can you not be willing to serve a brother when God Almighty comes down to serve you and will keep washing your feet as long as you'll let him?

Jesus Christ in closing predicts His betrayal, and then verse 26—now watch this one in closing: "Jesus therefore answered, 'this is the one for whom I will dip the morsel and give it to him.'" This is one of the great acts of servanthood in the whole Bible. Let me summarize it for you. To do with the morsel meant to take some lamb, wrap it up in some flour, roll it over sort of like a pig-in-a-blanket kind of deal, dip it in some bitter sauce or gravy, we would say, and dip it and then eat it.

Jesus takes some lamb, rolls it up in some dough, and says, "Here, Judas," in the greatest act of servanthood ever. Jesus offers Judas one more chance. He says, "Judas, let me roll up the lamb." Now, who is Jesus? The Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world. "Let me roll up some lamb. Let me serve you, Judas. You don't have to roll up your own dip. I'm going to get it for you, roll it for you, and dip it for you. And I'm going to offer it to you." He's not only offering food, He's offering Himself. He says, "Judas, here I am. Do you want me?" And because Judas said no, Satan took over. How much does Jesus love? He loves you enough that even when He knows you're getting ready to betray Him, even when He knows you're getting ready to sell Him down the road for 30 pieces of silver, He still offers His love and His grace. That's the service of our God.

Guest (Male): Dr. Evans has a quick closing thought to share with us when he returns in just a moment. But first, don't forget that today's lesson is part of Tony's powerful series, Pursuing Christ, a look at deepening your devotion to the Lord, not only through obedience, but through praise, service, and more. It'll equip you to set new priorities, demonstrate love, and reflect the Lord to those around you. These eight full-length lessons are yours with our thanks when you make a donation to help us keep bringing you Tony's teaching each day.

And remember, as a bonus, they'll come to you along with Tony's fantastic keepsake book, Experiencing Israel. This special double offer will be gone after this week, so be sure to contact us right away before time runs out. All the details are waiting for you at TonyEvans.org. Or call our resource center at 1-800-800-3222 for some in-person help. Again, that's 1-800-800-3222. When life gets complicated, we often turn to experts—people who know how to fix what we can't. But tomorrow, Dr. Evans reminds us that our greatest needs in life can't be solved by human expertise alone. I hope you'll join us for that. But right now, let's listen to this insightful little rhyme and closing thought for today.

Dr. Tony Evans: There's a clever young guy named somebody else; there's nothing this guy can't do. He's busy from morning to way late at night, just substituting for you. You're asked to do this and you're asked to do that, and what is your ready reply? "Get someone else to do the job; he'll do it much better than I." So much to do in this weary old world, so much the workers are few. And somebody else, all weary and worn, is substituting for you. So the next time you're asked to do something worthwhile, just give this ready reply: "If somebody else can give time and support, my goodness, so can I." Are you serving Christ, or are you putting it off on everyone else? I don't know what He wants you to do. I do know He wants all of us to do something that touches the life of someone else.