Humble Service

Introduction

Glenn Van Ekeren tells this story:

“It took me years to work up the nerve to take my wife along with me on a speaking engagement. My wife’s approval would be the ultimate compliment and encouragement as I endeavored to become a respected public speaker. I feverishly memorized the key points, practiced my illustrations, and worked on voice fluctuation.

“When I stepped on the podium that night I was confident of my ability to deliver a flawless and inspiring speech. Forty-five minutes flew by and the crowd applauded my efforts. The pride swelled up inside of me as individual audience members shook hands and thanked me for a memorable address.

“In the car on the way home, I turned to my wife and asked, ‘Sweetheart, how many great speakers do you think there are in the world today?’

“She smiled, placed her hand on mine and softly said, ‘One fewer than you think, dear.’”

Sometimes pride can get the best of us. And when that happens, somebody has to come along and put us in our place. Hopefully, it’s somebody who loves us who will do it gently and discreetly. In this case, it was a wife who had to set her husband straight and bring him back to reality.

Our passage for this article-Romans 12:3-5-is going to do something similar for us as we continue our study on Christian ministry and the use of spiritual gifts.

Before we begin, let’s remember what we learned from the first two verses of that chapter. We found out that God expects each and every one of us to offer ourselves as living sacrifices. Because of all the wonderful things that God’s done for us, is doing for us and will do for us, we should be totally committed to Him.

Specifically, we should turn over our bodies, minds and wills to Him. If we’ve ever wondered what God expects of us, now we know: He wants all of us and every part of us, day in and day out. That’s the kind of dedication that He’s looking for-that’s the kind of commitment that He wants out of every child of God.

Now that the Lord’s made Himself abundantly clear on His expectations for each one of us in terms of total commitment, now He turns His attention to our attitudes. It’s a gentle yet jarring reminder of how we should view ourselves. If you’ve ever wondered what true Biblical self-esteem is, this is it.

Don’t Think More Highly Of Yourself Than You Ought

Let’s read verses 3-5 and then we’ll go back and look at them in more detail.

Rom. 12:3 For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you.

Rom. 12:4 Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function,

Rom. 12:5 so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.

Paul recognizes that it’s only by the grace of God that he’s an apostle. He knows that whatever authority he has is because God’s showered Him with blessings that he doesn’t deserve or can ever hope to earn. And that’s an appropriate attitude for him to have, especially because verse three is like a slap in the face of pride.

What Paul says to us he says to “every one of” us. None of us gets off the hook. And what message does he have for each and every one of us?

“Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought.” When you think about it, this is a monumental statement. Don’t “think of yourself more highly than you ought.”

It’s as if the apostle’s saying, “You think you’re hot stuff? You think you’re God’s gift to everybody else in the church? You think you’re irreplaceable? Well, I’ve got a message from God to you. Want to know what it is? Stop over-exaggerating your worth. Stop thinking you’re so wonderful and so gifted and so talented and so knowledgeable if you’re not!”

Oscar Levant said this:

“What the world needs is more geniuses with humility. There are so few of us left.”

Levant apparently hasn’t read Romans 12:3.

Instead of exaggerating your capabilities and worth, verse three says, “think of yourself with sober judgment.” But what does that mean?

The Greek word for “sober” literally means to be of sound mind, to be sane. In other words, when we have an inflated view of ourselves and our capabilities, in a sense we’re out of our minds, we’re insane.

And why? Because our self-image is out of whack with reality. Because of pride, we’re over-estimating our worth and abilities. To be sober-minded about ourselves is to be realistic and honest in our assessments.

God doesn’t want us to be misled and carried away with pride. That’s obvious. But also notice this: God also doesn’t want us to undervalue our worth and capabilities. Do you see it?

To be sober-minded, or right-minded or to use sound judgment when evaluating ourselves, we shouldn’t overestimate ourselves, nor should we underestimate ourselves.

Warren Wiersbe says this:

“Nothing causes more damage in a local church than a believer who overrates himself and tries to perform a ministry that he cannot do. (Sometimes the opposite is true, and people undervalue themselves. Both attitudes are wrong.)”

In my mind, this is true Biblical self-esteem: a balanced and sane view of ourselves.

As we noted last time, the first 11 chapters of Romans reveal all of the wonderful ways God has blessed us and shown us mercy and grace. We have tremendous value in His eyes. Tremendous value.

And yet, the first 11 chapters of Romans also tell us that we’re sinful and fatally flawed. In fact, we’re so far gone that if God doesn’t rescue us our destiny is living meaningless lives followed by eternal judgment.

This is Biblical self-esteem. It’s a balance between thinking too highly of ourselves while not under-estimating our value and worth. It’s the middle ground, if you were. It’s an accurate assessment of who we are and our role in the Kingdom of God. It’s looking in the mirror and recognizing the many ways God has gifted and blessed you.

But it’s also recognizing areas that need shoring up. Do you see the balance? If you do, and if you can apply this principle in your daily life, you’ll have the kind of self-view that God wants you to have.

As we’ve already noted, Paul’s been laying the groundwork for Christian ministry and service. He’s about to put us to work. He’s laid out 11 chapters of heavy doctrine followed by the first two verses of chapter 12, where he says that out of gratitude believers need to become living sacrifices. We need to turn our entire lives over to Christ: our bodies, our minds and our wills. The whole enchilada.

But there’s something else that we need to do before we’re ready to discover and use our spiritual gifts. We need to have an attitude adjustment.

Don’t think too much of yourselves, but don’t think too little of yourselves, either. In essence, this is humility. Humble people are well aware of how much God has given them and done for them, but they don’t flaunt it because they’re also aware that they’re only where they are by the grace of God. So humble people are happy and well-adjusted, people that God can use in a mighty way.

Some commentators believe that offering yourselves as living sacrifices comes first, followed by an attitude of humility. Other commentators see humility inter-connected with that total commitment to Christ. No matter how you see it, the end result is the same: a Christian who’s ready and willing to do whatever God has called him or her to do.

God Gives Us The Faith We Need To Do Ministry

And just how are we supposed to do ministry? How do we accomplish what God wants us to accomplish?

The end of verse three gives us a hint: “in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you.”

In order to understand what this phrase means, remember, we’re supposed to have an accurate self-image, and that includes recognizing that God has equipped us with spiritual gifts to do ministry. But God doesn’t just give us these gifts, He also gives us the faith that we need to operate them.

Let’s say God gives you a beautiful new car: an SUV with all the bells and whistles. It’s a beauty and gobbles gas with the best of them.

So you see the car, recognize that it comes from God, thank Him for it and then jump behind the wheel to take a drive. But you can’t find the keys. There aren’t any keys. The car’s great and you can’t wait to use it, but you can’t because the Lord doesn’t give you the keys, only the car.

Or let’s say you do have keys, but when you try to turn the engine on nothing happens because there’s no gas in the gas tank. The car’s great and you can’t wait to use it, but you can’t because the Lord doesn’t give you any gas, only the car itself.

In the same way, God’s supernaturally equips each one of us with spiritual gifts, to be used for the common good. But God not only gives us spiritual gifts, He also gives us the faith or the capability or the power to use those spiritual gifts.

In our car analogy, God not only gives us the car, He makes sure we can use the car to the fullest extent by giving us the keys and a full tank of gas.

So verse three says that God measures out the exact amount of faith that you need and that I need in order to use and operate our spiritual gifts. God’s not in the business of frustrating us by giving us something and then laughing up in heaven as we frantically search for some way to use the darn thing.

God wants us to use our giftedness, we were created to do good works, so He gives us what we need to do just that, in terms of faith or capability. And notice that the word “measure” seems to indicate that the amount of faith that each of us is given differs from person to person.

Each Of Us Is Uniquely Gifted By God To Do Ministry

And why is that? Because each of us have different spiritual gifts. Because each of us has a different-and unique-role in the church. Because each of us is a spiritual snowflake in terms of giftedness.

And that’s the point that Paul makes in verses 4-5. Let’s read them again.

Rom. 12:4 Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function,

Rom. 12:5 so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.

Paul makes a common New Testament analogy here. He compares our human bodies to the body of Jesus Christ: the church. He says that each of us has a body with different parts and different internal organs. That’s obvious. We all have kidneys and hearts and arms and legs and lungs and fingers and on and on. But, he says, those parts don’t have the same function-they don’t all do the same thing.

That’s obvious: our knees do one thing, our livers do something else and our ears do something else.

And in the same way, we who are in Christ-that is, we who are Christians–”form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.” In other words, just as all of the parts of our bodies are unique and do different things, all of the people in the church-all of us-are unique and equipped to do different things. And just like human bodies, each believer depends on everyone else. The body of Christ, just like our human bodies, can’t function the way God wants it to function without everyone doing what they’re designed to do.

In order to get a better idea of what Paul’s getting at here, let’s read 1 Corinthians 12:11-20. The apostle has just listed several spiritual gifts-which we’ll look at in future articles-and then he says this in verse 11:

1Cor. 12:11 All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, and he gives them to each one, just as he determines.

So where do spiritual gifts come from? The Spirit. They come from God. And which Christians get these spiritual gifts? “He gives them to EACH one.” All Christians have spiritual gifts. You may not know it and you may not be using your spiritual gifts, but each and every one of us-those who are believers-are supernaturally equipped by God for ministry. Every single one of us. And yes, that means you and the person next to you. Every one of us.

And who decides who gets what? God does. “Just as he determines.” God is sovereign and He, and He alone decides who gets what spiritual gifts. That tells me that Christians who pray for certain gifts, whether it’s prophecy or speaking in tongues or whatever don’t understand the sovereignty of God: He’s the potter and we’re the clay. He’s the creator and we’re the creation.

And besides, while we can’t be dogmatic about it, I believe each Christian receives their allotment of spiritual gifts when they first believe. And if that’s the case, it doesn’t do any good to pray for a certain gift months or years down the road. What’s done is already done. We already have what God wants us to have. Then it’s just a matter of using our gifts, which become more evident and more pronounced as time goes on.

God decides who gets what in terms of spiritual gifts and it’s unbiblical to pray for something He doesn’t give us and obviously doesn’t want us to have. We need to be satisfied with who we are and how God has gifted us. This, of course, ties in nicely with having a sane or Biblically realistic view of ourselves.

Now let’s read verses 12-14.

1Cor. 12:12 The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ.

1Cor. 12:13 For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body -whether Jews or Greeks, slave or free -and we were all given the one Spirit to drink.

1Cor. 12:14 Now the body is not made up of one part but of many.

This is something important for us to grasp. There’s tremendous unity within the body. And why? Because all of the gifts come from the same place, the Spirit, for the common good, for the smooth operation of the body of Christ. And yet, just like the human body, the body of Christ isn’t “made up of one part but of many.”

In other words, again, there may be one Spirit and we may have the same goal of serving Christ and others–being Jesus’ arms and legs as it were here on earth–But we’re all unique. We’re all different. We have different functions or jobs to do in the church. We all have different spiritual gifts.

Despite this diversity, though, we mustn’t forget that we have the same goal in whatever we do. We may be unique in terms of spiritual giftedness, but we still depend upon each other. None of us are more important than anybody else. The body of Christ can’t function smoothly or properly if we’re not all doing our part, all depending upon each other. We’re all important and the body of Christ needs all of us to be serving in order to be what God wants us to be.

Now let’s read verses 15-20.

1Cor. 12:15 If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason cease to be part of the body.

1Cor. 12:16 And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason cease to be part of the body.

1Cor. 12:17 If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be?

1Cor. 12:18 But in fact God has arranged the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be.

1Cor. 12:19 If they were all one part, where would the body be?

1Cor. 12:20 As it is, there are many parts, but one body.

These verses reinforce the idea of the uniqueness of each of us, as well as the importance of all of us. The body of Christ depends on each one of us to do his or her part.

I have a bad back and because of that, I’m hampered. I can’t do certain things. I can’t run or twist a lot or lift heavy things. And some things that I continue to do I have to do very carefully or rely on different parts of my body in order to take up the slack.

Because my back doesn’t work the way it was designed, I can’t do all the things my body was designed to do. In the same way, if even one of you isn’t doing what God’s designed you to do, the rest of us suffer because of it.

An admirer once asked Leonard Bernstein, celebrated orchestra conductor, what was the hardest instrument to play. He replied without hesitation: “Second fiddle. I can always get plenty of first violinists, but to find out who plays second violin with as much enthusiasm or second French horn or second flute, now that’s a problem. And yet if no one plays second, we have no harmony.”

In the same way, the body of Christ is crippled or hampered when one or more of us aren’t serving the Lord with the gifts that He’s given us.

Conclusion

So what have we learned in this study? A lot.

First of all, we shouldn’t think more highly of ourselves than we ought, especially in terms of how God has gifted us for service. Instead, we should think of ourselves with sober judgment, accurately evaluating ourselves. We shouldn’t think too highly of ourselves, nor should we think too little of ourselves.

This is Biblical self-esteem. Christians with this kind of humble and realistic attitude are the kind of persons God can use in a mighty way. In fact, the Lord gives us just the right amount of faith that we need in order to use our spiritual gifts.

And what are spiritual gifts? They’re supernatural enablements from God to do ministry in the church and for the common good. Every Christian has them.

So every Christian should totally commit themselves to God by giving their bodies, minds and wills to Him. Then they should adopt the proper attitude about themselves and their role in the Kingdom of God. And then they should use the spiritual gifts God has given them.

And what, specifically, are the different spiritual gifts? That’s the topic of the next three articles, so keep reading!