A Good Word Wednesday #70 SERVE 🥛🤝🧺

A little bit of goodness, encouragement and hope in your mailbox today

Good Word of the Day: Serve

“Can I take your order?”

We all like good service at the restaurant. Or in the checkout line at the grocery store. Or in any place where we are paying for services rendered, we expect courteous, respectful help. It seems we live in a day where that definition of service isn’t the norm. We notice the contrast when our servers at the restaurant are especially attentive to our empty water glasses or bring extra bread or chips to our table without asking, or asks what we need and immediately brings it.

It begs the question in my life, how am I serving others? Do I always want to be the one being served or am I comfortable humbling myself and serving others?

I think of many people in my life who have humbly served others. I think of pastors, including my Daddy, who sat with families in the hospital, or in their homes or at the funeral home, as they grieved the loss of a loved one. I’ve seen acts of service like my Momma did when she took homemade chocolate chip cookies to new neighbors or organized meals for a young family with a new baby.

We need to challenge ourselves on how we are serving. I’ve never been a fan of church mission teams wearing matching t-shirts that identify themselves as servants. Or taking teams to locations that focus on them serving instead of those being served. I think sometimes our actions are more about ourselves than on those in real need. They seem to be saying, “Look at me. I’m serving you.” If that’s the case, it’s time to question our true motivations.

How can we think about others in the course of a day and humbly serve them through small actions even without others knowing? Here are a few ideas:

• Park in the farthest place at church on Sunday so others can park closer to the door.

• Serve at your church or a local nonprofit through the holidays sorting clothes, or cooking a holiday meal. Or anonymously give money to a family so they can purchase their own turkey.

• Rake leaves or mow the grass for someone in need.

I’d love to hear your ideas on how we can serve others.

As always, our ultimate example of how to be a humble servant is the life of Christ.

Wednesday in the Word

“After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him…. Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet.” John 13:1-17

“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.” Philippians 2:3-4

“…He made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.” Philippians 2:7

Share Your Good Words

Good Questions of the Week: How can you use your time, treasures and talents to serve others? Who is someone in your life who is an example of being a humble servant?

Good Unseen People

Photo: She Is Safe

The following excerpt is from a story that will be included in my upcoming book, Unseen People: Sharing Light and Life with Your Neighbors and the Nations. Click the blue link below to see the progress of the book. When you get to the page, scroll down to THE UNSEEN PROCESS — How The Book, Unseen People Is Being Born.

BIG Announcement about Unseen People here next week. Please check back here next Wednesday for A Good Word!!

Serving… servanthood… what is it exactly? God has a way of getting my attention fairly often when I read the same or similar scriptures or other readings twice or more in a short amount of time. Just this morning, in two separate books, I read about Jesus serving the disciples by washing their feet in John chapter 13. It was the very same story read within a matter of minutes — the picture of Jesus humbly taking the posture of a lowly servant to cleanse the dirty feet of the men who followed Him into that upper room.

Read the full story here: Let Me Serve You

Good Words I Recommend

A Good Blog: Come on in! You are welcome here

Another Good Book: Cross Cultural Servanthood

And Another Good Book: When Helping Hurts

Another Good Book: Let This Mind Be In You

A Final Good Word

I need to serve with the right motives. I need to serve with humbleness and with joy. Not because I have to. Not because God requires it. Not even just to meet an immediate need or request. But I need to serve to bring God’s presence into the situation.

I hope that I am serving you as you read these words each week. It is these good words that connect me with you. For that, I am profoundly grateful. Every day, my journey includes doing this…

“And now, go, write it before them on a tablet and inscribe it in a book, that it may be for the time to come as a witness forever.” Isaiah 30:8

And this…

“This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: ‘Write in a book all the words I have spoken to you. Jeremiah 30:2

Until next week, please share a good word with someone today.

I’d love to hear from you. This is your chance to share with me whatever is on your heart today. Please share:

Contact me privately: deannalynnsanders@gmail.com.

Thank you for taking your valuable time to read my words. Please share a good word with someone today. Invite others into our Good Word family.

Gratefully yours,