Her name was Doris Lawrence.  She taught Sunday school in my home church for as long as anyone can remember.  She taught my older sisters, not an easy task; she taught my older brothers, an even harder task, and she taught me - a task I'll leave you to imagine.  By the time she was my teacher, she was well into her 60s with no plans of retiring her attendance book.

   I am now 38, and as I look back and think of the people in my life like Doris Lawrence, I am in awe.  I mean, how did she do it?  How did she keep on teaching Sunday School for all those years?  Surely she must have had some real rascals come through her class; surely there must have been times of tiredness and frustration and lack of time.  Yet she kept on teaching - how did she do it?

   I think of another person I've met on life's journey - a pastor.  He is retired now, but at the time he was a pastor of a small downtown church in Hamilton.  I met him during my seminary days and had the privilege of being mentored by him for a year.  The work in that church was hard.  The community had changed and, like so many downtown churches, the congregation had not changed with the immediate community.  But he was diligent.  He faithfully preached the word, visited the sick and he tried to create links with the community.  He worked hard.

   Today, if you were to read his C.V., you would see that he never served in a large church and he never pastored a prestigious congregation - most of his pastorates were places where many people would not want to serve, like Indian reserves and forgotten downtown churches.  The church in downtown Hamilton was not a pretty place - in fact it was a wreck.  He had no office, and there was no air conditioning, computers or fancy technology.  And the congregation - well, it was a challenge.

   And, as I reflect on it, I have to wonder again, how did he manage to keep on?  What enables a person to continue to serve Christ's church without what many would call necessities?  What enables a person to serve when it would be much simpler to give up and much easier to walk away?

   What is the secret?  The obstacles to Christian service in this world are large.  The rewards seem small - and sometimes the effect of our Christian service seems so small and insignificant that we often wonder if we are doing any good.

   We are fortunate in our church.  We are fortunate to have leaders in our church who are devoted to serving us.  I don't need to admonish many of you to serve because so many of you are serving.  You are helping others, providing meals to those in need, listening to the lonely and visiting the sick.  Many of you are driving those in need to medical appointments, and helping others do their laundry, cut their grass or fix their car.  Many of you go out of your way to serve your fellow employees by listening to their concerns.  Some of you are seen as compassionate and helpful in your places of work, because you really take time to serve others.  Many of you are serving through teaching Sunday School, a mid-week group, or serve on one of our boards.  I would say that the majority of you here today understand that the Christian faith, if it is real in your life, expresses itself in service to others.

   No, I don't need to admonish the majority of you to serve or even to serve more - many of you put in long hours serving in the church and then serving God in your families, and in your work places.  You do not need to be encouraged to serve.

   No, I think the question we need to address is, "How do we keep on?"  Paul writes to the Galatians in 6:9, "Let us not become weary in doing good." (NIV)

   But that is hard!  How are we to persevere in our service?  Why not give up?  I mean, 1,000 to 2,000 pastors leave the pastorate every year, many more thousands in the congregation, men and women, throw up their arms in frustration and leave their area of service, leaving many churches weak and crippled.

   How do we persevere?  How did Doris Lawrence keep on teaching Sunday School all those years?  And that pastor, how did he keep on when the work seemed so insignificant?

   This morning, I want to hold up a picture for you, a picture that I hope will help you keep on doing good, to keep on serving one another in love, and to keep on giving of yourself for the sake of others, and for the sake of God's kingdom.  It is an awesome picture, full of meaning and inspiration.  A picture of Jesus, drawn for us by John in John 13:

Now before the festival of the Passover, Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father.  Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.  The devil had already put it into the heart of Judas son of Simon Iscariot to betray him.  And during supper Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God, got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself.  Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him.  He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, "Lord, are you going to wash my feet?"  Jesus answered, "You do not know now what I am doing, but later you will understand."  Peter said to him, "You will never wash my feet."  Jesus answered, "Unless I wash you, you have no share with me."  Simon Peter said to him, "Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!"  Jesus said to him, "One who has bathed does not need to wash except for the feet but is entirely clean.  And you are clean, though not all of you."  For he knew who was to betray him; for this reason he said, "Not all of you are clean."  After he had washed their feet, had put on his robe, and had returned to the table, he said to them, "Do you know what I have done to you?  You call me Teacher and Lord - and you are right, for that is what I am.  So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet.  For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you.  Very truly, I tell you, servants are not greater than their master, nor are messengers greater than the one who sent them.  If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them."
(John 13:1-17) (NRSV)

   I wonder if people like Doris Lawrence don't have this picture of Jesus washing the disciples' feet in the forefront of their mind - for it is a picture that inspires service; it is a picture that enables us to keep on, for it is a picture of our Lord's love for us.

   We often say, "God loves you," or we sing, "Jesus loves me, this I know."  But what does that love look like?  We look at this picture and we see it.  It is a love that gives of itself so completely and so continually that we can never out-give it, never out-love it, never come to an end of it.

   Someone may say, "What?  The washing of the disciples' feet was a practical thing; the feet were dirty, and you can imagine that they were stinky.  Someone had to wash the feet that night."

   No, this was an act of service.  In the ancient Middle East the washing of the feet was a job that the servant did when the guests came into the home.  There was no servant there - someone had to do it.

   Well, what about the 12 disciples - why didn't they do it?  Because they had just come into the room, we are told in Luke's gospel (22:24-30), arguing about who was going to be the greatest in the kingdom of God.  There wasn't one of them that was going to stoop to the place of a servant.

   But our Lord did.  He loved them so much that he served them by washing their feet.  It is a picture of the service that he still offers and gives to his followers today.  In this act he is saying, "I love you so much that everything I have is yours; I hold nothing back."

   If there is anything that he can do, we can be sure that he will do it.

   If there is anything that he can give he will give it.

   If there is any way at all in which he can possibly help, let it cost him his very life, we can be sure that we will receive it.

   Is it any wonder that Paul wrote to the Corinthians, "Christ's love compels us." (2 Corinthians 5:14) (NIV)  "The love of Christ urges us on" (2 Corinthians 5:14) (NRSV)  And so it urges on the modern-day follower of Christ to continue in service.

   O, the depth of Christ's love for us.

   We could put right beside this picture of Jesus washing the disciples' feet the picture of Jesus dying on the cross, for the one points to the other; the one illustrates the other - Jesus washing the disciples' feet - by his death we are cleansed from our sin.  Jesus serving the disciples - Jesus' service to us, giving of himself so completely on the cross, so that you and I can stand before God with joy and thanksgiving, free to live in the presence of God now and forever more.

   That's what the whole conversation with Peter is all about.  Peter says, "You will not wash my feet."  And Jesus, says, "Yeah, I will; you don't understand it now, but you will."  And we could add with certainty, "You will understand this better when you see me on the cross, dying for you, giving myself completely for you so that the muck of your life, the filth that is in your mind and in your heart, can be washed away.  And if you don't allow me to wash that away through my death on the cross, then you don't understand me and can't have any part of me."

   What enables a leader in the church to continue to serve?  What enables you to continue to give of yourself to others in service?  It is the reality of Christ serving us, us of all people, by loving us and giving himself so completely.

   But there is also this, in this awesome fact, in this picture.  It is this - it is that Jesus is doing this act of service.  Do you sometimes read the gospels and think, "If you Pharisees only knew who you were talking to - you wouldn't talk like that."?  Even in our modern age we sometimes have this buddy mentality about Jesus.  And so in our prayers we say, "Dear Jesus".  I understand the thought behind it, Jesus is our friend and we can talk to him openly and plainly, but let us never lose sight of the fact that the one who wrapped the towel around his waist is not just "Jesus" but is "LORD".

   He sits at God's right hand.  All of heaven attends to his words.  Every song written in the heavens praises his name, "Worthy is the Lamb that was slain".  He holds the keys of death and hell in his hand.  He is the Lord of lords and King of kings and one day every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.

   And this is the one who washes the feet of the disciples.  That's awesome.  My friends, if such service is not below the one who created the heavens and the earth, then is it below us to serve in such a way?  This is what Jesus explains in verses 13 to 16:  Jesus is our Lord and teacher, he has just washed our feet.  But I'm not greater than he is; the servant is never greater than the master.  And the messenger?  Well, I just bear the good news; I didn't create the good news.  You and I, we're not greater than the Lord, and if he washed feet, if he served people in such a self-giving way, then can we do any less?

   But there is just one more point I need to make here - Christ's self-giving love enables us to continue to serve; Christ's self-giving example shows how I can serve.  But what about the significance of the work?  Service to others often seems so insignificant.  Teaching Sunday school, coming week after week for a mid-week program, serving on a board?  The progress sometimes seems slow, the impact on the world seems so insignificant.

   How are we to keep on?

   Wouldn't it be wonderful if giving our lives to Christ in service to others was a blaze of glory?  You hear the Lord calling you to service and you know you'd do anything, go anywhere - you'd pay the ultimate price of martyrdom.  The church would raise a bronze statue of your likeness in your honour in the front yard there, and on the stone pedestal would be inscribed the words, "To the memory of one who gave his all."  A blaze of glory.

   But the truth is, Christian service isn't like that.  It's going to a nursing home and giving a shaky old man a cup of water.  It's listening to the neighbour's kid's troubles when you would rather say, "Get lost."  It's teaching Sunday School, week after week, to a group of kids who are hard to teach and sometimes ungrateful.  It's going to the committee meeting and making those difficult decisions with grace.  It's washing the feet of the disciples.

   And all the while, it's having Satan whispering in your ear, "It's of no use; what you are doing is not worthwhile.  You really should be doing something more grand, bigger, greater.  This isn't worth your time."  And he blinds us to apparent successes.

   But don't you believe it.  That's a lie.  I know because I believed that lie for a long time.  I worked in a small town church for 11 years and much of what I did I thought was a waste of time.  And then when we were leaving, the church had a dinner and invited the community.  They gave people a chance to publicly say their good-byes.  I thought, "Oh great, people are going to talk about the massive puppet shows we put on, the cable television show we had, the big anniversary celebrations we hosted."  But they didn't.

   One woman stood up and said, "Tom, you came to my sister's husband's funeral."

   And I'm sitting there, thinking, "Yeah it was a slow week."

   And she continued, "You were there to support me through that, and you don't know how much it meant to me to have you there."

   I thought, "You're right.  I didn't realize how much it meant to you.  At the time I remembered not wanting to be there and thinking that there must be a better way that I could be ministering."

   Then another man stood up.  He spoke of how I would come in to visit him when he had the butcher shop across the street from the church.  He had his struggles with that shop, and he spoke as if I was there every week for four years.

   I can only remember dropping in two or three times in those four years and we never talked about much, the price of pork, the latest frozen food product, his wife and kids.

   But to him, it was the greatest service I could have provided.

   And I remember going out of that dinner saying, "Lord, forgive me for belittling the acts of service which I think are so small and insignificant.  May I never again question your power to transform the simplest act of service for eternal benefits."

   And so one French theologian has said, "Do not forget that the value and interest of life is not so much to do conspicuous things ... as to do ordinary things with the perception of their enormous value." ¹

   How does one continue to serve?  With the truth of Christ's self-giving love ever before us, the example of Christ's service to us ever motivating us, and knowing that even the simplest acts of service have eternal benefits.

   That is how, I believe, people like Doris Lawrence and thousands of others of Christ's servants continue on until the day they hear the words from their Lord, "Well done good and faithful servant."

Copyright MBC and Tom Cullen - September 2001

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