Meeting Jesus Through Serving Others

MEETING JESUS THROUGH SERVING OTHERS

On Sunday night, I attended a gathering for the youth and adult Summer Costa Rica Mission Team.  It was great to hear about the experiences, the worship, the hard work, the family time together and the joy the group experienced through being the hands and feet of Jesus to the people there.  I am convinced that trips like that will change hearts and lives.  How can we not be changed when we come face to face not only with the needs of others, but in sharing life with them for a time?  I am so grateful for the youth who gave up part of their summer vacation and the adults who took time from their busy lives to build the Kingdom of God.  It is one more bit of evidence that our youth are not the church of tomorrow but they are living examples of faith right now.

I was moved by how the youth missionaries talked about their understanding that they were not the only ones with something to offer, that the people of Costa Rica were a blessing to them, as well.  I have heard others who have served in mission work say similar things.  Sometimes the very people we go to serve end up serving us in simple ways.  Other times it is the unexpected joy found in those living in poverty that makes a lasting impact.  Through the years I have come to know many people whose outlook on life, God, people, and the world has changed by being in service with others.

At the end of the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus gave us a hint that acts of service carried the potential to change the one who is serving.  In Matthew 25:31-46 (the well-known description of the final judgment where Jesus welcomes into his Kingdom those who have served others in need) he says that serving another person who is sick, hungry, thirsty, without adequate clothing or shelter, or in prison is actually serving Jesus; he says, “when you have done it to one of the least of these…you have done it to me”.  In essence, when we serve those in need, we will meet Jesus there. 

This assumes a few things that lead us to humility.  First, Jesus is already there ahead of us, at home with the poor and the broken.  We are not bringing Jesus to those who we serve or are in mission with.  Jesus has gone before.  Second, every person we serve carries the potential to change us.  It is not just about us serving to change others.  If it is Jesus we meet in those we serve, then we have just as much to learn and experience as we meet the risen Christ there and we must be open to this.  Whenever we come into the presence of Jesus, it carries the potential to change us in significant and meaningful ways.  (I think that is why so many people who do foreign mission work are so captured by the joy, even amidst the poverty, of the people that they serve; I think it is why people change their habits and attitudes after such a trip).  Last, as our service brings us to the threshold of a transformed heart and life, it creates a community where all of us (those serving and those being served) gather in the presence of Jesus.  It is together (serving and being served) that we meet the risen Christ in a special way.

So, as we serve others in Jesus’ name, as we reach out as the hands and feet of Jesus, we must also remember that Jesus waits for us and will transform us too.  In the end, Jesus reminds us all that we are in need of his grace and transformation, whether we have much in the way of material things or very little.  In brining people together through acts of compassion and service, Jesus creates community where rich and poor, young and old, and any other distinction we can make are brought together as one, and as humble joy-filled people we stand together in the presence of Jesus.

You are the hands and feet of Christ,

Brett