Sacrificial Service

My name is Jason Graham. My wife Dwan and I have 3 children Isabel (8), Mattie (4) and Noah (3). Dwan and I have been members of Living Hope for 9 years. We currently serve as small group leaders, work in the children’s ministry and are active in missions. I also currently serve as a deacon. Serving at Living Hope has given me the opportunity to use the gifts God has given me and it is through service that he has shaped much of my life.

The title of today’s message was The Church is Built Through Sacrificial Service. The title is as true of the church in the 21st century as it was in the 1st Century. Ultimately God builds the church, but he does so through the blood, sweat, and tears of followers of Christ. This morning I heard the message at the 8 AM service. Afterwards, I was able to walk through the halls of Living Hope and see that message being lived out in the lives of men and women who have chosen to make service in the name of Christ a part of their Sunday morning.

The great challenge of any sermon is not in listening to the sermon, it is not even in preaching the sermon. The great challenge is in how we actually live the sermon. It is here that we must stop and ask ourselves, are we really allowing the gospel to penetrate us to the very core? Are we living a life of sacrificial service? Are we being poured out as an offering to the Lord? This morning the special song was entitled Alabaster Jar, the interesting thing about an alabaster jar is often in order to get access to the contents of the jar – it had to be broken. 2 Corinthians 4:7 describes the followers of Christ as “earthen vessels” – fragile pots. The verse goes on to say that we are fragile so that the strength and greatness of God may be made known.

We at Living Hope have a wide variety of opportunities to serve both our church body and the surrounding community. We must continually be available to share the gospel with unbelievers. These individuals need their names lifted up before the Lord in prayer. Also, unbelievers need to see the body of Christ in action—loving one another and living sacrificial lives of service. Within Living Hope there are numerous opportunities to serve. The Bible commands us to love one another, encourage one another, build up one another, and comfort one another. Actually that list could be lengthened. In fact the words “one another” occur together approximately 93 times in the New Testament. That means that we are unable to obey a good part of the New Testament if we are not in community with other Christians.

I leave you with these words from Aristides as he describes the early Christians to the Roman emperor Hadrian:

Falsehood is not found among them; and they love one another, and from widows they do not turn away their esteem; and they deliver the orphan from him who treats him harshly. And he, who has, gives to him who has not, without boasting. And when they see a stranger, they take him in to their homes and rejoice over him as a very brother; for they do not call them brethren after the flesh, but brethren after the spirit and in God. And whenever one of their poor passes from the world, each one of them according to his ability gives heed to him and carefully sees to his burial. And if they hear that one of their number is imprisoned or afflicted on account of the name of their Messiah, all of them anxiously minister to his necessity, and if it is possible to redeem him they set him free. And if there is among them any that is poor and needy, and if they have no spare food, they fast two or three days in order to supply to the needy their lack of food.

May Christ be so manifested in the life of our church today! Glory be to God!