“Serving With Hearts Instead of Hands”

If you walk into the house of parents with young children one of the first things you may notice is the art work.  Their house is often covered with various pieces of art done by the kids.  Cards, drawings, finger paintings, etc. cover the walls and refrigerator.  If you didn’t know that the art was done by children you would probably find their taste in decorating peculiar, because let’s be honest the drawings from a four or five year old are usually not all that impressive.  Nonetheless, the parents display their children’s works with pride.  The reason is obvious, the child had made it for their parents with love.  It doesn’t matter what the art looks like, it only matters that their kid made it for them.  The love between the parents and their children are seen all around the house as the children make works for the parents and the parents hang it up with pride, regardless of how it looks.

I’m far from the first to make this observation (I believe C.S. Lewis was the first person I read it from), but this is likely how our works appear before God.  Even our very best efforts are more like the scribbles of a child than anything else.  You can show up to a Sunday service and have everything go perfectly; the band is in synch, the sermon is polished, and the worshipers are engaged.  And even though we all may be very impressed with ourselves for such a beautiful service, to the God who set the stars in the sky, who painted every sunset, and who created the vast oceans it’s nothing.  Why would God be impressed with even our best of services?  The reason is the same as it is for the parents who hang their children’s art: it’s because of love.  God accepts it because we do it out of love for Him, not because it’s impressive.  God accepts it because we love Him and He loves us.  As a proud parent he is delighted to receive what we offer as long as it is from the heart.

There is obviously something to be said for always putting our best foot forward in churches.  We want to match people to ministries where their gifts will help them thrive.  We want to do our best to serve our creator.  However, there is also something to say for choosing the work of the heart over the hands.  If someone is passionate to do something for God we should encourage them, regardless of how good they seem to be to us.  We should recognize that everything we do is like the drawings of a child, and that’s ok.  So let us serve with love, let us serve with passion.  We can talk about better ways to do something in church but first we need understand why we do it.  If we do anything outside of the motive of love all we have is a bad drawing, but if we do it from the heart God will be our proud father who accepts it.  If you are wondering where you should serve in the church, just jump in and find out.  If you are seeking to impress God, stop worrying about it because he accepts your gifts from the heart.  If you ever feel like you’re gifts aren’t good enough (or as good as some else’s) put your doubts aside, God’s not impressed by external things.  Because we our God’s children and he is our proud, loving parent let us choose to serve with hearts instead of our hands.

Keep the Faith,

Matthew