On This Day: A Faithful and Wise Servant of Servants

“Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom his master has set over his household, to give them their food at the proper time? Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes.” (Matthew 24:45-46)

   It is of the world, the flesh, and the devil to measure ourselves by externals. In fact, just this week I was reminded of the way God singled out David to be the second king of Israel. The prophet Samuel thought the firstborn son of Jesse would be the obvious choice, but God told him, “Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the LORD sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart” (I Samuel 16:7).

   Earlier, when God confronted King Saul with why he would be replaced, God said, “The LORD has sought out a man after his own heart, and the LORD has commanded him to be prince over his people” (I Samuel 13:14).

   I often look up the meanings of Bible words in the Bible Sense Lexicon from Logos Bible Systems. Today I found that “faithful” means “faithful adj. — characterized by steadfast affection or allegiance (to someone or something)” and “wise” means “wise (judicious) adjs. — marked by the exercise of good judgment or common sense in practical matters.” And what hit me was that these are qualities that are growing in me.

   A long time ago I found this amazing comfort in something God told me to do as a young pastor. I was reading in I Timothy about things Paul gave as instructions to his “son” in the Lord, things totally applicable to any man who serves God as a pastor. Everything sounded so high and… DEMANDING!

   UNTIL I read this: “Practice these things, immerse yourself in them, so that all may see your PROGRESS” (I Timothy 4:15). Paul did not expect Timothy to show “perfection” but to display “progress”!

   In a sense, all we need to do today is admit what is in our hearts about being “the faithful and wise servant” Jesus is talking about. If that is what we desire, and we know it is a blessing to admit any “poverty of spirit” in this area, even to “mourn” how poorly we may be doing (or feel we are doing), and we meekly admit we can’t make ourselves any better in this but Jesus can, and so we let ourselves enter that blessed realm of “hungering and thirsting after righteousness”, we can relax about how we are doing and just get down to the business of faithfully and wisely serving the servants of God with whatever spiritual gifts we are given (even if we don’t know what to call them) in whatever gathering of the body of Christ we are in.

   And may each of us be blessed in doing so!

 

© 2024 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517, Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8

Email: in2freedom@gmail.com

Unless otherwise noted, Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.)