Who is called to serve?
In our Old Testament reading from Numbers, the Lord bestows the spirit on seventy elders,
including two -- Eldad and Medad --
who weren't even present around the tent
of meeting, and the seventy go forth prophesying,
praising God in mystic exaltation, transported by the fervor of their new
ministry. Would that all the people were prophets, Moses says in response to
Joshua's complaint, Would that the Lord
might bestow his spirit on them all!
As ministers of the people, those called must embrace the precepts of the Lord, each of which
gives us insight into God's attributes:
like God's law, God is perfect,
trustworthy, enduring, true. If we
are diligent in keeping these
precepts, Psalm 19 suggests, we will become a faint reflection of who God is; cleansed, we will become blameless and innocent. Some of the
people in James' community clearly have not embraced God's law; they will weep and wail over their impending miseries, rather than be
equipped for ministry; they are not ready to serve.
Jesus recognizes the existence of the sinful and godless in
his own time: If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. Yet Jesus discounts no one who performs a mighty deed in his name:
Anyone who gives you a cup of water to drink will surely not lose his
reward. In Mark's Gospel, the
ministers of the Lord are those who embrace service, genuinely called by the
Spirit to pay attention to the lowly, to serve the needy, to drive out the demons of injustice and fear. In so doing, they will be transformed -- and so, should we join them, will we.
What opportunity to serve is calling you today?
Image source: Wordle
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