Learning by serving

If you want to understand better, then serve more, and focus your thoughts, energies and desires on those you're serving.

Big books can contain a great deal of profound wisdom. But our ability to absorb and rightly deploy any wisdom is seriously limited by unwillingness to hand over our lives for others and for God.

Without the desire to love God and love man, wisdom becomes knowledge which only "puffs up" (1 Corinthians 8:1). The raw materials are fed in, but they go into a machine whose innards are twisted, perverted - they are arranged not to produce the true good fruits, but something else, something lesser, something driven by an idolatry.

Jesus said "If anyone wills to do His will, he shall know concerning the doctrine, whether it is from God or whether I speak on My own authority" (John 7:17). Failure here is why there are many who are "always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth" (2 Timothy 3:7) - whether in the absolute sense, or in a relative sense, Christians stunted in their growth.

The Internet bears witness that there are many who are working hard at many things, but that it all centres around that vile idol, self. They know a lot: but they know very little.

If you want your children to be able to navigate this troubled world with true, godly wisdom, then don't just teach them. Don't just show them an example. Make service a vital part of their curriculum.

The modern world is very much against us here; it treats children and young people as those who must just receive. All must be made convenient for them to pursue education, and anything that hinders this is very much secondary, if not completely optional. Service can come later, later, always later. But once they're learned this, they won't forget it. (I'm busy with my important degree, I'm trying to impress at my first job, I need to get a deposit, small children use up all of our energy, I'm now making it into the higher levels, etc. etc.).

Authentic service is also a great antidote against being led astray by heresy, errors and simple dead-ends. Notice in Ephesians 6:11-14 how inseparable working and serving together in life is with avoiding "tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine". Love leads on to more knowledge and discernment (Philippians 1:9). A good heart sees things more clearly, and results in greater light flooding the whole being (Matthew 5:22). "Keep your heart with all diligence, for out of it spring the issues of life" (Proverbs 4:23). If our hearts are directed towards the love of God and the love of our unevangelised or suffering fellow-man, then this will help to keep us in the light. On the contrary, when the desires are elsewhere, then disease will ravage the whole body.

Is not failure here - failure to pay attention to sincerely doing the Master's will, practically, prioritising his priorities, in the tasks he's given us, out of love to the Master - behind so much trouble in the churches? One man has a doctrine he thinks he is so right about, another believes he sees some other issue so clearly, and perhaps both have some true and important things in what they say.... and yet, there's also a sense in the air that something important is not quite right. The machinery isn't going as it should, there is oil missing, and some parts are giving off noxious smells even if we can't quite describe exactly what they are.

Again: the master has given us work to do. There's much more sweetness in serving in some worthy causing alongside a brother or sister who has their heart in the right place, and yet hasn't understood a lot of things (and has misunderstood some others) in the Christian scheme of doctrine. There's no need to fret about them. If you keep serving with the desire to lift up Christ and help those who are in need, then you'll both draw nearer to Christ, and gain clearer views of his truth, and sweep away some of the mistakes. Progress will happen, because the way is open for light to come in. But on the other hand, you can be alongside brothers who are so, so doctrinally correct, and yet have a strong sense that something is still very wrong. The desire to do something costly for Christ just isn't there. Joy in service has departed. Some of the motions are still being moved through. But it's hard, hard, to stir people up to much of it. Why? Because the doctrines aren't being loved for the right reason. They're not in the service of crucifying sin that we might live with Christ, killing self so that we can serve others in his name. They're loved for some other cause - intellectual pride, one-up-man-ship, as tools to beat others down with, things to make us feel superior to those stupid worldlings with their Woke nonsense, etcetera, etcetera.

Brothers and sisters, if you want to know Jesus better, he's told us how. "Follow me". "Take up your cross". Find those whom you can serve in his name, inside and outside of the church. Seek to serve and thereby give a testimony to the marvellous love of your Saviour. You'll then find that so many things can be seen so much more clearly.

As the divine son, Jesus knew everything. As the incarnate one, Jesus had a perfect understanding of all the knowledge that he had, unclouded by any sin whatsoever. Driven by this perfect knowledge, he gave his life for others. We only really know anything to the extent that it teaches us to do the same thing.