Sermon quotes on servanthood
Augustine of Hippo
Your best servant is the person who does not attend so much to hearing what he himself wants as to willing what he has heard from you.
Confessions
Brother Andrew
I have come to see clearly that life is more than self. It is more than doing what I want, striving for what will benefit me, dreaming of all I can be. Life is all about my relationship with God. There is no higher calling, no loftier dream, and no greater goal than to live, breathe, and be poured out for Jesus Christ.
Henry T. Blackaby
Some would define a servant like this: ‘A servant is one who finds out what his master wants him to do, and then he does it.’ The human concept of a servant is that a servant goes to the master and says, ‘Master, what do you want me to do?’ The master tells him, and the servant goes off BY HIMSELF and does it. That is not the biblical concept of a servant of God. Being a servant of God is different from being a servant of a human master. A servant of a human master works FOR his master. God, however, works THROUGH His servants.”
Experiencing God: How to Live the Full Adventure of Knowing and Doing the Will of God
Gordon and Gladis DePree
Has God’s face ever been on a coin? We are the coin that bears the living likeness of God. Giving of ourselves with whatever that may include, is the only legal currency of the kingdom of heaven.
Max De Pree
Above all, leadership is a position of servanthood.
Jonathan K. Dodson
It’s impossible to be humble and generous when we aren’t looking at something greater and more gracious than ourselves. Humility and generosity need a target; we need others to serve and a great God to worship.
Taken from Our Good Crisis: Overcoming Moral Chaos with the Beatitudes by Jonathan K. Dodson Copyright (c) 2020 by Jonathan K. Dodson. Published by InterVarsity Press, Downers Grove, IL. www.ivpress.com
Duane Elmer
Power is meant to be shared with the goal of empowering others. Hoarded power weakens others and exalts oneself. Power, when grounded in biblical values, serves others by liberating them. It acknowledges that people bear the image of God and treats them in a way that will nurture the development of that image. In so doing, we honor their Creator.
Cross-Cultural Servanthood: Serving the World in Christlike Humility
Millard Erickson
What he was attempting to instill in his disciples was the attitude of a servant: humility and a willingness to put others ahead of oneself. In that culture, washing the feet of others would symbolize such an attitude. But in another culture, some other act might more appropriately convey the same truth. Because we find humility taught elsewhere in Scripture without mention of footwashing (Matt.20:27, 23:10-12; Phil.2:3), we conclude that the attitude of humility, not the particular act of footwashing as such, is the permanent component in Christ’s teaching.
Christian Theology (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1998), p.131.
James Forbes
Nobody gets to heaven without a letter of reference from the poor.
Eugene B. Habecker
The true leader serves. Serves people. Serves their best interests, and in so doing will not always be popular, may not always impress. But because true leaders are motivated by loving concern, rather than a desire for personal glory, they are willing to pay the price.
The Other Side of Leadership: Coming to Terms with the Responsibilities that Accompany God-Given Authority, Scripture Press, 1987.
Martin Luther
As our heavenly Father has in Christ freely come to our aid, we also ought freely to help our neighbor . . . and each one should become . . . a Christ to the other.
The Freedom of a Christian (1520), (accessed July 11, 2019).
Brennan Manning
In Love’s service, only wounded soldiers can serve.”
Abba’s Child: The Cry of the Heart for Intimate Belonging
Andrew Murray
A faithful servant may be wiser than the master, and yet retain the true spirit and posture of the servant. The humble man looks upon every, the feeblest and unworthiest, child of God, and honors him and prefers him in honor as the son of a King.
Humility: The Journey Toward Holiness
Mother Teresa
Never worry about numbers. Help one person at a time and always start with the person nearest you.
Albert Schweitzer
I don’t know what your destiny will be, but one thing I know: the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who have sought and found how to serve.
R. Alan Woods
We have all been called to be foot-washers.
The Journey Is The Destination: A Photo Journal, 2006.
Fulton J. Sheen
Civilization is always in danger when those who have never learned to obey are given the right to command.
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