Voskamp III: Service

My favorite part, I think, is how she directs us to see our service is to God, not to men.  She quotes Dorothy Sayers, "When service is unto people, the bones can grow weary, the frustration deep.  Because, whenever man is made the enter of things, he becomes the storm centre of trouble.  The moment you think of serving people, you begin t have a notion that other people owe you something for your pains . . . you angle for applause.

The insight is that service must be, beginning to end, for Christ, and people get the benefit of it.  This is radical, because we have been influenced by the secular notions of "giving back."  What will glorify Christ most in our service o people?  That is a hard question.  Obedience first, making it clear you are doing it in his name, ot out of divic responsibility (although there can be two duties here, just don't confuse them).   That we serve because we are redeemed and loved, not out of guilt of "distribution of wealth."  How is God glorified in my doing the laundry.  In this blog?  It's hard to make the connection, but it is obedience to the command to love my family.  I do it in joy, heartily, as unto the Lord.

Sayers is right, if we focus on service to mankind, it will never be enough, because human need never ends.  This sounds cold; but it doesn't have to be.  Feeling like it is never enough only makes one angry at those who do not make the same sacrifices, who don't give enough.  I am doing Christ's laundry, because "if you do it to the least of these. . ."

I remember an article in Atlantic Monthly written by some Ivy League graduate who was having trouble with motherhood.  She talked as "s---" work of motherhood, as if she was too good to wipe her own baby's butt, because she could get a job where she made enough money to hire a nanny to do that.  Yet this woman probably voted Democrat!