Sermon Tone Analysis

By Pastor Glenn Pease

When soldiers for the 6th Massachusetts Militia were attacked, and many were wounded at the start of the Civil War, they were brought to Washington, D. C. Clara Barton had been a teacher in Massachusetts, and she recognized some of the wounded soldiers as her former students.

She went to the hospital to help, and she discovered that no one was prepared for this emergency, and the supplies were short.

Other trains began to arrive with the wounded, and Clara appealed to her friends for supplies.

Barrels of food and bandages were being sent to her.

Many of the wounded died because it took so long for them to get treatment.

She kept moving closer and closer to the scene where they were wounded until she ended up right on the battlefield.

She became known as the Angel of the Battlefield.

She escaped death through all four years of the Civil War, even though wounded men she was treating were shot as she was aiding them.

She was like a angel being guarded by an angel.

After the war Lincoln asked her to take on the enormous task of locating the 80 thousand missing men, and report to the families if they were found dead.

This was another four years of work.

In 1869 she went to Europe for her own health.

While there the Franco-Prussian War broke out, and she volunteered her services.

She was again nursing the wounded.

She saw the efficiency of the Red Cross at work.

She came back to America and for 5 years labored to get legislation through Congress for the United States to join The International Red Cross.

She succeeded, and in 1882 the U. S. branch was established.

At age 77 she was on the battlefield again in the Spanish-American War.

She died at age 91 in the year of 1912.

Her lifetime of service to others all began with service within her own home.

When she was 11 years old her brother had an accident and was ill for two years.

She became his nurse and developed such a love of meeting the needs of the suffering that it became her passion for the rest of her life.

She gave her life to serving others, and was very conscious of the presence of Christ.

She quoted Jesus: "In as much as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me."

Then she added, "I never in my life performed a days work at the field that was not grounded in that little sentence."

She was asked how she could endure all the horror of the battlefield, and she replied, "You must never think of anything except the need and how to meet it.

Then God gives the strength, and the thing that seemed impossible is done."

Her life illustrates one of the hardest lessons in life for us to learn, and that is that greatness is not measured by what you get, but by what you give.

We have the same problem as the disciples had because we think greatness and successful living has to do with the position, power, and prestige we get in life, rather than the service that we give in life.

It is such a hard lesson to learn because all of the media constantly bombard us with the opposite message that life does consist in the abundance of your possessions, and that the key to greatness is power, position and prestige.

It is hard for our minds not to conform to this message when the Christian world tends to promote the same value system.

There is little in our culture that causes anyone to aspire to be a servant.

That is a thing of the past.

Servant-hood seems so archaic and obsolete.

Sid Frank in The Presidents tells of how two of the presidents of the United States were indentured servants as boys.

The two were Millard Fillmore and Andrew Johnson.

They were under contract for 5 to 7 years, and for all practical purposes were owned by their masters.

Andrew Johnson was indentured to a tailor and he hated it and ran away.

A reward of ten dollars for his capture was advertised in the Raleigh, North Carolina Gazette, but he was never captured.

Fillmore purchased his freedom for 30 dollars after he served a couple of years.

This kind of servant hood links it with it with slavery and this is repulsive to freedom loving Americans.

It is hard for modern American Christians to get their minds open to the mind of Christ on this issue because it goes against the grain of our culture.

The New Testament, however, is loaded with teachings about being servants.

To make matters worse the primary word for servant in the New Testament is the word doulos, and it means slave.

In Matt.

20:6-7 Jesus said to His disciples who were indignant at James and John trying to get places at His right and left hand in His kingdom, "Whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave."

In the parable of the talents the master says, "Well done thou good and faithful servant."

He uses the word doulos, which is slave.

The study of this word is time consuming, for it is used so many times.

But let me point out that Paul called himself, and his companions, slaves of Christ, and he considered all Christians slaves of Christ.

James, Peter, and Jude likewise proudly wore the same title.

It would take hours just to read all the verses that exalt the role of servant in the Bible.

When we come to the text in Luke 22 we see Jesus is using a different word than doulos.

Here He uses the word diakoneo, from which we get the word deacon.

Jesus came into this world to be a deacon, which is one who serves.

The word means one who waits on and ministers to others.

Jesus did not come to be waited on, but to wait on others, and to be their servant.

There is no escape from this reality that Jesus both taught and lived.

True greatness can be found only in service.

Therefore, whenever people are aware of the presence of Christ there will be a desire to minister to the needs of others.

If we open our homes to Christ, it means we will have no problem with the issue of submission to one another.

Submitting simply means ceasing to play the role of master and taking on the role of servant.

Since this is the highest role we can play, it means the husband never stands taller than when he serves the members of his family by meeting their needs.

The wife's calling to submit to her husband is not then a call to a place of second class lowliness, but rather, it is a call to the most Christ-like role of the servant.

The reason wives and mothers are more honored and exalted by holidays, and in poetry, is because their role as servants meets so many vital needs of the family members that everybody knows they are the greatest factor in family harmony, health and happiness.

It is service that makes them the greatest in the kingdom of the home just as it is service that makes any of us great in other realms of life.

Jesus took the little lads lunch, and that service that his mother rendered to her one little boy was used to feed 5,000.

Her family service was multiplied to minister to a multitude of families.

Jesus does this for all of us.

Whatever service we render to another member of the family enhances their potential to be of service to others.

This means that the Christian home is a service center.

It is a place where we are served, and a place where we learn the art of serving.

Someone said, "No matter how small your lot in life there is always room on it for a service station."

Each of us can be great in the kingdom of God by means of service.

We want to look at two aspects of service in this text.

I. THE SUPREMACY OF SERVICE.

Jesus said the servant is the greatest, and the whole of the Bible and history support this.

Moses was a great many things.

He was a leader, a law giver, a miracle worker, a man of prayer and faith, and a man of courage and compassion.

There are so many things one might remember him for, or put on his epitaph to sum up his life.

But in Joshua where God comes to him to tell him he was the new leader of Israel he referred 4 times to the fact that Moses was his servant.

That is the one characteristic that God selected to describe this great man.

There is no greater compliment that God can give a man, for to be a servant is to be the greatest of all.

Many of the great men of the Bible are called servants of God, and so the only upper class in the Bible is the servant class.

When you get into this class you are at the pinnacle of your career for God, for there is no place to go that is greater and higher.

If your goal in life is to be in the upper class, then service is the only way to go.

The final proof of this is that the Son of God Himself came into human life, not to be a king and ruler before whom masses would bow, but to be a servant of the masses.

Our Savior is supremely a Servant.

He not only taught this truth, He demonstrated it.

Jesus is Lord of all men, not just by right of creation, but by right of redemption.

He is the only being in the universe that has provided a vital service for every person who has ever lived.

He provided the way of salvation so that all can be forgiven and have eternal life.

There is not way to be like Jesus without being a servant.

In Acts 10:38 Peter sums up the life of Jesus by saying that He went about doing good.

Jesus was the servant of every man, woman and child He met.

That was the whole point of the parable of the Good Samaritan.

Who is my neighbor?

And the answer is, every person you confront in life who has a need you can meet.

The Scribes and Pharisees passed by on the other side.