Freely Given

Tell me about your good works to help the needy, the broken, and outcasts, and I'll smile and at your efforts.

Introduce me to those very same people you've helped who are your equals, who have been promoted to places above you, who are now your teachers, and I'll know you have served them and not yourself.

There is a difference between ministering to those whom we perceive as less fortunate victims and serving people because they are people... because their humanity, more than their situation, defines them.

The first boosts our egos, the second decreases our ego as we profess... we are equals and yet, I am less without you. We all belong.

I would rather hear about how the lives of those you've helped have changed you and others rather than hear how you have changed them.

Humility and servanthood are the foundation we need to build on, not our individual success stories and our giftedness.

If we define ourselves by the gifts we give, if an expectation of how we should be treated in the future is attached to those very same gifts, then they were not gifts at all, they were payments for future benefits.

Once a gift is given it belongs to the one who received it. The giftor holds no claims to the gift nor claims over the one receiving the gift. It is freely given.

That is the type of gift that is given in love.

The goal of service is not to have others look, act, and believe the exact same way I look, act, and believe.

The goal is for them to love others... no matter what.

It is not about what we do; it is about how we love.

"Freely you have received; freely give." Jesus