Serving | Spiritual PracticesSýnishorn

“Serve the Lord with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.”
– Psalm 100:2 (CSB) –

Serving isn’t meant to be a chore. Yet that’s often our approach.

When we hear about serving or read a plan like this, it’s easy to approach it as one more thing to do. One more thing I have to add to my plate in order to make me better. One more thing I’m not doing well enough that’s disappointing God or my church. One more thing tampering my peace and joy. One more weight. One more burden. Sigh. Her-umph.

Then the Bible tells us to serve the Lord with gladness. For some, it sounds like a nail in a coffin.

Many times, people read commands to love, by joyful, or serve with gladness as though God is commanding us to magically alter our emotional state. But we know emotions don’t always work like that.

That should cause us to pause for a moment, especially if “gladness” is not our operative term when serving. Maybe God isn’t talking as much about a feeling as he is an attitude. Maybe serving with gladness is a choice.

This is similar to when Jesus calls us to love our enemy. Is he telling us to magically feel good and happy about our enemy, as though they’re really our best friend? No. He’s telling us to treat them in a loving way regardless of how we feel about them.

Serving the Lord with gladness works the same way.

Have you ever noticed how two people can do the exact same task and have completely opposite attitudes? One grumbles and complains, stewing and lamenting as to why they have to do whatever job it is – miserable, and making everyone else miserable around them. Someone else approaches that same job with a sense of purpose and joy, and ends up turning the most mundane task into something fun that becomes infectious to everyone around them.

A man at our church was convicted of a white-collar crime that was more the result of negligence than intention, but the judge wanted to make an example out of him. In prison, this man got involved with the chaplain and went about trying to build a spiritual community. I remember him telling me, “I have at least six more months of ministry to do here.” Talk about approaching a bad situation with a joyful, servant’s heart.

God wants us to serve with glad-itude. (Forgive us for writing that. There’s no excuse.)

Now to be sure, there are certainly joy-killers in serving. Burnout from lack of sabbath. A relentless over-achievement driven by an inner sense of inadequacy. A need for the spotlight. A quest to impress. Wrong motives. Distorted expectations. Going through the motions. Checking out. Drill at the mill. A culture that stifles creativity, spontaneity, or laughter. All of these can be joy-killers when it comes to serving.

If you’re not serving with gladness, maybe one of these joy-killers is getting in the way. But also gauge your attitude. And if you find that you’ve shrouded your perspective in a cloak of negativity, make the attitudinal switch. A pastor named Eugene Wille would say: “If you’re not having fun, you’re not doing it right.”

Serving won’t always be fun. Sometimes we have to serve from a sheer act of the will out of obedience to God and a commitment to helping others. But if it’s never fun, it’s possible that there’s something in your heart that needs readjusting. God’s original design – and we’re talking pre-fallen creation here – was for serving to be a source of purpose, joy, and fulfillment. The more we approach it that way, the more we echo God’s intended way.

So the psalm declares, “Serve the Lord with gladness; come before him with joyful songs” (Ps 100:2, CSB). Adopt a spirit-filled attitude when you serve. It’s better that way, and you’ll be glad you did. And as you do, dare to take God seriously on the second part of that verse too. Sing. Out loud. Especially if you have a lousy singing voice. You’ll have to laugh. And rest assured, others will laugh with you.

Questions
God wants us to serve with gladness. How can you bring joy to others or recover joy when serving? How can you find delight in the amazing serving opportunities God has given you?