June 4, 2023 · Luke 12:35–40

Getting Ready and Being Ready

Be dressed ready for service and keep your lamps burning, 36 like servants waiting for their master to return from a wedding banquet, so that when he comes and knocks they can immediately open the door for him. It will be good for those servants whose master finds them watching when he comes.

“I love how Jesus does that upside-down kingdom. In that day, masters controlled servants. There was slave and free. It was a big thing. This would not happen. And what Jesus is saying is that it happens. We think of it now and go, oh yeah, Jesus is a servant to all of us. No — he's the King. And he says he's going to serve you. He's literally flipping everything around, and purposely, to tell you he loves you so much that when he asks something of you, he's going to do even more. He's going to ask you to be a servant. Not so that he can be served by all these servants, but so that he can serve you properly. So he can take care of you. Isn't that amazing? Where his heart comes with all this. He's not saying, be a servant because I need servants. He's saying, be a servant so I can serve you the best of the best. The kingdom of God is an upside-down kingdom, where God will himself serve the servants who were faithful and who were watchful. So this is our call. That we would prepare our hearts to be prepared — to be ready. Because God wants us to be a church that's ready to respond when Jesus calls.”