John 25-26 Whoever loves his own life will lose it; whoever hates his own life in this world will keep it for life eternal. Whoever wants to serve me must follow me, so that my servant will be with me where I am. And my Father will honor anyone who serves me.
If you read this passage wrong, you think,”If I hate my life, I’ll have it for eternity? I don’t want to hate my life for eternity.” But the way the passage really works is,”If you hate your life now, you’ll have a good life in Eternity.” How does this work? When you live on Earth, you should feel bad about the plight of the poor. Your empathy towards those who have so very little that they’re dying of starvation, should make us feel uncomfortable so we seek to do action. Our action being that we work about as hard as we can while still being healthy so that we have more to give to the poor.
Elsewhere in the Bible it says that there is no end to human desires. If we seek to please ourselves and ignore the plight of the suffering, we’ll have fun but never be satisfied in this life, and God will be upset with us when we meet him.Instead of seeking to fulfill our desires now, we should put them off like delayed gratification, and keep our treasures in Heaven. In Heaven, no one will need us to help them survive. In Heaven, we won’t have negative empathy because no one will be suffering. So in Heaven, we will finally be satisfied, and our greatest moment on Earth will be less than our least moment in Heaven!
Yes, life is a life of servitude. You can find joy in servitude and hard work if you have an advanced faith. Once you’re working as hard as you can to change this world for the better by donating your excess to the poor, you can feel a satisfaction with yourself that you’re working the best you can for God. God indeed does honor those that serve him. And whats more is that World Hunger can be solved if enough people work for it. So lets not have a defeatist attitude, but work as hard as we can helping others to the best of our ability. This world isn’t about what you get, its about what you give. It is no surprise this scripture is right after Jesus talks about his death. Just as Jesus died sacrificially, we must give of ourselves sacrificially. Jesus died for us, so we should live for him. And this life should be one of servitude towards the poor until the poor are no longer dying of starvation. Jesus said we’ll always have the poor, but he did not say they’d always be starving to death.
The Bible lets us know there is enough food in the world for all of us too: Proverbs 13:23 GNT Unused fields could yield plenty of food for the poor, but unjust people keep them from being farmed.
God bless you,
Jim