Motivations of the Heart: Serving or Success
Occasionally I get the delight of having morning tea with a German Catholic nun.
She has Alzheimer’s and will ask me if I’ve visited her convent before, regularly throughout our conversation. I always smile and nod, yes. I am not offended; I am there to be kind.
We start our time by walking around her home of forty years, on a beautiful acreage, where mountains can be seen, and wild kangaroos are spotted lazing in the warm sun. A secluded place untouched by suburbs or shopping centres. She often takes me to her white chapel, lined with the wooden pews and the shrine to Mother Mary, where we sit and contemplate Mary, Jesus, Joseph, angels, and Holy Spirit before we have our tea and biscuits together.
One morning she took me over to the gift shop where the origin story of this particular convent is displayed on the walls in pictures. She enthusiastically pointed out people and things she remembered, and we came upon this quote:
“Everyday sanctity can be described as doing ordinary work in an extraordinarily way or fulfilling the duties of your state as perfectly as possible and out of love for God.”
She noticed how touched and moved I was about such a quote--I couldn’t take my eyes off it--and suggested I remember it, and so I have.
The beauty of this quote reminds me, that in all things, our faith is worked out through serving. It reminds me that what we do isn’t as important as how we do it and that the motivation of our heart, is far more important than the skills of our hands.
In Romans 12:1, we read:
“So here's what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life - your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life - and place it before God as an offering,”
Our modern definition of success today, is not God’s definition. God sees through the lens of our heart. Whatever it is we do, isn’t judged by the deed itself, but by the secret motives of our hearts, and how exactly, we do it. Are we rushing, impatient, unkind, rude or arrogant in our task? Or are we kind, calm, patient, thankful and servant hearted?
My nun friend isn’t famous. She doesn’t have an Instagram account, a large wardrobe, or many fine things. Her health is waning, her memory fickle, but what she does have--her devotion to God--she brings the very best way she can. She delights in the different colours of green in the trees as we walk; she stops at every flower and notices how beautiful they are. She hums old German nursery rhymes. She finds contentment in her every day, no matter what life has thrown her way. We could learn a thing or two from her.
Our success comes through our serving wherever we are placed in life, season, calling, gifting. And our success in servanthood comes through a pure motivation.
In fact, the bible clearly says that this “unseen” serving is far more valued than anything that would win us accolades or Facebook “likes” or even encouragement from others.
The Bible says in Matthew 6:1 (MSG):
“Be especially careful when you are trying to be good so that you don’t make a performance out of it. It might be good theater, but the God who made you won’t be applauding. When you do something for someone else, don’t call attention to yourself. You’ve seen them in action, I’m sure—‘playactors’ I call them—treating prayer meeting and street corner alike as a stage, acting compassionate as long as someone is watching, playing to the crowds. They get applause, true, but that’s all they get. When you help someone out, don’t think about how it looks. Just do it—quietly and unobtrusively. That is the way your God, who conceived you in love, working behind the scenes, helps you out.”
A pure heart is what God desires, our tasks are small gifts back to him.
In honesty, I often wonder why we praise a person for simply outworking the very gift God has given them. The gift was given by God to enable that person to serve Him in a certain way, and yet, we flatter the gifted, while forgetting to glorify the Giver. The one who the gift was meant for. The one to whom all glory and honor is due. When we see someone operating in a beautiful gift, rather than praising their perceived success, we should praise the God who graced them—and us all--in the first place.
After all, every gift is ultimately meant for one thing; to point people to Jesus.
Not to point to our own self-worth, or value. Not to build our success in the world.
Our serving should come from this place too. A place where our heart can honestly confess “this is for God’s glory, may all I do, be simply so other may see Him.”
And not me.
Some days I visit my Nun friend and she doesn’t remember me. She doesn’t remember our talks on faith, our walks, or our laughs. If I were doing this for me, that might make me prickle, or decide my service is ‘futile.’ But I am not doing this for me. So instead, I restart, and I take her along paths I know she enjoys, and we pick a flower for her room. I find the books in the library she likes to read, and I make her tea the way I remember she likes it. And I do it with kindness and gentility.
“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law.
Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.”
~ Galatians 5:22
May my motivation be to delight the Father’s heart, to serve the Lord in all seasons. May my success and my reward be more intimacy with God.