Serving is a super interesting topic. Reason is that we know we should, we know why, yet we struggle to actually always follow through.
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Below I am going to cast an idea, or a concept if you will. It doesn’t foster nor permit abuse, and ultimately things happen on a case by case basis. This should be processed and applied with wisdom & maturity.
Serving in a foreign household
You’re visiting a foreign land. A family takes you in. They feed you. They take care of you. Then one day.. They ask you to make dinner. What do you do?
If you are super entitled you may want to fight and oppose, but as you realize that they owed you nothing and have been so kind to you, you feel guilty for refusing to show kindness and mercy back.
The best way to serve is to remember that you are a stranger. A foreigner. A person in a place and land not your own.
If you remember that, you won’t fight for rights you know you don’t have or think you do. You’ll understand the mercy that is upon you when you are given things not your own. When you are shown kindness you’ll know is undeserved.
When they place food on your plate, you’ll see it as love and not obligation.
You are a stranger and they have made their house your home.
How to serve beyond just a foreign household
To serve in all aspects, you have to abstract the idea of our nationality or belonging from just the current to something that spans all aspects.
And to realize that you are a foreigner even on this planet alters the way we think about serving on a global scale. All of a sudden, whatever happens we know this is not our home. If people hurt us, we can forgive because we know that ultimately they were just part of the journey and not the destination.
Why we struggle to serve at home
Often times we move into these things called habits, which are described as patterns of behaviour. As a result, unless there is a circumstance that calls for a drastic need to refurbish this pattern of behaviour (such as the death of a loved one who usually performed a certain chore), we tend to be too comfortable to disturb the pattern that we live in.
Using an example where: Dad works, Mom cooks, Children just sit back and play.
It can be quite difficult for the children to want to perform a different type of role because that would be outside of their usual routine. If however, the mom was to go and visit away for a few weeks, then the children are forced by circumstance to adapt to this new situation for as long as need be.
This raises an interesting point when we observe the life of the mom.
Serving can become a habit
Serving can be done out of habit. However, radical serving begins at the end of your comfort zone.
When we are used to doing certain things, we grow stronger in that discipline.
However to step out of your normal routine and prepare dinner for a family that has taken you in would likely be outside of your comfort zone, if for weeks, months they had been taking care of you and you aren’t quite comfortable with cooking on the stove.
Hence as leaders, and servants (Servant-Leaders), we want to get comfortable being uncomfortable. Because in those moments we not only grow, but we also impact in more ways than we are used to.
