The Work is Service

The Work is Service. It's the only way to consider it. I think also that there is a lot in that approach. There is a lot that is revealed through Service. I'm speculating but my sense is that these people that find themselves chewed up/spat out in cults never had that perspective. I wouldn't like to say they are motivated purely by vanity or self-will, but I do sense this lack of Service at the root of their ailing and a possible cause for them being attracted to a cult circuit in the first place. Although, one has to reserve caveats for the exceptions. I suppose the cult experience is one way in which individuals are broken down and prepared for the real Work, but again how many of those types are fit for the Work I don't know.

Considering this idea a little further it is not difficult to understand that the Service we are discussing is directly the means by which we are preserved through Christ by the Holy Spirit. We are in voluntary Service to God through faith and - what has historically been referred to as - penitence: a word I find loaded with negative association. Yet, this inner remorse (that is the meaning of penitence) for one's own wrong doings, which previously I have written about on this blog as remorse of conscience, is clearly a defining characteristic of a regenerate soul. We are all prisoners of the flesh and the world, our will in bondage and slave to a depraved heart. Unless grace saves, we are lost; it's either the Kingdom of God or the Kingdom of Satan. This penitent aspect of our regenerate nature unveils, if only retrospectively (and somewhat painfully), the idiocy (sickness) of the ways of the Old man. So the Old man is subdued and we seek restoration with Christ through 'holiness of heart' - a property of Service that secures a true lively faith and covenant obedience (another word that disturbs self-will and worldly pride).

Of the names of God, and there are many, perhaps the hardest to come-to and the most revealing is: Father, which is in Heaven. The direct simplicity of the name Father heralds the whole Christian mystery. When Christ said, Abba, Father, all things are possible unto thee; take away this cup from me: nevertheless not what I will, but what thou wilt. (Mar 14:36) he showed all that would how righteous service is done. It is the revealed Will of Our Father that we should know Him, so that we may become partakers in His nature. His is a Will that loves, and by the sacrifice of itself makes others partakers of the grace of adoption, heirs of everlasting salvation.

And through this internal call to Service one cannot mistake the operation of the Holy Spirit: For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts,(2Co 4:6) and heaven opens to us here now.