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At one of the big Asian churches I attended, there was the usual bookstore adjacent to the sanctuary where my students often shopped for bilingual Bibles. For many, this was their first face-to-face encounter with anyone from a church. Repeatedly I heard comments about the clerks.
“They welcome you! In other stores shop keepers never even smile.”
When one of my neighbors learned I was a Christian, he said he liked to hire people like that (whatever that meant to him) for his store.
“They’re honest and so friendly to the customers.”
In several afterschool programs, my team and I have heard from our bosses,
“You all really like the students. We’ve seen your faces when you teach.”
There is so much behind these comments that we will never know. But they are observations made by people who are probably totally unaware of what the Bible says about serving God with gladness.
Maybe they think the people observed have no problems. Maybe they think these people are paid to smile. Maybe they consider foreigners to be immune to irritating students. Maybe they just like that Christians work for less pay. Maybe we’re seen as naïve and knowing nothing of the hardships that fill their worlds.
Maybe I think serving joyfully comes with fulfilling work that I enjoy and others recognize. Something I chose. A job that uses my personal skills. The position I was expecting or promised. It’s sure easier at those times.
Though the Psalmist doesn’t say specifically when to serve the Lord with gladness or be glad in the Lord, Paul gives personal examples. He says “rejoice always” from prison and again after a long list of painful trials few of us can comprehend.
“Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again. Rejoice!” Philippians 4:4
In my childhood church there was a man who regularly sang the old hymn ‘there is joy in serving Jesus” as a solo. I was puzzled as I got older as to why his face didn’t look happy as he sang. I wondered when it was joyful for him to serve Jesus.
May I serve the Lord with gladness today.
What is one example in your life of the joy in serving where you’re at?
I love to have students come over to cook. Some will be in the tiny kitchen and some cleaning and cutting vegetables. Others look in my cupboards for bowls and cups. But sometime during the evening each one will look around my living room at my books and pictures and scrolls on the walls. They will chat among themselves, and later with me, about what they see. Some will say nothing at the moment but days later mention a book or saying they had seen. So many wonderful conversations have started from these visits. It’s a total take-over most of my little apartment and it makes me so happy. I know it’s not everyone’s source of joy! But when they leave and thank me for ‘letting them into my private space’ (as one guy put it) I thank God for the opportunity, the home, the job, the resources. I sink in my chair when they leave but I’m always ready to do it again.