What Do We Value?

Core values are talked about and heavily thrown around these days. From companies, non-profits, and organizations, to sports teams and churches, everyone supposedly has core values that drive their company's decisions or create the culture of their organization. We once spent an entire staff retreat and the following season attempting to identify, pinpoint, and embrace our core values at The Brook. It’s a lot of work. Let me repeat and even rephrase that: It’s a LOT of very, very hard work! Here’s why:

You have to face the TRUTH.

Core Values don’t begin with the facade of who you say or think you are, but the TRUTH of who you really are and what you actually do.

To make this discovery, you have to walk through the woods of somehow objectively discerning the things you have held to be of most value. To be clear: It begins not by asking what do we want to hold up as most valuable, but what do we actually place the most value on. Only then, in discerning the truth of the past & present can you begin to determine if you want those values to change for the future.

Don’t waste time asking the question: Do we have core values? We all have them; in our homes, our families, our churches… We all place value on something. We all hold some things to be more important and valuable than other things. 

The real question is: Do we KNOW what we value? Are we valuing and elevating those things intentionally? Are we even aware of what we are placing the most value on in our home? Our church? Our company? Our family?

Are you just teaching your kids what to say and do…or what to value?

Are you only leading & telling your people where to go, what to do, and how to do it…or what to value?

If we truly value something, we will always go through the less-traveled road to understanding and explaining WHY. We will start there and end there. We’ll keep going back there along the way because we know that the act or event void of the reason or purpose is not really worth our time, energy and attention. If I tell my kids, “Always take less and go back for more rather than taking too much and throwing it out”, but I don’t teach them why, they may learn to do what I say, but they won’t learn the value of why I do it. 

We all have values. Let’s know what they are and live them out with conviction and purpose. 

To Serve Or To Be Served

Jesus said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive."

Jesus said, “The Son of Man came to serve, not to be served."

He also said, “Those who desire to be first will be last; the last shall be first."

As followers of Jesus Christ, we are constantly lead to surrender ourselves and give of ourselves in order to serve others. The more we seek to know Christ, the more we grow familiar with this. Taking all of this into consideration, it seems almost preposterous to think we might be able to become too familiar with this. Let me explain.

For most of us, we don’t really have a problem or an issue with serving. We’ve grown to enjoy and find pleasure in serving others and giving of ourselves. However, where we do seem to have a greater struggle, in certain circumstances in life when we are the ones in need, is in allowing others to serve us. We have a very hard time being served.

On the surface, this seems right; this seems like we are doing what Jesus directed. But the problem is in the WHY. Why do we have such a tension and struggle with allowing others to serve us when we are the ones in need? Why is there such difficulty in letting someone else serve us?

Here’s why:

It’s humbling.

It makes us vulnerable.

In fact, (on the flip side) in the midst of serving – which seems selfless in and of itself – we can actually at times have self-centered motives. We would never verbalize this, but somewhere in the depths of us there is a voice that whispers: I would much rather someone feel like they owed me then me having to feel like I owed them. As if everyone else is keeping score. Jesus said we’re essentially supposed to lose sight of the scoreboard. There is no score. There’s your heart and their need.

Being served says, "I need you."

Being served acknowledges, "I can’t do all of this on my own."

But think about this in terms of being part of the Body of Christ. If you’re sick, or your loved one just died, or you’ve just had an emergency C-section or appendectomy, or you were just in an accident and still recovering - whatever the case may be - this is now an opportunity for someone else to find joy in serving you. It’s now about their heart and your need. Don't rob them of this. Or yourself.

Because it’s also still about your heart. Your humility.

As a foster family, maybe all of your closest friends are not being called to foster like you. Maybe they are, however, being called to come alongside you, serve you, and love those children.

Maybe you found yourself in the role of caregiver – taking care of an aged parent or grandparent. Perhaps your friends or the members of your small group or missional community are in a different place in life, but at the same time, fully ready, willing, and able to serve you as you give of yourself to take care of the one who raised you. 

At some point, we have to realize that Paul’s exhortation to the Galatians to “bear one another’s burdens” works both ways. Sometimes we have to come alongside. Sometimes someone else needs to come alongside us. Either way, we have to have the humility to serve and to be served.

I encourage you to ask the Lord to prepare your heart to be ready to find great joy in having the opportunity to serve and to know that you’ve been served. This is the way of the people of God.