Luke 18:31-33 The Message Then Jesus took the Twelve off to the side and said, “Listen carefully. We’re on our way up to Jerusalem. Everything written in the Prophets about the Son of Man will take place. He will be handed over to the Romans, jeered at, made sport of, and spit on. Then, after giving him the third degree, they will kill him. In three days he will rise, alive.”
Do you ever wonder if you have what it takes for God to use you? Some folks really struggle with this thought, because they think of Christian leaders who possess skill sets that they don’t have, like preaching, teaching, singing, writing, composing, officiating, etc. If you have such a mindset, get rid of it! God has instilled within every believer a desire to serve him in myriad ways, even in the smallest areas that may not even occur to you, like having a listening ear, saying words of encouragement, making people feel welcomed, feeding the hungry, clothing the poor, being a mother or father, etc. All of us are perfectly capable of doing much to be Jesus’s hands and feet in our modern era.
Think about the 12 disciples. Quite frankly, they weren’t the sharpest knives in the drawer, yet God chose them for extraordinary purposes. Today they sit on twelve thrones in heaven.
I love The Message’s paraphrase of Luke’s account of Jesus informing his disciples about the upcoming week between Palm Sunday and Easter. He could not have been any clearer. Be mindful that His revelation wasn’t the first time telling them. He had already informed them on two previous occasions! Luke revealed how the disciples absorbed Jesus’s words in the next verse: “But they didn’t get it, could make neither heads nor tails of what he was talking about.”
God used these twelve ordinary men–men who Jesus called “dull”–to establish His church. What they have accomplished is incredible, as clearly shown in Christianity’s expansive presence on earth over 2,000 years later. Can you have the imagination that you can produce a positive impact, too? I challenge you to find areas of servanthood. It’ll make a difference in your own life and the lives of others.