The last shall be first. That is the moral of the story.
On Monday, we began our “Real Men” of Willow Pond meeting with a simple question:
“Who said, ‘the last shall be first?’”
The boys threw out some answers and then one shouted “Jesus.” Good answer.
We continued. What does that look like? Who do we serve? How do we serve?
They responded. “My mom,” one shouted.
”Good! How can you serve your mom?”
“Clean the dishes!”
That’s great, how else?
“Take the trash to the dumpster.”
One of the boys, Joe, spontaneously said, “We can serve our wife!” He was making this comment on the heels of our reviewing the friendship/courtship/marriage/procreation sequence. Joe’s thought was a brilliant thought that, if embraced, makes me wonder if the Christian divorce rate would be better than 50%.
We then encouraged a plan. A friend Dallas Willard once began his Westmont College Chapel Sermon by asking: “What is your plan to become like Jesus? You do have one, don’t you?”
The bad news for me was “No.” And so we’ve since given that some thought. We’ll come up with a plan to cut and edge the front grass, but we won’t think strategically about following the King of the Universe.
Whoever comes up with a plan to serve their mom/family will be rewarded, we told them.
And with that, we let them go play.
About 5 minutes later one of the boys came to show us his plan. It was a piece of notebook paper, folded in half, with a title on the front that read “My how I plan to serve book.” When we opened it, he had outlined 4 points for how he planned to serve his mom:
1. I will take out the trash
2. I will wash the dishes
3. I will serve my mom
4. I will clean the house
We applauded him. We also told him this would be hard work.
And if he doesn’t deliver 100%, that is OK! If he sets out to do the above, and he scores 20%, that is absolutely incredible news. Because that would mark a shift of monumental proportions. The world wants him to serve himself, get whatever he can, and mark his “success” by how he feels.
Little steps above like 1 through 4 are huge. They are an 8.0 on the Kingdom “Richter Scale.” Steps of service, steps of love, like those above…reverberate for all eternity.
Because as we told the boys yesterday, Jesus was, and is, the expert on life. And when we put His teaching into practice we grow. When we serve, when we are in last place, we are really in first place. When we lay down our life, we have life in abundance.
The last shall be first.
-- Will Dowell and Dean Wilson
