The Power of Selfless Service

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Acts 20:31-35

31 Therefore be alert, remembering that for three years I did not cease night or day to admonish every one with tears. 32 And now I commend you to God and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up and to give you the inheritance among all those who are sanctified. 33 I coveted no one's silver or gold or apparel. 34 You yourselves know that these hands ministered to my necessities and to those who were with me. 35 In all things I have shown you that by working hard in this way we must help the weak and remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’”


 Paul hopes to inspire the Ephesian church to model selfless service to the world. This is the power of the gospel: what is not only heard in word, but seen in action (Phil 4:9), to be imitated (1Cor 4:16), to model good works (Titus 2:5), to give of ourselves an example to imitate (2Thessalonians 3:8-9). Yet, as Paul says in Phil 3:12, not having yet ourselves arrived, we press on. Imitating him, do we serve as models of joyous, winsome, selfless service? To whom?

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