To Serve Man: A Communion Meditation

How many of you remember the Twilight Zone with Ron Serling?

One of my favorite episodes was entitled, “To Serve Man.”

Anybody remember that episode?

SUMMARY:

Man has this tendency to see things only from his perspective.  We think differently than God. We seek comfort, shying away from what would be unpleasant and gravitate toward a life of ease. This is why we are so easily deceived.  This is how con men take advantage of the unwary, by preying upon these basic instincts and promising things which stroke man’s pride.

"We've translated the rest of the book. 'To Serve Man' ... it's a COOK BOOK"
 

So, what seems to be good for us isn’t always good for us.

Romans 11:33 - 36 (NASB) ³³Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways!  ³⁴For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who became His counselor?  ³⁵Or who has first given to Him that it might be paid back to him again?  ³⁶For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen.

Consequently, what seems to be bad for us, isn’t always bad, but may be of benefit.

• Matthew 4:23 - 25 (NASB) ²³Jesus was going throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every kind of disease and every kind of sickness among the people. ²⁴The news about Him spread throughout all Syria; and they brought to Him all who were ill, those suffering with various diseases and pains, demoniacs, epileptics, paralytics; and He healed them.  ²⁵Large crowds followed Him from Galilee and the Decapolis and Jerusalem and Judea and from beyond the Jordan.

• 1 Peter 5:6 - 11 (NASB) ⁶Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time,  ⁷casting all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you.  ⁸Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.  ⁹But resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experiences of suffering are being accomplished by your brethren who are in the world.  ¹⁰After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen and establish you.  ¹¹To Him be dominion forever and ever. Amen.

 

These passages briefly illustrate how our suffering can show the world His strength.

• Romans 9:19 - 24 (NASB) ¹⁹You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?”  ²⁰On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, “Why did you make me like this,” will it?  ²¹Or does not the potter have a right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for common use?  ²²What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction?  ²³And He did so to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory,  ²⁴even us, whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles. 

 

What have I learned?

I am still learning to trust in God.  Somehow I find it easy to justify taking matters into my own hands.  When I perceive things not going ‘my way’, I tend to fall into worrying about how others are going to see me. I forget that God KNOWS me and KNOWS what I need. It is difficult to accept present circumstances as HIS prescription for my growth.  Perhaps I NEED to be humiliated, put into a bad light (working hard and nothing to show for it). The line between being a good employee and just being puffed up gets blurry.

His ways are not our ways.

Wow.