You Gotta Serve Somebody

As we continue to hang out in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, we need the help of one of the greatest songwriters in history, Bob Dylan. In the year of Kate’s and my brith, 1979, he sang,

“You may be an ambassador to England or France, you may like to gamble, you might like to dance, you may be the heavy weight champion of the world, you may be a socialite with a long string of pearls….but you’re gonna have to serve somebody, yes indeed, you’re gonna have to serve somebody. Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord, but you’re gonna have to serve somebody.”

We all serve someone…we are all following something or someone. Dylan lists all sorts of people from all different walks of life, but every time he boils it down to really only two options…it may be the devil or it may be the Lord, but you’re gonna have to serve somebody. Bob was reading Ephesians 2:1-10 when he wrote Gotta Serve Somebody (can’t prove it, but I’m pretty sure). The Apostle Paul says the same thing…we all follow somebody, and there really are only two options, two categories that everyone falls into…you’re either following the devil or you’re following the Lord. But is it really a choice?

As we heard last Monday, if you want to know what the “Christian” position is on humanity you don’t have to look past Ephesians 2. However, you may not like what you read. Like Bob is in his lyrics, Paul is so stunningly black and white that it is almost unbelievable to our contemporary ears. He says that we are dead in our trespasses and sins (2:1, 5). Dead. That doesn’t make any sense. We are sitting here breathing the air with our hearts pumping and our brains functioning (hopefully). We are alive. We’re not dead. What is Paul going on about being dead? Well, Paul is saying that because of our trespasses and sins, which is just another way of saying our selfishness, our lack of love for ourselves, one another, and especially God, or simply our falling short of perfection, because of that we are the walking dead.

I don’t know about you, but my reaction to this is:

I’d like a second opinion. I know I’m not perfect, but I try my best not to hurt anyone. I’m a pretty good person. This can’t be the verdict on me. What if I’m not even a Christian, then this judgment can’t apply to me, right? This is too harsh. This doesn’t fit my paradigm or the way I see the world. Where’s the nuance? Where’s the proviso? This just sounds like crazy fundamentalism, or radical evangelicalism or something.

But Paul doesn’t pull back…he just says this is your state of being…this is reality. You wanna know why the world is the way it is? You wanna know why there is so much violence and hatred? This is why…this is what sin has done to humanity.

As Dylan sings,

“You may be a state trooper, you might be a young Turk, you may be the head of some big TV network, you may be rich or poor, you may be blind or lame, you may be living in another country under another name….but you gotta serve somebody.”

This is why Paul reminds the Ephesians that they used to be sons and daughters “living in the passions of their flesh and carrying out the desires of the body and mind…” (2:3). Sons of disobedience was a Hebrew expression referring to one’s character. It is saying that someone was still defined by the sinful heritage they received from their original ancestors. Genesis 3 shows Adam and Eve disobeying God in the garden…they were our representatives, they stood for all of us. You might object saying, “I didn’t vote for them to represent me!” But we have all had an official over us at some point that we didn’t vote for, but they still represented us whether we liked it or not. The difference here is the fact that, according to Genesis, Adam and Eve were not sinful. They were created good with the ability to not sin (Genesis 1:26-31). That means they were better than all of us, and certainly better than your average elected official. None of us would have fared any better.

In fact, none of us have. We all have already failed in our own lives. We are not perfect, we have all sinned…so, sadly our objection is overruled (Romans 3:9-26). Adam and Eve’s legacy to all of humanity is one of disobedience and wrath. Every single person on earth is born into that legacy, that heritage. This is the verdict on us under God’s perfect and moral law…we are as good as dead. That’s what it means to serve the devil…to follow the course of this world, to follow the prince of the power of the air (Eph. 2:1-2).

And what can a dead person do? Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

Then comes one of the greatest phrases in all of the Bible…But God… You’re all dead and there is nothing you can do to change your situation…you are truly hopeless by yourself…but God… “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been SAVED” (2:4-5 emphasis mine). What is the thing a dead person wants more than anything else? To live again! And that is exactly what God does for us…he makes us alive with Christ. He does the thing that we could not do for ourselves. He becomes our new representative (1 Cor. 15:21-22, 42-49) . He chooses us when we could not and did not choose him (John 15:16). He takes us from one state to another, from death to life.

Remember the 2006 movie The Guardian with Kevin Costner and Ashton Kutcher? They are Coast Guard rescue swimmers in Alaska, and they get the call of a sinking ship. They fly out to sea in their chopper and discover one of the crew is unconscious on the quickly sinking ship, and Ashton Kutcher comes down and physically grabs the person and carries him to safety. He does not offer his hand to the unconscious person waiting for them to reach out and take it. He doesn’t wait for a response saying, “I’d really love to help you if you would choose to accept my invitation.” No. He picks up the unconscious person, who is as good as dead, and he takes him out of danger. Paul is uncompromisingly clear that this is exactly how God SAVES us in Jesus. He takes us from death to life. This is how God saves you.

Not only that, he takes us from one loyalty to another, from serving the devil to serving the Lord. Remember, you gotta serve somebody. This is what service to the Lord means: “He raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Jesus Christ, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.” (Eph. 2:6-7). Where we were once sons and daughters of disobedience and wrath…now God makes us into his children (Eph. 1:1-6). You have become a son or a daughter of God by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. You are a son or a daughter of obedience…Jesus’ obedience on your behalf. You have a new heritage, a new character, and a new inheritance…instead of death and wrath you get eternal life and blessing. Amen.

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