Serving God and Others: Devotions From Time of GraceSample

You go first; I’ll wait

“I am Oz, the great and powerful! Who are you?” “If you please, I am Dorothy, the small and meek.” In one of many biblical themes running through that marvelous movie, the small and meek Dorothy turns out to be a witch slayer and hero.

L. Frank Baum, author of "The Wizard of Oz," got that idea from Jesus. “Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth” (Matthew 5:5). Jesus’ mother had learned that as well--when she learned she would be the mother of the Savior of the world, she marveled at how God knocks down the lofty from their perches and in due time lifts up the lowly (like her).

Not too many people believe that today. It’s a dog-eat-dog world. Our society has no admiration for the meek--they are losers, soon to be roadkill. Have you ever felt small and insignificant? Rejoice! God knows exactly where you are and does not think any less of you.

In fact, once when Jesus was looking around for a visual image of servant-leadership, he selected a child from the crowd and held the child up as someone for his ambitious and sometimes-arrogant disciples to emulate. He wants his people full of his Spirit, not full of themselves. Can you see how this takes all the pressure off our lives? We don’t have to get it all now . . .