The longer I serve Him

I’ve been thinking about the words of that old gospel song, “The longer I serve Him the sweeter He grows.” I believe that must be the testimony of every believer. Find a man who has served Jesus seventy years, and he will tell you he has discovered Jesus to be better and sweeter and more lovely with every passing year.

That’s certainly been my experience. As the years pass, I am less pleased with what I see when I look in the mirror, but I am increasingly amazed by the person of Jesus. The truth is, others disappoint us, and we disappoint both ourselves and others. Whatever we may have resolved when we first began to follow Jesus, none of us are anywhere near as faithful as we would like to be. We are inconsistent, often distracted, sometimes lukewarm, and never as we ought to be. But Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Hebrews 13:8). He is always kind, always merciful, always good, always holy, always true to everything He has ever said.  

Sometimes we don’t call on Him like we should. Sometimes we backslide. Sometimes we seem to lose interest in Him. But He never loses interest in us. He remembers our walls (Isaiah 49:16), He puts our tears in His bottle (Psalm 56:8), He makes our bed in sickness (Psalm 41:3), He delights over us with singing (Zephaniah 3:17), and lovingly makes intercession for us (Romans 8:34). He is a prayer-hearing God who always answers when we call on Him (Psalm 65:2; Jeremiah 33:3). Though we backslide, He graciously forgives and restores (Jeremiah 3:22). Though, like Peter, we are at times bitterly disappointing, He is still tenderhearted and kind.

Isn’t it wonderful to think that His compassions are new every morning (Lamentations 3:22–23)?! They never grow old and stale. He is not sometimes hot and sometimes cold. No, His love for me (and for you) is an everlasting love (Jeremiah 31:3). Think of the love that drove Him to Calvary when He gave Himself for you (Galatians 2:20). He had prayed for you that you would appear with Him in glory (John 17:24), and then, for the joy that was set before Him, He went to the cross to bear the punishment for your sins (Hebrews 12:2). This is love that is high and wide and long and deep (Ephesians 3:18). It is love that surpasses knowledge (Ephesians 3:19). But that love has not waxed cold with new discoveries of your sin. No, He knew it all when He went to the cross. He loved you then, and He loves you now. And even in your lowest moment, His love for you is just the same - just as strong, just as ardent.

Jesus never wearies of His bride (Isaiah 62:5). Rather, He holds His hands out to His people all day long (Isaiah 65:2) and encourages them with promise after promise. How eagerly He waits for the backslider to return (Luke 15:20), how willingly He would take your yoke upon Him (Matthew 11:29), how gladly He would receive any who would come unto Him (John 6:37), and how glad He is in the place of prayer to see your face and hear your voice (Song of Solomon 2:14).

As one songwriter put it, “Jesus never failed me yet.” And this is the experience of every one of us who know Him and are known by Him (John 10:14).

Many of us have come to love the 23rd Psalm. Today I have been meditating on the first few words: “The Lord is my Shepherd.” There are worlds of wonder in those words. This holy, omnipotent, gracious, loving, and faithful God is my Shepherd (Psalm 23:1). That makes me inconceivably rich. My Shepherd who loved me and gave Himself for me (John 10:11), my Shepherd who makes me lie down in green pastures, my Shepherd who is with me in the valley of the shadow of death (Psalm 23:2–4), my Shepherd who makes my cup overflow and whose goodness and mercy follow me all the days of my life (Psalm 23:5–6) is mine today, tomorrow and forever.

In the last little while, my health seems to have deteriorated. Whether this is temporary or not, I don’t know. Just a few months ago I felt strong and fit, so it has been particularly unsettling to feel my body giving out. I don’t yet know what is happening or why. I certainly don’t know where this is going. I could say that I don’t know what the future holds, but that’s not entirely true. Of course, there’s a sense in which you don’t know what the future holds either - but there is something we do know: before too long Jesus shall have what He prayed for (John 17:24). We shall appear with Him in glory (Colossians 3:4).

Like you, I don’t know what heaven will be like. But I do know my Redeemer will be there (Job 19:25), and there will be no need of the sun, for His glory is the light (Revelation 21:23). And there we won’t sin. Instead, we shall serve Him and praise Him and adore Him forever. And that makes you - like me - wondrously rich.

As the hymnwriter put it:

But He whom now we trust in
Shall then be seen and known,
And they that know and see Him
Shall have Him for their own.

O one, O only mansion!
O paradise of joy!
Where tears are ever banished,
And smiles have no alloy;
The cross is all thy splendor,
The Crucified thy praise,
His laud and benediction
Thy ransomed people raise.
(Jerusalem the Golden)