Serving by the Rules

“So that we should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter.”
Romans 7: 6

Rules, rules and more rules - the world is full of rules. Don’t touch this or don’t do that. This mentality often sneaks into the modern day church. A church should and must have codes of behavior and standards of morality. However, the balance of rules and serving in the spirit can kill the movement of the Holy Spirit. This verse suggests that the Holy Spirit brings freshness to our service. Like a spring breeze or a relaxing dip in a cool lake on a humid day, our service refreshes another. The Holy Spirit enhances our lives. Therefore we enhance another by allowing the Holy Spirit to channel this refreshment.

When we seek to serve by rules the body of Christ experiences deadness - like a dry arid desert needing a downpour of water. After a thunderstorm or early morning dew, you smell the sweet aroma of green grass. Flowers shine with sunlight dancing over their pedals and the birds chirp in thankfulness. During your visit to church, do you experience a Holy Spirit enhancement? Does it feel like a visit to an oasis surrounding an arid desert? God desires that we serve others with a freshness that stirs another to seek Him.

During this service for King and Kingdom, we must bring the new life that God desires all to experience. The delicate balance of spirit enhance service with an over abundance of rules is attainable. It all depends on who controls the church and the people in it. We live in a world of first impressions. The world believes that the church is full of unattainable rules. We are good at don’t do this and don’t do that but are we good at servicing in a refreshing manner? The choice is yours to make. Are you ready to serve in the newness of the Spirit?

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Darlene Hight lives with her husband, Mark, in Hamilton Ohio. She is drama coordinator for Crossway Community Church, a member of Christian Writers Guild, a mother of three and grandmother of eight and Oh yeah? A writer. If you would like to contact Darlene, you may do so by writing her at Didget_01 < at > yahoo.com

© 2008 Darlene Hight - All rights reserved.

This column is Used with permission.