Fruit of the Spirit – Day 6

We have been talking about servanthood and what it means to be a servant of God. This well-known parable of the good Samaritan is a wonderful example of someone with the heart of a servant. Why would this Samaritan stop and care for this wounded man, potentially at a great risk to himself? He could have just passed the wounded man by and no one would have known, no one would have thought less of him. I think ultimately, there is only one reason; he had a servant’s heart. He had a heart of compassion. Jesus said that he took pity on the man who had been beaten. He had compassion for him and because of that compassion, he was moved to help him.

Previously, we spoke about availability as one of the keys to servanthood. This parable reiterates that. The Samaritan did not plan for this to happen. It was not a part of his scheduled day. He saw a need and he made himself available. He just went about his daily business keeping an eye open for an opportunity to serve. There are simple service opportunities in front of us every day, but most of the time, we do not make ourselves available for them. God does not operate from our daily planner. The appointments in our diaries and cellphones seldom match up with the appointments he has for us. God can use us if we are compassionate towards the needs of others and willing to make ourselves available to the service appointments that he has for us.