He said, The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many Matthew The foot-washing event of John 13 dramatized the lesson He sought to convey by His life and His teaching. But He was the Lord. He had nothing to prove. Which is correct, of course. In fact, the opening verses of John 13 make this very point:. John That, believe it or not, is all one sentence in the Greek.
It was intended, clearly, as a single unit to make the point that all this is happening with the certain knowledge of the Lord Jesus and that His act of service is of one piece with the rest. From time to time, you and I encounter one of those humans who seem to have no other ambition in life but to find more ways to help more people.
They shun recognition, dislike the spotlight, live simply, and baffle critics. All they do is bless others and the world beats a path to their door, looking for their secret. After the war, the Lord used a number of separate strains of witness to bring him to Christ.
Then, for another quarter century, Fuchida covered the globe bringing the gospel of Jesus Christ. I heard him in New Orleans sometime in the mids. Following the war, Fuchida made a point of meeting as many ships as he could which were bringing returning POWs back to Japan. Seeking out some he knew, he asked how they had been treated in America. After sitting in on a number of war crime trials, Fuchida was convinced that the USA had treated their prisoners just as harshly as had the Japanese.
Once in a while, the returning POWs did testify to mistreatment, but again and again, they told of being treated with kindness. In the reports, one name kept recurring. In one of the prison hospitals in America, a young nurse named Margaret Covell had given sacrificial service to wait on her patients. One day, a Japanese prisoner asked Miss Covell why she went out of her way to be so kind. He was not prepared for her answer.
Her folks had been missionaries at a Christian school in Yokohama. When war threatened, the missionaries all relocated to Manila. Eventually, the Japanese came there, too, and they were arrested. The military confiscated their portable radio and, thinking it to be a secretive communications device, questioned and tortured the Covells.
Then, they beheaded them. She became bitter and filled with hatred. Then, she did as she thought they would have, and devoted herself to waiting on them. Fuchida was stunned by such reports.
The concept was foreign to him. Fuchida set out to find out what the missionary couple, the Covells, had said before they were beheaded. That should tell him something. But no one seemed to know. Then one day, Fuchida received a Bible. A friend challenged him to read 30 pages before dismissing it.
By the time he had read that many, Mitsuo Fuchida was enthralled by its message. That was it, he felt. That is what the Covells did as they died. They forgave their executioners. Later, Mitsuo Fuchida testified that this was the moment he was converted to Christ. Until that time, he still had not had a conversation with any Christian on how to be saved. The Lord used the Holy Scriptures and the loving example of three faithful servants, Margaret Covell and her parents.
I daresay that the Missionary Covells led far more people to Christ by dying for Him at the hands of the Japanese than they ever had in their lifetimes. Likewise, their daughter Margaret, bore witness to the whole world of Jesus Christ through the preaching of a man she never met, Mitsuo Fuchida, world evangelist.
Jesus put it this way: Unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it produces much grain. So, who is the greatest? The disciples seemed to be bugged by that issue. Matthew and Mark Someone once asked Billy Graham who he thought might be the greatest Christian ever.
Could I add one more point to this issue, someone not suggested by the text but so true it almost goes without saying? I wonder if anyone has counted all the clinics and conferences designed to show church leaders how to put their institution, their ministry, their congregation, on the map.
How to be great in their community, or at least greater than the competition. It seems so clear, so plain. Does this mean car washes and gasoline giveaways? A food pantry for the needy?
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