Of Service to God and Service to Ourselves

In a particularly entertaining passage in The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien, Gandalf the wizard employs a clever and amusing tactic to introduce his destitute group of fifteen wanderers to the powerful and reclusive character, Beorn. As the story goes, each wanderer upon introduction and according to his custom offers to Beorn his name along with a pledge of being “at your service!” The rather impatient but also self-sufficient Beorn replies, “I don’t need your service, . . . but I expect you need mine.”

That is not unlike our relationship to God, even as we offer Him our service. God the Omnipotent has no need of our service, but we are very much in need of His, all day and every day. A difference, and important difference, is that while God does not need our service, we need to give it.

We need to give our service because of what giving does to us, especially what it does to us inside. It is the inner man that concerns God and is the reason for which He created this brief mortality that we sometimes narrowly call “life.” Our mortal life was designed by God as an opportunity to shape and develop our character for our permanent life of immortality, after our death and later resurrection. That concern for the inner man was behind God’s teaching to Samuel the prophet when Samuel was looking for a new king to govern Israel.

But the LORD said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the LORD seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the LORD looketh on the heart. (1 Samuel 16:7)

Our inner life changes for the better each time we do good, with each worthy service that we provide. It constricts with each mean and sinful act. In the words of the modern prophet, Spencer W. Kimball,

the more we serve our fellowmen in appropriate ways, the more substance there is to our souls. We become more significant individuals as we serve others. We become more substantive as we serve others—indeed, it is easier to “find” ourselves because there is so much more of us to find!
(Spencer W. Kimball, “The Abundant Life”, Ensign, July 1978, p.3)

A couple of simple examples may illustrate how actions can change us. In these examples we consider apparently identical actions that differ only in terms of the intent behind the actions. That intent, expressed through action, rebounds on the soul and changes the character of the soul further, for better or worse.

Consider, for example, a man who accidentally walks off with someone else’s umbrella. Compare that with a case where another man knowingly takes someone else’s umbrella. In both cases the actions in all material details are the same. The umbrella leaves in the hands of someone who has no right to it. There is a profound difference, however, in what each case does to the character—the internal moral condition—of the actor. The first may cause some embarrassment but is scarcely a cause of shame. The second has at a minimum increased the willingness of the man to cause yet another injury to the property or person of someone else and has shrunken him in spirit and in love for his fellowman.

As a second example, let us look at a seemingly good act, the giving of a gift. With a gift freely offered, with thoughtfulness and generosity, the giver grows in characteristics of kindness and liberality. The same gift, however, given grudgingly, with hopes of currying favor or with a sense of obligation rather than goodwill, with residual covetousness for the possession surrendered, will stir resentment, envy, and perhaps even elements of hatred in the heart of the giver (see Moroni 7:6-11). Again, an action apparently the same in all material aspects becomes a blessing or a cursing to the actor depending on whether it was offered with a blessing or cursing in the actor’s heart.

All of that is to say, that we need to provide our service to find out who we are or, better said, in order to become who we will become. Genuine service, given from love for our fellowman and an even deeper love for our God, born out of our heartfelt esteem for the worth and value of God and for the potential of His children, unfailingly builds our own value, our own worth, and our own potential as the children of God. God our Father does not need our service, but we need to give it as an essential way of becoming like Him, the sons becoming like the Father by imitating His example.