2 Chronicles 12:5-8 

Then the prophet Shemaiah came to Rehoboam and to the officers of Judah, who had gathered at Jerusalem because of Shishak, and said to them, “Thus says the Lord: You abandoned me, so I have abandoned you to the hand of Shishak.” Then the officers of Israel and the king humbled themselves and said, “The Lord is in the right.” When the Lord saw that they humbled themselves, the word of the Lord came to Shemaiah, saying: “They have humbled themselves; I will not destroy them, but I will grant them some deliverance, and my wrath shall not be poured out on Jerusalem by the hand of Shishak. Nevertheless they shall be his servants, so that they may know the difference between serving me and serving the kingdoms of other lands.”

A big theme in recent texts in the lectionary has been "humility," and again it shows up here as Rehoboam's humility leads to the Israelites not being destroyed by the Egyptian King, Shishak.

But something else strikes me here with fresh eyes: something about service to God that I hadn't thought of.

God allows the Israelites to be Shishak's servants so that they may know the difference between serving God and serving earthly kingdoms or governments.

Have you noticed a difference?

I'm not sure I can answer for anyone but myself here, but it occurred to me as I read this today that service to God is bound up with freedom in a way that service to my government is not - despite how freedom is so highly valued in the US.

Maybe because in my experience, God's freedom is different than human freedom.

God's freedom is about freeing myself to become the person I am meant to be; serving God in the way in which my gifts are best utilized in service to God's creation. 

So service to God is entirely bound up in God's own servant leadership. It is bound up in my identity as a child of God.

God wants us to see that service to God is connected to service to others and God's own love and service to us in a web of love and compassion.

And perhaps the only way to see that, is to see how different service to human authority is.

Lord, I am your servant. Teach me how to serve your people in love. Amen.