For me, “The Servant Song” is one of those songs. I remember singing this song in my high school choir, joining in the soulful rendition of our college folk choir, and raising this song with prayer-filled communities as we prepared to go out and serve Christ among us. Every time I hear this song, I am transported back to these times in which my heart was filled with a special awareness of the Holy Spirit at work—present and alive—in the unity and fruits of these communities rooted in Christ’s love.
When I hear “The Servant Song,” I remember too that the call to serve requires accompaniment. Serving is never a one-way street if we’re doing it right; it is a special privilege that requires a certain vulnerability on the part of both giver and receiver. Pope Francis reminds us almost daily not just of our call to serve, but also of the need to accompany those whom we serve:
The call to serve involves something special, to which we must be attentive. Serving others chiefly means caring for their vulnerability. Caring for the vulnerable of our families, our society, our people. Theirs are the suffering, fragile and downcast faces which Jesus tells us specifically to look at and which he asks us to love. With a love which takes shape in our actions and decisions. With a love which finds expression in whatever tasks we, as citizens, are called to perform. People of flesh and blood, people with individual lives and stories, and with all their frailty: these are those whom Jesus asks us to protect, to care for, to serve. Being a Christian entails promoting the dignity of our brothers and sisters, fighting for it, living for it. That is why Christians are constantly called to set aside their own wishes and desires, their pursuit of power, and to look instead to those who are most vulnerable. (Homily of Pope Francis in Havana, September 20, 2015)
In the soundtrack of my life, “The Servant Song” is a powerful reminder of God’s presence in my life and my response to God’s presence. What about you? Where do you find God in the soundtrack of your life? What songs in your soundtrack bring to mind those who have held the Christ light for you? What songs remind you of times when you held the Christ light out to others? Whom might you be called to hold the Christ light out to in the future?
We’re in the last week of 31 Days with St. Ignatius. Read today’s selection, In God’s Waiting Room by Loretta Pehanich.