Mark 10:45 says, "The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give His life as a ransom for many." Luke 19:10 says, "For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which is lost." John 10:10 says, "I have come that they may have life and may have it abundantly." The Lord Jesus came to the earth for man. According to Mark 10, He came to serve men even to the point of giving His life as a ransom. The purpose for His coming was to serve men. In His service to men, there was the need for Him to give His life as a ransom, and that is what He did. His becoming a ransom was the highest and consummate act of His service to men. The Lord did not say that the Son of Man came only to be a ransom. He said that the Son of Man came "to serve." The goal was service. He was interested in man, and He considered man precious and worthy of love and service. He served men to such an extent that He met their need by becoming their Savior. This is why He gave His life as a ransom. If we preach the gospel of the Lord's sacrifice of His life as a ransom without having the Lord's heart of service, we are not qualified to be called His workers. Man is lovable. Because he is lovable, the Lord did not say that it was "the Son of God" who came to serve, but "the Son of Man" who came. The Lord Jesus first loved and served men, and then He gave His life for them. Love comes first; the sacrifice of life comes afterwards. When we work among men, we cannot preach the Lord's sacrifice without first having the proper love. We should not think that we can first preach His sacrifice and then love the listener after he has received the Lord. If we have no interest in man and do not find him precious, and if we have no awareness that we are all fellow creatures of God, we cannot preach about sacrifice. If we have never been touched by the expression God created man or have very little feeling for it, we are unfit to preach Christ's sacrifice. Brothers and sisters, we must first love all men before we can lead them to the Lord. We cannot hold back our love until they receive the Lord or until they become our brothers. Unfortunately, this is a problem with many people; they come short in this matter. Many people hold back their love for a person until he or she has become a brother or a sister. Brothers and sisters, this is not the way our Lord works. He first loved, and then He gave His life. We who preach His redemption also should love first and then preach redemption. Our Lord first served and showed mercy to others before giving His life as a ransom. In the same way, we should be interested in men, counting them worthy of our love and grace, before we present the Lord's redemption to them.
If God opens our heart to see that we are fellow men among all men, our attitude towards them will drastically change. We will find man lovable and precious. Brothers and sisters, it needs to dawn on us that man is precious in God's eyes because He created man in His likeness. Even today, man is still in the likeness of his Creator. Unless man becomes the object of our affection we cannot possibly become a servant of men. We must find man lovable and valuable in the sight of God. Many brothers and sisters have an altogether wrong attitude, temperament, and sentiment toward their fellow men. They consider them a burden, trouble, nuisance, or an annoyance. This is totally wrong. We must learn to see man as God's creation with God's image. Although man has become fallen, his future remains bright. If we regarded man as lovable, we would not feel that man is a burden, trouble, nuisance, or an annoyance to us. The Lord went to the cross for man. Can our love be anything less than this? If a man is touched by the Lord in a genuine way, and if he really sees the Lord's goal in coming to the earth, he will spontaneously conclude that man is lovable. It is impossible for anyone who has a genuine knowledge of the Lord to despise man.