The One Question That Decides Whether an Empire Survives

Jamie had been reading a book by Sir John Glubb on the rise and fall of empires. I am not much of a historian by nature, but I was fascinated as he laid out the distinctives between an empire and a kingdom, and the socioeconomic patterns that surface as an empire rises and then declines.

He began with this, and it is central to everything I want to say. He said that when an empire falls, it is because the people move from asking, how do we know what we know, to asking, how do we get the highest paying jobs. That statement stopped me. How do we know what we know?

As I pondered it, I began to see that we slowly move away from knowing there is Someone greater than us and into believing the world is really all about us. When I ask honestly how I know what I know, the answer is not simply my education. It is not simply the family I was raised in. It is not because I am an American or a Caucasian male. It is because there is a God in heaven who created me, and He reveals Himself in His creation. Romans 1 tells us that His attributes, His divine nature and His authority, can be clearly seen in what has been made, so that man is without excuse. There is a revelation of God that comes to people naturally as we journey through this life.

But when we lose sight of how we know what we know, we start worrying only about gaining more power, more money, the highest paying job. That becomes the most important thing.

How Empires Crumble: A Shift from Service to Self

Glubb traced this pattern all the way back to ninth century Assyria, showing how it repeats over and over. Jamie Winship put it this way, and I quote: we lose sight of the value, honor, and esteem of service professions when this happens. We stop caring about those jobs. We take them only because we could not get a higher paying one. And when that happens, the coming generation loses the sense that my life is to serve others.

Hear that again. My life is to serve others. When a people lose that, the empire begins to crumble.

It is a cosmic shift in the human heart, a move from God-sustained to self-sufficient. In those moments the empire becomes consumed with distractions, things like entertainment, sports, and celebrity worship. The internal fighting grows fierce because no one knows how we know what we know anymore. Everyone is just out to get their own. I have to make more money. I have to get the highest paying job. I have to gain as much power as I can. At that point, the empire is already on its way down.

What Does the Bible Say Will Last Forever?

Then Jamie asked a question. Do you know how long it takes, on average, for an empire to rise and then fall? About 250 years. And then he asked whether anyone knew which birthday the United States of America would celebrate on July 4th, 2026. Two hundred and fifty years. He looked at us and said, "Happy birthday."

I sat there next to political and religious figures from our state thinking, I am going to have to chew on this. What does it mean for us to lose our sense that we exist to serve someone other than ourselves?

If you remember one thing, remember this: I was created to serve. Say it with me. I was created to serve. You might carry the gift of leadership, teaching, hospitality, prophecy, or mercy. Why were we given those gifts? God gave them to us so we would serve Him and serve one another. All throughout the New Testament we are told to use our gifts to build one another up. This is a kingdom principle, not an empire principle.

The Trinity, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, is how we know what we know, because it has been revealed from God. His heart, His mind, and His system are not an empire. His does not rise and fall in 250 years. Scripture tells us that His kingdom will last forever. His kingdom is eternal, and service is one of the primary things it is built on.

"Your Kingdom Come": A Prayer That Is Not About Us

With that in mind, look again at the words, may Your kingdom come, may Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. That prayer is not about empire. It is not about you and me building our own society and then adding a belief in Jesus on top of it. Americans, you especially need to hear this. Nothing in this passage, nothing about the kingdom of God, is even about America. It is certainly not about our freedom. It is not about us at all.

It is about service to the King. It is about a kingdom. It is about a theocracy. If that word is unfamiliar, it does not mean a democracy where we all work together to keep our system running. It means there is one Ruler, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, and His is the kingdom we are here to build. He is the King of kings and the Lord of lords, and you and I were created by God to serve that purpose.

Why Do We Keep Forgetting We Were Created to Serve?

Why is it that when I pray, may Your kingdom come and Your will be done, I so easily forget that serving is the reason I am here? I believe it is because we face the same temptation Adam and Eve faced in the garden. We face it daily. It is the temptation to sit in the seat of God. My sin constantly tempts me to be the master and lord of my own life, and that leads me to try to build my own empire.

But that is not why we were made. We were made for the kingdom. I was made to serve in the courts of the King. I was created to serve.

This is the crazy cosmic shift. If I move away from God sustains me, God created me, and I am here for God's reason and no other, and slide instead into self-sufficient, all that I can build, everything I can put my hands to, something dangerous happens. Even pastors are guilty of building their own kingdoms and their own empires. Why is that shift so destructive? Because it is the most dangerous shift in the human heart, the move from God-sustained to self-sufficient, and it defiles the kingdom of the living God.

Where to Go From Here

So return to the question you started with. Why were you created? Not to build an empire that rises and falls on a 250-year clock, but to serve the King whose kingdom never ends. The gifts in your hands were never meant to make you the center. They were given so you could build one another up and build His kingdom.

Today, resist the pull toward self-sufficiency. Take the gift God has placed in you, your leadership, your teaching, your hospitality, your mercy, and spend it in service to Him and to the people around you. I was created to serve. So were you.