We are currently living in the golden age of biblical theology. Never before has the church had more resources to help it understand the biblical storyline and the themes that unite that story. On a human level, few have been more responsible for this renaissance of biblical theology than Don Carson. So it is with profound gratitude to God that I acknowledge my own debt to Don for instilling in me a love for the God of the Word and the Word of God.

When most people hear the title “servant of the Lord,” they tend to think of the suffering servant in Isaiah or the fulfillment of that passage in Jesus Christ. But a closer look at the biblical storyline reveals a number of individuals identified as servants of the Lord.¹This essay summarizes Matthew S. Harmon, The Servant of the Lord and His Servant People: Tracing a Biblical Theme through the Canon, NSBT 54 (London: Apollos, 2020). See also Harmon, Rebels and Exiles: A Biblical Theology of Sin and Restoration, ESBT (Downers Grove, IL: Intervarsity Press, 2020); Harmon, Galatians, Evangelical Biblical Theological Commentary (Bellingham, WA: Lexham, 2021); and Gary E. Schnittjer and Matthew S. Harmon, How to Study the Bible’s Use of the Bible: Seven Hermeneutical Choices for the Old and New Testaments (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Academic, 2024). The terms servant and slave have a range of use in Scripture. Often the respective Hebrew and Greek words refer to people who are in a subservient position to another person, whether by their own choice or against their will. Yet there is also a specialized use of “slave/servant” language in which that term is an honorary title given to a person whom God raises up to advance his creational and redemptive purposes in this world. Indeed, a closer look at the biblical storyline reveals a series of individual servants of the Lord who carry out royal, priestly, and prophetic roles. God uses these individual servants to create a servant people. This pattern is repeated throughout the Old Testament, climaxes in Jesus Christ, and is extended to the church in the New Testament.

1. Adam

Although he is never explicitly referred to as a servant of Yahweh, Adam was the first servant of the Lord. As a creature made in God’s image, Adam was invested with royal, priestly, and prophetic roles. God commissions Adam to rule over and subdue the earth as an expression of his own sovereign rule over creation (Gen 1:26–28). He places Adam in the garden (which is presented as God’s earthly sanctuary) to “serve” (עבד) and “keep” (שמר) it, language that is used elsewhere to describe priestly duties within the tabernacle (Num 3:7–8; 8:26; 18:7). Adam even exercises a prophetic role in that he receives God’s word (Gen 2:16–17) and then communicates that word to his wife. As Yahweh’s servant, Adam was called to produce a servant people by being fruitful, multiplying, and filling the earth with obedient divine image bearers. But Adam fails in his role as a servant, rebelling against God by seeking to determine right and wrong for himself (Gen 3:1–7). As a result, sin and death are unleashed into creation. Yet God promises to raise up a new servant, a serpent-crusher who obeys where humanity failed and takes upon himself the punishment humanity deserves for its disobedience (Gen 3:15). That promised serpent-crushing serpent will come through the line of Abraham (Gen 12:1–3; 22:1–9). But by the end of Genesis, however, that servant is nowhere to be found, as Abraham’s descendants live in Egypt as sojourners (Gen 50:22–26).

2. Moses

Nearly four hundred years later, that new servant appears: Moses. Although Abraham’s descendants had increased greatly, they languished in slavery to the Egyptians (Exod 1:1–2:24). So God raises up Moses to deliver his people (Exod 3:1–4:31), exercising royal, priestly, and prophetic roles. Following the miraculous signs Yahweh performs through Moses, culminating in the crossing of the Red Sea, Israel believes in both Yahweh and his servant, Moses (Exod 14:31). As a royal figure Moses leads the people to freedom under Yahweh’s authority, enabling them to fulfill God’s purpose. He frequently intercedes for the people, mediating God’s presence as a priestly figure. By receiving God’s words and communicating them to God’s people, Moses is the prophet par excellence. Even more significantly, in his role as the servant of the Lord, Moses transcends the ordinary roles of prophet or priest. His relationship with Yahweh is direct—he speaks with God face to face and has God’s Spirit resting upon him uniquely (Num 12:1–9). Through Moses God establishes his covenant with Israel, setting them apart as a kingdom of priests and a holy nation to live out a modified form of God’s original commission to Adam (Exod 19:1–6). In other words, God creates a servant people through Moses, his servant.

3. Joshua

The book of Joshua opens with the death of Moses, the servant of Yahweh, and the commissioning of the next servant: Joshua (Josh 1:1–9). He lives out his identity as the servant of Yahweh by defeating the enemies of God’s people and giving them rest in the promised land. During Moses’s life God had prepared Israel for this transition by putting his Spirit on Joshua (Num 27:18–23; Deut 1:38; 3:28; 31:3, 14–23; 34:9). Yahweh authenticates Joshua’s status as his servant by enabling him to perform Moses-like actions, including parting the Jordan River (Josh 3:3:1–4:24), appearing to Joshua (5:13–15), answering prayer for victory in battle (8:18–26), and writing down God’s words (24:25–28). But Joshua does more than simply imitate Moses the servant. As the servant of Yahweh, Joshua performs Adam-like actions. Through his conquest of the land, Joshua exercises dominion over a new Eden—the promised land (11:23). As a priestly figure, Joshua the servant mediates God’s presence to the nations around and intercedes on behalf of the people (7:6–9). By receiving and writing down the words of God, Joshua the servant exercises a prophetic role. Although Joshua does not rise to the level of Moses within the biblical storyline, he dies a faithful servant of Yahweh who plays his part well in redemptive history (24:29–30). He leaves behind a servant people committed to being faithful to Yahweh, even though Joshua knows that Israel will not live up to that commitment (24:1–28). But unlike when Moses dies, there is no clearly defined successor for Joshua, no clearly identified individual to fill the role of servant. Instead, Israel must endure hundreds of years of suffering through the sporadic and increasingly failed leadership of the judges. Only when God installs a king after his own heart will an individual emerge who fulfils the role of the servant of Yahweh.

4. David

That king is David. As the next servant of the Lord, he takes up the mantle of previous servants, including Joshua, Moses, and even Adam. David serves the Lord by establishing a kingdom that anticipates the full realization of God’s original creational purposes and the eschatological hopes of his people. As king over Israel, he exercises authority not only over Israel but some of the surrounding nations as well (2 Sam 7:1). In a limited sense, he exercises the kind of authority and dominion that God commissioned Adam to exercise. Despite not formally being a priest, he engages in priestly actions. Foremost among these is making preparations for the building of the temple (1 Chr 22:1–29:22) and leading the people in worship (2 Sam 6:1–19). In this way he parallels Adam, who was placed in Eden, God’s garden sanctuary, and commissioned to cultivate its expansion. God inspires David to write numerous psalms that are the very words of God himself, marking him off as a prophet as well. But David’s significance as the servant of the Lord goes beyond what he himself does. God makes a covenant with David (2 Sam 7:1–29), promising to raise up one of his descendants to rule over an eternal kingdom, exercising the dominion over creation that Adam failed to exercise. Through this future Son of David, the ultimate servant, God will one day realize his creational and redemptive purposes to produce a true servant people who will have God’s law inscribed directly on their hearts and will be empowered by his Spirit to faithfully obey his commands (Isa 11:1–10; Ezek 34:11–31; 36:22–38).

Although David’s son Solomon experiences some initial success, his eventual demise makes it clear that the wait for the serpent-crushing servant of the Lord continues. Following the death of Solomon and the split of the nation into the Northern and Southern Kingdoms, God’s people begin a centuries-long descent into increasing depths of idolatry and covenant rebellion. In the midst of that descent, God raises up the prophet Isaiah to foretell the future arrival of a new servant of the Lord.

5. The Isaianic Servant

Through the work of individual servants of the Lord, Yahweh had commissioned Israel to be a servant people through whom the nations would see the glory of the Lord on display (Isa 42:1–9).²Some scholars see the servant of Isaiah 42:1–9 as an individual messianic figure; see, e.g., John W. Oswalt, The Book of Isaiah: Chapters 40–66, NICOT (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans), 108; Robert Chisholm, “The Christological Fulfillment of Isaiah’s Servant Songs,” BSac 163 (2006): 393–401; Brian J. Tabb, “Sharing the Servant’s Mission: Isaiah 49:6 in Luke-Acts,” JETS 65 (2022): 510–12. But the larger context of Isa 40–48, in which all other references to the servant appear to be to Israel, seems to favor Isaiah 42:1–9 as referring to Israel. But instead of opening the blind eyes and deaf ears of the nations, Israel itself became blind and deaf because of their rebellion against God (42:18–25). So Yahweh promises to raise up a new individual servant who would restore rebellious Israel and be a light of salvation to the nations by obeying where Israel had failed (49:1–12; 50:4–9). He will restore Israel and be a light of salvation to the nations (49:1–12). This individual servant will obey where Israel failed, trusting in the Lord for vindication in the midst of suffering (50:4–9). Through his vicarious suffering for the sins of the people, Yahweh will accomplish the redemption of his people (52:13–53:12). Through the new covenant the servant inaugurates, he will create a servant people who reflect God’s glory to the ends of the earth (54:1–17). Through this promised servant, God will fulfill his original purpose for creation and his covenant promises to Abraham and David (54:1–3; 55:3). As a prophet, this servant will announce the word of the Lord to the ends of the earth. As a priest, this servant will offer his own life as a sacrifice for the sins of his people (Jew and Gentile alike). As a king, the servant will rule over his people and establish a kingdom that transforms creation itself (52:13–53:12; 65:17–25).This Isaianic servant creates a servant people who share in his victory over death and his inheritance (Isa 54:17). Thus, this individual Isaianic servant seems to be a culmination of previous servants, embodying elements of the previous servants and anticipating their fulfillment in a singular individual who transcends all who come before him.

6. Jesus

God’s people would have to wait seven centuries before this promised servant finally appears on the stage of redemptive history. The NT presents Jesus’s identity and work as fulfilling the role of the Isaianic servant of the Lord, both in its totality and with respect to specific elements of his life, ministry, death, resurrection, and ascension (e.g., Matt 8:17; 12:15–21; Mark 10:45; Luke 2:29–32; 4:16–21; 9:51; 22:37; John 12:37–38). Yet Jesus’s identity as the servant of the Lord extends beyond the repeated citations, allusions, echoes, and thematic parallels to the Isaianic servant.

The NT writers also use servant language in connection with identifying Jesus as the fulfillment of each of the servant figures who came before him. Thus, Jesus is the servant who obeys where Adam the servant fails, crushing the serpent and exercising the dominion Adam was commissioned to exercise (Matt 26:36–46; Luke 4:1–13; Rom 5:12–21). He is the servant who is the prophet greater than Moses, authoritatively leading his people in a new exodus from their bondage to sin (Luke 9:28–36; Acts 18–26). Jesus is the servant who gives his people a greater rest than Joshua, bringing them into the eschatological rest of the new creation (Heb 4:8–10). He is the servant who is David’s greater son, defeating sin, death, and the devil through his death and resurrection and ascending to the right hand of the Father to rule over an eternal kingdom (Luke 1:68–69; Acts 15:13–18). Jesus is the servant who obeys where Israel fails (Matt 4:1–11), not only bringing restoration to a remnant of Israel but becoming a light of salvation to the nations. He is indeed the servant of servants, bringing to fulfillment all that God begins to do through his previous servants.

7. The Apostles

Like every servant before him, Jesus the servant creates a servant people. But in an unexpected wrinkle, he does so through the agency of key leaders within the early church that are described as servants of Christ, servants of God, or servants of the Lord. Preeminent among these servant leaders is the apostle Paul. He presents his life and ministry as the fulfillment of the servant of the Lord described in Isaiah 49, a conviction that is central to his self-understanding (Acts 13:47–48; Gal 1:15–17).³On this theme in Acts, see Holly Beers, The Followers of Jesus as the Servant : Luke’s Model from Isaiah for the Disciples in Luke-Acts, LNTS 535 (London: Bloomsbury T & T Clark, 2016); Tabb, “Sharing the Servant’s Mission,” 509–22. In Galatians, see Matthew S. Harmon, She Must and Shall Go Free: Paul’s Isaianic Gospel in Galatians, BZNW 168 (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2010), 78–86, 103–15. By dwelling in Paul, Christ the suffering servant fulfills the mission of the servant to be a light of salvation to the Gentiles (Gal 2:19–21). Servant terminology is also applied to several of Paul’s ministry co-workers, but with the exception of Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:24–26, none of those descriptions borrow language from OT servant passages. The exception to this general observation is that, in both Acts 13:46–47 and 2 Corinthians 5:11–6:2, Paul uses the plural “we” to describe his ministry in language borrowed from Isaiah 49, suggesting that he views his ministry co-workers as participating in the servant’s mission. Peter, James, Jude, and John also open their respective writings by referring to themselves as servants of Christ, suggesting that they, too, see themselves in the long line of individual servants God uses to advance his creational and redemptive purposes, but giving no clear indication that such is the case.

8. The Church

Working through these servant leaders, Jesus the risen servant of the Lord creates a servant people: the church. The NT demonstrates the servant identity of God’s people in three primary ways: (1) directly calling them servants (Mark 10:43–45); (2) using servant language to describe them (Gal 5:13); and (3) showing them carrying out the mission of the servant (Phil 2:15). The risen Jesus dwells in his people by his Spirit to complete the elements of the servant’s mission that remain. Only Jesus vicariously suffers for the sins of his people. Only Jesus is the perfect image of God who fulfills Adam’s servant commission as a prophet, priest, and king. Only Jesus is the prophet greater than Moses, the conqueror greater than Joshua, and the king greater than David. Yet he now works in and through his servant people, the church, to bring to full realization every aspect that remains of the servant’s mission.

The church’s role as a servant people takes two distinct forms in the NT. The first and most frequent is an Isaianic shape. As God’s people suffer and endure it without violent response, they follow in the footsteps of Jesus the servant (Rom 8:33–34; 1 Pet 2:18–25), even as they await their final vindication from the Lord (Rev 6:9–11). As God’s people proclaim the good news of what Jesus the servant has accomplished through his death and resurrection, they are the means by which God restores Israel and shines the light of salvation to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8; Phil 2:15). Even the nature of their common life together is guided by the principle of using the freedom Christ purchases for us as a means to serve one another self-sacrificially in love (Gal 5:13). The second form of God’s people as the servant is Adamic in nature. When at last God consummates all his promises in a new Eden, humanity perfectly reflects the image of God (Rev 22:1–5). As God’s servants, redeemed humanity exercises the dominion over creation that God commissions Adam to exercise. They worship him as priests in his glorious presence. By virtue of their union with Christ the servant, God’s people at last fully realize their destiny as image-bearing servants.

Embracing our identity as a servant people frees us from the slavery of constantly trying to determine our own identity and instead enables us to live in the joy that comes from knowing and being known by God. Our corporate life should be marked by bearing one another’s burdens, because Jesus has already borne our greatest burdens for us. Through the church, Jesus Christ, the servant of the Lord, continues his mission of being a light of salvation to the nations. Empowered by his Spirit, we exercise servant shaped stewardship, mediate his presence to those around us, and proclaim his Word to a dying world. Those called to leadership within the church should advance God’s purposes by self-sacrificially using all available resources rather than employing political maneuvering and personal charisma to achieve a personal agenda. The result will be a beautiful and compelling picture of Jesus the servant, who loved us and gave himself for us (Gal 2:20).

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