The Gospel Changes Everything (Pt. 9): Leadership

We're in a series where we're seeing how the gospel of Jesus affects every area of our lives. Each post will look at how the truth of the gospel changes how we view a certain aspect of life and its implications in our lives.

There is a story of two of Jesus' disciples (James and John) who get in a heated argument. Each of them wants to sit next to Jesus when he ushers in his kingdom. They want to sit to the right and left of Jesus' throne. They want to sit in the seats of honor, power, and leadership. When the other ten disciples hear that these two disciples asked Jesus for these spots, they were annoyed and resentful of James and John. 

James and John didn't get it. Leadership, power, and authority look different in Jesus' kingdom. Through the gospel, leadership is different. Although desiring leadership is a good thing, Jesus redefines what it is and how it looks. This is how he responds to them. 

Jesus called them over and said to them, "You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles dominate them, and their men of high positions exercise power over them. But it must not be like that among you. On the contrary, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first among you must be a slave to all." -Mark 10:42-44

Jesus says that leadership in his kingdom is going to look starkly different than leadership in the world. Others use their leadership, power, and authority to dominate others. But Jesus counters that by saying his followers will view and use leadership completely differently. They will lead by serving others. They will use their power to build up others. They will become great not through making people respect them but through seeing others' needs as more important than their own. 

Now when Jesus gives a command alone, we should listen, right? He is God. But it doesn't just stop there. Jesus doesn't only say I'm making a new rule here about leadership. In the very next verse he says, For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life - a ransom for many." (Mark 10:45). 

So the reason that leadership is different among Jesus' followers is because our Lord and Savior first did this for us. He was and is the greatest leader, the King of kings, the Lord of every "lowercase L" lord in the world, the one who has ultimate authority and power. Yet he chose to come as a servant. He demonstrated to us that leadership in his kingdom is servant leadership, it's sacrificial leadership, it's life-denying leadership with the focus on the other. 

Jesus came not to be served by us, even though he deserves it. Jesus came not to dominate us with his power and authority, though he rightfully could have. Jesus came with the mission to serve humanity. The way he was going to accomplish that was through denying his own wants, needs, and rights by dying in our place in order to ransom us back from the slavery of sin and death. 

This is the gospel! This is why Christians view leadership differently. Not just because Jesus said it but also because he demonstrated it for our sake. So when we lead sacrificially as servant leaders, we demonstrate a Savior who first did this for us. When we use our power to bless others rather than ourselves, we embody the gospel of a Lord who first did this for us. 

"Christian leadership, like no other kind, with the posture of a servant aims to cultivate the world so others can flourish according to God's design." -Geiger and Peck. Leadership for Christians is others-focused because Jesus' leadership was that way. He led by dying, so that we could live. 

SPENCER PETERSON / COMMUNITY LIFE PASTOR

Especially love the church?

Galatians 6:10 says, "So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith.”  The question this passage usually elicits is: why the qualification here? Why are we to love Christians especially?

Three reasons:

1. We’re family

And family does good to one another, even after we hurt each other. This verse implies that as Christians we need to have good done to us, as if Paul has the church’s health in mind when he writes this. So, in the spirit of how we needed God to do good to us through his Son to save us from our sins, we need to do good to those who are being saved so as to help them persevere in the faith and catch a glimpse of God’s present-day love (not just past love) for them in Christ.

You could say that the idea of “doing random acts of kindness” is less at the heart of God as is “doing particular acts of kindness towards the Church.” God cares deeply about his redeemed family loving one another, like a parent loves to see his or her children play with, laugh with, love, and serve one other.

 

2. The Church is Jesus’ body

Doing good to the Church is linked closely with revering Christ himself and responding to his matchless grace.

In Matthew 25:34-40 Jesus says, in what serves as a picture of future judgment, "Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’”

The phrase “my brothers” in verse 40 is a reference to the Church. For who are the “brothers” except those who—together—call God “Father”? Jesus is saying to Christians, “When you loved other believers, you loved me, because the Church is my body on earth in a way that others are not.” So to respond to a Christian’s need in your local church is akin to responding to the grace, love, and forgiveness that Christ himself offers us through his death and resurrection. The inverse is true as well: to not love the church is to not love Jesus. As he says later in the passage: “When you didn’t love the brothers, you didn’t love me.”

So there is something to say about the connection between belief in the grace of Christ and a Spirit-filled life of love towards others who profess the same faith. What other Christians in your church do you know who are in need, hungry, thirsty, poor, sick, or otherwise in trouble? Loving them intentionally is more important than global humanitarianism.

 

3. It’s evangelistic

In John 13:34-35, Jesus says, “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

Christians loving other Christians puts Christ’s love for the world on display. True love only comes from God, for he is love. So, to love other believers, particularly, publicly, is to demonstrate physically what we preach spiritually. It puts at the center of our message the trinitarian, self-giving nature of God. It may very well be the thing that gets someone who’s not a Christian yet to come to your church gatherings, or the very thing that will knock down the remaining obstacles between them and true faith in Jesus.

So, hang out with other believers together around those aren’t yet saved. Let them see how much unity, love, and mutual submission you have with (and towards) other Christians. It will scream the gospel to them, maybe without them even realizing it.

 

Christian...love the Church!

Love outsiders, yes. Love lost people, yes. But do not neglect the particular call to sacrificially love your local church family. It is one of the truest marks of what it means to be a Christian.

CHRIS WACHTER / LEAD PASTOR

The Gospel Changes Everything (Pt. 8): Fear

We're in a series where we will see how the gospel of Jesus affects every area of our lives. Each post will look at how the truth of the gospel changes how we view a certain aspect of life and its implications in our lives.

Welcome to Holy Week, as Christians around the world remember and celebrate the death and resurrection of Jesus on Good Friday and Easter. As I've been preparing for my Easter sermon, I was reminded of how surrounding the story of Jesus' death and resurrection is the tale of two distinct pictures of the disciples.

On one side we see the disciples controlled by their fear. They're paralyzed and incapable of doing anything good because of it. The soldiers show up with Judas the traitor in the garden of Gethsemane and the disciples scatter. One disciple (Peter) grabs a sword and tries to defend Jesus. But I guess fishermen weren't trained in sword fighting and Peter ends up cutting off a guy's ear. Jesus rebukes Peter, heals the guy's ear, and the disciples run. They abandon Jesus in one of his most trying moments. 

And not only do they desert Jesus rather than defend him, they are almost no where to be found. Their fear of the soldiers and religious rulers made them incapable of staying near or helping Jesus. Their fear overtook them, and led them to abandon their master. One disciple (Peter) does follow the crowd of soldiers from a distance, hoping to find out what's happening.

But soon, even his fear cripples him. A slave girl (think the lowest of the low in the social hierarchy of the day) asks Peter if he is a follower of Jesus. Peter denies it. It's not a soldier, not a Jewish leader, not even a peer who asks Peter if he knows Jesus; relatively she's a social nobody. Yet Peter's fear consumes him again and he denies knowing Jesus a second time. Finally Peter's terror reaches a boiling point and he denies Jesus a third time, even calling a curse down on himself (essentially saying publicly, "I swear on everything holy that I do NOT know this man."). And his fear leads him to do what he had just promised Jesus he would never do (Luke 22:31-34): deny and abandon him. 

Peter denies Jesus three times. 

After Jesus’ death, the fear continued. The disciples cowered in a locked room, terrified that the Jewish religious rulers and Roman soldiers would come after them next. They'd all but forgotten that Jesus had said he'd have to die and that he'd rise again. So they succumbed to their fear, they locked the door, and they lost hope.

But then something happens and they become completely different people. The fear is gone. These men are nearly unrecognizable from the disciples we see prior to the resurrection. The gospel has come and these same men are transformed! The gospel leads these disciples from crippling fear to fearlessness. 

Soon after Jesus' death and resurrection (the essence the gospel), his disciples are known for their boldness, their fearlessness, and their courage in Christ. When they see the resurrected Jesus and when they finally understand the gospel, it changes them!

Acts 4:8, 13 describes this. "Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, ‘Rulers of the people and elders’...Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated men, they were astonished. And they recognized that they had been with Jesus.” 

Now through the gospel, we're given the Holy Spirit. Peter is empowered by the Spirit and  instead of running away, what does he do? He preaches with boldness. He stands before the same people who accused and convicted Jesus and he preaches the gospel to them! And it isn't just we readers who notice something is different. The rulers are astonished. I love this next part. It says that the rulers recognized that they had been with Jesus!

The gospel changed the disciples, not just in this one instance but for the rest of their lives. The fearlessness that came from the gospel didn't end in Acts 4 but continued. Church history teaches us that all but one of the disciples were not only persecuted (think whipping, imprisonment, torture) but also killed for following Jesus. The only disciple that wasn't martyred was John (they tried to kill him by boiling him in oil but somehow he survived so they exiled him to live as a prisoner on an island). 

So what happened? What turned this crew of terrified cowards into fearless martyrs? The answer: the empty tomb!

The good news (that's what the word 'gospel' means) of Jesus' death and resurrection destroys fear. Fear of man. Fear of uncertainty. Fear of the suffering. Fear of the enemy. Because Jesus rose from the grave, even the fear of death loses its sting! Because Jesus conquered death itself, his followers are freed from its power over them. Through his death, Jesus destroyed "the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil,  and deliver[ed] all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery" (Hebrews 2:14-15). The disciples are a great example of this: men who moved from slavery to their fear to being delivered by the gospel and having freedom over their fear.

As Christians you were once slaves to fear (you couldn't help but be fearful). But now through Christ, you've "received God’s Spirit when he adopted you as his own children. Now we call him, “Abba, Father.” For his Spirit joins with our spirit to affirm that we are God’s children. And since we are his children, we are his heirs. In fact, together with Christ we are heirs of God’s glory" (Romans 8:15-17). 

Through the gospel, God has "not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline" (2 Timothy 1:7). Because God has said, “I will never fail you. I will never abandon you.” So we can say with confidence, “The LORD is my helper, so I will have no fear. What can mere people do to me?” (Hebrews 13:5-6). 

In Jesus' death and resurrection, his love was demonstrated and given to us. And his love fills those who believe in him. "There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love" (1 John 4:18). Through the gospel we no longer have anything to fear. Jesus' perfect loves is driving it out. We no longer worry about the penalty for our sins because we know it's been paid for in Christ. 

When we read stories of the disciples' changed lives, we don't have to think, "I could NEVER do that!" In Christ, we've now been give the same Spirit that empowered them to be fearless in the face of persecution and death. We believe the same gospel and have been freed from the same slavery to fear. We know our savior has defeated sin and death once and for all and that the effects of his victory are given to us. Now in Christ, we have the same gospel that changed terrified cowards into fearless martyrs! 

SPENCER PETERSON / COMMUNITY LIFE PASTOR