Christ-Like Leadership

My recent trip to Europe, I also had a chance to visit several museums. And in Vienna, there was the National Gallery, National Art Museum there in the center of town, was one that I went into. And in most major art museums in the world, especially in Europe, and you'll see in America, too, you always see a lot of religious artwork. And the focus of religious artwork over the centuries has been for different portrayals, images of Jesus Christ. Now, when we are not used to our culture, certainly in the Church, we don't have images and portrayals of Christ that we hang on to.

But we're well aware that it is a focus of religious art. And when you go through these museums and you look at a lot of those, quite frankly, they're very interesting. This one in Vienna seemed to have an unusual number of very dark-themed portraits. Usually, many of them are dealing with the passion of Jesus dying or being beaten before his death or being taken down off of the cross. Very common themes that are presented.

Others as well. And if it's done by a Spanish painter or a Dutch painter, there's usually a very dark scene that is set, very somber-looking. And in some cases, especially among some of the Spanish artists, it's quite grotesque-looking.

It just doesn't appeal to my artistic eye anyway. I'm sure it appeals to some bodies. That's why they're hanging in these museums, but not mine. And you go, you look one after another, and you start moving quicker and quicker through an art gallery. At least I did, as you look at these, because they just do not speak to me as virtually no representation of Jesus really, really does.

And as I look back over, I thought, you know, none of it really does justice to the image of Christ. Whatever human mind and eye and artist seeks to portray Christ in whatever scene, whatever era, in whatever artistic expression, they just don't seem to get it right in portraying the image of Jesus Christ. And this is one thing that I notice so much in the great artwork of history, especially European art, that is attempted to capture something about the image of Jesus Christ. At least when you study the Scriptures and you come at it from the perspective of God's truth, the image of Jesus Christ is not something you realize is not something you can put on a canvas or capture in any type of art form.

And that is by God's design, I think. And I think God's spirit in a mind, as you begin to learn the truth and develop a relationship with Christ, and the Father, you begin to see that human art, human expressions, human representations, graven images and all the like, don't do it. They just don't.

And in reality, when you come to understand the truth, you recognize something that Paul brings out in Colossians chapter 1. And this means more to me now after going through a couple of art museums and just being exposed to that again off of this trip. In Colossians 1, just jumping down to verse 27, as he's speaking here in this whole chapter again about Jesus Christ, and his role, his service, being reconciled to Christ in Colossians 1 and verse 27, he says, He says, Now, Paul here hits upon a fundamental truth that we take a lifetime, perhaps, to really grasp and to understand.

What he's saying to us here is that Christ is in us. It is somewhat of a mystery. We go into more of this as we go through the Days of Unleavened Bread and the Passover Experience. But this is a very, very rich teaching. Christ in us, which is the hope of glory. When you come right down to it, the only image of Jesus Christ that matters is that image of Christ in you and in me. It's not what some artist puts on a canvas.

It's not what is sculpted by anyone to represent any aspect of Christ's life or death from the Gospels. The only image that really counts from God's point of view and should to you and I, we should focus our gaze and our attention upon, is Christ in us and how it changes us. How God's Spirit and Christ's life within us molds and shapes us into His image. That's what we should see. That's what others should see about us. This is, I think, what Paul is hitting on.

And this is where we are in God's Church today. It's where we were a year ago. It's where we were ten years ago. It's where we were thirty years ago, forty years ago, whenever you came to be a part of God's Church through the divine calling of God's Spirit when He drew us.

It's to this very matter and this very truth. But more so, in our recent ministerial conference, it was entitled, Look to Christ and Advance the Work. That was the theme. Look to Christ and advance the work. This is what we set for that theme. This is not just a one-off type of idea that we should just now move on from. Too often when we have had ministerial conferences over the years, general conference of elders' sessions, we have tended to hop from theme to theme over the years.

And one thing I have noticed over the years is that we never really developed the one theme that we had the year before or two years before or three years before, because we kind of moved on to something. This one is at the center of it. Look to Christ, advance the work. You can say that in different ways, but it is a reality that we find ourselves in. And because of that, the Council of Elders, in a one-day meeting after the session, the two-day ministerial session that we had, we adopted an approach that we have come to call Christ-like leadership.

That is, the culture we envision us to model and to develop within the Church. That's nothing new. We have talked about it before under different names. Christ-centered leadership, godly leadership, servant leadership. It's not a new concept. It is a different title, admittedly. But I think we are at a point where we recognize that we either develop this and model this, or we are not going to be used by Jesus Christ.

And this is not a program. I don't even want to use the term program because it's not a program. And I hope that we never create a notebook that has all the material in one little spot that sits on your shelf for this as well.

You can't put it into a notebook. If you will, this is the notebook for the concept, for the culture, for what we should be. And that is all of us. And it's not just the ministry. It's all of us within the Church developing a culture that models itself after what Jesus Christ has done, is doing, and will do.

Being Christ-like in all aspects of our leadership, whether it is on the pastoral level, on the family level, on the individual level, all of us have that responsibility to do. And we must. And this is what we focused on. And this is what we need to continue to focus on. And what I'd like to give you here this morning are four reasons why. I'm modeling this after one of the presentations that was presented at the conference, and putting it in some of my own words as well, but reinforcing it for all of us to consider as to why this is so critically important for the United Church of God.

For all of God's people, no matter where they may find themselves, it is critical because it is scriptural, and it is fundamentally based on this one hope of glory that we have of Jesus Christ in us, and the very image of Christ coming out of our DNA, out of our lives, out of our words, out of our thoughts, and how we relate to one another, and how we relate to God. That is so critical. First of all, because it's important to even being in the Kingdom of God. Being like this is so critical to being in the Kingdom of God.

In Matthew 18, Jesus points us to this. When they came to Him in verse 1, and they asked, who is greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven? Jesus called a little child to Him, said Him in the midst of them, and He said, Assuredly I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the Kingdom of Heaven.

Therefore, whoever humbles himself as this little child is the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven. Whoever receives one little child like this in My name receives Me. This is what we review every year when we have the blessing of the children. To become humble as a little child, willing to change and to grow in that way. In Matthew 20, verse 25, He points out this again in this matter of serving.

Jesus called them to Himself. This was after they had become displeased with two of the brothers who were seeking again to be given a higher position and place. And Jesus called them to Himself and said, verse 25, You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and those who are great exercise authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you, but whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant.

And whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave. Just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many. Having this attitude of service, again, we just see such a graphic example of it with the ouster of a man like President Mubarak in Egypt, who over 30 years took advantage of a position, quite frankly. All you have to do is go to Egypt and see the wide gulf between the rich and the poor.

And it's dramatic, and it's saddening. But it's there. All the money that has been poured in from the West has not trickled down economically to many of the masses there. And you can only do that so long. In history, and every government shows that when there are abuses, there eventually will be a revolution. The revolution often gets out of hand and out of control. It happened in Russia in 1917, happened in France in 1789, and followed up with the terror and the guillotine that took over from what was a reaction against excess. And those who Jesus spoke to in this principle of rulers who lord it over people and are not servant-oriented and are more interested in power, who are more interested in money, when that happens, there will always be a reaction.

It will be that way. It's happened throughout history to governments. It's happened within religions. It's happened in every aspect of society. It's there. There will always be a reaction to it.

And he's saying to those who are his disciples, to his followers, don't let it be so among you if you want to be in the kingdom. In Matthew 16, verse 24, Jesus said to his disciples, Matthew 16, verse 24 and 25, If anyone desires to come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it. Whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. A sacrificial approach, which takes discipline to give our lives in sacrifice. Now, we do it at various levels.

Every mother, every father has a measure of sacrifice that they make for their children. We all know that, who have been in that role. Being a parent is a sacrifice in many different ways. Being a good mate in a marriage is a sacrifice, as you give to it, as you submit yourself to one another. Being a disciple, being a friend, being what Christ says here means that we are willing to make a sacrifice to let the image of Christ be developed within us to the degree that it brings us closer to that image.

It's our life energy. We will make a lot of mistakes, you and I, along the way of the Kingdom of God. We will make personal mistakes. We will sin. We will need the grace of God to forgive us. We will need to change. We will need to be forgiven. We will make a lot of mistakes. And we do. But none of us want to make the big mistake of missing out on the Kingdom of God. None of us want to make the biggest mistake. And Jesus here gives us one very, very clear direct teaching that we have got to be developing in the image of this type of representation of His life, being Christ-like all along the way and in every part of our life.

So it's critical to be in the Kingdom, to be Christ-like.

Point number two, it is essential for having effective, growth-oriented congregations. Growth-oriented congregations. This Christ-like approach. Imagine what we could be if everyone in our congregation was working together on this goal. Not just me, not just our elders, not just the ordained people, but everyone. Every child, every teenager, every one of us capturing the vision of what it means to be Christ-like.

And again, not after the image of how the world wants to portray Him in their own way, but in the image that we see from the Gospels, from the Scriptures, from the Epistles. Committed to that. We have to be. But it's the only way forward. It is the only way forward for us, from this point on. We don't lead by this example. We don't lead at all. And every one of us has it within our ability to submit ourselves to Jesus Christ, to look to Christ, and take on that image. You don't have to be ordained for that. I chuckle sometimes when I am confronted with the driving ambition that often overcomes an individual to be ordained. There is a deaconess, or as a minister. And the extent to which we will deceive ourselves, the unibowed, our motivations and our actions, all in the name of wanting to be recognized by having hands laid upon them. I've said this before. I've been an ordained minister for 30... I've been in the ministry 38 years, ordained probably 37 of those years. And I willingly take the responsibility, but I will tell you, as the years have gone by, I fully recognize the burden of the job more than I ever did when I was first ordained. And a young, wet-behind-the-ear training. Literally, if I had known then what I know now, I ask myself would I have really wanted to pursue this and to go down this way. My answer is I hope that I would have. I do hope that I would have. Because I have no regrets at this point. But because of that, when I run across the ambition that sometimes drives individuals to be ordained, I just say, well, let me just give it to you. Let me just give it to you. If I could, I would. But I can't. It's not mine to give. You don't know what you ask. You don't know what you ask. But the clear teaching is none of us have to have that to be Christ-like. You don't have to be ordained to be Christ-like and to be a Christ-like leader. We have a lot of people who model that very, very well, who have never been recognized in that sense or ordained to a position. And you know it and I know it. Christ doesn't expect that. But it's essential that we all work together and that we are not ashamed of our calling and that we are willing to submit ourselves to one another. That's essential. In 2 Corinthians chapter 1, the attitude that the Apostle Paul had in 2 Corinthians here...

2 Corinthians is a unique book. You read it after you read 1 Corinthians sometimes, but you see a different Paul in the second letter that he wrote to this interesting group of Christians in Corinth. And some of the things that he says...

I mean, in 2 Corinthians chapter 1 and verse 24, he says, "...not that we have dominion over your faith, but are fellow workers for your joy, for by faith you stand." This comes on the heels of 1 Corinthians where he had to rebuke certain attitudes and point out some very major problems and mistakes and issues within the church. Then he comes back and says, we don't have dominion over your faith. He's saying, whatever authority we have is because you willingly submit yourselves to Christ as we do that. That's essentially what he's saying. We don't have dominion. We're all fellow workers. We are fellow workers for your joy, for faith by faith you stand. If we had that approach toward one another as fellow workers, not wanting to have dominion over one another, think of what could be done. In chapter 2, here in verse 4, he says, "...out of much affliction and anguish of heart I wrote to you with many tears, that you should be grieved..." Not that you should be grieved, but that you should know the love which I have so abundantly for you. Again, he's saying, I wrote what I wrote and had to say it, but I just said it out of love. And it was out of an anguish of heart, but it was necessary.

We should never be ashamed of calling out to Christ. Any congregation of God's people exists and works together because of individuals wanting to be like Christ, and use God's Spirit to mutually serve, help, and edify one another. That's what makes a congregation work. That's what makes a body of congregations work in the fellowship or in the Church of God. Our form of governance that we have in the United Church of God can only work if every one of us adopts and ingrains this attitude, this approach of being Christ-like in our approach toward one another. That's the only way it can work. We've chosen a unique form, and it can only flourish in an atmosphere of Christ-like leaders, individuals who are wanting to be molded in the image of Jesus Christ. Take any other approach, and it won't work. But take any other approach, and no form of governance will work. I famously quote John Robinson, our dearly deceased elder and brother here, who told me at the beginning of the United Church of God when we had our governance structure, our bylaws, our Constitution all crafted and ratified. And we even went through a form of doing it for our local congregation. And John said to me some advice he said had been given to him by a lawyer in some of his business dealings over the years, where he said the best form of contract or bylaws that any company, church, organization could have are those that are written. If you write them down and you agree to them and you sign on the bottom line, you then put them into a drawer and you close the drawer and you forget about them. Not that you disobey them, you live by them. I quoted that and somebody said, what do you mean? You disobey? No, no, you don't disobey. You agree to it, but you don't have to pull them out every week or every month or two or three times a year because somebody's not living up to it. You put them away in the drawer and because they become a part of the culture, the company works, the church works, and adopt an attitude like Christ and governance will work, whatever one chooses. That's what's so important. Governance is not the problem, it's sin that is the problem. It's pride, it's ambition, it's self-centeredness to the degree that it shows up. It's not a charter, it's not a set of bylaws, it's the problem, it's sin. That's what has been at the heart of our current problems. Point number three. This Christlike leadership is essential for building a spiritually healthy members and congregations. Ephesians 4. Ephesians 4. Verse 1.

That takes a lot of work. That can only be done when Christ is in us, the hope of our glory. Whatever gifts we have, whatever gifts God gives us, should be used to serve each other and to serve in the work. This is essential. He goes on to have more to say about this down in verse 11. He said He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers. These are gifts and responsibilities that can take various forms within the church. And He says they are for the equipping, verse 12, of the saints, for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, to build it up. Till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure and the stature of the fullness of Jesus Christ. Till we all come to that. So it's to be used, those gifts, those talents, those positions that one might occupy for a particular point in time, are for the building up of the body of the church, the body of Christ, to bring about a level of unity. And it is essential for mature congregations. Verse 13 describes a mature Christian and a group of mature Christians. We are able to come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. We still have a long way to go to come up to that verse, but it's essential that we keep working toward it. We can't let ourselves be discouraged whenever we see failures. And ourselves, in the ministry, or the church collectively.

So I ask the question that I did this week in my letter to you, how spiritually mature are you?

How spiritually mature are we? You know, maturity, emotional, spiritual maturity is not always measured by years. X number of years in the church.

Things that we do.

That's not the measure of our maturity. It's measured not by the time that we've put in, not by the number of feasts that we've been to, or regular attendance, perfect attendance at church, or attendance at everything, or what we might be able to do. That by itself is not what makes us mature. Now, it's a part of a process, and it's important. I'm not downplaying that at all. But it's not measured by time. Sometimes we look at an individual that's been in the church 20, let's say 40 years, which would be for some of you here, and someone who's been in, let's say, less than 10. And the one who may be newer in the church, when we look to someone, and certainly you would want to see years of experience reflected in that individual by so many different aspects of their life, their speech, their conduct, that they would represent a mature individual. But maturity doesn't always come just because we put in the time. It comes by wisdom. It comes by sound judgment. It comes by a depth of thinking, along with many other matters that are important. It's important that we don't just repeat one year's experience 10, 15, or 20 times. That's not growth. That is not growth.

Not one year repeated the same umpteen times. That's only repetition, and explains why sometimes mistakes are made over and over again. People can't get out of a rut. It's the same for emotional maturity. But when we look at spiritual maturity, we're faced with only one example alone, but determines our growth. That's the example and the model of Christ. That's the model. God has given us, God the Father has given to us, the perfect model of Jesus Christ to measure ourselves spiritually in this flesh. And that's what He is saying here in verse 13. That we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to a measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. It's the fullness of Christ that is our model for spiritual maturity.

And as you read through the next few verses, you see the areas that present a continual challenge to that maturity. Because He says in verse 14, we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro.

And when I read this, I was thinking about what I read to you earlier back in Daniel, where people, it says, in the end, will run to and fro and knowledge will be increased. It's a repetition of a thought. I'm not sure if the Hebrew and the Greek wording match up. I'm not saying that. I'm not comparing that. But certainly there's a repetition of a thought there. And here He says, tossed to and fro. In other words, not anchored, not stable, emotionally, spiritually, physically.

We should not be children, tossed to and fro, carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men and the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting. Quite a bit mentioned there in verse 14. Personalities, getting caught up with personalities, tricks, deceit. The trickery of men is nothing more than lies. Trickery of men and deceits. The cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting. It takes a great deal of discernment to be able to stand aside and determine what is truth, what is a lie, what is something that is being plotted craftily and deceitfully.

I could go on and on about that. I don't want to belabor that particular point. But Paul does give us certain barriers here that we need to be aware of that are barriers to being spiritually mature. You have to get beyond looking to these matters. You want to be grounded in doctrine. I'm looking forward to teaching the doctrines class at ABC. I'm trying to get ready for it. I have nine days over the next few weeks to teach ten doctrines. I don't want to scare anybody that we've done away with ten, but Randy Stiver did the other ten that first semester of ABC. I drew the second ten of the twenty fundamentals of belief we have in the United Church of God. I'm looking forward to getting into that with the students and going through the ones that I have to talk about. I've got, as I said, nine classes, eighteen hours to get in ten doctrines that I've got to get prepared for. I'm looking forward to going through that. You'll probably see some of that in some of the sermons going forward. Next year, he and I will probably flip, and I'll do the ten he did this year, and he'll do the ten that I did this year. As I've been going through them, you see the richness and depth of the truth of God that we have. God has given to us. You don't want to be thrown about by that. We've had our doctrinal battles over the years. But there's other things here that he mentions of craftiness and trickery of men. Again, personalities that are so easily allowed to be caught up in.

That's what we want to avoid. True, lasting growth comes when godly love conquers these matters. Godly growth comes when we look to Christ and we finally determine, for once in our life, to walk in his footsteps rather than following others. And sometimes I think, recently, I've thought, you know, that's what God wants. He's going to know before our lives are over if we will follow him, and to what extent, to what length, we will follow him. I've thought a lot about that. And perhaps every one of us, in God's wisdom and in a way, will test us to see if indeed we will be faithful to him. And not anyone else, and faithful to him. But that's a big subject to think about. But we have a high calling. We're God's heritage. We are his. And we belong to Christ in that way. Point number four. This Christlike leadership is also so essential for healing the hurts of the past and of the present.

In Philippians 3, verse 13.

Philippians 3, verse 13. Paul writes, In the present, I do not count myself to have apprehended, but one thing I do.

For getting those things which are behind, and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Therefore, let us, as many as our mature, have this mind. And if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal even this to you. Nevertheless, to the degree that we've already attained, let us walk by the same rule. Let us be of the same mind.

Paul didn't let things from the past bother him. He was able to let it go. This is a thing that, this is a truth that comes from what he wrote, writes here in Philippians, from prison, as he writes this very, very deep heartfelt letter to the church. He forgot the problems that anyone had done to him, that he had done, whatever issues he ran into. He didn't harbor those things. He moved on. And moved away from them. And was able to grow spiritually and write such things as he did here. You know, I learned something on my recent trip to Europe again, not just looking at paintings. I learned something, a practical matter, of how you can travel for two weeks. And you don't need as much clothing and luggage as you think you do. I used to kind of kid our daughter-in-law Stephanie and Ryan at times when we would travel together. And some of the thieves in the early years, they would show up, they would have umpteen suitcases. This was before the kids. Last time, last fall, when we went to Portugal, they had even less. They've learned that you don't need as much as well. I had one suitcase and a backpack, and I realized I could have taken even my smallest carry-on suitcase and packed it all in, probably done just well for two weeks, one person. I had a medium size. I thought, well, and it was only about half full, maybe two-thirds full. And I was well under my weight limit, so I didn't have to pay extra on Delta to check it through. But I realized I'd taken even too much clothing for that. We had one excursion when we were in Budapest. We went back, we went to Vienna for the weekend. We left the apartment, dormitory apartment, in Budapest, and we had a hotel that we were going to be in in Vienna. There was no need to carry for four days the whole suitcase. So I squeezed it all into my backpack, clothing for four days. So I even got it down into one smaller thing, so I didn't have to lug my big suitcase on and off the train through the streets of Vienna. And I learned you don't need as much. One of the adages, the wise adages of traveling is take twice as much money and half the clothes. I could have used more money on this trip. You can always use more money when you travel, right? Well, you know, you don't need as much as you think. I learned that the less you carry on a journey, the better you travel. You don't have to keep up with it. You can focus on why you're there, or the sights, or other things. And it's made me stop and realize I don't need as much clothing in my closet even after I've come back home. I can make do with what I've got and don't need to shop at a sale or stop in any place. You know, we carry a lot of emotional baggage around with us, too, in our life. All of us do. And that emotional baggage causes us a lot of problems, a lot of heartache. We carry it from our earliest years. The more ever we get rid of, the better and easier our journey in life can be. If we get rid of the pride, if we can get rid of the envy, if we get rid of the feelings of inferiority that we may have had for years, the ambition to be somebody, if we get rid of the fear, the proclivity to be easily offended, or to be suspicious. What's your baggage? What baggage are you carrying in your bag of life?

To the degree we can get rid of it and put it under the blood of Christ and exhibit more of the image of Christ, the easier our trip will be with our life. But the more we want to carry that baggage along with us and wheel it through the streets of life, the easier it's going to be to dig into it and pull something out and be reminded, oh, yeah, but get rid of it. Toss it off.

You know, I've been able to make up and reconcile with people that I never thought I'd be able to reconcile with.

Reconciliation is an important thing. I think with God's Spirit in any of us, we can reconcile with anyone in time. Maybe sometimes time has to go by before hurts can be and offenses can be sapped over and healed over to a degree. We all know that. But I've learned over the years in the Church that if we continue to obey God, if we stay together, in other words, if you keep coming through the door of church and you don't just go leaving church and just stay home or go someplace else, you know, in time you will find yourself asking, you know, what was it I was mad at that person about? You can forget. People can reconcile. I've reconciled with people I never thought I would reconcile with.

It's proof there is a God. Reconciliation, true reconciliation, can happen. It will take time. But we've got to at times get rid of the baggage that we have. In Ephesians 4, verse 31, Paul writes, Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you. These are some of the articles in our baggage that we carry around with us. We've got to get rid of. We could turn to other lists in Scripture. You can make your own as can I. But one who was striving to be a Christlike leader, to be like Christ, to bear the image of Christ, is going to be getting rid of that baggage because it's so important for healing and being able to move forward at every level in the church and in this life. This is what God has called us to. To be like Christ, to be like Him. And to the degree we do that will help us in our journey toward the Kingdom of God. Let's go back to Colossians 1.

This is the image that's important of Jesus Christ. Not what Greco, Rembrandt, Goya, or any other master artist from the past has crafted on a canvas to represent something about the life of Christ and fallen far short. Those are not important. They tell us nothing.

In the end, it's what is said here. To them God called to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. In the end, when we hold that mirror up and we see that image, we see less of ourselves in that mirror, and we see more of Christ, then we are following and coming closer to what this verse here tells us, Christ in us, the hope of our glory. That's our goal. That's what's important. That's the culture that needs to be created, demonstrated, and lived at every level within God's Church. That's our marching orders. They come straight from God. I hope we can do it. Our future depends on it.