Friday, July 27, 2012

Do what he tells you to do

As many of you know, I'm doing a sermon series (beginning August 6) on Biblical Leadership called Raising Leaders, Creating Followers.

As I did research, I narrowed the field of leaders I wanted to concentrate on in scripture to four. There are many, many more, but I chose four because I like doing series that are confined to a certain short length of time, four or five, and I like doing series that are essentially confined to a month's worth of Sundays.

I then looked for specifics: I chose Nehemiah because in my judgment any leader in the Bible (besides Jesus whom I eliminated early because one can't be a better leader than Jesus and I wanted human fallible leaders in my mix) begins with Nehemiah. Then I chose Moses because I wanted to discuss my worst leadership quality, delegating and counting on others around me. Next I chose David for I wanted to talk about the fixation the modern church has with age. Finally, I couldn't get away from a discussion on leadership without talking gender issues.

There are a few women in scripture I could pattern this on. I thought about Rahab, Esther, Ruth, some New Testament women, even the woman judge Deborah (what a leader she must have been to head up the nation in a time when women weren't valued very highly to say the least.)

I chose, however, one of my heroes in scripture, Mary the mother of Jesus. Why? Because she led without leading, a trait that most will never notice nor harness.

From many examples, I chose this one:

Here's the deal. There was a wedding. Mary was there. Jesus and his disciples were there. There was partying going on, with smiles and laughter handed out every bit as much as was food and of course wine.

Then, the wine ran out. The partying folks were about to get unruly. The embarrassment of whomever was throwing the wedding bash was about to be beyond measure.

Mary, still but somewhere in her 40s, then took charge.

She went to her son, and dare we mention that he is the Son of God, God himself in our theology, and she said to him, "They are out of wine."

There was no plea. There was no bargain. There was no pushing nor pulling. Just a straight statement of the situation. "They are out of wine."

Jesus, who we didn't mention was God himself in our theology, says, "You must not tell me what to do. My time has not yet come."

In other words, this 32-year-old man, human in every way but God himself in every way, says to his mom, "I can't do anything about that. That's not what I'm here for. It would be a waste of my time to show my power at this time at this place for this purpose."

God himself says that.

Mary says, not to Jesus, not to his disciples, not to anyone else that truly matters here but instead to the servants, "Do whatever he tells you."

In other words, she hears Jesus, but in her gentle manner of leadership, in the way that she must have told him to come in when the sun went down, in the way she would have told him not to play with so-and-so because he is too rough, in the manner she would have told him not to skateboard in traffic (okay, I might have exaggerated a bit), she told Jesus what to do without telling him what to do in front of his disciples and everyone else.

As Jesus called his disciples, got prepared for his ministry to begin, did all that he knew he had to do to set things in motion for the most important moment in history, Mary stood by and said nothing, I suspect. The facts concerning Jesus and his mother at this point aren't many. But what we see here is that Mary understood leadership to be that which is said without saying it.

I spent 25 years in management, ran four different sports departments, hired and fired, and what I learned from all of it is if you lead people, there will come a time when you have to admonish someone without embarrassing them in front of the rest of the staff.

Mary, a woman in a time when the entire gender was treated as if it was cattle, a time when divorce could be had by simply wanting it, a time when one could beat a woman in public for little or no reason, a time when a female child could be left on the side of the road simply for being a girl, commands God himself but never actually demands anything from him.

There aren't many examples of women leading men in scripture, but I would suggest that every time you see it happen, it is an extraordinary woman who does so.

A lot is made of Paul's writing that women should be silent in worship, but not nearly as much is made of how often it seems he had women lead in the planting of a church.

Esther preserved the Israelites in a time that simply being a Jew was a death sentence.
Ruth preserved love in a family where the blood-line proved to be Messianic.

On and on women show not only worth but leadership qualities.

Mary says, "Do whatever he tells you," and in saying so, basically tells us that she knows who he is, what he's capable of, and who she is, too.

It is worth noting that when persons went to the tomb to put spices on Jesus' body, it was women who did so. It was a woman that Jesus appeared to first. It was a woman who went to the disciples to tell them that Jesus was alive. It was a woman who spread the story of resurrection. It was a woman.

To me, the entire gospel is shouted in this little descriptive sentence. To me, we learn that Jesus is real and the answer to all that is so very wrong with humanity because we have not done what Mary told us to do.

To me, Mary's message still rings through the halls of history, right to the heart of financial crisis, to the heart of addictive behavior, to the heart of loss of love and to the heart of sin itself.

"Do what he tells you to do," is or should be the mantra that stands out beyond all other sayings in scripture. WWJD should be preceded by a drawing of Mary, not because of the theology of a perfect woman, but because Mary understood the necessity of following this man she named Jesus.

"Do what he tells you to do," is the essence of leadership. If you want to be a good leader, even a great leader, one must learn from someone greater. He is that one. I believe that leadership blossoms from Him.

Summing all this series up, leaders have passion about their mission, leaders equip others to help then delegate important matters to them, leaders come in all ages, sizes, looks and finally leaders come in all genders.

Leadership isn't just about who is in charge. Leadership is about who puts a charge in us.

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