What Makes a Leader Great

Sermon by Rev. Steven McClelland on James 3: 13 – 16, Mark 9: 30 – 37.  Focus on why leaders must be servants to the people they serve. Check out Jody Sinkway and the choir following the sermon.

Somewhere along the line someone in the church decided it was a good idea to start calling them St. Matthew, St. Peter, St. Andrew.

But, if you think about it the only thing that makes the twelve disciples remarkable in anyway is the fact that Jesus called them. In and of themselves they are highly overrated. They are no more special than you or me. In fact they are just like you and me.

So if you will indulge me I’d like to take a look at the disciples through the eyes of a modern day recruiting firm to see how they would have faired.

Imagine the memo to Jesus from the Galilean Human Resource Management Consulting Firm. It might have gone something like this:

Thank you for submitting the resumes of the twelve men you have picked for management positions in your new organization. All twelve have now finished taking our personality profile inventory tests, and we have not only run the results through our computer, but also have arranged personal interviews for each of them with our psychologist and vocational aptitude consultant.

The personality profiles of each one of the twelve are included, and we think you will want to study them very carefully. As part of our service to you, we will make some general comments. These are given as a result of countless staff hours.

It is our professional opinion that most of your nominees for the position of disciple have serious deficits in background, education, and vocational aptitude for the type of enterprise you are undertaking. In addition, they do not show any signs of teamwork or group cohesion. We recommend that you continue with your search.

Simon Peter is emotionally unstable, given to fits of temper and has serious impulse control problems. Andrew has absolutely no qualities of leadership. The brothers, James and John, place sibling rivalry and personal interest above company loyalty. Thomas’ doubting attitude will undermine morale. The greater Jerusalem Better Business Bureau has blacklisted Matthew for unethical income tax practices. James, the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddeus have radical leanings and show a high score on the manic-depressive scale.

Only one of the chosen twelve shows great potential. He is resourceful, has a business mind, is ambitious and highly motivated and demonstrates an ability to work well with authority figures. We recommend Judas Iscariot as your controller and Chief Financial Officer.

It’s amazing, when you think about it that out of this rag tag bunch of misfits Jesus was able to change the world. What that says to me is that it’s not extraordinary people who accomplish great things. It’s ordinary people who find in themselves the strength to do extraordinary things that change the way we see and operate in this world.

And his job description was simply: “Come follow me and I will make you fishers of men (and women).” It seems that’s a job description that any one can follow. It’s one that a group of rag tag fishermen certainly could follow and it’s one that you and I can follow.

You don’t have to have it all together to answer this ad. In fact it’s the very neuroses and idiosyncrasies that we so desperately want to get rid of that Jesus uses to his advantage. Consider Peter for example, its not in spite of his emotional outbursts and impulsive actions, but because of them that Jesus is able to build a church. The founder of the church had a personality. He had emotion and passion. These might not be great qualities in a middle manager, but they are great qualities if you are starting something big, starting something that has never been done before.

There’s not a successful entrepreneur that I know of who was stable or a conformist. The world was and is continually being changed by those who are discontented with the way things are.

So what’s my point? It’s simply this. The church was founded on priceless misfits. The church grew and the world was turned upside down because of ordinary people with extraordinary defects of character and personality. It is our job therefore to trust that by answering Jesus’ ad to come and follow we too have everything that is necessary to be a disciple.

We gather here each week therefore, not to warm our posteriors, but to be reminded that in order to be first we must all be servants to all whom God will put in our path. And therefore, one other thing needs to happen and must always continually happen. The older generation must always be about passing the mantle of leadership to the younger generation and the younger generation must not let that mantle fall.

When Jesus called the twelve he did so because he knew that they would have to build on what he had begun. He didn’t hamstring them with a lot of traditions and ways of doing things, he simply said: “Go and make disciples of all nations.” Each generation has a responsibility to prepare the next for the role of leadership, primarily that means giving it over to the next generation to grow in its own way.

But the younger generation also has a responsibility. They have a responsibility to step up to plate and accept the responsibility of leadership. This should be self-evident. And it’s not only in the church that this power struggle seems to take place. It takes place in religion, politics, and our economic systems. It takes place in every aspect of life.

The seven deadly sins in the church are not avarice, greed, gluttony etc, they are: “We’ve never done it that way before.” Those words kill the spirit and they entomb life.

But as James and John soon discovered the real issue isn’t one of power or who will be the greatest. The real issue is one of service. “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” So the question to all of us is this: “Are we willing to be a servant to the next generation? Are we willing to think about their needs? What is meaningful for them? And what are we going to do to attract them into this the body of Christ?” Amen