Leadership and Service

Preached at St Alphege, Solihull, 9.15 and 11am, Sunday 22/10/06
Year B – Trinity 19 (Proper 24)
Readings: Isaiah 53:4-12, Hebrews 5:1-10, Mark 10:35-45


In our gospel reading today Jesus draws a sharp contrast between normal worldly standards of leadership and the kind of leadership that he wants to see in the life of the church. He points out that worldly leaders often lord it over their subjects and act as tyrants. But this is not the kind of leadership that Jesus wants in his church. In the church, he explains, “Whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first must be slave of all.”
We all have leadership roles in the church. For every person in church today there must be at least 10 members of our nominally Christian community who are not in church. We all have a leadership role to these people in particular. So let’s think a little bit about this leadership role, about being a “servant”, being a “slave of all”. What do we understand when Jesus says we must learn to serve? More important; what does Jesus what us to understand? Well let’s think about this by looking at the example that Jesus himself gives us.
First of all Jesus is very clear that being a servant often means doing very practical things that a household servant might do to help the other people. The last supper was perhaps Jesus’ most important gathering with his disciples, and he started the whole evening off by washing their feet, a job which would normally be done by the lowest servant of all (John 13:1-15). After washing the disciples feet, Jesus says, “Do you understand what I have done for you? You call me Master and Lord and rightly; so I am. If I then, the Lord and Master have washed your feet, you must wash each others feet. I have given you an example that you may copy what I have done for you.”
John starts his account of the washing of the disciples’ feet by saying, “Having loved those who were his in the world, he loved them to the end.” The service of Jesus is therefore an expression of his love for the people around him. It is the desire to do good for them. To want their good, and to do his part in bring about their good.
We see this same attitude of wanting the good of the other in all of Jesus’ works of service. We see it when he healed the sick. We see this attitude in his teaching ministry. His teaching helps people to grow towards God and to build better relationships with one another. So the service of Jesus is always an expression of love. It always seeks the good of the other.
Our reading today from Hebrews drew attention to another aspect of Jesus’ service. The writer of Hebrews reminds us that Jesus did not seek to glorify himself by becoming a high priest, but rather he was appointed to that role by God the Father. It is clear from this that the service that Jesus offered to humanity, was offered in obedience to God. It was first and foremost service to God the Father. And if service to our neighbour is a big theme of the New Testament, then service to God is an even bigger theme.
Sometimes there might seem to be a contradiction between the service of God and the service of our neighbour. We might think “Well this Sunday I can either serve God by going to church, or serve my neighbour by going to visit my elderly relative.” In reality however there is no contradiction. If God wants us in church then the best thing we can do is go to church. We must entrust the elderly relative to God, knowing that he loves her and serves her more than we ever can. On the other hand, if God wants us to visit our relative then to avoid that visit by going to church would be going against the service of God. I would like to give another example. I find that if I am saying my prayers and the doorbell rings then it is almost always a sign from God that he wants me to stop my service of God in prayer and go and serve God by serving my visitor.
So there is a complete harmony between the service of God and service of our neighbour. God is present in our neighbour, created our neighbour, has a plan of love for our neighbour and wants their good. If we seek to do what God wants of us in each present moment, then we can do no more than this to properly serve our neighbour.
And this can be very reassuring because it gives meaning and value to many of the very simple and mundane tasks with which we fill our day. I find I spend a lot of time laying tables, washing up and giving lifts to children. Last week we moved house. Consequently I have found myself doing lots of cleaning floors, crawling around attics and crouching behind washing machines. It is wonderful to think that if I am seeking to do what God wants from me, motivated by love, then all these mundane tasks of service become a key part of my Christian life. They become a way of making real progress on my spiritual journey, a way of developing my relationship with God and my neighbour.
I want to mention one final characteristic of Christian service, particularly leadership service, and that is the readiness to accept sufferings out of love for other people. This is completely counter cultural in our present society, but it comes over very strongly in all three of our scripture readings today. It is especially strong in our OT reading from Isaiah. In this very famous and important passage, Yahweh’s suffering servant is “wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities”. This is one of the hallmarks of a true servant of God, and, of course 570 years after it was written it received its supreme fulfilment in the passion and death of Jesus.
So let us not be afraid if we suffer a little as we serve of God and serve our neighbour. If a suffering comes, let’s not assume that we have done something wrong. Rather let us accept these sufferings because they put us in the company of the truly great. God generously rewards his suffering servant in the end and we can discover with St Francis that it is through the cross of Christ that Joy comes into the world.
So if we can learn to serve like Jesus in all these different ways then we can become great leaders in the church. “However wishes to be great among you must be your servant and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”