Leaders Who Serve or Servant Leaders, February 8, 2009

Isaiah 40:21-31
I Corinthians 9:15-23
In his inaugural address, our new President declared “America is ready to lead again!” Future generations of pundits may relegate this as a political line like “We have nothing to fear, but fear”, “Our Competitors launched a dog into space and within the decade we will put a Man on the Moon”, or “Mr. Gorbachev, Tear down your wall!” But part of our AMERICAN ETHOS, is that we are A NATION OF LEADERS, we are a MORAL NATION, A MODEL FOR THE WORLD in Diversity, Tolerance and Success.

We have convinced every girl/boy trying out for Little League, that they could be pitcher. Every Pee Wee Football Player that they could be Quarterback, every child who can skate that they could earn the C on their Hockey Jersey that makes them Captain. In sports or business, in education, we challenge one another, not simply to pass, to succeed, but to lead.

The difficulty of leadership is as described by Max Dupree, CEO of the Herman Miller Furniture companies, “Leadership begins with defining Your Reality, and ends at the realization that you are actually a Servant, wanting to give thanks for the work of others.” To be a Leader, one defines themselves and their reality as a separate construct, a world apart, where we are in charge and everyone and everything is subject to our leading. We seek clear objective answers to questions, to know what is right and wrong, to be certain. The height of achievement is that we can GOOGLE the answer to any question. But, having Mastered Business Administration, having mastered Public Administration, having become a Master of the Universe, we ultimately come to realize that our construct of our Reality is part of someone else's, and we are dependent and subject to others for life itself. The great realization is that leaders will come to appreciate they have only achieved by the support and hard work of everyone working together. The assumed challenge of our time has been trying to teach and motivate leaders to serve, to give back.

This is the point of awareness of Isaiah 40. Isaiah was the Prophet sent to preach the Word of God, knowing all the while that God had hardened the people's hearts, stopped their ears and blinded their vision. He preached and preached and preached, doing whatever he could to gain the people's attention, but they were each too busy. The people needed to master their reality. They needed to control, to possess, to win. They needed to be fashionable. They needed to fight, to acquire, accomplish and achieve. They needed to love and to lust. They needed homes and cars and the latest electronic blackberry with fingerprint recognition. We really are not far different than our ancestors worshipping Babylonian Idols, Greek and Roman Statues as Gods of Fertility, Love, Power, War, and Wealth. When all that they have invested in, all that they have acquired, is found to be stuff. Like eating a dozen doughnuts or chocolate bars, it fills but cannot nourish or satisfy.

That is the point isn't it? Like so many generations of humanity before us, we have had the Word of God, and said who cares, what does it matter. The Bible is boring, dry and filled with wars. What does any of what happened thousands of years ago in Israel and Rome have to do with us? A week ago, the Pope in Rome absolved and received back a part of the church that had split off at Vatican II. This was a faction who blamed and persecuted Judaism for Crucifying Jesus, who believed worship and the Bible should not be translated into the common language but should only be in Latin, and disavowed as heretics all of us who are of other protesting reformed Christian denominations. While on so many fronts, we are achieving greater trust and accord, where eventually we can accept one another's Baptism and break bread together in full Communion, simultaneously the church struggles with accepting everything which would mean we believe in nothing.

Having endured years of economic hardship, wars and political collapse, Isaiah again preaches: “Comfort, comfort my people says your God. Have you not known, have your not seen? Where have you been to not understand that God is God.” At which point Isaiah is able to challenge the people, NOT to go back, NOT to return to what they once had and believed, not to try to do better and have more, but rather to be transformed, to change and mature and take responsibility for others.

The great struggle is not in how to encourage Leaders to Serve, but rather Can we create a new nation with a Servant Heart, who are able to Lead. Beginning with a Serving Heart, we begin with Compassion, with Empathy, with a Desire to Include and build up. The questions we ask, are not OBJECTIVE with a direct clear cut answer, but CROSS-EYED, as if seeing through the experience of the Cross, listening for how you are feeling, what you believe, what are your concerns. Most of our lives are not about WHO, WHAT WERE, WHEN, HOW, WHY, or HOW MUCH, so much as our need to be seen, to be heard for who we are, to be accepted, so as to be able to reveal the TRUTH. Listening to one another's souls, we do not try to FIX, to SAVE, to CORRECT, to RESCUE, to ANSWER, that is just Trivia. Our Souls crave TRUTH not TRIVIA, we hunger for our Center to be nurtured/ rather than our bellies to be satiated, we thirst for MEANING, for ACCEPTANCE, for FRIENDSHIP/ rather than to be anesthetized.

Paul described Having RIGHTS and being FREE. So often we are concerned and outraged by others infringing on our rights. They are too close on our Property Line, they have taken away our view; rather than recognizing we have rights and choose to be free to not enforce, to not demand, but instead to serve.

In every community there are a plethora of different churches, and we live in a time where people Church shop. We do. There are PILLAR CHURCHES which are the cornerstone of the community. There are PROPHETIC CHURCHES trying to be on the cutting edge. There are PILGRIM CHURCHES where those who have recently immigrated from another place, whose lives are transient attempt to find a home. There are Churches in SURVIVAL, attempting to maintain their program and staff and reputation until new members will come to save them. At different times, we have been all of these. What has happened here throughout the last generation, is that we have become a SERVANT PEOPLE. There are always those who will come to Coffee Hour and be concerned that they were not sought out, but in this fellowship there has been genuine concern for Anna-Margaret's heart, for a young couple having had surgery, for those with Cancer, for our older youth experimenting with excesses in alcohol, in drugs and sex. We are not being prudish, there is genuine concern and attention to see, to listen, to witness and care. This weekend as the Middle schoolers performed “Guys and Dolls” there were many present who were not parents or grandparents, but who simply cheered on Phoebe and Phoebe and Alison and Emma, Mary, Michael and David and John.

We are ready to lead, with a servant's heart as a serving people who listen.