The Power and Weakness of a Leader

Transcription

1 The Power and Weakness of a Leader Rich Nathan June 1, 2014 Strength in Weakness: Leadership Lessons from the Life of Paul Series 2 Corinthians 12:1-10 I ve been doing a series on leadership lessons from the life of the Apostle Paul over the last several weeks. Part of the reason that I m doing this is that the concept of leadership has been hijacked in 21 st century America. Leadership is now synonomous with completely over-the-top self-promotion. The person who screams the loudest whether they make sense or not, whether they totally makeup facts as they go, or contradict what they said two minutes ago; the person who screams the loudest and promotes themselves the most aggressively wins in our culture. There was a New York Times magazine interview last year with Kanye West, the rapsinger, music producer, clothing designer, and now husband of Kim Kardashian. Kanye West was asked, When your debut album, The College Dropout, came out, the thing that people began to associate with you besides music was: here is someone whose going to argue for his place in history; like, Why am I not getting five stars? Here is Kanye s answer: I went out for my basketball team in 8 th grade, I practiced and hit every free-throw, every lay-up and the next day I looked on this chart, and my name wasn t on it. I asked the coach what s up, and they were like, You re just not on it. I was a great basketball player. But I wasn t on my 8 th grade team, because some coach some Grammy, some reviewer, some fashion person, some blah-blah-blah they re all the same as that coach. When I didn t feel that I had the position in 8 th grade to scream and say, Because I hit every one of my shots, I deserve to be on the team! I m letting it out on everybody who doesn t want to give me my credit. You know, if Michael Jordan can scream at refs, me, Kanye West, as the Michael Jordan of music, can go and say, This is wrong. You just want the historical record to be right, is that it? I remember when Gnarls Barkley and Justin [Timberlake] lost album of the year, and I looked at Justin and I was like: Do you want me to go on stage for you? You know, do you want me to fight For you Rich Nathan

2 For what s right. I am so credible and so influential and so relevant that I will change things. But has that instinct led you astray? Like the Taylor Swift interruption at the MTV Video Music Awards, things like that. It s only led me to complete awesomeness at all times. It s only led me to awesome truth and awesomeness. Beauty, truth, awesomeness, that s all it is. So, no regrets? I don t have one regret. Do you believe in the concept of regret? I want to scream, if I don t say something, then no one is going to say anything, you know? So I come to them and say, Dude, talk to me! Respect me! Respect my trendsetting? Yea, respect my trendsetting abilities. Once that happened, everyone wins. The world wins; fresh kids win; creators win; the company wins. I think what Kanye West is going to mean is something similar to what Steve Jobs means. I am undoubtedly, you know, Steve of Internet, downtown, fashion, culture. Period. When you get something that has the name Kanye West on it, it is supposed to be pushing the furthest possibility. I understand culture. I am the nucleus. But the person who has trumped Kanye West in self-promotion, the person who has trumped everyone in screaming the loudest about himself is, of course, Donald Trump. Donald Trump Video As I consider who grabs the headlines in America today whether it was in sports, in entertainment, certainly in politics, even in Christian contexts, who is on Christian magazine covers, often it is not the most talented athlete, the most creative artist, the politician with the best ideas. The person who is talked about and quoted and interviewed is the self-assertive, self-promoting, self-sufficient, self-made man or woman, the person who is in your face and uses all their power and influence for selfadvantage. I want you to compare this 21 st century leadership style with the picture of leadership that we find in the New Testament. What we find in the life of Jesus and in the life of his great follower, the Apostle Paul. Jesus and Paul were the very opposite of most of the people we find on reality TV shows, or folks featured in People Magazine, or US 2014 Rich Nathan 2

3 Magazine, or who are interviewed as America s most fascinating people. Jesus and Paul model a whole different set of traits for a leader humility, vulnerability, self-limitation and weakness. I ve called today s talk, The Power and Weakness of a Leader. Let s pray. 2 Corinthians 12:1 10 (NIV) 12 I must go on boasting. Although there is nothing to be gained, I will go on to visions and revelations from the Lord. 2 I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body I do not know God knows. 3 And I know that this man whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, but God knows 4 was caught up to paradise and heard inexpressible things, things that no one is permitted to tell. 5 I will boast about a man like that, but I will not boast about myself, except about my weaknesses. 6 Even if I should choose to boast, I would not be a fool, because I would be speaking the truth. But I refrain, so no one will think more of me than is warranted by what I do or say, 7 or because of these surpassingly great revelations. Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. 8 Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. 9 But he said to me, My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ s power may rest on me. 10 That is why, for Christ s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong. Let me give you some background to this text. The world in the 1 st century was not terribly different than the world is in the 21 st century, at least with respect to leadership. Leadership positions in the ancient Roman world were viewed as a source of honor and a means of personal promotion. The entire Roman society revolved around a hierarchy of prestige and standing. The Roman Empire was obsessed with personal glory and self-aggrandizement. One of the great philosophers, Cicero, said this: Civic leaders are full of themselves, hopelessly boastful and arrogant, always praising their own accomplishments and merits. Humility, modesty, promoting someone else instead of yourself which are values everywhere promoted in the Bible, these qualities humility and modesty, promotion of others were never aspired to by Roman leaders in the 1 st century. The Apostle Paul was a missionary. He went around the Roman Empire spreading the good news of Jesus Christ. God has sent a Savior into the world to rescue us from all the things that are too strong for us the power of sin, the power of the devil, the power of 2014 Rich Nathan 3

4 addiction, God s judgment. God has sent a Savior and anyone who comes to this Savior acknowledging their need will find salvation. Paul went everywhere spreading this good news. Salvation has come into the world through Jesus Christ. But as Paul communicated the good news of Christ, there were many opponents to the Apostle Paul. We see this opposition in Paul s letters to the Corinthians. These opponents attacked Paul s person. They said his appearance was not that of a glorious leader. They didn t like the way Paul spoke. They felt that his speeches were amateurish, inconsistent with his letters. He was the opposite of the eloquent, persuasive, forceful orator that ancient Romans expected for a traveling philosopher. Paul was forced to defend himself against these opponents who were driving a wedge between the Corinthian church and the Apostle Paul who planted the church. These folks were getting in the way of the church and their pastor. So what do we discover about leadership from 2 Corinthians 12? First of all, I think we find: The ups and downs of leadership Paul talks about the ups of leadership. No one has ever experienced higher highs than the Apostle Paul. He says in 2 Corinthians 12:2-4: 2 Corinthians 12:2 4 (NIV) 2 I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body I do not know God knows. 3 And I know that this man whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, but God knows 4 was caught up to paradise and heard inexpressible things, things that no one is permitted to tell. And no one has ever experienced lower lows than the Apostle Paul. Here is what we read in v. 7: 2 Corinthians 12:7 (NIV) 7 Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. And if we look at 2 Corinthians 11, we have a whole chronicle of suffering by Paul. 2 Corinthians 11:23 27 (NIV) 23 Are they servants of Christ? (I am out of my mind to talk like this.) I am more. I have worked much harder, been in prison more frequently, been flogged more severely, and been exposed to death again and again. 24 Five times I received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one. 25 Three times I was beaten with rods, 2014 Rich Nathan 4

5 once I was pelted with stones, three times I was shipwrecked, I spent a night and a day in the open sea, 26 I have been constantly on the move. I have been in danger from rivers, in danger from bandits, in danger from my fellow Jews, in danger from Gentiles; in danger in the city, in danger in the country, in danger at sea; and in danger from false believers. 27 I have labored and toiled and have often gone without sleep; I have known hunger and thirst and have often gone without food; I have been cold and naked. What we see in the life of Paul is a paradigm for the life of every leader. The life of a leader is a series of ups and downs from great elation to great desolation. We need not look any further than the life of our Lord. We read in the gospels about Jesus baptism. Luke 3:21 22 (NIV) 21 When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too. And as he was praying, heaven was opened 22 and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased. Immediately after his baptism, what does it say? Luke 4:1 2 (NIV) 4 Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, left the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, 2 where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing during those days, and at the end of them he was hungry. We move from the blessing of his baptism to the desert of his temptation, from being affirmed by the Father, to being attacked by the devil, from being filled with the Holy Spirit, to being famished through fasting. This is the nature of life. Marriage is this way, raising kids is this way, our jobs, our relationships, even the church is this way, and certainly, leadership is this way a series of ups and downs. Sometimes when we re in the valley, we think the bad times will never end. Have you ever felt that way? It is just one thing after another. This will never be over. But God will lift you up again. Those of you who are in the valley, you will experience God s blessing again in the land of the living. The cross is always followed by the resurrection. And sometimes when we re on the mountaintop we think that will never end. My marriage will always be a continual honeymoon. My kids will always be obedient. No one in my immediate circle, no one I love will ever be sick. My church experience will always be encouraging. And I will always be affirmed by Christians around me. But no one lives on the mountaintop forever. Not in our sinful broken world with sinful broken people, when we ourselves are sinful and broken Rich Nathan 5

6 One thing we need to remember is that when life goes down for us, don t quit. There are no quit verses in the Bible. We re told in the Bible that he who endures to the end will be saved. Persevere. Fight the good fight. Keep going. Keep on keeping on. That s why I always tell you, left-foot, right-foot, left-foot, right-foot. It is because we live at a time when so many people throw in the towel. If you are in the valley regarding the church, don t quit on the church, don t quit on your marriage; don t quit on your family and don t quit on God. Well, lets look at the credentials of a leader. The credentials of a leader The Apostle Paul here in 2 Corinthians 12 decides to play his opponents game for just a moment. It is like he is out-trumping Donald Trump. Ok, if you think that boasting and self-promotion is the way that leaders are credentialed, I have way more to boast about than you do. These opponents that apparently called themselves apostles, we see that in 2 Cor 11:13, 2 Corinthians 11:13 (NIV) 13 For such people are false apostles, deceitful workers, masquerading as apostles of Christ. claimed to have superior credentials to Paul, spiritual people with great spiritual experiences. So Paul says, I will play your game. Here is what we read in 2 Cor 12:1-5: 2 Corinthians 12:1 5 (NIV) 12 I must go on boasting. Although there is nothing to be gained, I will go on to visions and revelations from the Lord. 2 I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body I do not know God knows. 3 And I know that this man whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, but God knows 4 was caught up to paradise and heard inexpressible things, things that no one is permitted to tell. 5 I will boast about a man like that, but I will not boast about myself, except about my weaknesses. We don t know the exact nature of the Apostle Paul s experience. We don t know if he had an out-of-body experience in which somehow his soul was taken up into heaven. By the way, Jews in the period around the time of Christ talked about different levels of heaven. Some talked about one level, some level three, some level ten or more. The Apostle Paul is talking about being taken up either bodily or in an out-of-body experience to the highest heaven where God dwells. He has an experience that either he cannot describe because it is indescribable, or he may not describe because the Holy 2014 Rich Nathan 6

7 Spirit has put him under divine constraint. He is not permitted to express the wonderful things he has seen. It is certainly the case that great spiritual experiences with God are impossible to convey to other people. Paul was the recipient of great experiences with God. We see in v. 1 he refers to: 2 Corinthians 12:1 (NIV) 12 I must go on boasting. Although there is nothing to be gained, I will go on to visions and revelations from the Lord. Now, few, if any of us, are ever going to have either an out-of-body or in-body experience where we re taken up to the third heaven. But it is absolutely clear in the Bible that every Christian is entitled to hear God their Father speak to them. Jesus says: John 10:27 (NIV) 27 My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. How does God speak to the normal, average Christian like you and me? God speaks in various ways today. He certainly speaks through his Word which is the scriptures. Particularly, as you read the Bible with an open heart, the Holy Spirit will often highlight something that you are reading. The Spirit of God will pick up a phrase, or a word we are reading in the Bible and he ll run us through with it. That word will suddenly become empowered and you will feel that God is speaking to you. That s why it is so important to have a daily discipline of reading the scripture and asking the Holy Spirit to speak to you through this book. And certainly God speaks to us in community. That s why we need to be in a small group where people are praying and listening to God and praying for us. The Lord will often confirm what he wants to say to us through other believers. God will speak to us as we pray for other people. Pray for people and then spend time listening. Lord, do you have anything that you want to say to this particular person? Sometimes a word will pop into our mind when we re waiting on God. Sometimes a picture will pop into our minds as we re praying and waiting on God. I remember years ago I had an experience in my small group. We were just being quiet and waiting on God and I had a picture in my mind s eye of a present coming down from heaven. It was a present with fancy wrapping on it. And as it came down, I could see that the box was wrapped with Christmas paper; it was a Christmas present. And when the box was unwrapped, I could see that there was a baby in the box. We were together; it wasn t a large group, and I asked the question: Is anyone praying about having a baby? There was no response for a few moments, and then a woman began to cry. She said, I haven t told my husband this, but I really want us to have another child. It was really awkward, to say the least! He looked at her in complete horror. It 2014 Rich Nathan 7

8 was obvious that the two of them needed to talk. I guess they did talk, and they did more than talk, because the very next year they had a little baby that was born on Christmas day. God gave them their Christmas gift. Sometimes the Lord will speak through dreams. I remember years ago I had a series of dreams one evening in which I looked out at the church and the church I was speaking to was incredibly diverse. It was nothing like the church I was pastoring at the time. I woke up from having this dream about having a diverse church and thought about it. I went back to sleep and had the same dream two other times that night. I felt the Lord saying to me, Rich, one day the church you pastor will be a racially diverse church. The Lord does speak and he gives us these wonderful experiences of his voice. But experiences with God are not sufficient to credential a Christian leader. Lots of people have had incredible experiences and are not worthy of being followed. Paul adds a credential to leadership that is almost never found in either ancient or contemporary leadership literature. He adds the credential of suffering. The suffering of a leader Here is what we read from Paul. 2 Corinthians 12:7 8 (NIV) 7 or because of these surpassingly great revelations. Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. 8 Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. Now, for nearly 2000 years people have debated what Paul meant by his thorn in the flesh. Literally, a wooden stake in his flesh that he describes as a messenger from Satan. There has been all of this debate about what it was was it epilepsy, depression, headaches, eye problems, even leprosy and malaria have been proposed. Was it a physical problem? Some people have suggested it might have been stuttering; others have said that it wasn t a physical problem at all. It was the opponents that came along; opponents that harassed Paul over and over again. Well, after 20 centuries of heated debate in the church, let me resolve today for you what Paul s thorn in the flesh was. I haven t a clue. It was either a physical problem for which there was some evidence, or a relational problem for which there is some evidence. The point is God does not keep either leaders or his people from suffering. Henri Nouwen, in his book The Wounded Healer, Picture of Nouwen s The Wounded Healer 2014 Rich Nathan 8

9 said this: A minister is not a doctor whose primary task is to take away pain. Rather, he [or she] deepens the pain to a level where it can be shared. When someone comes with his loneliness to a minister, he can only expect that his loneliness will be understood and felt, so that he no longer has to run away from it, but can accept it as an expression of his basic human condition. When a woman suffers the loss of her child, the minister is not called upon to comfort her by telling her that she has two beautiful healthy children at home; he is challenged to help her realize that the death of her child reveals her own mortal condition, the same human condition that he and others share with her. Perhaps the main task of the minister is to prevent people from suffering for the wrong reasons. Many people suffer because of the false supposition on which they have based their lives. That supposition is that there should be no fear or loneliness, no confusion or doubt. But these sufferings can only be dealt with creatively when they are understood as wounds integral to our human condition. Therefore, ministry is a very confronting service. It does not allow people to live with the illusions of immortality and wholeness. It keeps reminding others that they are immoral and broken, but also with the recognition of this condition, liberation starts. Christian leaders suffer. And people that a Christian leader ministers to suffer. And much of ministry is preventing people from suffering for the wrong reasons because we live with the lie that life should always go well for us. And we live with the lie that neither we nor anyone we love should suffer and that suffering should be quickly over, if we love God. Brothers and sisters, we never meet God in our fantasies of what our lives ought to be like. We meet God in the reality of what its really like, even if the reality is, I m really struggling. This suffering of a leader leads to a broader consideration for every leader, and that is: The weakness of a leader Five times in vv the Apostle Paul speaks about his weakness. SLIDE 2 Corinthians 12:5 and 9-10 (NIV) 5 I will boast about a man like that, but I will not boast about myself, except about my weaknesses. 9 But he said to me, My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ s power may rest on me. 10 That is why, for Christ s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong Rich Nathan 9

10 Now, what is Paul speaking about regarding weaknesses? Well, he catalogs weaknesses in v. 10, 2 Corinthians 12:10 (NIV) 10 That is why, for Christ s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong. He speaks first about insults. He is talking about how the world treats people who are open regarding their faith, people who make fun of us, they make fun of our lifestyle and that we won t indulge in certain things because we re Christians. He speaks about hardships, circumstances that are forced upon us that we don t want, a change of fortune. Things are going along really well and then the rug is pulled out from under you. Anything that is hard. He speaks about persecution. He talks about prejudice and discrimination. It could be shunning; it could be being refused a promotion at work. It could be unfair criticism. It could be an economic boycott. It could be physical persecution because of our faith. And he speaks about difficulties things that weigh us down. Here is how I would define weaknesses. Weaknesses are all the things that we can t change that we desperately want to change about ourselves, about our circumstances, about our families, even though we pray regularly. If you have power to change something that you want to change, it is not a weakness. Weaknesses are all the things you can t change, even though you seek the Lord, like the Apostle Paul, who prayed three times, God, take this from me, and the Lord didn t. It is all the things we want to change about ourselves. About ourselves The weakness could be a physical weakness. You wish you could walk. You ve prayed to be able to walk and you can t; some physical disability. Maybe we re just clumsy and unathletic. A weakness could be an emotional weakness; you struggle with bipolar disorder; you struggle with an anxiety disorder. It could be a relational weakness. There is a wonderful book titled Washed and Waiting: Reflections on Christian Faithfulness and Homosexuality by a man named Wesley Hill. Cover picture of Washed and Waiting It is a painfully honest book by a man who describes his life this way: By the time I started high school, two things became clear to me. One was that I was a Christian. My parents had raised me to be a believer in Jesus, and as I moved towards independence from my family, I knew that I wanted to remain one that I wanted to trust, love and obey Christ, who had been crucified and 2014 Rich Nathan 10

11 raised from the dead for us and for our salvation, as the Creed puts it. The second was that I was gay. For as long as I could remember, I had been drawn, even as a child, to other males in some vaguely confusing way, and after puberty, I had come to realize that I had a steady, strong, unremitting, exclusive sexual attraction to persons of the same sex. Now, because Wesley Hill is a committed Christian, he has committed himself to being celibate. He believes that there is no place for sex outside of heterosexual marriage. But he has prayed, and he has had other pray that he would change; that his desire would change; that his attractions would change; that his temptations would change and they haven t. Weakness is anything about us that we desperately want to change, but have no power to change. Weakness is anything about our circumstances, About our circumstances that we want to change and we have no power to change. Circumstances we might like to change that we have no power to change might include: our infertility, our singleness, our unhappy marriage, having an adult child who is an addict, having a parent who has dementia. I remember when I first got out of law school I was fired from my first job at a law firm. Because I had done OK in law school, I thought I would easily be able to get another job. I sent my resume out and because I had been fired from this first law firm, other big firms wouldn t touch me. So I went to medium-sized firms and they wouldn t hire me. Then on the day before my son, Daniel, was born Marlene and I drove down to Cincinnati in our old Volkswagen Beatle, She was nine months pregnant and we re bouncing along in the car. I interviewed at the legal clinic that was really like a movie cliché. I went into this office and it had cheap wood paneling. The secretary was this gum-chewing bleached blonde with teased hair. Sitting around the waiting room were people with crutches, who had come in because of the clinic s advertising. I talked with the guy who ran this law firm and I asked him what sort of cases he handled. He said, Well, I ve got a case of a guy who got his foot injured by a defective lawnmower. I said, Do you do a lot of strict products liability work here? He said, Strict products liability? That s a great idea! I m going to put that in my complaint. The whole experience was so humiliating, it was so disheartening that when I got out to the car where Marlene was waiting for me, nine months pregnant, and I couldn t even get in the car. I just broke down and began to cry. I thought, Why is God doing this to me? Why won t he change my circumstances? Why isn t God answering my prayers? 2014 Rich Nathan 11

12 God doesn t let us live in a daydream about how our life is supposed to go. He doesn t allow us to just build our castles in the clouds. We never meet God in daydreams. We meet him in our realities in weaknesses. And God met me. The next day we had a baby boy and God began to rebuild my life. And he opened the door for employment first with the government and then at Ohio State. The Apostle Paul here speaks about the power in weakness. The power in weakness of a leader 2 Corinthians 12:9 10 (NIV) 9 But he said to me, My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ s power may rest on me. 10 That is why, for Christ s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong. Paul puts together two things that we always keep apart power and weakness. We think of power and weakness as mutually exclusive categories. You either have power, or you are weak. We think God s power is designed to cause us to escape from weakness. Here is something that I want to change, God s power comes and he changes it about ourselves, about our loved ones, about our circumstances. But this is not what Paul is teaching here. He is not talking about power that delivers us from our weakness, power that makes the pain totally go away. Paul is speaking about power in weakness. 2 Corinthians 12:9 (NIV) 9 But he said to me, My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ s power may rest on me. God s power, the power that builds people up instead of tearing them down, the power that heals bodies, heals us and heals the world is released in our weakness. Think about this with me. What keeps people from being saved? It is not our sin that keeps us from a relationship with Christ. Christ came to save sinners. It is not the amount that you ve sinned. It is not the kind of sin that we ve sinned that keeps us away from Christ? What keeps a person from being saved by Christ? It is only ever one thing the unwillingness to acknowledge our need for him. A person 2014 Rich Nathan 12

13 who will not confess that they need Jesus Christ will never be saved. If we refuse to admit our weakness, we will never experience the power of his salvation. Jesus said this. Mark 2:17 (NIV) 17 Jesus said to them, It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners. We have to say, Lord, I am weak; I need you. What keeps people from being set free from addictions? It is not the extent of the addiction. It is not the type of the addiction. What keeps people in bondage to addiction is the refusal to admit that I have a problem. It is the refusal to acknowledge weakness. Therapists call this denial. I m not an alcoholic. I haven t had a drink in a week. I don t drink as much as he does. I m not falling down drunk. I can quit anytime I want. If you were in my shoes, you would drink, too. If you had to experience what I ve experienced growing up in my home, you wouldn t be criticizing my drinking. The first step in every 12-step group AA, Narcotics Anonymous, Overeaters Anonymous, Gamblers Anonymous, the 12-step group for pornography addicts is this: We admit we are powerless over [alcohol, prescription drugs, overeating, gambling, spending, pornography use, anger] and that our lives have become unmanageable. The program we have here that meets every Friday night at our Cooper Road Campus is called Celebrate Recovery. It s all about people gathering together and admitting, I m weak. We will not see God s power break addictions in our lives until we confess weakness. Why don t we see more people saved around us? Why don t we see more of our neighbors, or more of our colleagues or coworkers, or clients, or classmates, or roommates, or family members come to know Jesus? It is because very often we are not willing to be weak. We re not willing to risk the loss of face, the loss of reputation, the association that might be drawn in this person s mind between us and flaky Christians, so we don t speak up at all. We won t allow it to be known that I am a Christian. We won t talk when the opportunity presents itself. Coworkers, friends, family members, neighbors, don t know what the inside of this church looks like because we are not willing to be weak, to put ourselves out and invite someone to church. God s strength is made perfect in weakness. The only people who ever get to see someone come to Christ through them are people who are willing to look foolish. Why don t we personally see miracles? Why don t we see people healed in the streets? Why don t we get prophetic words the way other people seem to in small groups for a neighbor or for a friend? 2014 Rich Nathan 13

14 John Wimber was the founder of the Vineyard movement. He came to Christ at age 28 after having been a professional musician and a producer of the group called The Righteous Brothers back in the early 1960 s. John Wimber saw hundreds of people physically healed through his ministry. What was one of the secrets of seeing God s power work through him? Listen to John Wimber s testimony as he describes his conversion: John Wimber Video Why is our weakness the absolute prerequisite for seeing God s power? It is because this principle of power in weakness expresses the very nature of God. It goes to the very heart of God. This is the way God works. He always displays his power in weakness. How did God come into this world? He came as a helpless baby. So often Jesus refused to display his power and he lived as a weak man. He refused to feed himself by turning stones into bread, refusing to gain crowd approval by jumping off the pinnacle of the Temple. His most famous parable, the Parable of the Prodigal Son, could be renamed the Parable of the Powerless Almighty Father because in the parable we see a father who doesn t dominate, but instead chooses to wait for his child to come back to him. Power in weakness, not apart from weakness, but in weakness, through weakness, goes to the very heart of God. What is God s way of salvation? It is Jesus standing mute, offering no defense when he is accused of blasphemy and treason, being stripped naked, spit on, beaten, and nailed spread-eagled to a cross. Here is what we read in 2 Cor 13:4: 2 Corinthians 13:4 (NIV) 4 For to be sure, he was crucified in weakness, yet he lives by God s power. Likewise, we are weak in him, yet by God s power we will live with him in our dealing with you. No greater summary of Christian leadership can be found in the entire Bible than what Paul says in 2 Cor. 12:10: 2 Corinthians 12:10 (NIV) 10 For when I am weak, then I am strong. Over against self-promotion, self-made, self-sufficient, self-aggrandizing 21 st century socalled leaders, the secret to Christian leadership is this: When I am weak, then I am strong. Let s pray Rich Nathan 14

15 The Power and Weakness of a Leader Rich Nathan June 1, 2014 Strength in Weakness: Leadership Lessons from the Life of Paul Series 2 Corinthians 12:1-10 I. The ups and downs of a leader II. III. IV. The credentials of a leader The suffering of a leader The weakness of a leader A. About ourselves B. About our circumstances V. The power in weakness of a leader 2014 Rich Nathan 15