I have a bias, which you have probably discovered by this point: I’m a follower of Jesus Christ. On my best days that reality colors everything I think, say and do. 2,000 years ago Jesus said that no one can serve two masters. He didn’t say it was difficult to serve two masters. He didn’t say it would be extremely difficult to serve two masters. He said it’s impossible. That means we must choose our master. In doing that we also choose who or what we worship. I chose to worship Jesus when I was twelve years old. (Some would say He chose me, and I have no argument with that.) I haven’t followed Him perfectly, or anything close to perfectly over the years. For a brief time in my teen years I even attempted to abandon following and worshiping Him.
It didn’t work out for me.
When I say it didn’t work out for me, I mean that I couldn’t NOT worship Jesus. I would say to myself, “I don’t believe there’s a God,” and then “shout” back, “Yes! I do believe there’s a God and He has revealed Himself to me in Jesus Christ.” I know many people have difficulty letting Jesus be their master, their owner, their Lord. So do I! It’s far easier to worship myself than Jesus. When Jesus said that no one could serve or worship two masters, He made it clear that the chief rival god would be “mammon,” which many modern translations render “money.” It’s a fairly good translation, since what Jesus was going for was the overall concept of material wealth and provision. For us the best representation of that pursuit, and therefore of that “god” is money.
Jesus told us that money would be the chief rival god, because it is so tangible, so measurable and we have been led to believe that it will purchase us everything we need: security, position, friends, and whatever else we value. The truth of the matter when it comes to money is it’s a “dissatisfier.” What I mean by that is if we don’t have enough money to meet our needs, we will be dissatisfied, but we can never have enough money to be satisfied. Satisfaction doesn’t come from material things. It comes from relationships, and ultimately it comes from being in relationship with the one, true and living God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. That’s why leaders worship–God.
We all worship something, whether we’re adherents of one of the world’s major or minor religions, or we claim to be atheists, in which case we will worship ourselves, or science, or some other invention of our minds. Everyone worships. The reason I contend that leaders worship God is because in order to be the best, most effective leaders we can be, we need to have as much wisdom as we can. God’s wisdom as found in the Bible has been demonstrated to be true over thousands of years and across cultures. We need authority to be leaders, and all authority is delegated. When we worship God, we are worshiping THE delegator of all authority. Jesus told His disciples that “all authority in heaven and earth had been given to Him.” From where? From His heavenly Father. That’s the kind of authority I want in my life, so I worship the source, and He shares it with me.
I don’t worship God solely, or even primarily, in order to get things: wisdom, authority, blessing, and every other good gift God gives. I worship God, because I have come to see that Jesus’ statement about masters is true: I CANNOT worship or serve more than one master. God is the best master. He does give wisdom, authority, blessing and every other good gift to those who love, worship and serve Him. From my experiences in places such as Cuba, Cambodia and Haiti I have seen first hand that people with virtually no worldly wealth can be far “wealthier” than Americans who have dedicated themselves to the worship and service of money. I have seen from a handful of Americans who lived their lives wholeheartedly for themselves, and then turned their lives over to God that there is no substitute for worshiping the living God in the name of Jesus and in the power of the Holy Spirit.
All this ties into leadership, because at the end of the day every leader has a “source” of his or her authority as a leader. It may be a title. It may be wealth. It may be tenure. It may be experience. The best source of authority for any leader is Jesus. Jesus demonstrated and initiated the model of “servant leadership,” which has been popularized sporadically in American business culture over the past several decades. Those who serve in churches and service industries may find servant leadership more appealing than those who work in businesses that are more geared to the “bottom line,” but the funny thing is all arenas of life work best when servant leadership is exercised, and then coupled with worship of the God from whom it derived. One day every knee will bow one day, and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord either voluntarily or involuntarily, so why not do it NOW?
I know that’s a bold statement. It’s a statement of worship. I told you up front I have a bias. In every era of history, but the one in which we’re living now, thinking men and women have been able to hold a thought without agreeing with it, and still be civil toward one another. That is basically true in America today except when the thought being held is that Jesus Christ is the exclusive God of the universe who invites everyone to worship Him, and become part of His eternal family.
This is my twentieth post in twenty days. I have been clear that I am a follower of Jesus in a number of those posts. In the ones where I haven’t mentioned it explicitly, I haven’t hidden it. My goal is to help leaders lead better. Therefore, I cannot do otherwise than bring my faith in Jesus into the discussion, because He is the lens through which I view everything, including leadership. I will never bludgeon you with my faith, but neither will I hide it. I invite you to investigate it if you haven’t done so, and to do so without the commonly held preconceived biases about what is and isn’t possible in the natural world. After all if the God in whom I believe is the one true God then He created the natural world, and “invented” the natural laws that hold it together. Thus, by definition He comes from beyond the natural and isn’t bound by it.
Although I am a preacher, I don’t want to preach, so I’ll stop for today. I do urge you to be clear about who or what you worship and why. This will deepen your clarity as a leader, and as I said yesterday clarity always leads to greater effectiveness as a leader.
Here’s to becoming a better leader by worshiping the one true God–today!