Good Lessons from Some Bad Leaders

All right, let’s turn to Mark chap 11 as we continue on our journey through the gospel of Mark. To set the stage, tensions are growing between Jesus and Israel’s spiritual leaders. Earlier in chapter 11, when the chief priests and scribes heard that Jesus had cleansed the temple of all the money changers and merchants, Mark reports that they were this odd mix of anger and fear. As the heads of the spiritual establishment, they felt their position and authority threatened by Jesus because he didn’t play ball according to their strict rules, and yet Jesus had way more popular support than they did so they were afraid to do anything publicly that could turn against them in a bad way. So at this point what begins to happen are a series of confrontations between Jesus and the religious leaders of Israel. Jesus was an equal opportunity offender and he offended the leaders of all the various sects in Israel at the time - the chief priests and the scribes and the Pharisees and the Sadducees - and in their mutual anger they formed a coalition to try to bring Jesus down.

So in their anger the religious leaders decide to rumble with Jesus in order to bring him down - this morning we’re going to look at the first two of seven confrontations between them – but every time they take Jesus on they come out the worst for it. I thought about titling this message Smackdown from the Savior but instead I’ve entitled it Good Lessons from Some Bad Leaders because what I actually want to do is take the negative force of these confrontations and spin them around in order to find some really positive lessons for all of us, but specifically for Christian leaders today. So I want to share two positive lessons and then close with four personal resolutions from the leaders here at GCC.

Mark 11:27-33 

I. Good spiritual leadership remembers that Jesus is the ultimate authority over the church

In verse 27, the chief priests and scribes and elders come up to Jesus with a question: by what authority are you doing these things, or who gave you this authority to do them? It’s not a bad question but they’re asking it with bad motives: they see themselves as the legitimate authority over the temple and the spiritual life of Israel and their question is meant to remind the crowd that Jesus doesn’t have their stamp of approval and cast a doubt on the legitimacy of his ministry and teaching. The trap is this: if he refuses to answer it he looks like he can’t answer it because he is acting without proper authority, but if he answers he’s put in the uncomfortable position of having to blow his own horn and bear witness to his own authority – which would be considered very weak grounds, if not a completely invalid grounds for claiming authority and again, the effect is to cast doubt on the legitimacy of his ministry.

It’s a really well-laid out trap, the only problem is, Jesus doesn’t step into the trap. Jesus can’t refuse to answer the question, but he can require something from them before he will answer it. And so Jesus counters their question with a question of his own – a question that the crowds would recognize as completely natural and legitimate to ask of the spiritual leaders of Israel. A man named John just turned the nation on its spiritual head, as the spiritual leaders of Israel what is your judgment of John, where did he get his authority? It’s an ingenious question because the answer to the question Jesus asks is the answer to the question they asked. Answer the one, and you’ve answered the other. But because of their hypocrisy, his question would be like shining a light on rats – forcing them to scurry for cover and exposing their evil motives (and the illegitimacy of their authority).

It seems like such an easy question to answer: was the baptism of John from heaven or men? In other words, where did John get his authority? They’re the spiritual leaders of Israel, if anyone would know, they should. But they can’t just answer the question – they need to huddle and run through the different scenarios depending on how they answer: if we say from heaven, he will say, why then did you not believe him? See, if they said John got his authority from God then they’d be answering their own question because John bore witness that Jesus was the Messiah, the One sent by God whose sandal John wasn’t worthy to untie. And it would remind the crowd of the voice that spoke from heaven over Jesus when John baptized him in the river Jordan saying, “This is My beloved Son in whom I am well-pleased.” On top of that, everyone knew that the religious leaders didn’t accept John’s baptism so there’s no way they can say that his baptism was from heaven.

But they didn’t dare say that his baptism was from men (in other words, its authority was earthly, not from God) because the crowds held John as a prophet and things were already at a dangerous tipping point: John had captured the hearts of the masses with his raw message of repentance and baptism, then he had pointed to Jesus as the One who would come, and now they are even more astonished at miracles and the teachings of Jesus, and there is an unspoken question going through the crowds like an electric charge: could this be the One? Could this be the Messiah? Could this be the prophet we’ve been waiting for? His popularity was 1000 times that of the religious leaders and the crowds could quickly and devastatingly turn against them if they directly came out against both John and Jesus. So they have to answer, “we don’t know” which means, “we won’t answer.” Jesus then says, neither will I answer you.”
But notice what’s missing from all their calculations? Truth. They never ask themselves or concern themselves with what is true. Their calculations are completely built around what answer protects their position. In the end the only answer that protects their position is an evasion and a lie. Jesus doesn’t outmaneuver them, he simply confronts them with immovable truth and they need to evade it.

Frank Koch tells of a time when he was serving on a battleship and was on watch on the bridge as night fell. The visibility was poor with patchy fog, so the captain remained on the bridge keeping an eye on all activities.

Shortly after dark, the lookout on the wing reported, "Light, bearing on the starboard bow." "Is it steady or moving astern?" the captain called out.

The lookout replied, "Steady, Captain," which meant we were on a dangerous collision course with that ship. The captain then called to the signalman, "Signal that ship: 'We are on a collision course, advise you change course twenty degrees.'"

Back came the signal, "Advisable for you to change course twenty degrees."

The captain said, "Send: "I'm a captain, change course twenty degrees.'"

"I'm a seaman second-class," came the reply. "You had better change course twenty degrees."

By that time the captain was furious. He spat out, "Send: 'I'm a battleship. Change course twenty degrees.'"

Back came the flashing light, "I'm a lighthouse, your call."

The battleship changed course.

Truth doesn’t budge and because Jesus is the Truth, he doesn’t budge. He doesn’t maneuver, he doesn’t shift, he doesn’t calculate or dodge or weave. Jesus is the immovable truth, his authority over all creation and over the church is absolute, and we must all bow to his Lordship.
And that brings us to a good lesson from these bad spiritual leaders: Christian leaders have both the privilege and the responsibility to point to Jesus’ authority over the church. He is the head of the church, he rules the church, he is the absolute sovereign over the church, and any authority that doesn’t emanate from Jesus’ ultimate authority is a false authority.

That’s the truth: we can either preach it or we can crash against it, we can love it or sink our lives rejecting it, but Jesus’ authority will never change course. In attempting to describe Jesus’ absolute authority, Paul adds layer after layer of authority-describing words near the end of the first chapter of Ephesians:

…that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, 19 and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might 20 that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, 21 far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. 22 And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, 23 which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.

That’s truth – whether we believe it or not. But if you read what comes before it, Paul isn’t just describing Jesus’ authority, he’s praying that the Ephesians have a revelation of his authority! He is constantly asking God to open their eyes to see, to give them a foretaste of it, to give them just a glimpse of an authority that will blow them away when they see Jesus face to face!

Christian leaders should not be about promoting their own authority, they should be about exalting Christ’s authority. Years ago I read a church’s website that described the pastor as the head of the church. No way! Christ is the head of the church and the church isn’t a two headed monster. Pastors and other Christian leaders are servants of Christ and servants of the church for Christ’s sake and any authority a Christian leader has is limited by God’s word and bound by the purpose of serving the spiritual life and growth of God’s people.

Sadly, these religious leaders missed the opportunity to connect God’s people to God’s loving authority and Jesus tells a thinly disguised parable that explains why.

Mark 12:1-12

II. Good spiritual leadership remembers that Jesus is the owner of the church, and leaders are only called to be faithful stewards

The meaning of the parable was clear to the religious leaders – they knew he had spoken this parable against them. The vineyard was a clear reference to Israel. Last week we saw that Israel is often symbolized by a fig tree, but she was often symbolized by a vineyard:

Let me sing for my beloved
my love song concerning his vineyard:
My beloved had va vineyard
on a very fertile hill…
For the vineyard of the LORD of hosts
is the house of Israel,
and the men of Judah
are his pleasant planting;
and he looked for justice,
but behold, bloodshed;2
for righteousness,
but behold, an outcry! Isa 5:1, 7

Israel was the vineyard, God was the owner, and the religious leaders were the tenants. When the owner sent his servants to receive some fruit from his vineyard the tenants abused and even killed the servants. Finally the owner sent his son, thinking they would respect him but they schemed that if the son was dead the inheritance would be theirs and so they killed him. The parable ends with severe judgment. The owner will come and destroy the tenants and give the vineyard to others who will be faithful. And Jesus reminds them of the passage from Ps. 118:22 and Isa. 28 that predicts that the leaders will reject the foundation stone of God’s building, but the Lord will make that rejected stone His cornerstone – the most carefully constructed, largest, and most solid stones laid in the foundation upon which the building rests.

The problem was that the religious leaders grew to love God’s people too much. Not love them in the sense of care about them or want the best for them – no, love them in the sense of loving how they could exploit them for their own selfish purposes: loving the positions of power, the status of being important, the material benefit they derived from them. They exploited God’s people, fleeced the sheep, if you will, in order to elevate themselves. They saw themselves as the owners and the rightful recipients of any benefits (fruits) the vineyard might produce.

Here’s the good lesson we learn from these bad leaders: God’s people belong to God. God loves His people so much that He purchased us with His own blood. Jesus came to purchase us back to God with his own precious blood. He could give nothing greater, and nothing more valuable than himself, his life.

God loves His people. God loves His church. He loves you, every one of you. If you aren’t a Christian, God loves you and provided a Savior to save you from your sins. By believing in Christ, the Bible says God will give you eternal life as a gift. You couldn’t earn it, but He gives it freely.

If you are a Christian, God loves you with a love that is deeper than the ocean. But it’s more than just that He loves you personally. He does, and I pray you sense that. But He loves you (us) corporately as His beloved people for which he gave His life. Matt and I had the opportunity to drive down to Covenant Fellowship Church in Glen Mills, PA on Thursday, and as I was interacting with various pastors and they were asking me how things were going, what a sense of joy to tell them what a beautiful church family the Lord is building here.

Not because we’re a big church. Not because we have a beautiful building. Not because we’re perfect or do everything right. No, because of the grace that the Lord is pouring undeservedly upon us.

Yesterday at Travis’ and Judith’s lovely wedding, during the reception time for some reason I was watching David and Carin Polczynski as they were serving the drink for the toast, and (I hope they don’t mind my sharing this) but I just felt the Lord’s love for them – how precious they are to the Lord, to this body, to me. They’ve been here now for about 7 or 8 years, and we’ve had some sweet times of fellowship and prayer and sharing together as well as a brief season where we didn’t see eye to eye but I think we all tried to walk in a way that honored Christ and loved each other – and all of that only goes to make the bond of friendship and affection more strong and more real. I don’t share that about David and Carin because they’re unusual or special, but because they're not: that is true for every single person in this body. They happened to catch my eye but I could share a similar sense of gratefulness for every one of you. It’s not about us all being perfect or everything going smoothly or everybody doing everything right. It’s about Jesus being our Lord and authority, and that authority is the loving authority of a God who owns us because He purchased us in love. And together we live under that banner of Christ’s love and in that ocean of grace. We belong to Christ and any leaders are just stewards of the Lord’s possession.

Conclusion:
As we close, I want to share some resolutions that, by the grace of God Matt and I, as well as the leaders on the board, want to keep.

1. By the grace of God we will seek to faithfully point you to Christ’s authority and find our joy in your seeing and loving His Lordship in ever greater measure. We will seek to command only where scripture commands, counsel where scripture seems to give wise principles, and encourage diversity and the freedom of grace where scripture does not speak specifically.

2. By the grace of God we will seek to faithfully remind you of His great love for you – most powerfully displayed on a bloody, splintered, wooden cross where Jesus gave his life to purchase your souls and mine back to God. This congregation belongs to God and we will seek to be faithful stewards of His beloved vineyard.

3. By the grace of God we will seek to create and foster clear lines of communication as a church family so that as the Lord moves us forward, we move forward together in unity. In the book of Acts we see an open and God-honoring cooperation between the leaders and the congregations. I think in that cooperation is a wonderful synergy of combined wisdom and ministry and perspective and we want to cultivate that sense of loving unity.

One such opportunity we have before us for communicating together is over the new polity proposal that Sovereign Grace Ministries recently came out with. You can find the polity proposal at http://goo.gl/GNxVl and I want to invite you to read the proposal (its long – about 78 pages long) and we want to hear any thoughts, questions, concerns, or positive feedback that you have. Matt and I appreciate the work and thought that went into it, and SGM’s desire to have a more representative polity. At the same time, we also have our concerns and reservations about the polity proposal and we want to talk about all that with you. So we will be having a church family meeting on January 6 shortly after the service to do just that - discuss the polity – to both share our perspective and to give a chance for questions, concerns, and affirmations to be shared, as well as to share what we think the next step should be. Please make a note of the date because this will be a very important family meeting and so we want as many people to come out as possible.

So that’s one upcoming opportunity, but as a principle we want to foster clear lines of communication and loving unity and we will be talking more about that in the future.

4. Finally, even with the grace of God we will mess up. Promise. We will make mistakes, and we will sin. We resolve by the grace of God to confess those mistakes, to own them, to apologize where we blow it. and to repent when we sin. Openly and honestly.