KidMin Leadership: Personal Godliness (Jesus)

As we would expect godliness is manifested perfectly, in the perfect leader, Jesus Christ.

In his book The Return of the Prodigal Son, Henri Nouwen tells the story of his visit to the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg and his encounter with Rembrandt’s painting depicting the return of the Prodigal Son in Luke 15:11-32.

Nouwen was transfixed by the painting and stood before it for so long that a Hermitage staff person brought him a chair. He continued his vigil in front of the painting contemplating the biblical message and the artistic genius of Rembrandt.

The message conveyed by the Bible passage and painting was nearly inexplicable for Nouwen and eventually led to the writing of the book, one of his most profound. 

Speaking about Jesus and personal godliness is nearly inexplicable, as we attempt to contemplate genuine perfection.

Christianity affirms a trinitarian God with Jesus being the divine presence of God in the flesh. As God incarnate, personal godliness is an article of faith. 

Personal godliness flows out of Jesus' life in a natural expression of His being just the same as breath. Godliness in Jesus’ life was perfection. Attempting to discuss that which is perfect is an endless task.

John states as much at the close of his gospel (John 21:25).

We have asserted that effective leadership flows out of personal godliness. Therefore, we would expect the perfect leader, Jesus, to manifest a perfected personal godliness.

Reading the Gospel accounts with this in mind, we are not disappointed. The challenge is choosing a particular quality to examine as there are endless options!

Surveying the leadership landscape of my lifetime, I have chosen three qualities that have been particularly challenging and meaningful for me.

1. Reliance on God to Resist Temptation

Jesus was a flawless leader and therefore, it is no surprise that personal godliness was a feature of His leadership from the outset.

Jesus was sinless, the perfect manifestation of personal godliness. This is stated clearly in Hebrews.

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. (Hebrews 4:15 ESV)

This passage sets the stage for a discussion of Jesus as the Great High Priest (Hebrews 4:14- 5:10). In doing so, Jesus is shown to have faced the temptation to sin and was found sinless.

Most agree that this refers back in some way to the wilderness temptation (Matthew 4:1-11, Mark 1:12-13, Luke 4:1-13). In those well-known passages, Jesus is tempted at the very beginning of His ministry and does not succumb.

Occurring at the onset of His emergence as a leader, the nature of the temptations is instructional.

The essential nature of the temptations below the surface levels of hunger, pride, and greed is that of idolatry. In each case, Jesus is tempted to surrender to the things of this world and give up total dependence on God.

This is the very essence of idolatry. Rather than giving praise and worship to the Creator God, we are led to give allegiance to that which He created. 

This was evident in the garden and onward, causing the downfall of many a leader.

When allegiance, attention, and subtle worship are given to that which was created, they exert influence and control.

Looking back at Hebrews 4:15, we see that Jesus’ complete devotion to God allowed Him to resist the temptation to worship that which was created by God, including Satan. He was willing and able to rely completely on God the Father.

The temptations close with Jesus’ proclamation “Away from me, Satan! For it is written: Worship the Lord your God and serve him only” (Matthew 4:10 NIV).

As the perfect leader, Jesus was committed to personal godliness rooted in the worship of God and complete devotion to Him.

Idolatry is much more than giving worship to a metal or wooden object. The temptations Jesus faced were much more than simply renouncing a “golden calf.”

The pull of power, greed, and the other magnetic features of our world were the real temptations that Jesus resisted, and they are the temptations that leaders face today. The lure of power, sex, and material wealth are ever present for Christian leaders today, just as they have been in the past.

When I relocated my family back to the United States, I was invited to speak at a large mega-church in Southern California. The sanctuary seated about 1,500 people and there was a packed service on Saturday night and three on Sunday morning.

By the time we were finishing the last service on Sunday, I had spoken to over 5,000 people. They laughed at my jokes, they had tears in their eyes at some of my stories, and there was a lot of laughing, head nodding, and positive feedback.

After the service, I told my wife that if I did that every weekend it would be a challenge to maintain a life of humility. I can hardly imagine the struggle that mega-church Pastors and Christian leaders leading enormous ministry organizations must face.

When you examine leaders in the Bible, so many of them are undone by fame, money, power, and sexual promiscuity. These are the same idols that leaders struggle with today.

When a leader focuses their attention, affection, and heart on fame, sex, money, and power they can slowly move them into a position of idolatry. At that point, the idol exerts control and brings sin into the life of the leader, breaking down personal godliness.

In and of themselves, money, fame, sex, and power are not evil. Like fire, they are part of life when used properly. When they take on the role of an idol, they become like wildfire that burns uncontrollably and ruins life.

In Jesus, we see that personal godliness is much more than adhering to a list of do’s and dont’s.

Effective leadership is not founded on simply getting good marks on a moral checklist. Personal godliness is rooted in the worship of the LORD our God, and Him only.

For the leader seeking to build a foundation of personal godliness, Jesus offers an example of intimacy with the Father and the active worship of God as a characteristic feature of personal godliness.

Effective leaders have a lifestyle of worship and intimacy with God that provides them the strength to resist temptation and maintain personal godliness.

2. Zealousness for God

When we characterize Jesus’ life we are often drawn to images of Jesus as peaceful, meek, well-spoken, and enlightened.

He has a kind of otherworldly calm about him. Many of the cinematic productions have been built on this general picture.

From “Jesus of Nazareth” (1977) to “The Chosen” (2017), Jesus’ humanity has the general qualities of a religious sage. Incidents such as the overthrowing of the tables in the Temple (Luke 19:45-48) are depicted in many ways as a kind of anomaly in His normal behavior.

Certainly, Jesus was meek, a peacemaker, and was filled with more wisdom than any sage. However, in addition to those qualities was His zealousness. In fact, I would like to suggest that one of the distinctive features of Jesus’ life was zealousness.

Zealousness is often associated with a zealot, and therefore bound to the idea of social or political revolution. Those who consider Jesus a zealot, view Him as a political revolutionary who was set on overthrowing Roman rule.

When He failed and the revolution fizzled, He was crucified by the Romans ending His life. Zealousness in this sense is associated with a failed revolution.

Zealousness, however in the biblical terminology is defined by J.C. Ryle as “a burning desire to please God, to do His will and to advance His glory in the world in every possible way.” This kind of zeal is far removed from that of a revolutionary.

In this sense, Jesus was a leader filled with zeal. We find this term specifically applied to Jesus in John 2:17, when John cites Psalm 69:9, referring to zeal for the house of God.

In “purging” the Temple Jesus exhibited a singular focus on pleasing God, doing His will, and defending His glory in cleaning out the abuses that had developed within Temple worship.

We could cite many other examples, but it seems clear that Jesus' ministry was fueled by His desire to please God, do God’s will, and advance His glory. This was a feature of the personal godliness that was the foundation of His life and ministry.

This is a personal godliness quality that is needed by leaders today. It would appear that the burning desire of some is to please the followers as evidenced in the positivist, self-help, “get God on your team” preaching that is so commonplace. The lack of teaching on sin and personal finances are two telling signs that offending the congregation is a weighty consideration.

It is also clear that advancing the “brand” of a ministry organization or church can conflict with advancing God’s glory. More cynical is the advancement of the leader himself as the celebrity culture infiltrates the church.

Today a few large churches have made a “name” for themselves causing thousands of others to emulate their methods in the hopes of experiencing the same growth.

Similarly, some leaders have risen to national status creating a personal brand that has extraordinary influence, particularly in the political arena. Politicians seek them out for endorsements, presidential debates are hosted in their sanctuaries, and television interviews abound.

Zealousness for God’s kingdom seems to have taken the back seat. 

Jesus reminds us that zealousness is a key element of personal godliness the foundation for effective leadership.

3. Self-Sacrifice

In my years of ministry, I have had the great misfortune and sorrow of observing the moral failures of numerous Christian leaders. Some of those have been close-up and traumatic.

One involved the pastor of a local church who was accused of having an affair with the female worship leader. His defense was based on I Timothy 5:19, where Paul instructs Timothy to not entertain an accusation against an elder without two or three witnesses.

The pastor reminded the elders that “two or three witnesses” had not seen the pastor in an actual “compromising” situation. As is too often the case, he accused the elders of trying to undermine “his” ministry. The situation continued and deteriorated further until the affair was brought into the light and both had to resign their leadership roles in the church.

Throughout so many of these sad situations, a Christian leader works to hold on to “their” ministry. There exists a decided lack of humility. Confidence, vanity, arrogance, and a kind of combativeness supplant any sense of meekness, modesty, and self-sacrifice.

The fallen Pastor had reduced personal godliness to a list of rights and wrongs, do’s and do not’s that could be checked off on some kind of simplistic moral report card. His own report card had failing grades.

Personal godliness does include moral virtue but is something much deeper, evident in Jesus’ life of self-sacrifice.

There are numerous references to this leadership quality in the gospels (Matthew 16:24, 20:28; Mark 10:45, Luke 9:24, 14:27; John 10:11, 15:13). In the gospel accounts, it is apparent that a feature of Jesus life and ministry was self-sacrifice.

In fact, it was not only a quality of His life, but it was also the core of His vocation. Paul speaks about this quality in the famous hymn that is Philippians 2:5-11. 

“In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death— even death on a cross! Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” (Philippians‬ 2‬:5‬-11‬ NIV)‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬

Paul encourages the Philippians to have the same attitude that Jesus had which is summarized in his humility and self-sacrifice (vs.8).

This quality of Jesus’ life was essential to His leadership role as the Savior of the world. Self-sacrifice was not limited to His willingness to suffer death on the cross (vs.8), but was a lifestyle of servanthood that He embodied (vs. 7).

Self-sacrifice is not an unachievable quality of the Divine Son, but rather a quality that should be emulated by His followers (vs.5). Paul affirms that Jesus’ life of servanthood and self-sacrifice led to His exaltation as “the” leader before whom all would kneel.

Jesus’ commitment to lowliness and humility correlated directly with His universal influence. 

In contrast to this is our struggle with pride, recognition, ministry “success,” and the celebrity leadership culture that is so prevalent in our society. A commitment to humility and self-sacrifice by definition avoids recognition and notoriety.

In my experience, when Christian leaders gather, three issues that are always the common touch points.

How many children do you have in your ministry? How big is your budget? What kind of facilities do you have? The answers to these establish a kind of ministry pecking order with the leadership being those with the most children, biggest budgets, and largest facilities.

It is disturbing that these are so incongruent with humility, servanthood, and self-sacrifice.

Jesus embodied a life of service and self-sacrifice dedicated to God and His Kingdom purposes. As my former pastor said, every Christian leader wants to be “recognized” as a servant leader…but they really don’t want to be treated like one.

Jesus understood that self-sacrifice was a critical ingredient to personal godliness and thus effective leadership.

Next week we will conclude our loom at personal godliness and leadership through the life of St. Paul. My blog will be posted the same time every week and I hope you can join us next week. The podcast version is available here!