Leadership Lesson 1: Influence and Service (speaking notes)

Tonight I want to talk to you about a very important subject – Leadership

What is a leader?

You are the next leaders of this church – and if we will grow into the church God wants us to be we must approach leadership according to God’s pattern

I was going to use some books I read in Bible School but I decided let’s go with the Bible instead.

God needs leaders in His Church. While the Pastor is the senior Shepherd – God never intended for him to do all the leading and do all the work.

In the OT Moses was trying to lead the Children of Israel to the Promised land but he kept getting distracted because the people were getting into disputes and disagreements. Moses’ father in-law gave Moses the idea of splitting the camp into teams.

God needs people who can step up to the plate and lead.

Leadership is about influence not position – never chase a title or power. If that’s what you want then you are too spiritually immature to lead.

Many of the prophets of the OT were not from the formal ministry (priestly line) but were called by God to speak for Him.

Ie: Samuel was a little boy, Elisha was a farmer

God calls people to lead before he ever gives them a title.

Influence defined

1.the capacity or power of persons or things to be a compelling force on or produce effects on the actions, behavior, opinions, etc., of others:

2 Tim 2:24-26

And a servant of the Lord must not quarrel but be gentle to all, able to teach, patient, 25 in humility correcting those who are in opposition, if God perhaps will grant them repentance, so that they may know the truth, 26 and that they may come to their senses and escape the snare of the devil, having been taken captive by him to do his will.

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Influence is about becoming a positive impact on their life

Discipleship

Building people through positive affirmation

How can I influence people in my youth group

Example – remember somebody is always watching you

o Worship with all your heart even when you don’t feel like it

o Pray and seek God to show others how they should do the same

o Live a life that brings glory to God

Positive Affirmation

o Find someone and invest time into their life

o Call them on the phone

o Pray with them at youth

o Pray with them

o If they aren’t in the altar on Sun find them and bring them to the front

Leadership is about service not power

Jesus is our perfect example

Jesus was the perfect servant leader

John 13:3-5

3 Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come from God and was going to God, 4 rose from supper and laid aside His garments, took a towel and girded Himself. 5 After that, He poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them with the towel with which He was girded.

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John 13:12-17

12 So when He had washed their feet , taken His garments, and sat down again, He said to them, "Do you know what I have done to you? 13 You call Me Teacher and Lord, and you say well, for so I am. 14 If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet , you also ought to wash one another's feet . 15 For I have given you an example, that you should do as I have done to you. 16 Most assuredly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master; nor is he who is sent greater than he who sent him. 17 If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.

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Jesus was the King of Kings and yet He washed feet!

Jesus’ was motivated by a desire to SERVE. He didn’t speak with authority and rebuke just because He could - He did it for the betterment of those He was serving.

What did a servant look like in the Bible?

A servant is nice word for slave.

A person could become a servant if they were in debt to their master

We are indebted to Jesus – we serve Him b/c he paid the penalty of sin for us

Find a place of service and do it with all of your heart.

Four keys to servant leadership

• A servant takes responsibility

Matt 25: 14-19, 26-30

"For the kingdom of heaven is like a man traveling to a far country, who called his own servants and delivered his goods to them. 15 And to one he gave five talents , to another two, and to another one, to each according to his own ability; and immediately he went on a journey. 16 Then he who had received the five talents went and traded with them, and made another five talents . 17 And likewise he who had received two gained two more also. 18 But he who had received one went and dug in the ground, and hid his lord's money. 19 After a long time the lord of those servants came and settled accounts with them.

26 "But his lord answered and said to him, 'You wicked and lazy servant, you knew that I reap where I have not sown, and gather where I have not scattered seed. 27 So you ought to have deposited my money with the bankers, and at my coming I would have received back my own with interest. 28 So take the talent from him, and give it to him who has ten talents .

29'For to everyone who has, more will be given, and he will have abundance; but from him who does not have, even what he has will be taken away. 30 And cast the unprofitable servant into the outer darkness. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.'

Be responsible for your place of service

• A servant is owned by someone

1 Cor 3:23-4:1

And you are Christ's , and Christ is God's. Let a man so consider us, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God

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Remember: You are doing this for Jesus not for yourself

• A servant is submissive

Heb 13:17

17 Obey those who rule over you, and be submissive, for they watch out for your souls, as those who must give account. Let them do so with joy and not with grief, for that would be unprofitable for you.

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Remember: Submit to God and His undershepherd – your pastor

• A servant isn’t in it for himself/herself

Heb 12:2

Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross , despising the shame…

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Remember: Jesus didn’t die because he thought it would be enjoyable. He died for us so that we could be saved. We serve people not b/c of what we get but b/c it helps others

If you will commit to becoming the leader God wants you to be – he will bless your life!

Matt 25:23

23 His lord said to him,'Well done, good and faithful servant; you have been faithful over a few things, I will make you ruler over many things. Enter into the joy of your lord.'

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Next Time…“The Character of a Leader”

Homosexuality Lesson Notes

What’s the big deal about Homosexuality?

Homosexuality and alternative lifestyles are becoming more and more popular. It’s now cool to sexually experiment. Couple all of that with media and political pressure in our schools, workplaces and public spaces – standing up for what you believe can be difficult. I want to give you a biblical explanation why homosexuality is wrong.

Outline

What does the Bible Say about the GLBT lifestyle?

Rom 1:24-27

24 Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves, 25 who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.

26 For this reason God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. 27 Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due.

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What’s interesting here is the Paul’s word for women and men in the Greek is barely used anywhere else in scripture. It refers to biology – the words women/men are not used to represent the idea of gender. But in this context, Paul is very pointedly saying the homosexual behavior committed by these people was unnatural to them as males and females (arsenes and theleias). He is not considering any such thing as sexual orientation. He is saying, in other words, that homosexuality is biologically unnatural-not just unnatural to heterosexuals, but unnatural to anyone (“Homosexuality and the Bible, Jason Dull, http://www.apostolic.net/biblicalstudies/homosexualbible.htm accessed Feb 7/08)

In other words, God made men for women and women for men.

The Old Testament declares that Homosexuality is a sin

Lev 18:6-23

22 "'Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable.

23 "'Do not have sexual relations with an animal and defile yourself with it. A woman must not present herself to an animal to have sexual relations with it; that is a perversion.

NIV

Homosexuality, like all sexual sins, is a sin against yourself and God

It is sin against God because you are violating His Word.

It is a sin against your self because you are violating God’s natural design for human sexual relationships

1 Cor 6:8-11

9 Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, 10 nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God.

1 Cor 6:12-20

All things are lawful for me, but all things are not helpful. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any. 13 Foods for the stomach and the stomach for foods, but God will destroy both it and them. Now the body is not for sexual immorality but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. 14 And God both raised up the Lord and will also raise us up by His power.

15 Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a harlot? Certainly not! 16 Or do you not know that he who is joined to a harlot is one body with her? For "the two," He says, "shall become one flesh." 17 But he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with Him.

18 Flee sexual immorality. Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body. 19 Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? 20 For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's.

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The bottom line is this – Homosexuality is condemned by the Bible as a sin. It’s a sin b/c it violates the Word of God and God’s design for normal human sexual relationships

Are people born Gay?

Is there a genetic link that makes people gay. No!

Is being gay a pure choice? NO!

Researcher Dean Hamer (1993), for example, attempted to link male homosexuality to a stretch of DNA located a the tip of the X chromosome, the chromosome that some men inherit from their mothers. Referring to that research, Hamer offered some conclusions regarding genetics and homosexuality.

"We knew that genes were only part of the answer. We assumed the environment also played a role in sexual orientation, as it does in most, if not all behaviors..."(Hamer and Copeland, 1994, p. 82).

"Homosexuality is not purely genetic...environmental factors play a role. There is not a single master gene that makes people gay...I don't think we will ever predict who will be gay" (Mitchell, 1995).

Citing the failure of their research, Hamer & Copeland further write,

"The pedigree failed to produce what we originally hoped to find: simple Mendelian inheritance. In fact, we never found a single family in which homosexuality was distributed in the obvious pattern that Mendel observed in his pea plants" (1994, p. 104).

What's more interesting is that when Hamer's study was duplicated by Rice et al with research that was more robust, the genetic markers were found to be nonsignificant. Rice et al concluded:

"It is unclear why our results are so discrepant from Hamer's original study. Because our study was larger than that of Hamer et al, we certainly had adequate power to detect a genetic effect as large as reported in that study. Nonetheless, our data do not support the presence of a gene of large effect influencing sexual orientation at position XQ 28" (Rice et al, 1999, p.667).

Simon LeVay, in his study of the hypothalamic differences between the brains of homosexual and heterosexual men, offered the following criticisms of his own research:

"It's important to stress what I didn't find. I did not prove that homosexuality is genetic, or find a genetic cause for being gay. I didn't show that gay men are born that way, the most common mistake people make in interpreting my work. Nor did I locate a gay center in the brain.

"The INAH 3 is less likely to be the sole gay nucleus of the brain than a part of a chain of nuclei engaged in men and women's sexual behavior....Since I looked at adult brains, we don't know if the differences I found were there at birth, or if they appeared later." (Nimmons, 1994, p. 64).

Indeed, in commenting on the brain and sexual behavior, Dr. Mark Breedlove, a researcher at the University of California at Berkeley, demonstrated that sexual behavior can actually change brain structure. Referring to his research, Breedlove states:

"These findings give us proof for what we theoretically know to be the case-that sexual experience can alter the structure of the brain, just as genes can alter it. [I]t is possible that differences in sexual behavior cause (rather than are caused) by differences in the brain" (Breedlove, 1997, p. 801).

http://www.narth.com/docs/innate.html accessed Monday 2008-02-04 @ 1:10 pm

In other words people are not born gay. Nor does someone wake up one morning and decide they are sexually attracted to people of the same gender. It is a product of environment, personality, family and choice.

What is the appropriate response of the Church to Homosexuality?

1 Cor 6:9-11

9 Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, 10 nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.

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Paul seems to indicate that there were former homosexuals in the Church.

While we must never back down on our beliefs we must not be afraid to reach out to homosexuals. Everything that I have read leads me to believe that most homosexuals fall into that lifestyle because events leading up to their life left them broken, confused and empty. God help us if we turn our backs on a group that is so destroyed by sin. We must without compromise hold to our beliefs, but at the same time be like Jesus and reach out to the sinner. A homosexual must never be ostracized from the Church, they must not feel hated or rejected. We must welcome them with open arms and shown the love of Jesus Christ just as we would the adulterer, drug addict or any other sinner desperately needing Christ to cleanse them of sin.