{"id":6157,"date":"2014-12-23T00:05:04","date_gmt":"2014-12-23T08:05:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/?p=6157"},"modified":"2014-12-22T23:03:13","modified_gmt":"2014-12-23T07:03:13","slug":"leading","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/2014\/12\/23\/leading\/","title":{"rendered":"Leading"},"content":{"rendered":"

The mother of the Zebedee brothers came with her two sons and knelt before Jesus with a request.<\/p>\n

\t\u201cWhat do you want?\u201d Jesus asked.<\/p>\n

\tShe said, \u201cGive your word that these two sons of mine will be awarded the highest places of honor in your kingdom, one at your right hand, one at your left hand.\u201d<\/p>\n

\tJesus responded, \u201cYou have no idea what you\u2019re asking.\u201d And he said to James and John, \u201cAre you capable of drinking the cup that I\u2019m about to drink?\u201d<\/p>\n

\tThey said, \u201cSure, why not?\u201d<\/p>\n

\tJesus said, \u201cCome to think of it, you are going to drink my cup. But as to awarding places of honor, that\u2019s not my business. My Father is taking care of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\tWhen the ten others heard about this, they lost their tempers, thoroughly disgusted with the two brothers. So Jesus got them together to settle things down. He said, \u201cYou\u2019ve observed how godless rulers throw their weight around, how quickly a little power goes to their heads. It\u2019s not going to be that way with you. Whoever wants to be great must become a servant. Whoever wants to be first among you must be your slave. That is what the Son of Man has done: He came to serve, not be served\u2014and then to give away his life in exchange for the many who are held hostage.\u201d (Matthew 20:20\u201328)<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\tBoth Matthew and Mark record the effort of the mother of James and John to get positions of power and authority for her sons. Jesus used her request to once again teach his disciples about the nature of leadership and the way followers of Christ were supposed to interact with one another. Jesus was not advocating anarchy, with no one in charge. He wasn\u2019t opposed to administration. He recognized the need for leadership. After all, he led his disciples.<\/p>\n

\tBut Jesus believed that the only motivator among we, his followers, was our mutual love for one another. Our only concern was what was best for our neighbors, not maintaining our power. The emphasis was always to be on someone other than ourselves. Authority comes from service, from putting others first. Authority comes from not even thinking about our position or our status. Certainly there are those who are leaders, who are gifted with administrative ability. But the methods of Christian leadership differ radically from those of a business or a government. If we want to get ahead, then we need to concern ourselves with helping the people around us, focusing on their needs, without ever worrying about whether we\u2019re getting the proper respect or have an impressive title.<\/p>\n

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The mother of the Zebedee brothers came with her two sons and knelt before Jesus with a request. \u201cWhat do you want?\u201d Jesus asked. She said, \u201cGive your word that these two sons of mine will be awarded the highest … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_s2mail":"yes"},"categories":[18,17,16],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6157"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6157"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6157\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6159,"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6157\/revisions\/6159"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6157"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6157"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6157"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}