Gigi is Billy Graham's daughter, and she writes about one of
those days she wishes she could wiped off the calendar. It all
started with an experience some of you have had. It was flood
damage to their house. The carpet men were there replacing the
water ruined carpet. She was trying to do some cleaning up of the
mess and overdid it. By suppertime she was totally exhausted. She
got the kids into the car and headed for McDonald's. She stopped
at the bank while her husband ran in. She was doubled parked. She
glanced in her rearview mirror and saw a large older model car pull
up behind her. It was driven by an older woman with flaming red
hair. She started to blast her horn, and now we read Gigi tell what
happened.
"I don't know what possessed me, but after my whirlwind day,
this was the last straw! I decided not to move. She gave another
long, loud blast which just reinforced my stubborn refusal to budge,
and I motioned for her to pass me. As angry as she was, she
managed to maneuver the big car around and pulled up beside me.
Then she lowered her window and began to yell. I blew her a kiss.
That did it! She screamed, then stuck out her tongue.
By this time she was out of her car, threatening me and calling
me names, attracting the attention of people passing by. Suddenly I
wanted to crawl into a hole. The red-headed grandmother returned
to her car, and Stephan appeared, wandering what the commotion
was all about. We continued on to McDonald's, but I was too
distraught to eat."
She could not sleep well for several nights, for she felt she had
been so un Christlike, and she wished she could apologized to the
woman. She had let her tiredness and anxiety drown out the gentle
voice of the Holy Spirit, and let her stubborn human nature take
control. The point is, it happens to the best of Christians at times.
We loose a sense of awareness that we are Christians, and that we
are to be different from the world by demonstrating a power of
self-control that is superior to what is natural to man. The Christian
is under constant attack and without self-control is always at risk of
blowing it, and demonstrating to the world that they are far from a
finished product.
The point that Paul stresses is that a Christian leader is to be
one who has a great deal of self-control so that he does not let his
actions or emotions go to extremes. He does not dominate, lose his
temper, or go off on a binge of drinking to escape the pressures of
life. He is one who has other ways than the world has of dealing
with the stress of life. He is not controlled by the circumstances, but
is self-controlled. Food, sex, and money are all important elements
in his life, but he is not controlled by them, for if he is he will lose his
credibility as a leader. Again, we need to see that people who are
excessive, domineering, and obsessed may be very successful people,
but Paul says they do not qualify to be leaders in the church.
A well known pastor was counseling the son of one of America's
great industrialists and he concluded that his drinking problem was
due to the domineering actions of his father. He confronted the
father and almost got kicked out of his office because the father went
into such a rage. But later the man called and said he reflected on
what had been said and it was true. He ran an empire all day and it
was hard to shift gears when he came home to his family. He began
to cry and admitted that unless God helped him he could not change.
God did help him, and in time he learned to be different with his
son. Here was a man greatly qualified to lead a major industry, but
Paul says he was not qualified to lead even the little church of Crete.
The church has higher standards than government or industry.
In these secular realms there is a demand for leaders who will
do almost anything to succeed. Violence in behavior and the pursuit
of dishonest gain are not vices in the dog eat dog world of
competition. Human nature has not changed. These things were
popular in Paul's day as well, but a Christian is to be different. A
Christian leader is not to be violent Paul says. He writes the same
thing to Timothy, and adds a word to clarify what he means. I Tim.
3:3 says the church leader is to be, "not violent but gentle." No man
or woman is fit to be a leader who treats people in an ungentle
manner. The Christian who is abusive to their mate and children,
or to anyone is not a good reflection of the spirit of Christ.
A Christian leader is one who is always sensitive to other
people's feelings and does not trample on them. You can see that
this would take considerable self-control when working with people
who are lazy, lying gluttons like they were in Crete. The impulse to
treat them like the evil brutes they are would be always tugging at
your emotions. It would take great self-control to resist. The
immature Christian will surrender to this impulse and lost their
temper. They may even try to compel people to be better by force.
This will not work, for people must be led and taught and
persuaded. Only the self-controlled mature Christian has the
patience to put up with this slow process without exploding in
frustration.
The mature Christian feels the same frustration and negative
emotions as anyone else. The difference is that they do not let their
behavior be controlled by their emotions. They are self-controlled.
They choose how they will respond rather than being dragged along
by their feelings to do what they don't want to do. Self-control is
their major virtue, for it is one of the fruits of the Spirit. It enables
them to choose the will of God rather than the desires of their
human nature. Without self-control the Christian will not be a
whole lot different from the non-Christian. They will be at the
mercy of circumstances. A Christian leader is one who can
demonstrate they are not slaves of circumstance. They can choose to
act or react to life in a way consistent with their knowledge of God's
will.
They are not people who are controlled by whims and desires.
Such people tend to be impulsive, and so they overeat, overspend,
and just lean toward excessiveness in all they do. They do not react
gently, but violently to those who block the way of self-indulgence.
They may be great people in many ways, but Paul says do not choose
them as church leaders. Self-control is the key to defeating Satan. It
was the key Jesus used to remain perfect in a fallen world. Imagine
having a billion dollars but not buying a hamburger when you are
famished and as hungry as you have ever been. Even this
illustration does not match what Jesus did. He was starving, and yet
with the power to turn stones into bread He did not do so. That was
self-control, and by it He defeated the temptation of Satan.
The whole point of the temptation of Jesus was to make Him
loose self-control and do something out of God's will. That is the
point of all temptation. It is to get you to surrender your control to
another force. Once you loose self-control you are under the control
of some other force, and it is usually an evil force. Self-control is
essential to be a good Christian, and especially to be a leader of
Christians. What is not under control is out of control, and this
leads to extremes. Any Christian who tends to be an extremist is not
a good leader, for leaders need to examples of balance.
It is pretty much a universal belief among all people's of the
world that the person who has learned self-mastering is the wisest of
leaders. Cato the pagan could say, "He approaches nearest to the
gods who knows how to be silent even though he knows he is right."
Jesus had this kind of control before his accusers. This is hard to
do, but it is what Jesus expects leaders in the church to do. Why is
this so important? It is because the world in which the church is to
serve is one of two major extremes. There is the pagan life-style of
eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die. The excessive lust
for pleasure at any cost.
On the other hand, there is the ascetic life-style of the Gnostics
and other cults that snared many Christians by their self-denial
philosophy. They refused to enjoy the pleasures of life that God
gave to man. Both extremes make a Christian unfit for leadership,
for they both reject the balance life that the Bible reveals to be God's
will for man. The self-controlled leader is to set the example of
being an abstainer from lawless pleasures and moderate and
legitimate pleasures.
The reason Paul made so much of this is because even the pagan
world recognized that a life of balance, moderation, and self-control
was the highest level that man could achieve. They called it
temperance. Plutarch said, "Temperance is the greatest of the
virtues. Euripides said, "Temperance is the noblest gift of the
gods." Christians were to reach this highest level in the eyes of the
pagan world as examples of what surrender to Christ could enable
even the common man to achieve. Pagans would be impressed by a
Christian who could be provoked and be insulted, and not respond
with violence. The code of honor among men in many cultures, and
for many years in our own, was to use violence to preserve your self
respect and reputation.
The decades of dueling were due to this code in our culture.
Many of the heroes of the screen still follow this code and pulverize
anyone who dares to offend them. They are usually scum bags and
notoriously evil, and so we cheer them on in their violence right
along with the world. The paradox is that even though we love these
heroes of violence they do not qualify to be our leaders in the realm
of spiritual growth. If a man is quick to strike out and hurt another
person, they are disqualified as a church leader. There is a great
deal of difference between being a hero and being a Christian
leader.
This paradox is even more radical as we look at the final
negative in Paul's list of what a Christian leader is not to be. "He
must not be pursuing dishonest gain." It is clear in the Bible that
economic status has no bearing on Christian leadership. You can be
very poor, or very rich, and be a truly godly leader. But the way
you get your little or your great wealth makes a big difference. The
thing that amazes me is how little commentators say about this
particular negative. In our culture it is a very touchy subject
because there is so much deception in this business of acquiring
money.
Christians are involved in all kinds of businesses that make
excessive profit from their products. Where do you draw the line
between greed and an honest profit? If I can sell you for 5 dollars
what cost me a quarter to make, is that greed or merely taking
advantage of the system? It is extremely hard to define what a
Christian would have to do to be labeled with this disqualification.
The result is that it is just ignored, and today you could probably be
a slum lord and still be an elder in the church. The culture rather
than the Scripture sets the standard.
It is very hard to avoid being guilty here. If you have money
invested in bonds or mutual funds, or if you have insurance, or just
about any investment you can think of, you could very well be
getting interest and making money off some company that provides
and evil product or service, and which rips people off with cold and
calculated greed. No doubt all of us have made money from
investing in someone else's evil. There are many investment
strategies today to help Christians be socially and spiritually
responsible, but lets face it, to be an American in the kind of
economy we have it is near impossible to avoid some level of greed.
But there is a counter-movement today that says Christians are
not to conform to this materialistic economy that says that the one
who dies with the most toys wins. Pastor David Sorensen and his
Barbara wrote the book Tis A Gift To Be Simple. The sub title is
Embracing The Freedom Of Living With Less. This is just one of
many examples of couples who decided the cost of ever moving up
and getting more and more was too great. Their marriage and their
family suffered for the sake of requiring more stuff. They were
always busy and had no time for love, fun, and enjoying the gifts of
God. They were trapped in a life-style that did not mirror their true
values. They had everything but the time to enjoy what they valued
most. So they decided to do the unthinkable and deliberately move
down and live on less.
They decided to cease their over consumption which our culture
promotes, and aim for simplicity. As I read the book I could see the
biblical basis for their choice, but I also recognized how hard it
would be to persuade many to follow. Tony Compalo in his book
Carpe Diem, which means seize the day, goes on and on about the
American Christian is trapped in an absurd situation. He writes,
"Just think about last Christmas season. Your biggest problem
was probably not figuring out where you would get enough money
to buy presents for family members and friends. Instead, it was
trying to figure out what to buy for people who had everything. The
answer to that problem should have been self-evident. What you
should buy for those who have everything, is nothing. But you
didn't have the guts to pull it off, did you? No! Instead you went up
and down the aisles of department stores having anxiety attacks.
Panic-stricken, you searched yea, even prayed, that somebody
somewhere had invented some new things that nobody needs so you
could buy them for people who have everything. This is not an
absurd description of a reasonable world. It is a rational description
of an absurd world."
Capitalism has proved it is the best kind of economy. It has
defeated fascism and communism in this century, and the whole
world wants to get in on it now. The problem is, in order to keep it
going you need people who will buy more and more things they
don't need, and in larger and larger quantities. Our way of life
demands that we be consumers of masses of things we do not need.
In order to do this we need to make a lot of money, and that means
we need to spend more of our life working and less of it with our
family and in building relationships. The major portion of our lives
has to be given to the goal of purchasing things we do not need. The
result is that we are slaves and do not realize it. We are bound by
loyalty to our culture to sacrifice our lives for the sake of the value
system. You see the paradox of it all and the absurdity of it all. We
fall in love with our slavery to the system, for it is exciting to be able
to have masses of things we do not need. The more we get, the more
successful we are, and our self-esteem is raised.
The Sorensen's down sizing of their life style said this was one of
the major problems they had to cope with-the loss of self-esteem as
they ceased to buy what they did not need. The bottom line is this:
The vast majority of Christians are a part of our materialistic
consumer oriented culture. None of us would dare to say I do not
have a lot of things I don't need. As good Americans we need to
have a lot of things we don't need. But a Christian leader is to be
one who is self-controlled, and who is moderate in the degree to
which he or she is motivated by the consumer spirit.
We already conform to the world too much in this area, but a
Christian leader is to be one who may be rich, but who displays
moderation in lifestyle. Many extremely wealthy Christians have
done this successfully. They have made millions, but live a life style
not that different from the average middle class Christian. On the
other hand are the many middle class Christians who live like they
have millions, and they devote their life to consumerism and the
acquiring of things for status. The more I study Paul's
qualifications for a Christian leader, the more I realize how hard it
is to be a truly committed Christian in our culture. The scary thing
is that we haven't even gotten to the positive things yet, and already
it seems impossible to find Christians who can measure up.
I have concluded that hardly anyone is worthy to be a leader in
the church, or to be a pastor. Just as we are saved by grace, so we
are allowed to serve God by grace. We are not worthy, but everyone
so chosen is to be a person who is committed to excellence of
character, and one who is clearly striving to be an example of
Christlikeness. As strange as it sounds, the more you know about
how the world functions, the more you realize that being like Christ
has strong financial implications.
I can rationalize my conformity, for I just look at my peers and
say that I am only doing what they all do. I live up to the level of my
income. I buy things I don't need because I can, and I am sure you
do the same. We need to be reminded of the warning of Jesus in
Luke 12:15, "Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of
greed: A man's life does not consist in the abundance of his
possessions." Jesus knew that Christians would have a battle with
greed and the persistent hunger to possess things. Paul's point is,
only those who are winning this battle are qualified to be Christian
leaders. Moderation in all things and self-control in all things is the
quality to look for in a Christian leader. This should be the goal of
all of our lives.
