Speaker 1: 0:01

For the rest of us. Let's stand for the reading of God's Word from 1 Corinthians, chapter 4. This is all of chapter 4, beginning in verse 1. The Word of God reads this way this is how one should regard us as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. Moreover, it is required of stewards that they be found faithful, but with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged by you or by any human court. In fact, I do not even judge myself, for I am not aware of anything against myself, but I'm not thereby acquitted. It is the Lord who judges me. Therefore, do not pronounce judgment before the time, before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart. Then each one will receive his commendation from God. I have applied all these things to myself and Apollos for your benefit, brothers, that you may learn by us not to go beyond what is written. That none of you may be puffed up in favor of one against another, For who sees anything different in you? What do you have that you did not receive? If, then, you received it, why do you boast as if you did not receive it Already. You have all you want Already. You have become rich Without us. You've become kings, and would that you did reign so that we might share the rule with you?

Speaker 1: 1:29

For I think that God has exhibited us apostles as, last of all, like men sentenced to death because we have become a spectacle to the world, to angels and to men. We're fools, for Christ's sake, but you are wise in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You are held in honor, but we, in disrepute. To the present hour, we hunger and thirst, we're poorly dressed and buffeted and homeless, and we labor, working with our own hands. When reviled, we bless. When persecuted, we endure. When slandered, we entreat. We have become and are still like the scum of the world, the refuse of all things. I do not write these things to make you ashamed, but to admonish you as my beloved children, For though you have countless guides in Christ, you do not have many fathers, For I became your father in Christ Jesus, through the gospel. I urge you, then, be imitators of me. That is why I sent you Timothy, my beloved and faithful child in the Lord, to remind you of my ways in Christ, as I teach them everywhere, in every church. Some are arrogant, as though I were not coming to you, but I will come to you soon, if the Lord wills, and I will find out, not the talk of these arrogant people, but their power, For the kingdom of God does not consist in talk, but in power. What do you wish? Shall I come to you with a rod or with love, in a spirit of gentleness? This is God's word. Thanks be to God. You may be seated, and may God bless this reading and preaching of His Word.

Speaker 1: 3:10

There's a lot in this chapter. There's a lot of really good stuff in this chapter that we don't have time to talk about this morning. Sadly, we're just going to focus on some of the most important things. But if you want to nerd out a little bit and come and talk to me about other interesting things in this chapter, we can talk afterward.

Speaker 1: 3:32

But growing up as a kid, I always wanted to play Dungeons and Dragons. It seemed so cool. The rule books had the coolest pictures on them. There were barbarians and wizards. So I bought and read the rule books. This was Advanced Dungeons and Dragons, so second edition Back in the early 90s it would have been, but the problem was that I did not have anyone to play with.

Speaker 1: 4:00

My sister had no interest. I didn't have any brothers. My friends didn't really have any interest in playing. So I read the rule books and I was excited. But I was just a lonely kid with D&D rule books. And then, when I grew up, I had kids and I realized that this was my chance. I finally got to live out my dream. Somebody got us the D&D rule books for Christmas one year and so I read them cover to cover. I explained the rules to my kids and I was the dungeon master and they were the players. And so the point is that have kids and live out your dreams through them. That's how you do that.

Speaker 1: 4:49

But since then I've continued to try to convince my adult friends to play. I'm still the same old, young, lonely boy that I've always been. Many of them, I've found, are willing to sit down and give it a try, but they're not willing to read the rules. They're not willing to read hundreds of pages of rules. They're not going to put in lots of time to craft adventures. So from the time of my youth until now, I have always, it has always fallen upon me to be the dungeon master, and if you ever end up in one of my games. Remember this I might not always be your pastor, but I will always be your dungeon master.

Speaker 1: 5:31

And there's one thing I've learned about Dungeons and Dragons, and it's this is that the dungeon master is simply the person who wants to play the most. They're the person who wants to play so bad that they're willing to do the things that no one else is willing to do, like read the rules or create the adventure. Host the event, get the snacks, gather the group. They're the biggest nerd. That's what it means to be a dungeon master, but also that is a microcosm of really what it means to be a leader and why leadership is so important.

Speaker 1: 6:11

It all goes back to Dungeons and Dragons, Because without good leadership, we remain isolated individuals doing our own thing, each going our own way. Great leadership brings people together to craft a grand adventure and tell a wonderful story that we could never do on our own. That's what great leadership does. Without leadership, communities drift, families fracture, churches divide and disintegrate or drift from their mission. Companies collapse. All of us know that the world needs good leaders. We need good leadership, but there's a problem, and it's that they're hard to find. Good leaders are hard to find and why? There's a few reasons. Leadership is notoriously difficult. So who would want to do it? Real leadership is often unrewarded, and so what's the incentive? Why put in all of the hard work and blood, sweat and tears? And then leadership is often abused, and so the people that we're trying to lead are often skeptical or slow to trust so-called leaders.

Speaker 1: 7:21

I'm telling you all of this because I think that the overarching idea in 1 Corinthians 4, there's many subjects that Paul touches on in this passage but good spiritual leadership is at the core of what Paul is talking about here. The Corinthian church had its own crisis of leadership, and we'll talk about that more this morning. Own crisis of leadership, and we'll talk about that more this morning. But Paul's solution for them is not less leadership or more leadership, but gospel leadership, a specific kind of leadership, Leadership that is shaped by the cross, sets the stage for the grand adventure of following Jesus together. The Corinthians had a massive misunderstanding of what spiritual leadership was all about, and we're just like them. We long for good leadership, but we rarely know what it looks like. We know that we're supposed to have it, we know that we're even supposed to be good leaders in certain contexts, but we rarely know what it looks like or how to become what we're supposed to be. But in these words from Paul, we encounter three unique features of gospel leadership, and that's what we're going to look at this morning.

Speaker 1: 8:33

Gospel leadership is stewardship, that's number one. Gospel leadership is costly number two. And then number three, gospel leadership is intimate, that it's a stewardship, a costly leadership and an intimate leadership. So first, gospel leadership is stewardship. Gospel leadership is stewardship, and stewards live to please their master and not the crowds. So look at verse one.

Speaker 1: 9:05

Paul says he's talking about the apostles, but also anyone that would lead in the church. He says this is how one should regard us as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. Leaders in the church, Paul says, are servants and stewards, and by the mysteries of God he's talking about the gospel message which for ages past was kept hidden and mysterious but now has been made known through Jesus Christ stewards of the mysteries of God. And, as we all know, a steward is someone who manages and administers something that does not belong to them but that belongs to someone else. And Paul's point in all of that is that, because we are stewards, faithfulness is the most important thing. If you look at verse two, he says, moreover, it is required of stewards that they be found faithful. He says that's the most important thing. It's not, however good these other things might be popularity, being extroverted, being multi-talented None of those things are the key requirement. The key requirement is that they would be faithful.

Speaker 1: 10:20

The most important thing a steward can do is to faithfully carry out what their master has given them to do, and this is why Paul says that, at the end of the day, God's judgment is the judgment that matters most. Verses three and four and verse three. He says but with me, it is a very small thing that I should be judged by you or by any human court. In fact, I do not even judge myself, for I'm not aware of anything against myself, but I'm not thereby acquitted. It is the Lord who judges me. So Paul is not just saying there, he's saying I'm a steward of the mysteries of God. I'm accountable to God. He's not just saying so I don't care what you think of me, or I don't care what any human court or any human judgment thinks of me. He's also saying I don't even care what I think of me. He's saying I don't even trust my own opinion of me. I might feel like I'm doing good today or might feel bad the next day, but that's not what matters. What matters is what the Lord thinks and says. He says it is the Lord who judges me. The point is that gospel leadership is a stewardship that is accountable to God, accountable to God alone.

Speaker 1: 11:33

I got a message earlier this week from a pastor friend in Lexington. He's a guy in our presbytery and he messaged me because a wealthy man in his congregation just bought a company here in Cincinnati. It's a roofing company and that man who bought the company is looking for someone to run it for him. So they're looking to hire a president and it's a great job. So if anybody's looking for a job, this is a sweet job. You don't own the company, but you're going to run it for them A president who will oversee daily operations and their main task is to make the business profitable. And that would be a good example of a steward. If you get that job, you're not the owner of the company, but the whole company is put into your care and you're charged to make it profitable. So imagine you do come up to me after church today and we get you connected. Imagine you get hired for that job.

Speaker 1: 12:33

Imagine you work there for a year and then the owner comes to evaluate what's been going on and he does some interviews and he looks at the books and he learns a few things. He learns that you are very popular. All of the employees love working for you. You're the best boss that they've ever had. You're super laid back. They get unlimited PTO. They can leave early sometimes if they want to. They love working for you. You're very popular with the employees. All the customers love you. You cut deals for your friends. You even did a free roof this past year for somebody that needed it. You go above and beyond for the customers.

Speaker 1: 13:08

Everybody thinks that you're great, but the problem is that the business is not profitable. As a matter of fact, it's hemorrhaging money. You have failed to do the one thing that was given to you to do, which is to make the business profitable At the end of the day. Here's the point in all of this, and my point is not that profit is the most important thing. That's not what I'm saying. You do need to conduct business in a way that is loving toward everyone, but the point is that at the end of the day, you have to give an account to the owner, and what he thinks about how you've done is far more important than what anybody else thinks. Your employees could love you, the customers could love you, but that doesn't matter. That's not going to save your job. At the end of the day, what matters is what the owner thinks.

Speaker 1: 13:58

And similarly, Paul is saying that leaders in the church are stewards. They're servants. The elders and the deacons and the leaders that serve this church are serving you, serving this congregation, but they are accountable to God. Accountable to God, and what matters is what God thinks of what we have done together. So what does that mean? Two things before we move on. Two points of application.

Speaker 1: 14:28

If leadership is stewardship, here's two implications. Number one leadership starts with you. Paul says that he was entrusted with a stewardship, and one thing that this means is that leading others always starts with what God is doing in you. Something was deposited into the life of Paul. Jesus appeared to him. Paul spent a long time on his own, studying, meeting with the other apostles as well, before he went out to ministry. But there was something entrusted to him, deposited into his life, that he is now tasked to steward and to pass on. You cannot pass on what you have not received. You can't take people a place that you've never been, somewhere where you've never gone. You can't shepherd others without first being shepherded by God. So leading others publicly begins with what we do in private. It begins with developing a rich private life with the Lord that nobody ever sees. Effective leadership that people see, that is public, begins with countless hours of time with the Lord that no one will ever see. Leadership begins with you.

Speaker 1: 15:46

Some of my favorite preachers, for example. When I listen to their sermons, it's not that they're the most eloquent or the smartest or making the most interesting points. They're often making very simple points, but they preach so well. Their preaching is so effective because they themselves are amazed with what the Bible is saying. It's like when you hear them preach, it's like they just went and spent time with the Lord. They learned from him, they discovered what he was saying, they were moved by it and now they just cannot wait to share with you what they've found. I hope you get some of that from me sometimes, but I think that that's the very best. Preaching is that they are amazed themselves at what the Bible is saying They've spent enough time with God for His Word to sink in emotionally. So for you, whether you are leading your family, your household, other people that look up to you, younger men and women that look up to you, or maybe you're leading a ministry in our church younger men and women that look up to you, or maybe you're leading a ministry in our church, or maybe one day you will lead a ministry in our church effective leadership begins in secret, with you, between you and the Lord, in the countless hours that no one will ever see.

Speaker 1: 16:58

So don't give that short shrift. That's number one. Number two you can't please everybody as stewards. Pleasing God is what matters most. I wish I could please everybody. I really do. I try. I'm definitely a people pleaser and I love when people feel good about me. To know that people are happy with me just puts me on cloud nine, but I have a very hard time when people are upset with me. It could ruin my vacation and so we're going on vacation in July. If you're upset with me, don't wait till after July to talk to me about it, and I will bend over backward to keep people happy and make all kinds of sacrifices. I'm a people pleaser.

Speaker 1: 17:46

But the reality is that if you are ruled by what people think of you, you will never lead them well. If you are ruled by what people think of you, you will never lead them well. Sometimes the most faithful acts of leadership is disappointing somebody for their good. Sometimes that's the most faithful thing that we can do, but if we're obsessed with what they think of us, we'll never be able to do that. We'll never be able, whether it's our children, whether it's our friends or people in our church or anybody that looks up to us as stewards.

Speaker 1: 18:18

Leadership begins with what God is doing in you, and what God thinks of us is what matters the most, because we are accountable to him. So leadership, gospel leadership, is a stewardship. Point two gospel leadership is costly. Mans, at some point you're going to have to learn this. So I'm going to tell you now. You might not understand what I'm talking about, but don't say that I didn't warn you. But it's good. At the end of the day, Gospel leadership takes a heavy toll and it is without earthly reward. And we're going to explain that Gospel leadership takes a heavy toll and it's without earthly reward. So the leaders in Corinth seems to be attached to the earthly rewards of leadership, the benefits of leadership.

Speaker 1: 19:07

In verse 8, Paul is he is he's being ironic here and he says this. He says already, you have all you want Already. You have become rich Without us. You have become kings, and I wish that you did reign. He says would that you did reign so that we might share the rule with you? Paul is writing to addressing the leaders in the Corinthian church and he says take a look at yourselves, guys. You are already. You're rich, You're satisfied and filled, You're warm and well-fed. You're rich, You're reigning, You're wise. In verse 10, Paul says you're wise, you're strong, you're reigning, you're wise. In verse 10, Paul says you're wise, you're strong, you're held in honor. Everything that you wanted out of leadership, you've gotten it.

Speaker 1: 19:54

Everyone knows that leadership is hard work and the leaders in Corinth were putting in the hard work to lead the community and in return they were receiving, and perhaps expecting, some reward for that labor. If not financial compensation, then at least they should receive honor and celebration, Maybe in their society or at least within the church. They should be regarded as wise, they should be in control, they should be shock collars. You know, if they're going to put in the hard work they should be able to get to make decisions. But then Paul gently reminds them of the lifestyle of those who held the highest office in the church, which was the apostles. What was their reward for their labor?

Speaker 1: 20:39

Look at verse 9. Verse 9, he says I think that God has exhibited us apostles as last of all like men sentenced to death. And he goes on in verse 11,. He says to the present hour we hunger and thirst, we're poorly dressed and buffeted and homeless, and we labor, working with our own hands. When reviled, we bless. When persecuted, we endure. When slandered, we entreat. We have become and are still like the scum of the world, the refuse of all things.

Speaker 1: 21:10

Paul is saying here that gospel leadership is difficult and it is often without earthly reward. The apostles put in more work into kingdom work than anybody did. And what was their reward? What gain did they have from all that they gave?

Speaker 1: 21:30

Listen to what Paul says in 2 Corinthians 11. This is a familiar passage. In verse 24, he says five times I received at the hands of the Jews the 40 lashes less one. Three times I was beaten with rods Once. I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked. A night and a day I was adrift at sea. That's crazy to think about. 24 hours adrift at sea, on frequent journeys in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, dangers from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers in toil and hardship through many a sleepless night in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. And apart from other things, there is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches. The point is that leaders in the kingdom of God need to be prepared to not be rewarded. Leaders in the church taking leadership in your family, taking leadership for the kingdom of God in whatever way that God would call you to do that, you need to be prepared to not be rewarded in an earthly sense, because gospel leadership is often without earthly reward.

Speaker 1: 22:51

And I'll illustrate this and kind of get an application to help you make sense of what I'm talking about here. So I have been both an employee and an entrepreneur and I can tell you from experience, as most of you know, that being an entrepreneur is so much harder than being an employee, as the joke goes. I got tired of working 40 hours a week for someone else, so I started my own business and now I work all the time. If you're an entrepreneur, you know what that's like. Starting a business is a heavy lift, countless unpaid hours. You can't turn work off and compartmentalize. There's constant anxiety. That's just not there when you're just an employee. And pressure. Why would anyone do that? Wouldn't it be so much easier just to go work for the man? Why would anyone put in that hard work? And we have many entrepreneurs in our church and I can hear you saying amen even though you're not saying it out loud, I know I feel it in your spirit.

Speaker 1: 23:50

Well, the idea, of course, is that at some point there's going to be some reward. At some point down the line there will be money. At some point down the line there will be freedom of schedule. At some point down the line there will be success or maybe honor. If we grind for long enough, eventually it will pay off. And shouldn't kingdom work be like that? Shouldn't working in the kingdom of God be like that, that? If we roll up our sleeves and put blood, sweat and tears into people and into the church and into God's kingdom, if we serve in the church, if we disciple people, if we seek to engage neighbors and friends in evangelism. If we serve in the kids' ministry, if we give time and money and attention, if we serve as an elder or as a deacon or some other kind of leader, shouldn't it pay off down the road? I mean, maybe we'll never get rich or never get paid, but shouldn't we at least get honor and respect and at least some control and the ability to make decisions and an ease of life? And Paul says no.

Speaker 1: 24:56

Paul says whoever seeks to lead in God's kingdom will put in blood, sweat and tears and they will not receive an earthly reward. That's not where the reward is. It's costly. So what's the incentive to lead? Why would anyone do it here at St John? I want to see all of you become leaders. We want to see you roll up your sleeves and lead in whatever ways that God has called you and gifted you inside of the church and outside of the church. And that is so much harder to do than to simply sit in a pew and just come to church. You know, every other Sunday Mega churches are so big partly because they're so easy, because you can do that. You can just go, sit in a pew and just receive and you don't have to lead anything, you don't have to get in the game and I'm not trying to cast shade on any particular church but I want to call upon you to do something different to get in the game, to bleed and to sweat and to cry for the sake of the gospel. And what am I offering in return? Because we're saying there's no earthly reward.

Speaker 1: 26:02

We'll listen to what Paul says in Philippians 3. Paul says in Philippians 3, but whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord. For his sake, I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, that I may know him in the power of his resurrection and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that, by any means possible, I may attain the resurrection from the dead. Paul says that's the reward. And what is he saying there? He does mention the eternal reward of heaven and resurrection from the dead, but there's something else that he mentions in there.

Speaker 1: 26:53

There is the reward of knowing Christ, of having Christ and of becoming like him, the more that you sacrifice for the good of the kingdom, the more that you invest in people, the more that you invest in a struggling or a difficult church community or a struggling or a difficult person, the more you sacrificially minister to your kids and teach them the Bible and the gospel, even though it's very difficult work to do that. The more you do that, the more you will get to know Jesus, the more you will have him and know him and encounter him. And you will encounter something so wonderful in Jesus and in knowing him that you are willing to lose everything else if it just means that you can have more of him. That's the reward. Gospel leadership is costly. It's without earthly reward many times. But the real reward is a knowledge of Christ, that we would know him and that we would become like him. That's a reward all on its own. Point three gospel leadership is intimate. What I mean by this is that gospel leadership is up, close and personal. It cannot be done from a distance.

Speaker 1: 28:19

Paul speaks to them as a father. If you look at verse 14, he says I do not write these things to you to make you ashamed, but to admonish you as my beloved children. And then he makes this distinction in verse 15. He says you have countless guides in Christ, but you do not have many fathers. He says you have thousands of guides, but you don't have many fathers. He says you have thousands of guides but you don't have many fathers. I became your father in Christ Jesus through the gospel. Now, what's he talking about there? What's the difference between a guide, of whom they have thousands, and a father? Well, here's just a few things that we can say. A guide is helpful. They can point you in the right direction, but a father is intimately involved and committed. A father knows his children and they know him. They live life together so much that they can closely observe his life and imitate him. Paul says in verse 16, he says I urge you then, be imitators of me, Imitate me. That is why I sent you Timothy, my beloved and faithful child in the Lord, to remind you of my ways in Christ, as I teach them everywhere, in every church. That's very interesting. Paul is saying that, along with this letter, he's sending them this letter which has his doctrine, but he's also sending Timothy to them, not just to remind them of Paul's doctrine and his teaching, but, he says, to remind them of his ways. He says I'm sending Timothy to remind you of my ways in Christ, which means his lifestyle, his practices, his demeanor, his way of being, the way that he lived out his faith. He says Timothy is going to remind you of how I lived when I was among you.

Speaker 1: 30:04

Real gospel leadership is up, close and personal. It's life on life. It cannot be done from a distance. My father had an impact on me in some interesting ways. I call him father. He is my dad because he raised me, but technically he's my adopted father. So we don't share DNA and our kids don't share DNA with him, but it's incredible to see still what traits I have inherited from him, even though we have no blood relation. There's many ways in which I'm like my dad. One of them is the need to always be busy. My wife jokes about this, but both my dad and I are really really, really good at running errands, because we don't like to just sit around and twiddle our thumbs, and so we like to be running around and being busy. My daddy's always finding something productive to do with his time, whether it's cleaning or running errands. He's busy doing something, and I'm the same way, but it's not because we share DNA that I inherited that from him somehow it's because I lived with him for so long in my formative years and in that time he made an indelible impression upon me. Likewise, the people who will have the greatest spiritual impact on you will be people who you spend a lot of time with, People who you eat with, who you live with, who you share struggles with, who you share ministry work with. Those people will have the biggest impact on your life, for good or for ill. And the only way that we can impact other people in a significant way is to do that is to invite them into your life so that they learn not only what you say, that you believe, but that they learn your ways, they learn how you live it out, they learn your demeanor, they learn your mannerisms. Gospel leadership cannot be done from a distance. So here's what this means for you. Just one quick application.

Speaker 1: 32:14

All of us need not just guides, not just good books and good sermons. All of us need someone we can imitate Hopefully a few people throughout our life that we can imitate. I can stand up here in the pulpit and preach a sermon and I can be a guide. I can preach to you, I can point you in the right direction. I can say that's the way to Jesus. Many helpful books that you can read will be guides to you in Christ, or people that you watch on YouTube or wherever you consume your media. You have countless guides and they're going to help you, and that's a good thing.

Speaker 1: 32:55

But you need some people in your life that you can imitate. These are people that know your name and you know their name, that you can call them up, that you can spend time with them. That's really what it means to be a pastor. You need a pastor in your life and you also need to learn to be pastoral to others, Older brothers and sisters in Christ who know you and you know them. For me, it's been guys like know you and you know them. For me, it's been guys like you don't know these people, but Paul, Evan, Chuck you guys have met Chuck. I just got breakfast with him this past week. Many of those people you don't know, but when I'm lost and confused, I can think about them and I can ask what would Chuck do in this situation. Or I can think about the things that he did when he was in a similar situation and I can ask what would Chuck do in this situation? Or I can think about the things that he did when he was in a similar situation and I can be encouraged. I mean, you know, Chuck went through something like that and this is what he did and it worked out okay for him, so I can imitate him.

Speaker 1: 33:50

These are not a perfect example. They're not perfect examples, but they are living examples and real examples that you can learn from and imitate Again. In other words, you need a pastor, and a pastor is more than a preacher, more than a teacher, more than a guide. There's someone that knows you and you know them, and something about them is worthy of imitation. That's what our session strives to be Again striving imperfectly, strives to be again striving imperfectly, but we want to be pastors to you. We want to be pastoring not from a distance, but involved in your life, and we want to raise up more and more elders in our church and also just men and women in general who can lead in that kind of way.

Speaker 1: 34:38

The world and the church desperately needs gospel leadership, and gospel leadership is no more than imitating our Lord Jesus. Jesus, after all, was a steward. He came, as he said, not to do his own will, but to do the will of the Father who sent him, giving an account to him alone. And Jesus went to the cross, to the great chagrin of his disciples. Thank God, he disappointed many people in order to do what his father had called him to do, but it was for our own good. And Jesus paid a costly price. Leadership for him was costly. He put in more work for the kingdom than anyone ever has or ever will, and His reward was not earthly gain, but His reward was accomplishing the salvation of many.

Speaker 1: 35:27

And finally, Jesus' leadership is not from a distance, it's up close and personal.

Speaker 1: 35:31

He doesn't just minister to us from heaven, but came down from heaven to earth, became as one of us, tabernacled among us in our very flesh, to be as close to us as we could possibly imagine, and is now even closer through the power of his indwelling Holy Spirit.

Speaker 1: 35:53

A servant is not greater than his master, but when the servant is fully formed, it is enough that he would be like his master To.

Speaker 1: 36:00

When the servant is fully formed, it is enough that he would be like his master.

Speaker 1: 36:02

To that end, let us pray Our Father. We pray that you would bless our church with good leaders. We thank you for the leaders that we have and we pray, God, God, that you would help those men and those women who are leading in our church to imitate these things and to follow you, so that others can imitate us in ways that we are imitating you. And we pray, God, that you would raise up more leaders in our own congregation. We pray that you would raise up future officers of our church, elders and deacons, but also leaders of ministry and people that lead and might never have any kind of recognition or title, but they are putting themselves out there for the glory of God and for the sake of the kingdom. Lord, raise up these people. We pray that you would raise up people like that, even amidst our children, that our children would grow up to lead in your kingdom and to lead in a way that imitates the cross. All of this we ask in Jesus' name, Amen.