How to Identify a Leader Worth Following

If you got your Bibles, you can open up to First Corinthians chapter number 10, the very, very end of First Corinthians. Chapter number 10, in the very, very beginning of First Corinthians. Chapter number 11, how to identify a leader worth following. How do we find that leader that's worth following? We're going to follow the leader. We want to follow a leader who's worth following. Am I right? You ever followed somebody and you realize that they were lost. Nothing more annoying than that. You ever had somebody sitting in your car shotgun supposed to be giving you directions, they're giving you the lead that you're following, only to realize that they're not, in fact, looking at the map. They're actually searching social media.How to identify a leader worth following, Jesus, the apostle Paul says this, there's kind of a little bit of a thing going on in the Corinthian church. These believers are, they're new ish. They are familiar ish with Jesus, but not fully and truly. There's some dispute over what they should eat, when they should eat, how they should eat, it there. There's some dispute in worship, this that the other. And so they're like, we just want to know. And so Paul addresses them. He says, Hey, here's what I do. I try to please everything, everyone and everything that I do. Come on somebody say, Please, everyone and everything I do. This word please means to accommodate the opinions, desires and interests of others. One of the marks of a leader is that they're not just trying to do their own thing and say, hey, well, this is, this is this is what I do. Shut up and do it. They try to consider, hey, what's going on in your world? How can I accommodate your background? How can I accommodate the place where you've come from? How can I help you? How can I gain some understanding so that together, we can understand one another and move forward, as Christ has called us to move forward. I've been around a lot of guys over the years who well, this is just what I say. So you do it. This is why we encourage you to bring your own Bible, to read your own Bible, to get in your own Bible, God forbid anything is ever preached or taught that is not rooted in Scripture. This is why we read through the Bible every single year, because I don't want you to just take what I'm saying to the bank. I want you to take what I'm saying to the Lord and say, God, what are you doing in me through this word. Y'all hear what I'm saying. And I love that about Paul. He says, Hey, listen, listen, listen, it's my aim to please everyone in everything that I do. I'm not trying to offend you or go against you, but what I am trying to do is show you the truth of God's Word. Sometimes that will be offensive, but what I'm going to do is I'm going to build relationship with you, and that's the beauty of this portion of Scripture. What had happened was Paul, and we'll get there in just a minute. Well, let's read. I don't just do what's best for me. I do what's best for others so that many may be saved. See, I can remember when we first moved here, the style of church that we did was long church. We did long church, long church. We would do praise and worship for an hour 15. We would preach for 45 minutes, an hour, maybe an hour 15. You know what I'm saying? And people would, you know, leave church, and they'd be like, Oh, Pastor, that was the most glorious thing in the world. But what we realized was that there was only 14 of us in church, everybody. So we were like, Okay, what do we do here? And so when the Lord moved us here, he said, Hey, here's what you're going to do. You're not going to do church for three hours. You're actually going to do three services in three hours. And we were like, what? And so here I am being accused of some old friends that I don't even do church. I'm not even saved anymore. And then we got some folks around here. That are like, whoa. These guys are the devil. They got y'all lifting your hands. They got y'all praying, well, don't go to that church. They're crazy. You know what I'm saying. So I find myself stuck, but so that many can be saved. Did y'all know that? Did y'all know that 440 people made commitments to follow Jesus at Mercy? City locations this year? Isn't that exciting? Isn't that exciting? And that's not I know, you know, a lot of churches be like, hey, raise your hand. We don't do the whole raise your hand thing. What we do is we only count people who have gone to our connections table. So if we can't, if we can't help them in the next step of discipleship, then we don't count that as a salvation. We count that as a seed that we're going to continue praying over. You hear what I'm saying. So we want to know names so that we can point people to next steps. Many may be saved, and you should imitate me. Paul says, Just as I imitate Christ. I love this about Paul, because some people are like mom, and this guy is an arrogant fool. But what he did was he laid down his life. He chose, he aimed to please everyone and everything that he did so that, so that he could build relationship in such a way that he could say, Hey, you follow me as I follow Jesus. I'm not going to put you off in such a way that you can't follow Jesus if you see me, do you hear what I'm saying? And so I might say some things that offend you or defend your flesh, but what I'm going to do is commit to relationships so that even though you might be offended by in the flesh, you can still follow me as I follow Jesus. You can imitate me as I imitate Christ. Isn't that great? I love that I love, that I love that I think that we could all stand to identify a leader, that we could, that we could, that we could follow, not the person in the passenger seat on the GPS. Was supposed to be on the GPS, but they're on the social medias playing on the little thing. So how do we identify a leader? Y'all want to know five things, five things, five H's, in fact, in identifying a leader, we're following, because every leader is not worth following. Can I just tell you that not every leader is worth following. Just because you got a position, just because you have a title, doesn't make you worth following. It doesn't make them worth following. Look at this pastor or a smile on my face. Some of y'all are following leaders because they got a nice YouTube channel, but they don't ever. They don't actually lead anything. You got a little Instagram guy that you follow. Can I? Can I tell you something, we don't need to be following the guy that can put our physical body in tip top shape if they can't even keep their marriages together, y'all hear what I'm saying, why not find somebody that keeps their marriage together and can honor like, you see what I'm saying. Like, let's, let's look beyond just, hey man, this guy will help you earn a million dollars this year or gain 10,000 followers this month. But brother, don't even know the name of his kids. What are we doing? Let's find some leaders worth following. There are five things Y'all ready for em. Look at your neighbor and tell em, I'm ready for em. I'm ready for him. Number one, humility. Humility. I think at the forefront of every leader we're looking at, you gotta be humble. You gotta be humble. And can I just challenge your thought on humility after I give you this scripture, James, chapter four, verse number six, says this. He gives grace generously, as the scripture says to the humble, but he opposes the proud. God opposes the proud, but he gives grace to the humble. Humility in success and in failure. You ever? You ever seen the guy get interviewed, and they just won the big game, and they're like, Oh, glory to God. Glory to God. Man, I love it. Just want to stop and thank my savior, Jesus Christ. He's humble in success, but then what does he do in failure? See, I think failure is the true indicator of whether or not somebody operates in humility. Because what happens is, when we fail, we want to take it. On ourselves. But if we take failure on ourselves, and what we're truly doing with success is taking it on ourselves, we might, in words, say, hey, praise God. Want to thank my Lord, Jesus Christ, but in failure, what are you doing? I'll just take the whole thing on me. That's that's on me. I take ownership of that. Well, if you own the bad, then ultimately, my friend, you're going to own the good. And that's not humility. Humility is not is it's not giving God glory in the good and not the bad, or giving God the glory in the bad and not the good. Humility is giving God the glory in all things and all things. First, I love Paul said, Hey, follow me, but follow me as I follow Jesus. He didn't say, Follow me as I do my thing. He said, Follow me as I follow Jesus. Right? What's he doing? He's giving glory to God in all things, don't follow me. And my strategy, follow me as I follow Jesus. Don't follow me. And my wisdom. Follow me as I follow Jesus. Don't follow me and follow my skill. Follow me as I follow Jesus. Humility is not thinking less of yourself like our culture tends to think people, oh, well, he's just a humble guy. He's a humble guy. Oh, you know, hey, no, it's not me, brother. It's not it's not me. Hallelujah. Oh, God, no, that puts the focus on you first. Humility puts the focus on God first. It's not thinking less of myself, it's thinking of myself less I think of myself next after Jesus. Thank God, thank God that he's given me this giftedness and this ability to lead. It's okay for you to be bold and confident in your ability, the skill set that God has given you. Please be bold in that. Please step up and use that. The giftedness, the wisdom that he's given you. Please use that. Please be bold in that. Just start the business. Please be bold in that to put on the field. Please be bold in that, please, please be bold in that. No, it's not me. No, no, no, God has given you that gift. Just give God the glory first. That's what humility is. We're looking for humility in our leaders, we're looking for humility. The second thing that we're looking for is honesty. Somebody say honesty. Second Timothy 215 says this, work hard so you can present yourself to God and receive His approval. Who whose approval God's approval? Be a good worker, one who does not need to be ashamed, and who correctly explains the word of truth avoid worthless, foolish talk that only leads to more godless behavior. One of the key, one of the key indicators that you're not operating in honesty is by listening to the way that you speak or the things that you'll listen to. If it's worthless, godless talk, then honesty is escaping you, my friend, honesty is escaping us. When I'm looking for a leader, I'm looking for someone who can present themselves to God honestly, there's no shame and nothing hidden. Can I tell you what our culture calls that? You know what our culture in the Church calls that kind of honesty where there's no shame. They call it arrogance. But can I tell you what it is? It's honesty. When you're able to come boldly, the Bible says in the book of Hebrews, to come boldly before the throne of God. How can you come boldly? Well, when there's nothing hidden, I have to pretend I'm falsely humble if I'm trying to hide things, and it's in it's an act that I put on. Come on, man, we're looking for leaders that are humble. We're looking for leaders that are honest. We're looking for leaders that can be unashamed. They can explain the word of truth, because the truth is, in them, a leader who doesn't waste time with the foolish pursuit of doctrines, teachings or ideologies that are counter or extra biblical leaders who are worth following know that Jesus is the truth, the way in the Life, and anything else is just a vain pursuit. It's simply foolish talk and ideas leading people in confusion and ultimate deception. Come on, man, can I tell you something somebody's following you don't lead them into confusion or deception. You. Let's stick to the Word of God and the Word of God alone. That's it. Nothing more, nothing less, just the word of God. The third thing is this. The third H is this, when we're looking for a leader, we're looking for somebody who's hopeful, somebody who points us to hope. You ever been around a leader that's just gloom and doom all the time, like dog, God, man, what do I have to look forward to? You don't like life. I don't know if I want to follow you. You hate being married. Do I want to follow you? See what I'm saying? Come on, man, we're looking for leaders who are full of hope. I'm not talking about leaders who are lying. I'm talking about leaders who are full of hope. I'm talking about leaders who are going through the mess, but and they're willing to share it. But to also point you to the person of Jesus and the power of God. I love what the psalmist writes, why am I discouraged? Why is my heart so sad? Nevertheless, here I am. Imma put my hope in God. I'll praise him again, my Savior and my God, come on, all of us go through stuff, and all of us need to be honest about the stuff that we go through, but we don't need to stay in the stuff that we've gone through. We need to let the we need to let the stuff not define who we are. We need to let it shape who we are. We need to let the word of God define who we are. Does that make sense? Come on, you've been through tough times. I've been through tough times. I don't need you to gloss over and pretend like it didn't happen. Let's talk about it. But now point me to the hope that you found in Jesus, the healing that you found in Jesus. Would you infuse some hope in me that way? I'm looking for a leader that'll bring hope. I'm looking for somebody who's hopeful. I think it's impossible for us to truly be hopeful, if we're not honest. Had leaders in the past that I didn't think struggled with anything. I thought it was like God and then my pastor, you know what I'm saying, and all the while, all the stuff in my life is playing through my mind as I'm sitting at church, and I'm thinking, this, brother's perfect. How am I supposed to do that? You can't  some of us as parents, our children, think that we're perfect. Come on, everybody. We gotta let them in our world. We gotta share with them our shortcomings, our fears, our faults. Why? Because we deliver hope to them in our honesty. I'm not saying let's stay down in the dumps together. I'm saying, let's look to Jesus together. There's hope for a future. We're looking for leaders that are that are hopeful. The next thing that we're looking for is we're looking for leaders who are honorable, somebody say honorable. So we're looking for leaders who are humble, who are honest, who are hopeful and who are honorable. James, chapter three, verse 13, says this, if you're wise and understand God's ways, prove it by living an honorable life. You Are you wise? I like to think that I'm wise. Well, prove it by the way that you live, doing good works with humility that comes from wisdom. One of the prayers I pray every day is, God, give me wisdom. Give me wisdom to remain where you brought me. I didn't earn this. I don't deserve it, but God, you chose it. Sometimes I wonder why, and then there are other times where I think, so that people can see a misfit, failure, dirty, rotten scoundrel who should have been and was counted out by everybody, but you redeemed. You took out of the pit, and you set his feet on solid ground. If he can do it for me, he can do it for you, maybe, just maybe, God, that's why you chose and so let's keep moving forward honorable life. We're looking for leaders who have matching character meaning this, they're the same on the public platform as they are in their private living room. Y'all hear what I'm saying. It's not a lot of difference. It's not a lot of difference. The only thing that you're going to get from me different is there's a little bit more I've run through a message a couple of times. I'm typically going to say the same things that I'll say at home or in the office, and I think that's how we should be. I don't think it does anybody any favors to have a mismatching life. You. I'm grateful to God to be on this journey. I'm grateful to God to be here, but I'm also really grateful to God that I'm not the only ones called to lead honorable life matching character. I heard a preacher say way, way, way, way. At the beginning of my faith journey, he said, the real you is who you are when nobody can see you. The real you, the real real you, isn't you right now, the real you is who you are. The real you is what you think when you're not talking to anybody else, what you would say when it's that's the real you. So I can remember that day, man, I just said, God, I want to be I want to be more aligned within myself, because my thoughts used to just beat the tar out of me. That's why we do things like the 40 days to enjoy filled life together. Some of y'all stopped me even this morning and said, Man, this 40 days is really beating me up in the best way possible. And I'm telling you, I remember the first time going through it. It rocked my world. Some days would be like a gut punch from heaven. Other days, I didn't feel like I got a thing, because my thought process wasn't even to that point yet where I could receive but slowly and surely, God just transformed my life. Why? Because he was trying to make somebody who could be honorable, whose life was not separate. The fifth and final thing is honoring, honorable and honoring. Are they the same thing? No, they're they're different things. Because here's the reality, you can't truly know if somebody is honorable. You can look at them from the outside and think, Well, maybe they're honorable. He owns, he owns a business. He's getting straight A's. They're, you know, they're doing really good. Got a great marriage. It seems like they must be honorable, but you can never really know if somebody's honorable until you identify. Are they honoring? Come on, you following a leader. How do they interact with their spouse? Do they honor their spouse? How do they interact with their kids? Do they honor their kids? I can remember over the years watching somebody preach on a stage, and for whatever reason God just led me to look over at their wife, and if I could tell that the wife didn't have any honor for the husband, I was just like, I gotta be careful. Here. I gotta be careful. The Bible says this in Romans, 13, seven Part B says, Give respect and honor to those who are in authority. Everybody would say, Duh, yeah, everybody can honor those who are in authority. We got officer Kenny here in his uniform today. We're going to give him honor, the honor that is due to Him, the respect that is due. Of course, we are that's easy. That's easy money, right? For most of us, but here's what's difficult. Proverbs, 31 this verse changed my life. Speak up for those who can't speak for themselves. Ensure justice for those being crushed. Yes, speak up for the poor and the helpless and see that they guide get, see that they get justice. So here's the thing, everybody can honor people that we're supposed to honor, but what about the people that can't do anything for us? Do? Do we honor them like when you're when you're identifying a leader to follow? I think this is one of the things we need to look at. How do they treat people? How do they interact with people that can't do anything for them? Course, we honor people. You scratch my back. The whole thing I'm scratching you scratch. What about somebody who can't do anything for you? What about somebody who's not going to be your largest customer. What about somebody who's not going to get you ahead and help make next steps for you and your career path? What about those people that can't do anything for you? How do you treat them? An indicator for me, whenever I go out to eat with somebody, I look at how we treat the waitress. How do you treat the waitress? Do you learn their name? Do you call them by name? Do you smile? Do you look up? Do you break conversation, or you just look past them? That's a big deal for me. You know, what else is a big deal for me. It's a big deal for me. How somebody would treat my kids. Do. I can't follow a leader who wouldn't honor my kids. My kids can't do anything for them. Sometimes I'll make a phone call and people jump to do something because it's easy to honor what you're supposed to honor. But what about when my staff calls you see an email come through from pastor and it's like, Oh, I better respond. But what about the nursery leader? Somebody who can't do anything for you? Necessarily. We're looking for the four, the four five H's. 5h of finding a leader we're following humble, honest, hopeful, honorable and honoring. And you might be asking, Well, Pastor Matt, where in the world do we find a leader like that? Can I tell you the truth? You don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't find a leader like that. Leaders like that are made. They're cultivated. They don't fall out of the sky. These types of leaders are developed through passion, through pursuit, through painful experiences of failure, and through personal relationship with Jesus. And you might be wondering, Well, Pastor, Matt, how am I supposed to know who to follow then? And I'm I apologize if I led you astray. I'm not trying to challenge you to follow anybody. I'm trying to challenge you to see if you're worth following. Do you live a life that's worth following? Could you look at somebody because whether you like it or not, somebody's following you, whether you admit it or not, the youngest in the room to the oldest room, somebody's following you. Can you look at them and say, Hey, follow me as I follow Christ. And do you display those five characteristics of what we would look for in somebody to follow. So  let me ask you this question. Everybody, this message isn't about me, this message is about you. What if somebody starts talking about your honesty. What if somebody starts talking about your level of hopeful delivery? What? What if somebody talks about you being honorable or not, would somebody's personal experience with you trump the lies that they're believing or that are being spewed? Can you, my friend, follow Jesus in a way that you can turn to somebody and say, Follow me as I follow Jesus. Come on say to your kids, your teammates, your co workers, hey, you follow me as I follow Jesus. You follow me as I follow Jesus. I come on. Would you close your eyes with me this morning, you said, Pastor, Matt, that's me. I want to improve on those five H's. I want to be somebody who says, Follow me as a follow Jesus. I want to be so closely walking with Jesus that I can easily turn and say, Follow me as a follow Jesus. If that's you, would you just lift your hand just high enough so I can see it, just high enough to say, You know what? That's me. We're going to follow the leader. I just want to pray for you, father. Thank you for every hand that's lifted. Thank you for every heart that is open. Thank you for every life that is stirred. Oh God, this is not about us. This is about you, and this is about the many who might be saved as we follow you. So stir our hearts, God, draw us in to be the people of character, the people of integrity, the people of life, the people of peace, oh God, that no matter what the enemy might bring our way, somebody's personal encounter with us would say, No, I've seen Jesus, and I'll continue to pursue Jesus. It's in your powerful and matchless name Jesus, we pray. Amen. Amen.