Now here we go again with that upside down kingdom. Give to receive, serve to lead, die to yourself to live the abundant life.... Sometimes it can get a little confusing.

 

As we look at what was going on here, we see that the apostles, Jesus disciples, were having power struggles. You have power struggles everywhere there are people. even if there is just one person, that person will have power struggles within themselves. You have power struggles in the work place, You have power struggles in the home. You have power struggles in the church, boy do you power struggles in the church..... Not my church...OH NO!!!!! it is just all the other churches.... right? Right!!!!!!

 

The fact is we all desire to be recognized and accomplish some good things. The thing that we get confused, is in how to be a good leader. A good leader does not sit on his throne all day and get fed bon-bons. A good leader leads. and the only way to lead is to be out front.

 

We have been created to do great things. look real quickly with me in the book of Ephesians and re-discover some purpose in your life.

 

 

(Ephesians  2:8-9 KJV) For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.

 

OK you should know those two verses, so you know that it is not the things that you do that you should be boasting about, but the next verse tell us that it is the things that you do, that you have been created for:

 

 

We have been created by God unto... or For the purpose of doing  great things that God had planned for us from the foundations of the Earth. Now, here I want to take a little bunny trail about the difference between predestination and pre-ordained. You have a choice. God has got great plans for you but you can choose to walk in them or not. God has given you unlimited potential, you can use it or not. God has planted in you the seeds of greatness, you can chose to let that greatness grow up in you or not. Even Jesus was given the choice. He was predestined from the foundations of the earth to die upon that cross for our sins, but in that garden before he was taken, and even while He was upon that cross, he could have chosen not to drink from that cup. You are given new opportunities every day. Every day you get to choose to lead or to follow. You get to chose to bring God glory or to sit in darkness. You get to chose to fulfill the call that God has placed upon your life, and in so doing, experience the blessing and the abundant life that He has prepared for you, or to sit and complain about how you  were never given a break. OUCH!!!! that is enough of that painful little bunny trail... let's get back to learning how to lead by serving....

 

OK, So we have learned that we have been created to do great thing. We have been called to be great and Jesus tells us that if we want to be great then we have to serve. Now, for that model of S.E.R.V.E.

 

Every letter is going to stand for a different aspect of leadership and service. As we learn how to better serve we will become better leaders.

 

The first letter is "S" it stands for:

 

 See the future: We each need to have vision of where we are going and where we want to go. You have to have goals and set benchmarks for success. If you do not aim for anything will will hit nothing. The Bible tells us that without vision the people scatter. If you want to accomplish anything in your life you have to set that goal in front of you. Get a vision of what God desires for you. When it says "see the future," don't just get some pie in the sky idea, but actually see yourself doing it, accomplishing it. Sometimes you have to visualize yourself successful in order for you to become successful. We too often concentrate on the mistakes we have made in the past and not enough on the potential success that awaits us in the future. It is good to look at your failures to learn from them but don't make your failures your model. See yourself as the success that God created you to become. Get a vision and develop a plan on how to get there.

 

The next letter in the SERVE model is the E

 

Engage and develop others. You can not make yourself the center of the universe. The more you put others above you the higher you will grow. When you start to focus your life outside yourself and decide to try to help someone else out, you discover abilities and talents that you never knew you had. Jesus taught this over and over agian. If you want to lead then help someone grow. Zig Zigler, the great sales motivator said "If you help enough people get what they want, you will have what ever you want." Or something like that.... The idea is to lift up others. It really is all about helping your neighbor. Get other people excited about the plans that God has for their lives. Get people engaged, not necessarily in your plan, but in helping them discover their own vision.

 

OK, now the third letter is  R. this one might be a little hard for some of us.

 

Reinvent constantly. That means change. Change can be real hard for some of us. But if you want to do things better you are going to have to do them differently. You have to be different to be better. Do not be satisfied with the status quo. So wheater we are talking about your health, or your finances or your relationships you have to constantly examine what you are doing and find a better way of doing it. Do you remember the Japanese word that I taught you which means constant and continual improvement. the word is KIEZEN. In order for you to get from here, to where you want to go, you are going to have to constantly evaluate where you are, and see what you have to stop doing that is keeping you back, and discover what you have to start doing to get you to go forward. The important thing is to go forward.

 

Now for the "V."

 

Value results and relationships. Sometimes when we get wrapped up in our own agenda and set out eyes upon the prize of a given project we forget the people helping us get there and instead of walking with them along this path of success we end up stepping on other people's toes or even worse walk on others backs to get where we want to go. All that is going to do is to give us a harder fall from the top of the house of cards that we built for ourselves. We need to value both the results of our efforts and the relationships that we build while getting there.

 

I have to take another little bunny trail here because relationships are so important to where you are going in life. The point I want to make here is made clear by the fact that you are who you hang out with. Show me your friends and I will show you your future. Sometimes we have to evaluate our relationships. We are constantly building and cutting ties with people. Sometimes God brings us divine appointments with people that we can help along this journey of life and that can help us and at other times the enemy will put people in our path that are there to trip us up and trip us up and trip us up. Sometimes you have to make the hard call and cut some ties. Too often cutting those ties that we know are holding us down become harder than making new ties that will lift us up. The Bible is clear that we need to shake the dust off our feet of those negative influences in our lives.... And you know exactly who they are!

 

Enough said.

 

The important thing hear is to value good relationships and build good relationships with good people. Do not find yourself unequally yoked with people who are dragging you further and further away from God and your purpose in life of bringing Him glory. Value results, Value relationships.