Mt 4:19 Then He said to them, "Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men."

We just saw that Christians who obey Jesus have a different perspective of Him than Christians who do not obey him. And here we see that if you are an obedient Christian, you will be a soul-winner.

Many Christians believe that greatness is achieved in the Christian life by becoming a ruler. They seek Christian office without ever making the sacrifices that soul-winners make. They won't spread God's Word, do menial tasks, or take sides against wrong.

Soul-winners, on the other hand, have a special manifestation from God, and they see greatness in terms of SERVICE. The Gospel being spread, souls being saved, the Word being taught, etc., are marks of success to them. Some time ago, we saw that conflicts betwen these two groups of Christians are inevitable; now we see that the Christians who seek to rule often are lacking in spiritual maturity.

Who Actually Loves Jesus?

John 14:21 "He who has My commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves Me."

Unlike his brothers, Joseph obeyed his father. While Jacob favored him because he was the son of his old age, Joseph's conduct was a factor in continuing that love. The Christians who love Jesus the most aren't the ones who shout the most, arent't the ones who criticize the most, and aren't even the ones who read the Bible the most. The ones who OBEY are the ones who love Jesus the most.

Jesus continued in John 14:21 "And he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and manifest Myself to him." These Christians have a different viewpoint of Jesus than other Christians have. They place Him in a different position in their lives, and they re-act to Him differently, because they know more about Him.

This relationship with their father made Jacob's other ten sons jealous, and it sometimes makes Christians jealous as well.

Joseph

"...and Joseph brought a bad report of them to his father." Gen 37:2

If you remember the idea of this blog, I'm trying to help people who have been hurt by churches or other Christians. Joseph was definitely a man who had been hurt by God's people. Let's take a look at what happened and why.

First, Joseph, unlike Jacob, had lived a Godly life. He told the truth when God's people were doing wrong (bringing his father the truth about his brothers).

Second, Joseph's brothers could see that their Father loved Joseph more than them. In John 14:21, Jesus said "He who has My commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves Me. And he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and manifest Myself to him."

It was a self-feeding system: Joseph loved his father more than they did, and their father loved Joseph more than he loved them. You, personally, can get into a system like that, but you might have God's people turn hostile to you if you do.

To be continued...

The Wrong Leader

Ge 31:43 ¶ And Laban answered and said to Jacob...what can I do this day to these my daughters or to their children whom they have borne?

Laban organized his brethren and pursued Jacob for seven days. He was the leader, and people who followed him might have received leadership positions in his "posse." But Laban, after all the bluster and effort, accomplished nothing.

He didn't get his daughters back. He didn't get his grandchildren back. Of all the blesings that God gave Jacob, Laban got none of it back. He didn't even get his household gods back, and God didn't even want Jacob to have them in the first place.

Brethren, DON'T follow leaders who aren't being blessed by God!

Following Laban

Ge 33:4 But Esau ran to meet him, and embraced him, and fell on his neck and kissed him, and they wept.

More people chose to follow Laban than to follow Jacob. But the ones who followed Laban got hurt, losing much of their wealth, while the ones who followed Jacob did well. Why?

There is more than one reason, but here's an important one: Jacob tried to undo the wrongs he had done. Laban never went back to Jacob to ask forgiveness for cheating him. But Jacob, although frightened, risked his life to ask Esau's forgiveness.

I have never heard of a church or a Christian school or Christian college going to someone they had wronged and asking forgiveness. Many "has-been" Christian institutions have been declining for decades, without ever trying to correct the wrongs they have done to former employees. And, in my opinion, it is better for Christians to stay away from those institutions.

But Jacob wasn't like that. He wasn't perfect, but he grew enough that he wanted to right his wrongs.

The Good Thing About Laban

Ge 31:42 "Unless the God of my father, the God of Abraham and the Fear of Isaac, had been with me, surely now you would have sent me away empty-handed..."

Laban was a leader who was not being used or blessed by God. Motivated by a desire to control the blessings tht God had given Jacob, Laban pursued Jacob. But with victory in sight, God forbad Laban to harm Jacob.

Laban was afraid to wrongly harm a servant of God. When I taught Christian school, I would see parents with money get teachers fired for making their children behave. The school would often wait until the end of the school year to tell the teacher he or she was not coming back next year, cutting the teacher off with no support.

And I saw three other things. In every case I know of, with no exceptions, the teachers did all right. And the Christian schools, for a variety of reasons, eventually shut down. And the church went through a downward spiral that lasted for years.

No exceptions.

Being a Leader?

Ge 31:22 And Laban was told on the third day that Jacob had fled.
23 Then he took his brethren with him and pursued him for seven days' journey, and he overtook him in the mountains of Gilead.

Laban was a leader. In his conflict with Jacob, Laban was able to get his brethren to take his side. Jacob, meanwhile, couldn't get any of his brethren (except for his wives and children) to side with him.

Yes, Laban was a leader. But God wasn't blessing him. His success as a leader was partly the result of his ability to inspire jealousy of Jacob and partly the result of his ability to exploit greed.

In fact, there is only one good thing that can be said about Laban as a leader...