Resurrection and the Need for Leadership

[HKHaugan]

John 20:19-23 The Resurrection and Leadership
This passage shows how Jesus taught leadership to the disciples on the day He rose from the dead. Reading this passage in the spiritual perspective He intended follow the outline and see if this isn't the way we should approach every meeting, every committee and prayer group gathering and every worship service.

What is the context and what parallels do we see for us? What is 'evening' 'the first day of the week' 'the locked doors' what do they mean to us now? Let's take a look:

Vs.19.
Evening—darkness, fear, anxiety, giants
First day of the week---It is always the first day of the week after a significant event that demands a new response.
Disciples were together---what do we do now?
With the doors locked---what are the doors we have locked that we bring into this meeting? Pains and hurts and expectations of past events in our lives, in the Body and those facing us, shape us. Face the facts of the strongholds we have built that cause us to think and act the way we do.
For fear of the Jews—this is the main context in which they are meeting,---fear.
Who are the Jews? The imaginary giants we place before us because of our human experience of the world.

Into this atmosphere, this context, Jesus appears. He appears at this moment, the right moment, their conscious moment of self in fear, with a purpose.
First, to get them to shift their consciousness from self to Him
Second, to bring them peace
Third, to make them aware that He is always with them when they are together.

So the He says, “Peace be with you.”

Vs.20
He shows them His hands and His side. Jesus has an agenda. It is part of His mission and will continue in His ministry, the agenda of personal peace and shared personal peace. Let’s look at why.

Jesus demonstrated early on in His ministry that He knew what was in the minds of those around Him. This is an appearance with a purpose. He has anticipated the way humans without Him will act. He has already confronted them knowing fallen human nature.
1. He knows they are operating alone in their five senses, human wisdom and worldly experience.
2. He knows their aloneness is vulnerable to sin and its two companions, fear and pride.
3. He knows that they will begin the process of turning on each other, shifting to the aloneness strategies of blame, self-justification and rationalization (inherited from Adam in Gen.3). He wants ‘to nip in the bud’ what He knows will happen without His intervention.
4. He knows that they will try to assert their personal fear driven agenda. Who is number one? The result is a reversion to the ‘survival of the fittest.’ The strongest voices win. We might not say it but we think it. ‘This is the way it ought to be done.’ ‘’What’s wrong with these people, are they stupid?’ ‘I’m gonna get this done the right way. I don’t need them to get what I know needs doing. I’ll do it my way.’
Jesus knows these reactions, anticipates them and appears and speaks to them before they can take root.
His appearance causes them to react with joy. They have forgotten themselves in His moment of revelation.

Vs.21
So Jesus again says, “Peace be with you” and adds “As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” An immediate commission, consecration and affirmation. It is sealed with His breath.

Vs.22
He breathes the Holy Spirit on them because something new has to happen. They have to forget where they have been and move into the present and future with Him in mind. The most important thing to prepare for every meeting from now on is to know the presence of the Holy Spirit who brings Jesus into their midst. It is Jesus’ forgiveness, His Cross that brought it and the need to operate in the atmosphere of forgiveness whenever they are together.

This is not Pentecost. This is a special anointing for forgiveness. They can no longer look at each other the way they did before. They have to see each other as God sees them, images of God who need to grow in faith and love with each other. Only as they can see each other as forgiven by Jesus will they be able to operate as church leaders.

So “Receive the Holy Spirit, If you forgive anyone his sins, they are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.” It simply means this. Unity in Jesus brings unity in the Spirit. Unity from the Spirit opens the door to God’s specific will for where we are. This is not unanimity but unity in the Spirit. If you don’t keep short accounts, but come into any meeting with preconceived ideas about what should be done, about the other people you work with and personal expectations, that will bind up what the Lord wants done. We have to repent and seek forgiveness before we start any gathering, before we speak and before we move to action. It’s true in worship, in discipleship, ministry and mission.

Paul says it like this, “I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another in what you say and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly united in mind and thought (1Cor.1:10).”