This is a series on 11 Leadership Lessons from 12 Disciples, based on the recent sermon Jesus Calls the Twelve, on Luke 6:12-16.
Lesson #9: Hurt before fruit
Who's on Jesus' team? Who's the last guy listed? Judas. That one hurt. Do you think it hurt Jesus? Years feeding this guy, loving this guy, training this guy, praying for this guy, investing in this guy. This guy betrays you with a kiss for thirty pieces of silver so you can get murdered. That hurts. Do you think it hurt the disciples? "Judas? We thought he was our friend. He was in our community group with Jesus. He murdered Jesus." Imagine somebody in your community group murders the leader of your community group. Does that affect the community group? Yeah. What in the world? It hurt. You think the disciples had some late-night conversations, "What happened with Judas? What happened? I mean, what, he was stealing money from our ministry the whole time? The guy was a con man? He didn't even love Jesus, are you serious?" It hurt.
You think it hurt the followers? You think for a while there were rumblings? "Maybe Judas is the bold one. Maybe Judas is the courageous one. Maybe Judas is like the Old Testament prophets, and he's up against Jesus and the disciples because they're wrong." Religious people are already criticizing Jesus. Do you think they love Judas? "Yeah Judas, throw some rocks at him. We don't like him either." I'm not glad that he hung himself, but it did simplify things. Had Judas not hung himself, he might have started his own ministry, his own church, competed with the disciples. We could have had war. We could have had war. I'm so glad he didn't plant a church, start a ministry, just go do somewhere else what he was doing with Jesus.
God uses evil for good.
See, there are sheep, there are shepherds, there are wolves, and some lead as shepherds, others lead as wolves. Judas was a wolf. It hurt. But in the providence of God and the sovereignty of God, God used it for good.
Read the rest here.
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