13 Then they brought little children to Him, that He might touch them; but the disciples rebuked those who brought them.
14 But when Jesus saw it, He was greatly displeased and said to them, “Let the little children come to Me, and do not forbid them; for of such is the kingdom of God.
15 Assuredly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will by no means enter it.”
16 And He took them up in His arms, laid His hands on them, and blessed them.

Jesus told us that to get into Heaven, we must be childlike in our faith.  Some people will call that naive but that is not the point Jesus is making.

Erwin starts off by saying a child is nonthreatening.  Nobody is intimidated by a child and that is how we are to live as Christians.  It is not our calling to threaten people into accepting God, though so many Christians resort to this.  It is easy to do because it is the way of the world.  When you can’t convince by reason, it is nearly automatic to use force. Jesus never did this.  Even though He created the world and could have destroyed all of His foes in an instant, Jesus never used violence to force people to follow Him.  With the one exception we see where He drove out the merchants in the temple courtyard, Jesus did not use aggression, even when He was falsely accused, severely beaten, and unjustly crucified.

The next point Erwin makes is that children are not good at deceiving. This is quite obvious when you play hide and go seek with a little one.  They will go hide and then 2 seconds into the seeking, they will say, “Don’t look in the closet, I’m not in there!”  Children are also very open with their emotions.  When they are happy or sad or angry or hungry or tired, you know it.  Adults become very good at putting on a face.  They may be very angry and bitter but put on a happy face as though nothing is wrong.  Adults become very good at lying to or manipulating others to achieve an agenda.

The final point Erwin makes is that childrent are innocent. Children were not under the command of the law until a certain age of accountability. The idea that Jesus is making here is that we are innocent when we accept the forgiveness through Christ.  This is hard to accept for Christians because we have a hard time forgetting our sins.  We may say that we are forgiven and believe it in our minds but we constantly beat ourselves up over repented sins. We must truly accept our innocence once we receive God’s forgiveness through the blood of Christ.  That does not mean we can keep living in sin because God has forgiven us but we must accept that forgiveness, turn away from sin and live for God.

Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven

As Erwin goes on to explain, most people have such a huge misunderstanding of humility.  We believe that humility is telling people how bad you are, how little you know, how much better other people are than you.  That is self-pity at worst and false-humility at worst.

Jesus gave the perfect example of humility, which Erwin defines as simply seeing ourselves as we actually are, nothing more and nothing less.  It is being honest with ourselves and with others about who we are and what we can do.

In our warped minds, Jesus could have easily been accused as being full of pride and having a large ego when He said things like, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life” or “if you have seen the Father, you have seen Me for I and the Father are One.”  These are not seemingly humble statements but they are true.  He was not building Himself up, He was merely telling people who He was. There is nothing wrong with declaring out loud who you are.  The problem comes from within when you become prideful.  The difference between pride and humility is in the heart.

If Tiger Woods said in an interview that he was the best golfer in the world, would that be inaccurate?  It moves from humility (being honest about yourself) to pride when he starts believing that being the best golfer in the world makes him more valuable as a human being and that other people should start treating him special.

The value of humility and being honest about yourself is that you have nothing to hide from people.  Jesus was accused of many things but never had to fear those accusations because He was innocent of any wrongdoing.  He had no skeletons in the closet, he had no past that could be used against Him by His enemies.

Contrast that to our politicians in America today.  They stand before us declaring themselves as our servants who have given up their private lives to work for us.  They tell us that they do it in all humility to make a difference in the world.  Then, we hear story after story how they weren’t paying taxes, how they were cheating on their spouses, how they were engaged in scandals to earn enormous amounts of money.

Humility also frees us up in our relationships with others.  When we are honest and open, we don’t have to hide anything and those we associate are not left guessing what we really meant when we spoke.  If we are always open, they can take our words at face value.  Humility frees us from the bondage of always wondering what people are really thinking.

John 3:21 says:

Whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God.

Walking in humility and being open and honest allows us to accurately represent Christ to a dark and sinful world.  When we claim to be Christians but walk as the world walks, they see no reason to change because there is no difference between us and them. Fortunately for us, the Lord can do His work despite our shortcomings.

Jesus didn’t tell people they should be merciful, rather He showed them by being merciful.  I can somewhat relate to this on a smaller scale by my time spent as a math teacher.  I could have just sat at my desk and told the students where to find the information in the book and verbally told them how to do certain problems.  Instead, I tried to model how to do the problems by doing examples.  I demonstrated strategies by using several while they watched.  I had them do practice problems and then showed them how to solve the problem once they tried.  Where my example breaks down is my lack of patience and tendency to get frustrated when they showed no interest in learning.

People learn very quickly when things are modeled to them and this showed in the life of the disciples.  Where I relate more to the relationship Jesus had with the disciples is with my two sons.  They are ages 6 and 4 and they do everything I do.  Even when I don’t want them to learn from me, they are watching every move I make.  I heard someone say one time that our kids are like the Holy Spirit because they reveal our weaknesses to us.  I have found this to be very true.  I will hear my boys make noises of frustration that sound strikingly similar to noises I make when I am working on something around the house that isn’t quite going as planned.  I will hear them say words to each other in tones that I don’t like but realize that they probably get it from me.  Now, not all their habbits they pick up from me are bad but there are enough of them to realize I fall very short of how Jesus did it.  It does make me feel good though when I will hear them share with each other or say something to each other that I tried to model to them.  They are empy slates that right now think I am the coolest person in the world so I have a huge responsibility to help shape them and mold them into the men I believe the Lord wants them to become.

The husband/wife relationship is the same way.  I have found that if I want my wife to act a certain way or do something for me a certain way, telling her usually doesn’t end up well.  It gets me in trouble and ends up causing the opposite effect.  Instead, if there is something I want her to do, I get that result when I act that way myself.  The same is true the other way around.  When she tells me to start acting a certain way it usually doesn’t work because we are humans and are sinful by nature.

Our ultimate goal is to be more like Jesus.  How likely would that be if He would have said, “Be holy because I told you to be Holy.”  Instead He said, “Be holy as I am holy.” and showed us how to live a holy life.  He didn’t say, “Pick up your cross and go that way.” but said, “Pick up your cross and follow after me.”  Everything He did was an example and a demonstration on how we are to live.

Instead, God came down as a baby born in a dirty smelly animal shelter in a little known town amongst chaos as the people were flocking back to be counted in the census.  His grand announcement was to a few shepherds in a field while everybody else was busy being counted.  Jesus grew up and became a common looking man as Isaiah tells us.  He didn’t have any money, He didn’t have a home, He was always hanging out with less than spectacular men and women.  He grew up in a town with a bad reputation and he died a criminals death by hanging on a cross.

The people wanted a great King that they could rally around and overthrow the Romans and surely God in the flesh could do just that.  That wasn’t what Jesus came to do though.  He came to save us all from sin, not to free the Jews from the Romans.  He came to live a life of example of how we ought to live.  He turned the entire world upside down and went against all human nature and how we think things should be done.

The second thing Jesus told the Disciples about how to be great was that they were not to lord over their followers as the rulers of the world do.

Mark 10:42-45
“You know that those who are considered rulers over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you shall be your servant. And whoever of you desires to be first shall be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life ransom for many.”

The world puts the leader at the top but Jesus flipped this.  He told the Disciples that if they want to lead, they must become servants to those they are leading as an example to them on how they should live.  The rulers of the world tell their followers to submit and punish them when they do not.  Jesus told His Disciples to submit and then demonstrated to them how to do so by doing it Himself.  Here was the Creator of all things giving up all He had in Heaven to come down to Earth and wash the feet of fishermen, tax collectors, and zealots.  This is not right according to all we are taught.  The Disciples should have been washing the feet of Jesus.  They should have treated Him with reverence and respect but Jesus turned it around and put the responsibility on the leader.

We see this in the marriage relationship.  Erwin uses this example to discuss how we love the verse, “Wives, submit to your husband as unto the Lord”.  Men love this verse.  They use it to lord over women and say, “Woman, submit, for I am your Lord” but we conveniently forget the rest of the passage.

Ephesians 5:21-25
Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.

Wives, submit to your husband as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her…

While it does tell the wives to submit as to the Lord in everything, the husbands must take a closer look at their roles as “Lord”.  Jesus told the Disciples to rule and lead as a servant.  This changes things quite a bit for the husbands.  The rulers of the world lord over their followers but Christ nurtured the Disciples, He loved them, He taught them, He washed their feet, He lovingly corrected them, and ultimately died for them.  If a husband is doing these things for his wife as Christ did for His Church, the wife has an easy job.  Of course she will want to submit.  When the husband starts demanding respect, telling her what to do, and disregarding her feelings, the wife will rebel and will not want to submit.  The wife’s submission starts with the husband’s ability to serve her and demonstrate submission just as Christ did.

Too many Churches today and too many Christians today want to follow the example of the rulers of the world and take control at the top while telling others how to follow.  Jesus lowered Himself to the bottom and showed others how to lead.

This section discusses the first part of the nature of Jesus and what He tells the disciples they must do to be the greatest in the Kingdom.  Jesus came to serve rather than be served.  This was very strange to the Jews who were looking for the Savior King to come rescue them.  Why would a King come and be a slave to others?  They didn’t realized that the King had a very different purpose for His first coming.  They were looking for the Jesus of the second coming where He would come as a conquering King who ruled over all the Earth.

Erwin discusses a very important distinction between two different types of servanthood: coerced slavery and servanthood by choice.

When you tell people that you are going to work on being a better servant, they usually respond with, “Great, I have a list of things that you can do for me.”  They may try to give you a guilt trip into doing what they want and accuse you of nothing being a good Christian if you say no.

Jesus said no many times to people who asked Him to do things for them.  How could this be if Jesus was supposed to be a servant to all?  Jesus was comfortable enough with Himself to not fall victim to flattery or manipulation.  He had no problem telling someone no when He knew they were trying to coerce Him to or trying to get Him to do something that He knew was not best for them.  Being a servant does not mean having to do anything people ask/tell you to do.

The type of servanthood Jesus tells us to perform involves a choice and it involves doing things for people out of love.  If someone is trying to manipulate you into doing something for them, they are taking away your choice and that is not healthy.  That results in resentment and bitterness.  It is ok to say no to a request.  The key is letting the Holy Spirit guide you in wisdom to do what’s in everyone’s best interest.  Sometimes no is the best answer to someone who is being manipulative because the first thing they need help with is the way they treat others.  If they are allowed to continue in their attempts to manipulate, this negative characteristic is encouraged and they continue in that behavior.   This is not always easy, but doing what is right seldom is.

Erwin ends this section by discussing humility and defines it as having an honest self-image of ourselves.  Jesus had no problem declaring Himself to be THE WAY, THE TRUTH, and THE LIFE.  He declared Himself to be God.  One could say, “That sounds pretty prideful to me!” but is it?  Jesus was and is those things so is it boasting to describe who you are?  Humility does not lift yourself up nor does it tear yourself down but paints an honest picture of who you are to others.

1. Servant
2. Not Lord It Over…
3. Example
4. Humble
5. As a Child
6. As the Younger
7. Last
8. Least
9. No Force
10. No Blind Ambition
11. No Reputation
12. Human
13. Obedient
14. Death

As I read through each of these, I plan on posting my thoughts and understanding of what Gayle Erwin describes as “The Jesus Style”.

I hope you enjoy and get as much out of his book as I have.

We have cartoonized Jesus, God, Satan, Heaven, and Hell so much that Christianity is often not recognized anymore and the true purpose of why Jesus came is not understood.

Last night we started by talking about what it meas to be great and first. The Disciples are seen fighting often over who was the greatest among them. They would bicker and argue like children but quickly shut their mouths when Jesus would ask what they were talking about. He knew but I guess He figured it would be fun to see how they would respond. After asking, He would break into a little mini sermon on what it meant to be great in the Kingdom of God. He told them if you want to be great then you must become a servant, or a slave, to others. Servants exist to make life better for others. This is the exact opposite of human nature. We are told to have high self-esteem. We are told to take care of ourselves first before we can take care of others but Jesus turned that around. We are to be other-centered and have high others-esteem by putting their needs ahead of ours.

True satisfaction comes in others-centered service to others. We often like to act like we are serving others but our attitudes after that “service” gives away our intentions. Often we are upset about something after we help others out because we are expecting something in return.

Jesus was our perfect example of selfless service. He came down to earth, had no home, had no money, was born as a baby in a dirty barn, he grew up in a region that was considered a hick town. The book of Isaiah tells us there was nothing special about His appearance. He lived a perfect life and died one of the most brutal deaths a person could suffer. If He was God, why did He go through all of this? He didn’t have to but He lived as an example for us. He didn’t just tell us to serve others, He showed us how to serve others by becoming a servant. He showed us how to love unconditionally by loving us unconditionally. He had his pick of anyone in the world to make His Disciples and He chose a bunch of uneducated losers who never understood what He was talking about, denied knowing Him, argued over who was the best among the group, betrayed Him, and doubted His promises.

Today we talked about humility. Humility is not a strength of people. Even in our humility, we are often prideful. We look at ourselves and say, “look how humble I am.” Gayle explained that humility is having an honest and accurate view of ourselves and presenting that view of ourselves in an honest open way to others. When we are truly humble and honest, people are not left guessing the intentions of our actions. They can trust us and the relationship can thrive. There is such a huge problem in America now with the breakdown of relationships because we can’t trust anyone.

The entire retreat was narrowed down to one simple thing. If you want to be great, put others ahead of yourselves. Jesus was our perfect example on how to do this.

Ezekiel 28:12-19
Son of man, take up a lamentation upon the king of Tyrus, and say unto him, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Thou sealest up the sum, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty.

Thou hast been in Eden the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold: the workmanship of thy tabrets and of thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created.

Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire.

Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee.

By the multitude of thy merchandise they have filled the midst of thee with violence, and thou hast sinned: therefore I will cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God: and I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire.

Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty, thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness: I will cast thee to the ground, I will lay thee before kings, that they may behold thee.

Thou hast defiled thy sanctuaries by the multitude of thine iniquities, by the iniquity of thy traffic; therefore will I bring forth a fire from the midst of thee, it shall devour thee, and I will bring thee to ashes upon the earth in the sight of all them that behold thee.

All they that know thee among the people shall be astonished at thee: thou shalt be a terror, and never shalt thou be any more.

When you look a little deeper into who the Lord is talking about here it becomes very clear that the King of Tyre is Satan himself. The descriptions do not fit those of a man.

We see that this King was in the garden of Eden. This King was full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. This King was beautiful and is called the anointed cherub.
This King was perfect in his ways from the day he was created.

The only four beings in the Garden of Eden were God, Adam, Eve and Satan. Since this is not the description of a man, that rules out Adam and Eve. It is clearly not God because of the end of verse 19 and the fact that God is giving these words to Ezekiel. That leaves Satan and the object of this proclamation.

This King was perfect and beautiful but then iniquity crept in. What caused this beautiful perfect angelic being to fall. All we have to do is look at verse 17 as well as some more information found in Isaiah 14.

Lucifer’s heart was lifted up because of his beauty and wisdom. In Isaiah 14 we find five things that Lucifer claims he will do. He says that he will:

1) Ascend into heaven
2) Exalt my throne above the stars of God
3) Sit upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north
4) Ascend above the heights of the clouds
5) Be like the most High

Lucifer suffered from over-inflated self-esteem. He esteemed himself higher than god. Self-esteem is nothing more than another name for pride and the Bible tells us in Proverbs 16:18 that pride comes before destruction and in this case, Lucifer’s pride will cause his destruction. Ezekiel 28:19 says at the end that he shall never be any more.

God is not joking when it comes to pride. Lucifer was cast out of heaven and awaits destruction for eternity in Hell because he tried to lift himself higher than God. Eve’s sin is that she disobeyed God’s command to stay away from the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and at of it in order to become more like God.

Our schools, our psychologists, and our leaders are telling us that we must have high self-esteem. We must esteem ourselves in order to be happy but the Bible tells us something quite different. Esteeming ourselves too highly is very dangerous. Rather, Philippians 2:3 says:

Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than themselves.

As Christians, we are not to have high SELF-esteem but high OTHERS-esteem. This is a very difficult thing to do because we are very sinful beings and we all love ourselves. We take joy in tearing others down to make ourselves look better. Much of the destruction and judgment of the Bible comes against people who were prideful and esteemed their own beauty and wisdom above God’s.

America is very guilty of this, myself included. I am always comparing myself to others, especially those that I am better than. That is human nature. We want to lift ourselves up but all that we have comes from the Lord. Apart of Jesus Christ we are losers. Huge wicked sinners deserving of Hell. Because of Him we are made perfect and may enter into eternity in His presence.

While we are to esteem other people higher than ourselves here on earth, ultimately we are to esteem Jesus higher than all. It is through His sacrifice that we may have eternal life. It is through the work that He did that we may stand before the Father in Heaven as perfect and righteous.

The Lord sees you and me as perfect because He sees the work that His son did for us. Our works are nothing. The Bible actually calls our best works filthy rags. There is nothing that we can do to earn our way in Heaven so esteeming ourselves highly is not only sinful, it is meaningless and untrue. On our own, we really have nothing to esteem because we are all sinners who deserve Hell.

The good news, however, is that God did all the good works we need for us. All we must do is allow our old sinful self to die and become reborn in the spirit through Jesus Christ, our loving Savior and God.

Do not be like Lucifer and esteem yourself higher than the Creator of the Universe. As he has shown us, pride does lead to destruction, and that destruction is eternal.