August 21, 2023

Looking Out For the Little Guy

“Truly, truly, I say to you, a slave is not greater than his master, nor is one who is sent greater than the one who sent him. If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.”

John 13:16-17 (NASB)

             I used to work for a supervisor who was a servant-leader. A servant leader is one who looks out for his own first. As a supervisor, he was one of my favorites in all twenty-five years of my service. His name was Sam. He watched the new cases come in each day. He screened all the cases personally, then decided if he was going to assign them. If he saw no reason for further follow-up, he closed the case. It was a stark difference from the last supervisor. My old supervisor assigned every case, without a review. This caused our unit to be overwhelmed by the caseload we all carried. I remember one day (a Friday afternoon), he came into my office and said, “I’ll see you Monday,” “You have field work to do.” I said, “What?” He said, “I’ll see you Monday.” He told us to leave early and start our weekend. This happened periodically too. He knew when we had a hard week. After he left, we got a different supervisor. He was not bad; he just was not Sam. After working for Sam, I would have done anything for him if he asked. This is because he looked out for us, and then himself. He was the boss, but you would never know it.

            “Truly, truly, I say to you, a slave is not greater than his master, nor is one who is sent greater than the one who sent him.” Robertson says, “Jesus here enforces the dignity of service. In Luke 22:27 Jesus argues this point a bit. In Luke 6:40 the contrast is between the pupil and the teacher, though some pupils consider themselves superior to the teacher. In Matt. 10:24 Jesus uses both forms of the saying (pupil and slave).”[1] “The power, the impetus, and the grace to wash one another’s feet is proportionate not only to how we see Jesus but to how we see ourselves. Our Lord saw himself as King of kings, and he washed the disciples’ feet.”[2] The illustration was simple. I think the disciples got it. No one is above their master. There is always someone over you, but it stops with God. Here is the key to true service, “If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.” Note the way Jesus says this in this verse. He does not say if you know these things you are blessed. This is only half of the equation. Knowing and doing them is the key to being blessed. “Mere knowledge, however, no matter how true and excellent, brings no blessing. The adjective μακάριος is especially significant in this connection, for it denotes the joy and the satisfaction arising from possessing and experiencing the divine favor in the one or the other of its manifestations, C.-K. 711.”[3]

            In my career, I had many supervisors. Some were nominal. Some were terrible. Some were only concerned about getting promoted. Some were lazy and just trying to get by. When I think about Sam, I noticed something about his leadership style of serving others. He moved up without even planning to do so. He did not go looking for it. In fact, the leader of the agency at the time promoted him to a position he was not qualified to perform. He still succeeded. In fact the position he took was risky and troubling from the beginning. It was fraught with problems from the beginning. He left years later as one of the best leaders that section ever had in my opinion. Jesus served others, being God Almighty and He left a mark on the whole world!

[1] Robertson, A. T. (1933). Word Pictures in the New Testament (Jn 13:16). Broadman Press.

[2] Hughes, R. K. (1999). John: that you may believe (p. 317). Crossway Books.

[3] Lenski, R. C. H. (1961). The interpretation of St. John’s gospel (p. 929). Augsburg Publishing House.