Jesus came on the scene proclaiming the arrival of the Kingdom of God! To the disappointment of many, it was not an outward kingdom that would manifest itself with the overthrow of nations and governments. It would not force everyone to live godly, nor would it impose punishment on the wicked. There was nothing about his Kingdom that fit into the anticipation of the religious mind. According to Jesus, the Kingdom of God was “within.” Instead of a geographic location that could be ruled by power and might, it was a realm that could be entered by faith. This realm could be accessed by any person, anywhere in the world, any time, regardless of external circumstances. No longer would people go to Jerusalem, a temple, or another holy location.

This new Kingdom is an issue of the heart! The idea of a centralized power controlled by the edicts of leaders was non-applicable. People would weave in and out of this Kingdom based on the values and beliefs that guided their decisions. Those who trusted God’s word and applied those values to their decision making process would experience the Kingdom with all its benefits. Those who did not, regardless of how good they were, would not experience the Kingdom of God with all its benefits.

The message of the Kingdom was an intellectual struggle for everyone, the least of which were no doubt the apostles who were being discipled to live, preach and model this Kingdom reality. Nothing about it worked like other Kingdoms. The King was open to the common people. There was no hierarchy of power. There wasn’t a lot of “pomp and circumstance.” There were no political agendas. It took a total shift in thinking to understand how to lead in this new Kingdom. But this belief system would give access to all the promises of God!

Contrary to the way other kings built their kingdoms; Jesus invited sinners, tax collectors, Samaritans, Gentiles and enemies of Israel to join Him in the Kingdom of His Father. When they followed Him, in pursuit of this Kingdom, He taught parables, worked miracles, expressed mercy, and stilled the guilty conscience. Many had a heart to hear, believed God and entered in. Others walked away disillusioned and disappointed. His idea of the Kingdom did not fit what they were looking for. When speaking to those who assumed they would be first in line for this new Kingdom and all its benefits, Jesus said, “Assuredly, I say to you that tax collectors and harlots enter the Kingdom of God before you” (Matt. 21:31-32). Or, as He so often said, the last shall be first. To enter in, one simply had to have hearing ears — ears that listen with a heart of faith, instead of a critical intellect. Thousands of people came close to the Kingdom of God, walked away empty, and never had a hint of what they had missed, or how close they were!

This same message of the Kingdom is offered to us today. This Kingdom message holds forth a promise of a life better than anything we had ever heard, anything we had ever seen or anything we had ever imagined. The Holy Spirit will teach us what we need to know, He will lead us into this incredible realm, if only we will surrender our personal agendas, cultural concepts and embrace the teachings of our Lord and Savior! (1 Cor. 2:9-10).

As new believers we are to renew our mind. (Rom 12:2). It is the top priority for the new convert. This is a process where we throw off our former way of thinking. We surrender our every thought, opinion and preference to the teaching of the Lord Jesus. In the early days of faith, we should embrace a new set of values and standards. Our life paradigm should shift from that which was imposed upon us by our culture, to the view and opinion of God. Maybe no one has to renew his or her mind more than the leader. We are called to lead people to live this Kingdom life. We are called to build churches that accomplish the agenda of the King, while following the principles He set forth. Our leadership style, regardless of the gifting, must be motivated by Kingdom values and goals!

This realm called the Kingdom of God is entered into by the values and beliefs that drive our decisions. When we harmonize our motives and goals with those of the Lord Jesus, we harmonize with the life and power of God. We experience God’s power for God’s goals. We experience the righteousness, peace, and joy of the Holy Spirit regardless of external circumstances. When we work our own agendas, we simply succeed by the sweat of our brow. Kingdom living makes no sense to the carnal mind. And Kingdom leadership probably makes even less sense! The carnal mind has spent a lifetime developing values and life strategies. It has created methods for survival and success that it trusts more than it trusts the principles of God. In this very struggle, the teaching of Jesus is fulfilled, “Through your traditions (culture) you make the word of God of no effect.” (Mk 7:13). Many success stories are simply great natural ability that meets the world’s standards, but does little to further the goals of the Kingdom. It looks like success and godliness but denies the power thereof!

There is probably no place where Kingdom thinking seems upside down as much as in the mind of a leader. None of the traditional laws of leadership fit the new model. Guilt, control, force, manipulation, political agendas and all the typical corruptions associated with power have no place in this Kingdom. All the rules have changed! All these carnal methods can no doubt get results but they do not endear the follower to the Kingdom of God. In fact, they alienate him. When leaders use carnal methods they reinforce the carnal mind of the follower. Carnal leadership builds organizations; spiritual leadership builds people. The religious leaders of Jesus day saw the multitudes as their servants. They used them to fulfill the agendas of their religious party. But Jesus showed an interesting paradox. He had a passion to reach the multitudes, but never at the destruction of the individual. Many great leaders of our day have learned the secret of building great organizations that serve the needs of the people. They have stayed true to Kingdom values. Carnal, leaders however, build organizations just for the sake of their personal glory and failing ego. They look successful because they are large and powerful, yet, their people are dying for a lack of Spiritual reality.

Jesus’ leadership style tended to defy logic. So very often He did for people what seemed to hurt the overall cause. Prostitutes, tax collectors and sinners often accompanied him. Their very presence offended the upper echelon of the Jews. This tendency to allow these people shared access, and equal value caused many to be offended and turn away. While Jesus, no doubt, regretted the loss of every potential follower, He never tried to satisfy the cultural standards to keep people, who would only be high maintenance, divisive controllers in the end. Remember the same people who wanted to make Him King by force, were the same ones who wanted to kill Him when he failed to meet their expectations.

James, the brother of Jesus, later addressed this very issue when he warned against showing preference to the wealthy by giving them special seating in your congregations. As he pointed out, it is these very people who in the end turn on you and persecute you. This new Kingdom was not prejudiced against the wealthy or the powerful; it was just not biased in their behalf.
The Kingdom leader needs to be ever aware that wealthy people tend to trust their wealth, powerful people tend to trust their power, and so on! Regardless of what a person trusts – other than God’s Word – money, power, sin, etc., it renders them carnal minded. Never deceive yourself in this; carnal minded people will never harmonize with Kingdom values. There will always be a source of friction. And in the end, when the Word of God contradicts what they trust, they will align themselves against the principles of God and become the source of strife and division.

“For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. 6 For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 7 Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. 8 So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God “(Rom 8:5-8, NKJV). Yet, these are often the very people we place in power! We falsely assume that those who succeed in the world’s system can succeed in our system. And they can, if our system is built on the same principles and values!

The leader who has a heart for the Kingdom has to ask, “Will I help people even if it hurts my organization?” That is a tough question for any leader. Jesus no doubt dealt with this issue. Once, a man who was suspected of a heinous murder began to attend my church. Word spread through the community and it cost me some church members. In the end the man got saved, confessed to the crime and was sent to prison. In this life all I got was a smaller church attendance. But how did the Kingdom benefit? And was that enough for me? Were the loss of some church members and financial support more important than a soul being saved and the murderer being removed from society?

Our church was one of the first integrated churches in our city. We had the first bi-racial staff and leadership team. And I may have performed one of the earliest integrated marriages in our city. After I performed my first integrated marriage I asked a friend of mine his position on the matter. He warned me against it. He was sure it would hurt my church. In fact, he had refused to perform interracial marriages for that very reason. He was right; I performed the wedding and lost a few of my biggest givers! But what did the Kingdom gain? What was modeled to the world and our church about the Kingdom of God? There was no difference between what I faced and what Jesus faced for preaching to the Samaritans.

In the parable of the Good Samaritan, Jesus seemed to strike at the very core of this exclusion of ministry based on social factors. He was maligned because of his inclusion of the poor, the sinful, the outcast and those of racially rejected backgrounds. Yet, this simple parable stabbed at the hypocrisy of the racial heart.

The way the carnal mind keeps score; Jesus was not a good leader. To the carnal mind growth of the organization is the true earmark of success. But it seems that Jesus had something else in mind. In the beatitudes Jesus seemed to say that the very people that were considered the losers of the day, by the religious community, were the very people who had a heart to grasp the Kingdom of God. Jesus didn’t seek out those who had the power and resources to help him build a large affluent following. Instead He sought those who had a heart for the reality of this new Kingdom!

We will all be faced with those hard Kingdom questions at one time or another. “Will I do what is best for the person, based on the word of God, even if my church benefits nothing from it?” I believe we could all answer in the affirmative on that question. But what if we take it a step further? “Will I do what is best for the individual, based on the word of God, even if it hurts my church, or ministry?”

In John 6:53 Jesus made the statement, “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you.” From that time many people stopped following Him, Even His disciples had trouble with this. At this point, I¹m sure there were those who thought Jesus had no clue how to be effective in growing a congregation. After all, one day He would have a following of thousands and the next day He was being run out of town! But was He motivated by something greater than the size of His crowd? Remember, He desired to reach the multitudes; but he kept everything in perspective with Kingdom values.

One of my early realizations in ministry brought me to this opinion, “If you compromise to reach people, you have nothing to offer them once they follow you.” Jesus gave an interesting perspective to the ones who stayed to listen to His explanation. They would not be able to grasp resurrection realities if they could not bear with such difficult statements. He did not want to drive the people away, yet he knew they had no capacity to enter the Kingdom. If He compromised the message to keep the people, He would have people but no message that actually gave life!

Those who could not see past their own opinions were often offended and walked away. Those who minimized his teaching and argued their point of view were too busy being right to grasp a new understanding. But to those who chose to consider His words, stay and be taught in private, Jesus said, unto you it is given to know the mysteries of the Kingdom! As A leader I want to know how to do both, reach a lot of people and stay true to the only thing that will give them life.

The ultimate in carnality is when someone’s beliefs don’t really work for them, but their need to be right drives them to force their view onto others. The religious leaders of Jesus’ day did not have peace, joy or righteousness in their heart. Yet, they insisted they were right. But in their insecurity, they would often orchestrate the death of those who opposed them. Early Christians burned people at the stake for disagreeing with their theology. How likely is it that they were motivated by Kingdom values? It seems the more intense the dogmatic reaction the greater the evidence toward a life that is not working.

I have often wondered how many sermons are being preached by people who have very little of the joy of the Lord. How many leaders are having nervous breakdowns, yet leading others down the same path they are walking. How many sermons simply regurgitate information that has never been made to work? Or, how many sermons are geared for control instead of helping people connect with God in their heart?

Jesus said to the leaders of His day, you won’t enter in, but you won’t let others enter in. The way into the Kingdom is blocked by religious people who won’t go in but won’t let others go in. “You’re hopeless, you religion scholars! You took the key of knowledge, but instead of unlocking doors, you locked them. You won’t go in yourself, and won’t let anyone else in either”(Luke 11:52, TMB).

We live in a day when there seems to be a call to return to the Kingdom of God. As leaders we must assess what that means in light of the way we treat people, how we build organizations, and what motivates our actions. We must question our every motive and answer one question. “Do I do what I do for the Kingdom of God or for my own personal goals?”

The way of the Kingdom may not produce everything the world calls success. It certainly didn’t for Jesus. But to stand before God and hear, “Well done my good and faithful servant,” will surely outweigh any sacrifice we made in this life.

I am so thankful for those who have built large churches and ministries while holding on to Kingdom values, and I hope to learn from them all. At all cost I hope to follow the way of Jesus for the sake of the people for which He died, and the great mission we have of ministering this message of the Kingdom of God!