Power

Who do you consider powerful in your life?

Superman?
Barack Obama?
Gordon Brown?
Teachers?
Your friends?
You?


Who do you influence?
Think about who you have influence over.  Who do you have power over?  How do you deal with that power?


Human beings desire power.

The philosopher Nietzsche believed that the dominant motivation of mankind is the desire to have power and influence over others. 

Nietzsche did not believe that this was a bad thing, but that power, influence and control was both good and desirable.

This desire for power can be expressed in various ways:


Physical
Some believe that the more physically attractive we are, the more power we have over others.
Unfortunately, this view is furthered by much of our media and advertising.  Physically attractive people are seen as being happy and more successful than others.
People become convinced that if they are thinner, taller, stronger, more attractive in some way, they will be seen as more important than others.

Intellectual
Some people believe that if they are more intelligent than others, they will be able to have control over them.
This can be by being able to beat them in arguments, being able to come up with better ideas, or just knowing more stuff.
Some people believe that being intelligent means that they will be seen as more important than others.

Social
Humans have a natural desire to be in community with others, and this is often expressed in a need to be popular.
We see this often in school (and even more often in horrible cliched teen movies).
The popular people have power and control over others because other people want to be like them.
Some people believe that being popular means that they wil be seen as more important than others.


Spiritual
Unfortunately, in some churches, some people believe that being more holy, or appearing more holy means that they wil be seen as more important than others.


In all these ways there is one thing in common:  society dictates that to be powerful, we must value ourselves over others.

The world says power is good. The world says that power is so good that it is worth killing for.

What does the Bible say?
The apostle Paul, writing in the book of Philippians, says:

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves
- Philippians 2:2

This verse, I feel, gets to the root of how we as Jesus-followers are to act towards others.

While the world says that it is good to value the one (ourselves) at the expense the many (everyone else), the Bible tells us to value the many at the expense of the one. As Jesus-followers, it is not enough simply to say we believe in Jesus and his promises for us. We are to follow in the footsteps of Jesus. Paul writes in another of his letters:

Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.

In the first passage we looked at, Paul tells us to consider others better than ourselves.

The word “others” in Greek literally translates to mean “others”. The simplicity is deceptive. The Bible tells us not to consider our peers, or the people we like as better than ourselves, but to consider those who are different to us as better than ourselves.

So why should we value others?

In the book of Daniel, 3 of Daniel’s friends were to be executed in a furnace. The king came down to see the execution and saw that they were not dying but were fine and there was not 3, but 4. Our God is not a god who sits idly by when we are struggling, but a god who stands with us in our need.  Essentially, I want to say that God values others, and therefore so should we; however, it is deeper than that... 


God is a community. God is one person and God is three people. Before time began and after time will end God is a community. God didn’t create us as some sort of narcissistic need for people to love him, or because he was lonely. What sort of god would create us for company? God lives in community. God invites us as his people to join him in his community.

As we follow God, we join him and others in Holy Community.  As human beings we are born with in innate desire for community.  I believe this stems from being created in God's image.  When we put ourselves first over the needs of others, we rebel against the Holy community that God created for us.

The German theologian Karl Barth, in his commentary on Philippians writes,

The 'one thing' that Barth is talking about here is the grace of God.  I think this quote is great.  The strange, the different, the unintelligible.  How many of us when we think of these words can think of someone straight away?  Who really rubs you the wrong way?  Who do you know who is strange? Who do you know who is different? Who do you know who is unintelligible?

The people we meet who really rub us the wrong way are perhaps how we encounter God.

As we encounter the strange, the different, the unintelligible in others, we discover how we God encounters the strange, the different, the unintelligible in us.

As Jesus-followers we are to follow in the footsteps of Jesus. The world values the pursuit of power. God calls us to live a different way, in holy communion with others and with him, each of us valuing others as better than ourselves.

Think about your lives.  Think about the people you meet every day.

Who do you influence?

How do you influence?