What Makes a Good Christian Leader? Timothy and Epaphroditus

Introduction

What makes a good Christian leader? In Philippians 2:19-30, Paul commends Timothy and Epaphroditus, who show genuine concern for others rather than themselves. Revd. Mark Fletcher explains why Christian leadership means servant leadership, why we should honour such people, and why, in leadership as in faith, we cannot do this by ourselves.

The epistle to the Philippians is full of soaring prose, memorable verses, and magnificent passages. But this isn’t one of them.

It’s a rather prosaic interlude where Paul talks about wanting to send someone to see them because he wants news about them. And yet in the detail of this rather ordinary passage of the Bible there is some really very important insight on a very important subject, which is the Bible’s perspective on what good leadership looks like. And the question of the sort of people that we should entrust with leadership could not be more pertinent. There has been this swing towards strong autocratic leaders who get things done and let nobody stand in the way. But history teaches us that the desire for power should be seen as a warning sign.

Plato himself said in the Republic, those who seek power are not worthy of that power. And in fact, there is a lovely moment in the Narnia stories where Aslan says to Prince Caspian, welcome, Prince, do you feel yourself sufficient to take up the kingship of Narnia? And Caspian replies, I don’t think I do, sir. I am only a boy. And Aslan says, good. If you had felt yourself sufficient, it would have been proof that you were not.

And so the leaders that we’re talking about in this passage are the sort of next generation of Christian leaders. After the disciples and the apostles, who we know reasonably well, you have this new generation who will carry the church forward and build it as it spreads across the world, and yet we know surprisingly little about them. You might know about Stephen who was martyred, or Philip who met the Ethiopian eunuch, but we don’t know many more of them. And I wonder if that is not actually part of the point, that faithful Christian ministry is not about making making a name for yourself. It’s not about celebrity or building a brand. And in fact, very often those things have become a stumbling block. No, here we are presented with a very distinct model of leadership. And I don’t think it could be more important. So here in our passage tonight, we meet Timothy. And in fact, he’s one of the few that we do know a little bit more about, primarily because there are two pastoral epistles written to him at the end of the New Testament. So we know that he was raised in a Jewish Christian home and his grandmother would have been a very early convert to Christianity. And so Timothy was schooled in the scriptures from a very early age. We also know that he’s quite a gentle character. And so Paul writes to the rather pushy church in Corinth and says to them, when Timothy comes, see that you put him at ease amongst you, for he is doing the work of the Lord. He was quite a gentle soul. He may also have been slightly kind of, his health may have not been very robust. There’s a nice little aside where Paul tells him to use a little bit of wine for the sake of his stomach. So he’s not an obviously impressive person. And yet, when Paul is at his lowest point, facing potentially the end of his life, who he wants with him is this faithful friend, Timothy. And what is it that sets Timothy apart? Well, it is that he genuinely cares. Verse 20, I have no one else like him who will show genuine concern for your welfare. You see that that’s the test. We tend to want our leaders to be impressive and articulate. But what Paul sees as the greatest thing is empathy, is compassion. Someone motivated not by their own interests, but for the good of others. And what we learn from Timothy is that God is able to do really significant things through apparently ordinary people. And that might be the most important thing. Because what we need are leaders who don’t teach us to trust in them, but point us to God. Leaders with integrity, motivated by love. There’s a similar sense of that with this other character in our reading, Epaphroditus. Verse 20, he longs for all of you and is distressed because you heard he was ill. Still, Epaphroditus had been sent from Philippi to care for Paul, but had got sick and had almost died. And now he’s worried that they’re worried about him. Can you see the sort of the kindness and the gentleness of a person like that? And these are the people that Paul honours and elevates into positions of leadership. And of course, that stands in quite significant contrast to many others in the history of the church. Verse 21, for everyone else looks out for their own interests, not those of Christ Jesus. We don’t know exactly who Paul is talking about here, but we know that from elsewhere there were plenty of people who were sort of seeking influence in the church out of self-interest. And it’s obviously such a kind of shocking thing. People claiming to be servants of Christ and yet who are actually in it for themselves. Motivated what? By ego and status and reputation and even potentially power and wealth.

I’m struck though that there has been a tendency, I think probably throughout history, certainly over recent decades, to switch between two extremes. One, a sort of anti-authoritarianism, and then we replace that with authoritarianism and then switch back the other way. Do you see we sort of switch from one extreme to another? And I think there’s sort of a foundational mistake there because we miss the fact that there is actually a better way. There’s a tendency, you know, when we’ve had bad experiences of leadership, to say, well, we don’t need leaders at all. But in actual fact, what the Bible calls us to do is to intentionally honour Christ-like leaders. Verse 29, Paul says, welcome him then in the Lord with all joy and honour such people. You see, that phrase is important, isn’t it? He’s not just talking about Timothy or Epaphroditus. He says, honour such people. Raise up people like this and entrust them with leadership. Well, because it matters.

In the church, we ordain leaders. We examine people’s faith and character to know if they will be trustworthy. And we seek prayerfully those who God is calling into leadership. We’re seeking caring, humble people who we can trust. And we do that specifically because if we don’t, leadership will be enacted by self-interested, ego-led people. Because if we don’t appoint good people, then the vacuum will be filled by the loudest voice and the strongest personality who will seek to dominate others. Do you see this concept of good leadership, of Christian leadership, is actually something I think we need to have a really clear picture of, all of us. And I think that if we are wise, we need to sort of enact this for ourselves. There is that tendency in all of us to think, oh, I can do this by myself. I can work it all out by myself. I don’t need anybody else. But the wise will seek out people who are trustworthy and allow yourself to be accountable. Don’t just seek people who agree with you. That’s not what leadership looks like. The wise know that they can’t do it all by themselves, that they need those who will gently guide and correct them. Take this idea of godly leadership seriously.

So, in a world that is torn between individualism and autocracy, the Bible offers us a wonderfully clear vision of Christ-like leadership, of the servant leader, the gentle shepherd, whose role is not to point to themselves, but to lead us to God. You were not made to do this all by yourself. And the wisdom of God is that we find our place and we find our flourishing in a community of faith where we allow ourselves to be accountable to one another and to a diverse and gifted leader who can equip and encourage us to build us up so that we might attain to the fullness of Christ. We can’t do this by ourselves. We were never meant to. Seek out those that you can trust, to whom you can be accountable, who will challenge and encourage and teach you to help you to be all that Christ is making you to be until you attain all the fullness of Christ as was intended for you from the very beginning. Amen.