Episode Transcript
[00:00:04] We're going to get straight into the word of God this morning. We start a new series today called headship.
[00:00:11] And this is not a series about headship of male and female roles. This is a series we're doing about Christ being the head of the church.
[00:00:26] This is a headship series about us fully knowing that Christ is the head of the church and the head of our lives and him taking his rightful place. What we're going to do, we're just going to start off reading from Colossians this morning. So if you've got your bibles, we encourage you to bring your bibles with you. If you are a young adult here or a young person this morning. We do have sermon notes to go along with this that you can take away or follow during the service that's on the info desk. So feel free to help yourself to those. So, Phil, I'm going to invite Phil. Phil and I are going to say this together this morning. So, Colossians, chapter one. We're going to start from verse 15 going through to verse 20. So, Phil, can I invite you out to come and read that with me? And what I would love to do as the church can we stand for the reading of God's word together?
[00:01:32] So starting from verse 15.
[00:01:36] Okay, we're just going to go to verse 20. Are we ready, Phil? Yeah. Okay. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all. I'll just wait for Phil to get it. You got it. Oh, no, no, no. We're going to read it together.
[00:01:57] We're better together.
[00:02:00] Sorry, that was cheesy, but there we go.
[00:02:04] So from verse 15, he is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him all things were created. Things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible. Whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities, all things were created by him and for him he is before all things and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead. So that in everything he might have the supremacy.
[00:02:57] For God was pleased to have all the fullness dwell in him and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood shed on the cross. Thank you, honey. Okay, you may take your seats this morning.
[00:03:24] Christ, the firstborn over all creation. Let's just remind ourselves this morning, by him all things were made.
[00:03:36] All things were made.
[00:03:40] All things were created. Things in heaven and on earth, visible, invisible, where the throne's powers, rulers, authorities, all things were created by him and for him.
[00:03:55] By him and for him.
[00:04:02] For him.
[00:04:04] Him alone, no other.
[00:04:07] By him and for him.
[00:04:11] He is before all things.
[00:04:17] Wow.
[00:04:20] In him all things hold together.
[00:04:27] If you haven't got things together, then look to Jesus pretty quickly because in him all things hold together and he is the head of the body.
[00:04:48] He's the head of the body. That's right. We, if you belong to Christ this morning. We are the body of Christ.
[00:05:00] We are the church and he is the head.
[00:05:06] If you're in leadership of a church this morning, go few Phil and Esther Lawson and the team. We are not the head.
[00:05:18] Phew.
[00:05:19] I'm not that great.
[00:05:22] He is the head. I love it when people come to me and complain about the church and I say, well, go and take it up with the boss.
[00:05:31] Go and take it up with the head. Complain to him about me and see what he says.
[00:05:39] He's the head of the church.
[00:05:43] The head.
[00:05:45] Amazing. He is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead.
[00:05:51] We can be encouraged about rising from the dead because he first rose from the dead.
[00:05:57] Incredible, incredible passage of scripture. I just wanted to start off with that this morning. We are this whole series. I just want to set the scene for this whole series. I'm not really going to go into the full start of the preach today because I want us to have some really great fellowship and time together around some food today. But we're going to be looking coming up to spring, and it is a beautiful time to start this series looking at the head, because headship is a leadership of love.
[00:06:30] Headship is a leadership of washing feet. It's that kind of leadership. It's that kind of love. And anybody who wants to take on any kind of leadership in the church, we have to realize as Christ as the head that any kind of leadership is a serving type of leadership because Christ is our example and he is the head. When we look at headship, it is not some egotistical figure who wants to be the boss.
[00:07:10] It's always about Christ who offers a leadership of love. It's the feet washing, crown piercing nails on a cross headship that we are following.
[00:07:29] And his name is Jesus and he is the head.
[00:07:35] But the sad thing is in society, and we know this, is that many people don't think they need a head.
[00:07:42] Have you heard of the expression a self made.
[00:07:46] Oh, I'm a self made. Oh, are you? Wow. I'm a self made millionaire and I'm a self made person. And I can self make all these resources, and I've made it in life because I've got all this. And, yeah, I know where I'm going.
[00:08:04] I know what I'm doing in life.
[00:08:10] Some people feel so confident in their own abilities, in their own judgments, in their own opinions. But let me tell you that even the best of us who think we are that great will fail at some point if we are the heads of our own lives.
[00:08:31] And then there are some of us in the church, and I want us to get excited, really. This is not a condemnation, bash over the head type preach.
[00:08:39] It is a wake up call. It is a stirring of our spirits because God has so much more for us.
[00:08:46] But then there are some of us in the church that we know Christ is the head. You've agreed with this passage in Colossians, but we just haven't paid too much attention to the head over the years as the church. Anyone relate to that? Maybe you don't want to put your hands up. I can.
[00:09:05] I've known that Christ has been the head, but I haven't really paid too much attention to what the head has been. Sane.
[00:09:14] And as the church of Jesus Christ, I believe for too long we've been going along in our own strength, coming up with some good plans, but they haven't really been his plans. We haven't said, hey, let's go to the head. You know, we planted this church only last year, okay? And we've done church before, but this time it feels really different.
[00:09:44] And we said, Lord. And we surrounded ourselves with people and teams and, Lord, everything we do down to the point of what we say and what we preach about everything we do, we want to clear it past you first. We don't just want to steam ahead doing things because they sound good. They look good on an Instagram reel.
[00:10:08] We want the sign off from heaven. We want the sign off from the head.
[00:10:18] We have been created and fashioned by God to have a head over our lives.
[00:10:25] A headship of love, a leadership of love. A feet washing, crown piercing, selfless love. Love who is called the head. You know why? To be fully alive. To live fully satisfied. To live fully complete, to thrive in all that we're called. To do with meaning and purpose. To go above and beyond anything we can even dream for ourselves, is only possible if we rely on the headship of Christ and not on the headship of us.
[00:11:02] We get into dangerous territory when we start thinking that we know it all, that we've got it.
[00:11:14] You know, in my early years as a follower, I was just a young girl at high school.
[00:11:19] And it became apparent, and we're going to look in a couple of weeks about gifting and all of that stuff.
[00:11:26] But it became really apparent about year seven, year eight in high school, that I carried a leadership gift over my life.
[00:11:36] And I started to see that when the teacher would put us into teams at school, I'd be sat with a group of maybe six, seven people, and the teacher would say, now, discuss.
[00:11:49] And everybody would look at me and I'm like, why are you looking at me? And this would happen time and time again from year seven right the way through high school. And I started to realize maybe there's a leadership gift over my life, to the point that when I got to year eleven, when head girl and head boy were announced, and usually head boy and head girl are announced on their academic ability. And let me tell you, I was not a grade A student. I had to work hard. I was middle of the road. In fact, I failed science miserably.
[00:12:29] But they appointed me as head girl over this large high school because of my leadership ability.
[00:12:41] As I entered my young adult years, I was known for leadership and initiative. Naomi, we have a good laugh at that. Leadership and initiative. And I was so proud of this leadership gift and having initiative. Go and see Esther. She's the one with initiative. She'll know what to do.
[00:13:10] Do you know what initiative means?
[00:13:13] It means the ability to assess, take charge, and initiate things independently.
[00:13:25] So I was initiated in my early twenties. I was leading. I was on a leadership team of a very large church in my early twenties, taking charge, using initiative and leadership.
[00:13:40] And I suddenly reached a brick wall.
[00:13:47] I was praying a lot, and I was leading and using my initiative.
[00:13:51] But what I hadn't realized that on my discipleship journey.
[00:13:57] And we thanked God for giftings, but I was not using the gifting as God had wanted me to use it.
[00:14:07] I was leading and used my initiative. Oh, and I was praying, but there was little breakthrough, and I'll tell you why. Because at some point during my discipleship, early discipleship years, I was leading and using my initiative outside of Goddesse.
[00:14:30] I was having an independent spirit.
[00:14:37] How subtle.
[00:14:40] I had this independent spirit. In other words, I was relying on myself instead of relying on God.
[00:14:51] One of the main reasons I believe, looking back, when I started to rely on myself, and some of you are going to almost relate here, because I got hurt by people.
[00:15:11] People hurt me, people let me down.
[00:15:22] I was disappointed in God because God wasn't working to my timescale.
[00:15:29] Anybody else relate to that one.
[00:15:34] And so I started to believe the lie that actually, if I was going to do anything in life, I had to rely on myself, I had to work independently, I had to get a job done. I'll just go and do it.
[00:15:51] But it left me incredibly lonely.
[00:15:55] It left me incredibly broken and I felt totally unloved.
[00:16:04] And I spent most of my twenties trying to earn the love of God and try and get some kind of value over my life by doing things for him rather than with him.
[00:16:26] I wasn't breaking through victoriously. I wasn't living every day going, wow, there's purpose in what I'm doing.
[00:16:35] I was actually being self reliant, actually limited my capabilities. I actually, without knowing it, limited my life.
[00:16:47] I thought being self reliant opened up all this freedom so I could be in charge of myself and get on and do things and make things happen. But actually all it was doing was making my world very, very small.
[00:17:02] Little did I know that all I had to do, all I had to do.
[00:17:10] Sounds really easy, doesn't it?
[00:17:12] Was just rely on God.
[00:17:18] How many of us know, really know that God wants to father us, that God wants us to lean on him, to lean on him for absolutely everything, to fully, fully rely on him?
[00:17:45] Oh, I don't know if I can do that. Lord, I've been so let down by people like, lord, I've been a prayer for a long time and I don't. You're not answering these prayers. I'm not sure I can step over that line fully, fully give it all to you.
[00:18:03] Like turn to Luke 13 really quick.
[00:18:15] I'm going to read something now to you. You all still with me? You're still awake? Good, good, good.
[00:18:21] Luke 13. We're starting from verse ten. This is a beautiful passage. Oh, it's just beautiful.
[00:18:30] And what I'm going to do, I was reading this a couple of weeks ago and I felt something prophetic through this passage for the church.
[00:18:38] Let me just say as well also, Phil, when you were saying 200 chairs, right, honestly, we are in the season of harvest.
[00:18:45] There is, and it's not going to be because the church is flash, because the church is attractional, as in the sense of worldly attraction. Honestly, there's going to be so much growth coming and we're going to look around and go, it's the God who's caused the growth, honestly, it's just going to grow. We are going to grow and grow and grow and grow and grow. And so many people are going to find Christ. Honestly, I just see it. I just see it anyway, and we'll work out how. We'll fit everybody in. But it doesn't matter.
[00:19:17] It doesn't matter.
[00:19:20] Okay. A crippled woman. Let me just read this to you from verse ten from Luke 13. On a Sabbath, Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues, and a woman was there who had been crippled by a spirit for 18 years. She was bent over and could not straighten up at all.
[00:19:42] I don't know if you've ever seen somebody who's bent over. I did once. I was walking in a forest. I don't know how this lady was walking. Beautiful. I mean, stunning woman, like, late thirties. Honestly, she was like this.
[00:19:56] It was so painful. I had some time with her and prayed with her in this forest. She was like that walking, and it looked so painful. And she was bent over and could not straighten up at all.
[00:20:09] When Jesus saw her, he called her forward and said to her, woman, you are set free from your infirmity. Then he put his hands on her, and immediately she straightened up and praised God.
[00:20:25] We could carry on. But it's not really my focus this morning. It's indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath. Whoo. The synagogue ruler said to the people, there's six days to work, so come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath. The Lord answered him, you hypocrites, don't each of you, on the Sabbath, untie an ox and donkey from the stall and lead it out and give it water? Then should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has bound for 18 long years, be set free on the Sabbath day from what bound her? When he said this, all his opponents were humiliated. But the people were delighted with all the wonderful things he was doing to God. Be the glory. Great things he has done.
[00:21:07] She was crippled. Okay?
[00:21:12] First thing is, she came to worship Jesus.
[00:21:16] She was a worshiper. She came to worship Jesus.
[00:21:20] The second thing is, it was Christ's power that set her free.
[00:21:28] Nobody else's. Christ's power. The third thing, it was Christ's touch.
[00:21:35] Fourth thing, it was Christ who healed her.
[00:21:40] This is headship.
[00:21:42] The one who sets people free, the one who touches lives, the one whose power it is.
[00:21:51] We give him all the glory for what he does. We never take the glory for ourselves.
[00:21:57] And it's the one who has compassion over people. And as I was reading this passage, I felt to, and we have to be careful when we read scripture because this really happened. This really happened.
[00:22:13] Okay. But I feel there's something prophetic for the church as well, that we have been bent over in that state for too long. There has been a crippling spirit over the church for too long because we have moved from living under Christ, who is the head, to relying on ourselves.
[00:22:38] We've relied on our own gifting. We've relied. But you know, we've hit a ceiling. And if you've been in the church long enough, you know we've hit a ceiling because we're not witnessing some of the things that we're reading about in the early church.
[00:22:54] And this is not to bring shame, condemnation, and go, oh, we've got it wrong.
[00:23:00] It's to say, lord, we recognize that we need to bring our lives again under the headship of Jesus Christ. And, you know, when you are bent over, like, go and bend over, like, when you're at home, later, when you're bent over, your view is limited.
[00:23:22] See, when we are crippled in spirit, that means we're relying on ourselves, not the power, the touch, the healing of Christ and all that he's done for us. Our view is limited.
[00:23:41] When we're bent over, we can't see things properly as we should see.
[00:23:48] We're blinded.
[00:23:52] Christ the head.
[00:23:55] Christ the head. When we're bent over, we have limited resources.
[00:24:01] Let me tell you, the church of Jesus Christ is not limited.
[00:24:08] But we hear so many people in the church going, oh, I don't know how we're going to raise this amount of money.
[00:24:15] I don't know where we're going to get these resources from, how we.
[00:24:23] Who's the head?
[00:24:27] Who's the head?
[00:24:29] But you see, when we're crippled and we're trying to do things in our own strength and we have this limited view, we have this limited resource.
[00:24:40] But when we fully trust him as the head and we say, phew, we don't have to worry about X, Y and Z because he's in charge.
[00:24:52] He was before all things. In him, all things hold together. He's the head.
[00:25:05] May God release us from a crippling spirit. As the church, there is no limit in God.
[00:25:14] God forgive us when we rely on ourselves, when we don't wait on you for the answers, when we try and manipulate situations, when we try and make things happen and manoeuvre things to try and work out our lives, God forgive us.
[00:25:33] May we just wait?
[00:25:36] Say, Lord, we're not moving until you move. We're not going until you go or you tell us, I have messed up too many times because I have been so reliant on the, on myself.
[00:25:53] There is so much gifting in this room, so much gifting. But may the gifting in this room, may we say, Lord, you've given me this gift, I hand it back to you. David said, Lord, what is all this that you've given me? What is me and my family that you've brought us this far? Lord, we're only giving back to you what you gave us in the first place. Your bank account, you didn't earn it.
[00:26:31] It all belongs to God.
[00:26:34] Sorry, I'll go back. You did earn it through working, but it all belongs to him.
[00:26:41] From your finances to everything, it all belongs to him. And yet we're like this, we're desperate to hold on and God says, oh, if you just release, if you just release, if you just release, if you stop being so reliant on the things that I've given you anyway, I'm going to give you more.
[00:27:02] I'm going to pour out. There's going to be no limit to my barns. There's going to be no shut doors on the barns.
[00:27:10] I'm going to keep pouring out and pouring out and pouring out.
[00:27:13] But you've got to stop relying on yourselves.
[00:27:16] Stop relying on yourselves.
[00:27:19] Stop relying on your own judgments. Oh, we like to make judgments, don't we? We like to come up with things.
[00:27:28] Oh, we put two and two together and come up with ten. We see that and we assume that and we speculate that. Oh, and that, and that didn't happen. Oh, that must mean this, what a lot we are.
[00:27:45] Take it to the Lord, rely on him.
[00:27:50] This has come in, Lord, I don't know what to do with it. I'm going to give it to you. I'm going to rely on you. I'm not going to do this how I would do it. I'm relying on you.
[00:28:03] What if, what if, as a church this year and we're going to go on this beautiful series, I'm going to watch a video in a moment. What if, as a church, we fully, and I mean fully, relied on Christ as the head that we leave this place today and we say, Lord, first of all, forgive me for jumping in with my big size sevens.
[00:28:34] Forgive me, Lord, and I've raced ahead.
[00:28:38] Let us be like Jehoshaphat, who says, lord, I don't know what to do, but my eyes are on you.
[00:28:45] Let me tell you, it's an absolute game changer for the church. It's going to transform us. It's going to transform this place.
[00:29:00] See, Satan the enemy, you know, when God gave us free will. Sorry for the sniffles when God gave us free will, how amazing that he gave us free will.
[00:29:13] He could have been so controlling.
[00:29:17] He graciously gave us free will. But when he gave us free will, we also had the most important decision to make over our own lives.
[00:29:26] Who governs us?
[00:29:28] Who leads us? Who leads you in life? Is it going to be God? Are you going to allow God to govern you?
[00:29:36] Are you going to you self govern?
[00:29:40] Are you going to allow the God of this world and this age to govern you or others?
[00:29:47] Young people, when you're on TikTok and there's influences, are they influencing you?
[00:29:55] When you're watching all your Netflix series, what's been played out, the ethics, the morals, are they influencing you?
[00:30:05] Who is influencing us?
[00:30:08] Adam and Eve had it at the beginning of the garden.
[00:30:12] They chose to come from under the headship of Christ to govern themselves.
[00:30:23] And every time that happens in life, people fall flat. They do.
[00:30:30] They do. Because the headship of Christ is a leadership of love. It is a feet washing, crown, piercing nails on the cross.
