Purpose And Power Of Authority (26 page)

Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. (Ephesians 4:29)

Commit your concerns to your Ultimate Authority and let Him lead and guide you:

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely,
whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. (Philippians 4:6–8)

To thrive under authority, we need to remember that both delegating and submitting to established authority are built into creation and life. Primarily, you submit to your authority not for the purpose of protecting your relationship with that authority but rather preserving your higher relationship with the Creator, who established authority and desires that we live in it for the sake of peace and order. Like Jesus, we need to obey God to fulfill “all righteousness” (Matthew 3:15), which means “all right standing, or positioning.”

Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving.(Colossians 3:23–24)

Chapter Thirteen

The honor of your presence is requested….”

When you receive correspondence in the mail that begins with those words, you know you are being invited to a special event—a wedding, a milestone anniversary or birthday party, or another significant occasion. If such an invitation were to come from a head of state, it would be regarded as a particular honor. To enter into your authority is to accept the honor of a gracious invitation from the Sovereign of the universe to join with Him in fulfilling a significant purpose in the world.

In conveying the meaning of personal authority in preceding chapters, I have sometimes referred to it using additional terms, such as assignment, life mission or vision, vocation, work, occupation, and calling. The Greek word kletos, which is translated as “calling” in various places in the Scriptures, has the meaning of “invited.” The word calling is defined in Merriam-Webster’s 11th Collegiate Dictionary as “a strong inner impulse toward a particular course of action especially when accompanied by conviction of divine influence.”

These concepts provide a good description of personal authority. We were created with an inherent “impulse,” or motivation, to pursue a particular purpose in life in service to others, and we have been invited to fulfill that purpose by God Himself.

I have summarized the authority of our calling in twelve principles, and as we move to part three of this book, I want to highlight them so that you may be sure about the scope of your personal authority and domain. These principles summarize the nature of your own personal authority so that you can identify, understand, and take action to fulfill your calling with the conviction that it has been given to you by God to serve your generation.

Human beings were given dominion, or a general authority over the earth, at creation (see Genesis 1:26), though they abandoned this authority. When you reconnect to your Creator through the Authorized Dealer, Jesus Christ, you are restored to this authority, and you are also given another general authority. It is to act on the Creator’s behalf in communicating to the world the opportunity for all people to be restored and reconnected to Him and to receive the benefits of coming under His eternal warranty and discovering their own personal authority. (See, for example, Matthew 28:18–20.)

Your connectedness to the Creator unites you with all others who are restored to Him. It is essential to understand that you have common purposes together with them, as those reconciled to the Creator, even as you exercise your personal authority. Paul wrote,

Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to one hope when you were called—one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.(Ephesians 4:3–6)

In Ephesians 4, we saw that there is one body, Spirit, Lord, faith, baptism, and God and Father of us all, who is the Ultimate Authority and who unites us. The next part, however, begins with “But”: “But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it” (verse 7). There is individual grace (divine influence, or divine invitation) within the context of our oneness with others that enables us to carry out our specific callings. “Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s grace in its various forms” (1 Peter 4:10).

Paul wrote about his own authority in a way that we can all take to heart:

I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.(Philippians 3:12–14)

Authority is characteristically community based and interdependent. We all have something to bring to a community that will contribute to its life, no matter in what realm that community exists. We are meant to use our authorized power within such communities as we fulfill our unique callings.

Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to
all the others. We have different gifts, according to the
grace given us. (Romans 12:4–6)

What then shall we say, brothers? When you come together, everyone has a hymn, or a word of instruction, a revelation, a tongue or an interpretation. All of these must be done for the strengthening of the church.(1 Corinthians 14:26)

True authority is central to your nature as God created you; it is an integral part of your personality and gifts. It is not something you have to put on as an addendum to who you really are, and it will not seem forced or uncomfortable to exercise but instead natural. Because of this, personal authority is liberating to the one who enters into it.

For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.(Psalm 139:13–16)

When Moses was called by God to lead the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt, he said, “O Lord, I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue” (Exodus 4:10). Moses didn’t realize that power came with the authority he had just been given.

The Lord said to [Moses], “Who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or mute? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the Lord? Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.”(Exodus 4:11–12)

God had told Moses, “I am sending you to Pharaoh” (Exodus 3:10), so Moses wasn’t going to Pharaoh on his own merits but under the authority of God.

Like Moses, most of us don’t recognize the natural power of our personal domains, and we also don’t realize that our Creator stands by us to enable us to fulfill the authority He has given us. The book of Hebrews encourages us, “Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful” (Hebrews 10:23).

When you operate in the authority of your calling, you are automatically equipped for it because God is faithful to supply what you need. You are “self-sufficient” in the sense that you were born with a purpose, and you have built-in abilities that God assigned to you to fulfill it. Moreover, when you function under God’s authority, all His resources are on your side, as well, just as they were for Moses.

The gifts that the Creator has planted within you will grow and be fruitful as you trust in the power of what He has given you and commit its use to Him. God says,

I am watching to see that my word is fulfilled.(Jeremiah 1:12)

As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.(Isaiah 55:9–11)

Even though personal authority is self-fulfilling, it can remain undiscovered or hidden inside us—sometimes for a lifetime—unless we awaken to its reality in our lives and put it into the context of a restored relationship with our Creator. This is one of the reasons that Paul wrote to the first-century Ephesians,

I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe.(Ephesians 1:18–19)

Authority will also lie dormant within us if we ignore, neglect, or reject it. Paul wrote to Timothy, “I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands” (2 Timothy 1:6), and Jesus told this parable about the gifts and calling that are entrusted to us by God:

[The kingdom of heaven] will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted his property to them. To one he gave five talents of money, to another two talents, and to another one talent, each according to his ability. Then he went on his journey. The man who had received the five talents went at once and put his money to work and gained five more. So also, the one with the two talents gained two more. But the man who had received the one talent went off, dug a hole in the ground and hid his master’s money.(Matthew 25:14–18, emphasis added)

The parable continues with the master returning and the servants who had been entrusted the five talents and the two talents presenting their doubled talents to him. He replies to each, “Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness!” (verses 21, 23). Then, the servant with the one talent—who we are told buried it out of fear (see verses 24–25)—came and gave it back to the master, having obtained no increase in the property.

His master replied, “You wicked, lazy servant! So you knew that I harvest where I have not sown and gather where I have not scattered seed? Well then, you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers, so that when I returned I would have received it back with interest. Take the talent from him and give it to the one who has the ten talents. For everyone who has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him.”(Matthew 25:26–29)

We do not need to fear having nothing to show for ourselves to our Creator if we invest in and exercise our natural gifts and talents and then wait expectantly in faith for the results.

In addition, when we use what we have been given for the sake of others, it is multiplied back to us: “Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you” (Luke 6:38).

Just as we need to put our gifts to work in the first place, we need to refine them by continual use, training, and development so that they can be optimally effective.

We constantly pray for you, that our God may count you worthy of his calling, and that by his power he may fulfill every good purpose of yours and every act prompted by your faith.(2 Thessalonians 1:11)

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does. (James 1:22–25)

Personal authority is a permanent part of our natures; it doesn’t go away, “for God’s gifts and his call are irrevocable” (Romans 11:29). Our authority may be recalled for misuse, but our essential makeup and gifts remain. If we realign our lives with God, He will restore us and renew our calls. “We know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28).

This principle is the reason why the same ideas and dreams keep coming back to us throughout our lives. We must realize that our personal authority is connected to our identities and reflects our true purposes so that we will seek to pursue what we are called to do in life.