 Willow Creek pastor summons courage, integrity, compassion By John H. Adams The Layman Online Monday, October 7, 2002 ORLANDO, Fla. – Bill Hybels, the senior pastor of the largest church in North America, says the Bible's "three Joes" and Nelson Mandela are examples of what is needed to revolutionize the church today.
"I want to call out of you higher levels of courage, integrity and compassion," Hybels said. "I never go from one level to the next unless someone calls something out of me." Hybels is the minister of Willow Creek Community Church near Chicago, a congregation of 6,500 members that attracts 17,000 worshipers for its four services, and the leader of a coalition of 8,500 like-minded congregations called the Willow Creek Association. He told the Gathering: "The local church is really the hope of the world. Who other than the local church is going to help millions of people? Who other than the local church can reach out to the unemployed and disillusioned? Who other than the local church can take a wholistic approach and provide bread for the body and nurture for the soul? Who other than the local church has the guts to tell a trembling world that a sovereign God is still on the throne and a weight-enhanced woman hasn't had the last word?" Joseph of Arimathea was a secret follower of Christ "in a manner that would not threaten his livelihood, his status or money," Hybels said. "The more you have to lose the harder it is to be a leader with courage … the harder it is to bet the farm." But after the crucifixion of Jesus, Hybels said, Joseph of Arimathea "throws caution to the wind. He demands that he be allowed to give the body of Jesus Christ a Christian burial. He knows that he will become a card-carrying Christ follower, but he doesn't give a rip." And why did Joseph of Arimathea, with wealth and status to lose, become an open follower of Christ. "I think I know the answer," Hybels said. "He watched as the one who had all power set aside that power in order to atone for your sin and mine. He watched the whole bloody mess. I think that when Joseph heard Jesus' final cry something stirred within him … He probably gritted his teeth and said: 'I will never cower again … I will never waver when God asks me to make a tough decision." "Is there any leader here tonight who needs a bell rung?" he asked. "Some of us, truth be told, are still mostly talk. Some of us watch the world deteriorate around us. Some of us know exactly what tough decisions ought to be made. It just feels like there's too much to lose. We hide behind the veil of good intentions and settle for another year of some days." "Could you imagine what would happen to the church if all of us did what courage required?" he asked. While talking about the integrity of Joseph, the son of Jacob, Hybels cited America's fading confidence in the integrity of business, political and church leaders. "The water level for tolerating two-faced leaders is at nostril level right now. The culture is crying out, 'Enough is enough." But Joseph "lived and died with clean hands and a pure heart," he said. "He crossed the finish line without a scandal on his record. Joseph would call every one of us to a higher standard of integrity. He was the original zero-tolerance guy when it came to deceit. If he stood up here, he would say, 'Please, men and women, honor God, body, mind, soul, thought, word, deed, motives, methods and money.' Put systems in place that will make deceit unlikely if not impossible.'" "What if all of us took Joseph's pledge to a zero tolerance?" he asked. Joseph, the husband of Mary, "calls us to a higher level of compassion," Hybels said, referring to Joseph's discovery that his fiancee was pregnant. "Joseph was a righteous man, but did not want to expose her to public disgrace," Hybels said. "He put it in his mind to divorce her secretly" so that Mary and her family would not be publicly shamed. "He made a decision from a compassionate center." "I wonder what would happen if ever pastor, every leader of a local church would lead from a compassionate center filled with love?" he asked. Hybels said he accepts invitations to speak without charge every Friday night. One invitation came from a church in Texas that was in a town so small that "when I asked our pilots, they couldn't even find it on the network." The people in that church wanted Hybels to speak at a fundraiser. Their downtown had deteriorated in an ethnic transition. The church leaders wanted to buy the central downtown block, put a church there and provide an ethnic ministry. "I didn't have to pray about that one," Hybels said after receiving the invitation to speak. When he arrived, he said the first thing he wanted to do was go downtown and see the location for the proposed church. "As we were driving around that block, I could see the finished project," he said. "I could see that building all refurbished and filled to overflowing. I could hear the praise music in the ethnic style. I could see the after-school program." At the fundraising banquet, "I slobbered my way through this. What they were doing would pack a stronger punch in their town than if they added 500 people to their congregation. Growing a bigger church doesn't necessarily impress seeker and cynics. They were diving elbow deep into the heart of that city." After Nelson Mandela was arrested by white South Africans, he told the court: "Ending apartheid is a cause for which I would gladly give the rest of my life and a purpose for which I will gladly die." Mandela spent 27 years in prison and saw apartheid end, becoming the first black president of South Africa. "His courage, his integrity, his depth of feeling led to a revolution that ushered in a whole new day," Hybels said. With his voice cracking, he added, "I'm not trying to be melodramatic. I really believe this stuff." He concluded: "Is there a cause for which you will gladly die? If that's true about you, you are unstoppable. You will build a church that the gates of hell cannot prevail against." |
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