I Kings 19

In the sacristy closet of the church where I served as associate pastor hung the mantle of C. Henry Anderson. Pastor Anderson had pastored the church for 25 years in its heyday. Even though two pastors had come and gone between Pastor Anderson and my arrival, people still put that guy on a pedestal: he had baptized and confirmed, married and buried a whole generation of people, and he was the measure of what a pastor was supposed to be. He was reverent, caring, and proper: the guy mowed his lawn in a shirt and coat. He was holy, close to God, in charge.

One day I put on that mantle, just to see what it was like. It was a full-length wool cloak, and I was surprised at its weight. I had recently stepped up to take the place of the senior pastor who was on disability leave for back surgery. I had some staff and key lay leaders to help, but as I tried on that cape of C. Henry Anderson, I knew I couldn’t lead like him. The mantle of leadership was too heavy for one person to bear.

In our Old Testament lesson for today, the prophet Elijah was feeling the weight of leadership, too. He had been appointed by God to eliminate worship of the fertility god Baal in Israel. Earlier in I Samuel, Elijah had challenged the prophets of Baal to a duel and won. He proved that Baal was a sham and put all the prophets of Baal to death.

You’d think Elijah would have been thrilled at this success, but he had the exact opposite reaction. Queen Jezebel was a worshipper of Baal, and she put a price on Elijah’s head for taking out all Baal’s prophets. Elijah was so dejected that he wanted to quit; he actually asked God if he could die. Instead, God told him to anoint a successor – someone who could shoulder the mantle of leadership with him.

Our reading today shows that Elijah wasted no time. No sooner did Elijah hear the word of the Lord than he set out to find Elisha. Elisha is in the middle of plowing a field when Elijah throws his mantle over him. It was a sign of transferring prophetic authority to Elisha and an invitation to a new way of life. For the next six years, Elisha faithfully served and followed the elder Elijah, supporting Elijah’s work and growing in ability and strength. Elijah’s old prayer to God about the weight of leadership was answered in Elisha: the mantle was lighter when carried by two.

But as I read I Samuel, I note that these two leaders had a wider circle of support. Both Elijah and Elisha trained and led a company of prophets – people who served Israel through prayer and offering spiritual guidance. It says to me that leadership was never intended by God to be a burden a few people shoulder, not even two amazing prophets. Leadership is something that all people of God are meant to share.

Martin Luther often talked about “the priesthood of all believers.” It’s a phrase he used to describe that each person by virtue of their baptism has a ministry to share and is a full participant in the life of the community of faith. The church is not a priest’s domain; leadership is not the pastor’s or the council president’s job. It is everyone’s job, and we all do it in different ways.

So, I wonder: how can Epiphany be that kind of community? How can we be a place where each person’s gifts are cultivated and invited? How can we enable our leaders to identify and mentor others, as Elijah and Elisha did?

Leadership is essential for the success of our congregation’s strategic plan. We need a strong pipeline of people who can lead the charge to grow in faith, build thriving community, and transform lives through Christ’s love. The first step is to get new people involved. In the old days, that meant things like time and talent sheets where people filled out a form with their interests and skills. Sometimes it was a ministry fair where leaders set up booths to advertise their ministry. But these methods do not work as well nowadays. Time and talent sheets are only as good as the follow-up on them, and families on the go are not likely to fill out paper forms or to attend ministry fairs. The biggest drawback in depending on these methods, however, is that they typically only happen once a year. We currently use our weekly newsletter to communicate a variety of ministries and invite people to join in. But it’s hard to find those emails if you don’t sign up right then. And you can’t go back easily months later to find information on something that sparked your interest.

But what if we had a way for people to find a way to get involved at Epiphany at the moment they were inspired and had time to do it? We have technology like our website and our database that is available 24/7 and can be built out to become this kind of ministry finder where new people can find and join small groups, serving ministries and studies. This is where we are headed as a congregation, and it will take staffing and congregational commitment to put it into place.

The other piece that is necessary is to create a healthy cycle of serving in leadership and then passing it on. The role of committee chair or ministry leader is not meant to be a life sentence. A person should be able to step into leadership for a time and then give it to the next person. We do this with our council president – it’s a two year commitment: the first year you serve as president-elect, and the second as president. It is my contention that every ministry and committee leader should be thinking about who their replacement is, and everyone in the ministry should be thinking about who else to invite to join them. Every group charter at Epiphany should contain the charge: invite new members and cultivate new leadership.

I think back to the cloak of C. Henry Anderson, and I realize that sometimes you just get thrown into leadership despite people’s best efforts to prepare you. God sustained me and taught me that I didn’t have to be all things to all people, that I could lean on the gifts of others in a collaborative leadership style.

I think back to that story of Elijah throwing his mantle over Elisha. It’s a powerful vision of leadership passed from one to another. But that image alone seems too small for God’s purposes. Leadership isn’t just about one person mentoring another person. It's about a whole culture that invites, trains, and raises up new leaders.

Which reminds me of something else from the church of C. Henry Anderson. Every year in the church preschool, there were a few days when the teachers gathered the children in the fellowship hall and brought out a big parachute. Each child grabbed an edge of the rainbow-colored fabric. Together they made the parachute rise, filling it with air, and then whooshing the air into their faces as they brought the parachute back down. The best part was when the kids pulled the parachute down behind their backs, creating the dome of a parachute sky above them.

To me this is a beautiful image of leadership. Instead of the mantle that a few people wear, I like to think of leadership as a parachute that we all hold onto, that we all make dance. It is a circle where all have a place to contribute and a gift to share, where the smallest and the tallest all have a place. That’s where we are headed: the priesthood of all believers; the ministry of Christ, shared with you and me.