Christ Church Sermon, Unsung: Leadership, September 20th, 2026

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>> Today's scripture is from the uh book of

2 Kings chapter 23 25. Neither before

2 Kings 23 · chapter mention

nor after Josiah was there there.

Neither before nor after Josiah was

there a king like him who turned to the

Lord as he did with all his heart and

with all his soul and with all his

strength in accordance with the law of

Moses. Hear what the spirit is saying to

the church. Thanks be to God.

>> Thanks Gordon. You know, there's certain

things that you learn after you've lived

in the South Hills as long as I've lived

in the South Hills. First of all, you

learn that distance and time have

nothing to do with each other. Somebody

can tell you that they're 5 miles away.

That can mean 15 minutes, 30 minutes, or

it means you could pack a lunch in order

to get there in time. It depends on

Route 88, Route 19, accidents, school

traffic, or or whether or not somebody

decided to close one of the lanes of the

road at 8:15 in the morning during rush

hour. I've also learned that everybody

in the South Hills has a shortcut. Tell

somebody where you're going and

immediately they say, "Oh, don't go that

way." Then come the directions. Go past

Giant Eagle, down the hill, turn by the

church, take the second left, not the

first left, but the second left by what

used to be the Sonokco, and then cut

through 17 neighborhoods. And by the

time they're done giving me the

directions, I don't even remember where

I was trying to go in the first place.

Now, here's the interesting thing about

directions. We can give somebody perfect

directions and we can be heading in the

wrong direction ourselves.

And the same is true spiritually. We can

come with we've become very good at

telling other people what they should

do, where they need to go. You need to

forgive. You need to pray. You need to

trust God. You need to be generous. You

need to get your priorities right. You

need to change. We can become very good

at giving spiritual directions while

forgetting to ask the most important

question. Am I following Jesus myself?

Because that is where Christian

leadership begins. Now, I know a lot of

you when you hear me say the word

leadership are going to immediately tune

me out because you think you're not a

leader. You think leaders are people

with titles. You know, pastors, choir

directors, people in the public eye,

managers, principles, coaches, the

people that get elected to public

office, people that have offices, people

that lead meetings. So, when you hear a

sermon about leadership, some of you

think, "Well, this sermon really isn't

for me, but I'm not a leader." But I

want to challenge that idea

because I'm here to tell you that every

single one of us is a leader. We are all

called to be unsung leaders. Maybe we're

unnoticed. Maybe we're a leader without

a title or an office or a platform or a

microphone or a staff. Or maybe we are

noticed. But we are all leading somebody

because leadership at its basic level is

influence. And every single one of us

influences someone else. Your children

are watching you. Your grandchildren are

watching you. Your co-workers are

watching you. Your friends are watching

you. Your neighbors are watching you.

People at Christ Church are watching

you. That's not as creepy as it sounds.

Sometimes people are watching you and

you don't even realize they're watching

you. So the question is not, "Am I a

leader?" The question is,

am I leading people and where am I

leading people? And am I following Jesus

when I lead those people? Which brings

us to one of the most unsung leaders in

scripture, a king by the name of Josiah.

You heard for read it. He said, "Neither

before nor after Josiah was there a king

like him who turned to the Lord as he

did with all his heart, with all his

soul, and with all his strength." It's

quite a legacy statement there. But

notice why scripture remembers Josiah.

It doesn't say he had the biggest

kingdom. It doesn't say he had the

strongest army. It doesn't say everybody

liked him. It doesn't say he was the

most charismatic. Scripture remembers

him for one thing. He turned to the Lord

with all his heart, with all his soul,

and with all his strength. Scripture

remembers Josiah because of the

direction of his life.

Now, Josiah's story, for those who may

not know it, begins in a pretty unlikely

place. Josiah becomes king when he is 8

years old. Eight. Think about some of

the eight-year-olds we have running

around Christ Church right now.

We love them. They're wonderful. I'm not

sure if we're ready to turn the

leadership of the church over to those

8-year-olds. Most of them can't find the

jacket they took off when they got to

church this morning. But believe it or

not, Josiah's biggest challenge was not

his age. It was actually what he

inherited. His father and grandfather

had led Judah farther and farther from

God. Idolatry had become normal. The

temple had been neglected. God's

covenant had been forgotten.

Josiah inherited a mess that he didn't

create. Anybody here ever inherit a mess

that you didn't create? I see the

parents all raising their hand. Right?

You start a job and you discover there

were problems at that job that started

long before you got there. You become

what the one handling everything in your

family and you discover that there are

financial problems and relational wounds

that nobody has ever talked about. You

become a parent and suddenly realize

that you don't want everything that you

had in your childhood to be part of your

kids' childhood. You step into ministry

and discover that there are decisions

that were made years ago that are still

affecting today. You know why? Because

families have histories. Churches have

histories. Organizations have histories.

We are all part of histories. Josiah

teaches us something very important

about leadership when it comes to what

we inherit. We could spend our entire

life asking whose fault is this? Or

eventually we can say what am I going to

do with what God has placed in my hands.

You see, Josiah realized that he

couldn't change his father. He couldn't

change his grandfather. He couldn't

rewrite yesterday,

but he could decide what he was going to

do right now in this moment. Josiah

essentially says, "It may not have

started with me, but something will

change with me." That's leadership.

Deciding to stop making excuses and

start asking God, "What should we do?"

That is something that every single one

of us can do. We may not be able to fix

everything in our family, but something

can change in us. We may not be able to

change our workplace, but something can

change with us. We may not be able to

change everything in our community, but

something can change with us. We may not

be able to solve every problem at Christ

Church, but something can change with

us. You see, unsung leaders stop waiting

for somebody to go first and instead

they take the first step. They say,

"What has God placed in my hands?" And

we see that Josiah listens. Josiah

orders repairs to the temple. And while

they're working, Hilkaya, the high

priest, makes an incredible discovery.

He says, "I have found the book of the

law in the temple of the Lord." Now,

think about that for a second. You know

what he's saying there? He's saying, "I

found the Bible in the church."

And that seems to be news for everybody.

They had the building. They had the

priest. They had the traditions. They

had the worship. They had all the

outward pieces. But somewhere along the

way, they had stopped listening to God.

And if we're not careful, the same thing

can happen to us. For example, I've

spent almost my entire life around the

church. I know how weekends work. I know

what happens when somebody doesn't show

up. I know what happens when the

technology doesn't work. I know what

happens when something that went great

at rehearsal fails miserably in the

service. After enough years in ministry,

you can become pretty good at doing

church. And that's one of the dangers

because it's possible to become so busy

doing things for God that we stop

listening to God. If I'm not careful, I

can prepare a sermon without listening

to God. I can sit in a meeting without

listening to God. I can plan ministry

without listening to God. I can move

from conversation to conversation, from

meeting to meeting, from worship service

to worship service, and suddenly realize

I have talked a lot about God throughout

the week, but I've have I actually

listened to God. Now, maybe you have

your own version of not listening to

God. You know, you handle everything

that needs handled. You get to the end

of the week after trying to keep

everybody's schedule straight, hold

everything together, and suddenly the

week is gone and you realize you never

had any time to listen to God. And into

all that noise, Josiah teaches every

unsung leader something very, very

important. Leaders listen before they

lead.

When God's word is read to Josiah, he

doesn't immediately say, "I know exactly

who needs to hear that." You ever do

that? You ever hear a sermon and think

to yourself, "I wish so and so would

hear that sermon." Do you ever read a

scripture and say, "I really got to send

that to whoever." Josiah doesn't do

that. When he hears the scripture, it

says he tears his robes. He tears his

robes because he realized how far they

were from God. His first question was

not, "What is wrong with everyone else?"

His first response was, "What is God

saying to me?" That's leadership. And

that kind of leadership is available to

every single one of us. You don't need a

title to ask what is God saying to me.

So before we ask God to change our

family, we should ask God to speak to

us. Before we ask God to change Christ's

church, we should ask God to speak to

us. Before we ask God to change the

people we disagree with, we should ask

God to speak to us. Unsung leaders

should be asking, "Where have I drifted?

What have I stopped seeing? What am I

holding on to?

Where am I wrong? What needs to change

in me? Because an unsung leader

understands that I cannot lead anybody

somewhere that I am unwilling to go

myself.

Before Josiah leads anyone else, he

allows God to lead him. Unsung leaders

let God change them first. Josiah

doesn't just listen, he changes. And

those are two different things. We could

sit in worship and we could say, "That's

right. Good point, Pastor Chris. Amen."

And we can walk out of this room the

exact same way we walked into this room.

But Josiah hears these words of God and

allows it to change the direction of his

life. And that makes his leadership

different.

That challenges me personally because

again after years of being a pastor,

it's easy for me to stand up here and

tell you what disciplehip looks like. I

can preach about prayer all day long.

The real question is, am I praying? I

can preach about generosity, but am I

generous? I can preach about

forgiveness, but is there somebody in my

life that I'm refusing to forgive? I

could preach about serving, but am I

willing to serve when there's no

platform, no microphone, and nobody

knows I'm doing it? I can preach about

trusting God, but what happens when

there's something in my own life that

doesn't go the way I want it? That's

where leadership becomes real.

Not when we're holding a microphone and

everyone sees us, but when nobody is

watching. Most Christian leadership

doesn't happen in the public eye. It

happens in our everyday life doing

everyday things. often when we don't

even realize people are watching us.

Now, I'm here to tell you that we are

all surrounded by unsung leaders. I've

seen them here at Christ Church. I've

watched people prepare communion knowing

most of the congregation will never know

their name. I've watched Christ kids

volunteers kneel down to get eye to eye

with a child who's nervous and has some

anxiety so that they know they're cared

for and loved. I've watched adults sit

with teenagers and listen. Not lecture,

not fix, but listen. Those are all

examples of leadership. No spotlight, no

applause, no title, no recognition. Just

somebody who sees what God has put in

front of them and is willing to say, "I

can do that."

Kind of sounds a lot like service, which

we talked about last week. But that's an

unsung leader. I think sometimes we've

made leadership too glamorous, which is

why so many people don't view themselves

as a leader. But Christian leadership is

simply living in a way that points

people to Jesus. Sometimes leadership is

showing our children what forgiveness

looks like instead of just telling them

they should forgive. Sometimes

leadership is treating the cashier at

Giant Eagle with kindness, even when the

line is long and we're already running

late. Cuz remember, people are always

watching us.

Sometimes leadership is what happens in

our car when somebody cuts us off and

our kids and our grandkids are hearing

everything that we say. When that

happens, sometimes leadership is

admitting, "I was wrong." Sometimes

leadership is saying, "I'm sorry."

Sometimes leadership is doing the right

thing even though if we did the wrong

thing which would be easier nobody would

know we ever did it. That's why I want

you to hear this this morning. You are

already leading. The only question is

what kind of leadership is your life

providing? Because people learn from us.

Which leads to a very important

question. Are we faithful when no one

else is watching? Some of the most

important leadership decisions we'll

ever make happen quietly. That's true

for you. That's true for me as a pastor.

I mean, over the years, I've learned

that being a pastor doesn't just

automatically make me anyone's spiritual

leader. Having a title doesn't do that.

Standing behind this pulpit doesn't do

that. Following Jesus is what makes me a

leader. The reverse is also true. You

don't need the title of pastor to be a

spiritual leader. You don't need to be

on staff. You don't need to chair a

committee. You don't need to teach a

class. You don't need to have hundreds

of people following you. You just need

to be faithfully following Jesus

wherever God has placed you. So our

prayer is not God give me more people to

lead or make the people that I lead

easier to lead. The prayer is Lord begin

with me. Because our world tends to

measure leadership with questions like

how big, how many, how much, how

successful, how many people came, how

much did it grow. Now, don't get me

wrong, those questions are important.

Numbers matter to some degree. They

matter here at Christ Church. We want to

know if we're actually reaching people.

We want to know how many kids are in

Christ kids so we are sure we have

enough adults. We want to make sure our

teenagers are connected. We want to know

how many people are walking through the

door and who they are so we can reach

out to them. We want to know how many

people are serving and growing in their

faith. We want our ministry to make a

difference in the South Hills. But

numbers never tell the entire story

because some of the most important

things that happen, some of the most

important things that God does can't be

put on a spreadsheet.

How do you measure a moment when the

child realizes for the first time, God

loves me? How do you measure the moment

when a grieving person walks through the

doors of this church and realizes, "I'm

not alone." How do you measure the

moment a teenager discovers they're an

there's an adult here that actually

cares about them?

How do you measure somebody quietly

deciding, "I'm going to forgive this

person?"

How do you measure the person sitting in

this sanctuary who hasn't prayed in

years whispering, "God, if you're still

there, here's what I have going on."

We don't see all that, but God does. And

that takes me back to Josiah. Scripture

summary of his life is powerful because

it it doesn't say he controlled every

outcome. It says he turned to the Lord

with all his heart, with all his soul,

with all his strength.

Maybe some of us are exhausted because

we're trying to control outcomes that

God never asks us to control. Parents

get that, right? We love our children.

We teach our children. We pray for our

children. We model faith for our

children. And guess what? Eventually,

our children are going to make their own

decision. Pastors realize that. We

preach, teach, pray, invite, encourage,

but we cannot make anyone follow Jesus.

We are not responsible for what other

people do. Our responsibility is

faithfulness. Unsung leadership is not

controlling the outcome. It is being

faithful with the influence that God has

given us. Now, when I walk around this

church, I sometimes think about all the

unsung leaders who were faithful here

long before any of us arrived. Some of

their names we know, most we don't. But

we're sitting in the fruit of somebody

else's faithfulness.

Not just in the building, but in the

spiritual tradition. We are here because

unsung leaders came before us. And

someday there will be people that walk

into Christ Church who will think about

the unsung leaders who are leading right

now.

you know, people that haven't been born

yet, families that haven't moved to the

South Hills yet, people who don't know

Jesus yet. And the question is, what are

we building for them? And I don't just

mean physically, I mean spiritually and

emotionally. Not so that they'll

remember us, but so that they'll

encounter Jesus.

That's leadership. Faithfulness today

for the sake of people we may never meet

tomorrow.

So don't tell me that you're not a

leader. We're all leaders. We're all

unsung leaders. But unsung does not mean

unimportant or unseen. God sees it. Our

job is to lead wherever God has placed

us.

But remember how Christian leadership

works. We don't begin by saying follow

me. We begin by saying am I following

Jesus?

Now I want to leave us with four words

this morning. Four words that could

change our family. Four words that could

change our workplace. Four words that

could change our church. Four words that

could change the South Hills. Lord,

begin with me. Say that with me. Lord,

begin with me. We want our children and

grandchildren to know Jesus. Lord, begin

with me. We want Christ Church to be a

place where everyone is welcome and

feels like they belong. Lord, begin with

me. We want people to serve. Lord, begin

with me. We want people to give. Lord,

begin with me. We want people to

forgive. Lord, begin with me. We want

more kindness in our community. Lord,

begin with me. We want Christ Church to

keep building inclusive community,

sharing Christ transforming love. Lord,

begin with me.

Because maybe the greatest leadership

decision that we make this week won't

happen where everybody sees it. It might

happen when nobody else even knows we're

making a decision.

But God does. And that's when we

remember Josiah. Neither before nor

after Josiah was there a king like him.

Why? Not because everybody followed, but

because he followed God with all his

heart, with all his soul, with all his

strength. That's the kind of leadership

our families need. That's the kind of

leadership Christ Church needs. That's

the kind of leadership the South Hills

and our world needs. Not more people

fighting to get noticed. Just ordinary

people who have decided wherever Jesus

leads, I'm going to follow. When people

notice, I'll follow. If people don't

notice, I'll follow. If somebody thanks

me, I'll follow. If nobody says

anything, I'll follow. If it's easy,

I'll follow. If it costs me something,

I'll follow. Because the goal isn't that

someday people will look at our lives

and say, "Wow, what a great leader they

were." The goal is that through our

kindness, through our generosity,

through our integrity, through our

forgiveness, through our service,

through our love, through our

faithfulness, people will somehow be

able to look beyond us and say, "What a

great God."

So lead wherever God has placed you. And

remember, true unsung leadership begins

with four simple words.

Lord, begin with me. Let's pray. Lord,

we thank you for the example of Josiah

as a great leader. And if an

eight-year-old can be a great leader,

any of us can be a great leader, an

unsung leader.

The trick is asking the right question

which is Lord what do you want me to do?

What have you given me?

Lord begin your work in me.

And when we ask that question and

faithfully strive to do what you tell

us, you will put us in positions to lead

others, to share your transforming love,

and to make a difference in their life

and in this world. Thank you for

watching over us and equipping us and

helping us to be the leaders you call us

to be. We ask all this in your son's

name. And everyone said, "Amen.