Why Do I Have to Submit to Leaders When I Know I Could Do It Better?
By Angela D. Thomas, DrPH, MPH, MBA
Because subjection is what propels you into purpose. God moves you forward through the people He's placed in authority over you, not around them. Even Jesus was launched into His ministry by honoring His mother's word before He felt it was His time. Your breakthrough is often attached to somebody you're tempted to overlook.
We have walked all week through the first thirty years of Jesus' life. You're in preparation, not behind. You're collecting receipts. There's a place for preparation and a place for purpose. And the people back home may not honor your calling. Today we finish with the one move that actually pushed Jesus out of thirty hidden years and into public ministry. And it is going to challenge some of us.
Here it is. Subjection propels us into purpose. Being submitted to the leadership and authority God has placed over you is often the very thing that pushes you into your calling.
What Actually Launched Jesus Into His Ministry?
A wedding. Not a mountaintop sermon. A wedding where they ran out of wine. Jesus is there with His disciples, and His mother comes to Him with the problem. And listen to how He first responds. John 2:4 (NKJV) says, "Jesus said to her, 'Woman, what does your concern have to do with Me? My hour has not yet come.'" In my own translation, He's basically saying, what does that have to do with Me? I got invited to this wedding just like everybody else. My time hasn't even come yet. This was not His plan and it was not His timing.
But watch His mother. She doesn't argue with Him. She just turns to the servants. John 2:5 (NKJV) says, "His mother said to the servants, 'Whatever He says to you, do it.'" She knew who her son was. She had been keeping the things about Him in her heart since the day He was born. And on the strength of her word, Jesus tells the servants to fill the pots with water, and that water becomes wine.
Now catch what that miracle did. John 2:11 (NKJV) says, "This beginning of signs Jesus did in Cana of Galilee, and manifested His glory; and His disciples believed in Him." That was His very first miracle. The beginning. It moved His disciples from following Him on somebody else's word to actually believing in Him. And it happened because He honored His mother when He could have said, I came to save the whole world, I'll start on My own clock. He didn't diminish her. He submitted, and His submission launched His purpose.
What Does the Bible Say About Submitting to Leaders You Think You've Outgrown?
Let me bring it all the way into real life, because this is where we get stiff-necked. You may be sitting under a boss, and you know good and well you could do their job. You've got more education, more receipts, more drive. You carry the whole department on your back. Your boss may not even want to be the CEO, but you do, and you know you could get there. So little by little, you start to devalue them.
Be careful with that. That same boss can have a relationship that opens the exact door you've been praying for. Their one recommendation, their word, their access, their currency can catapult your whole career further than your gifts could carry it on their own. God can attach your promotion to a person you were tempted to look down on. So do not ever minimize, diminish, or side-eye the leadership God has placed over you in your season of preparation. It's their word, their relationship, their access that can propel you into your purpose.
Remember Tina Turner. She did not even like What's Love Got to Do with It when she first heard it. She wanted nothing to do with that song. But her management, people who did not have her talent or her fame, people whose names we don't even know, convinced her it was the best thing for her. She submitted to their direction, recorded it, and that is the song that propelled her all the way to superstardom. Same principle. Subjection to the authority in your life can carry you to a place your gift alone was never going to reach.
Where Do We See Jesus in All of This?
Everywhere. This whole series has been Jesus. He is the One who embraced thirty years of preparation without ever complaining that it was too slow. He is the One who collected the receipts, growing in wisdom and stature and favor. He is the One who knew the difference between His place of preparation and His place of purpose. He is the One who kept walking when His own hometown refused to honor Him. And He is the One who submitted to authority and let that submission launch Him. If the Son of God did it that way, so can you.
So here's the whole thing in one breath. Don't despise your preparation. Pray for your receipts. Know your places. Give grace to the folks who can't see you yet. And stay submitted, because your breakthrough may be attached to the very person you were about to overlook.
Take this to the Word yourself. John 2:1-11, Luke 2:51-52, Luke 3:23.
What This Means for You
Who is the leader or the authority in your life you've been quietly devaluing, and what might God be trying to do through them for your purpose?
This is the final post in the Amazing 30 series. Here's the whole week if you want to walk back through it:
Friday: Why Do I Have to Submit to Leaders When I Know I Could Do It Better?
I teach God's Word weekly inside the SheShed Community, and this is exactly the kind of teaching that hits different when you're in the room for it. The replay of this teaching, “The Amazing 30,” is available inside the community as well. Come sit with us.
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