After this, the Lord appointed seventy others and sent them on ahead of him in pairs to every town and place where he himself intended to go.
“Whenever you enter a town and its people welcome you, eat what is set before you; cure the sick who are there, and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’”
“Whoever listens to you listens to me, and whoever rejects you rejects me, and whoever rejects me rejects the one who sent me.”
One of the amazing things about Jesus was his willingness to delegate to others many of the core activities of his kingdom work. Jesus enlisted his disciples in the work of proclaiming and manifesting the reign of God. He empowered them to preach and to heal. We can learn from Jesus how to delegate to others even as we also acknowledge that he has delegated the work of the gospel to us.
When we think of the messianic ministry of Jesus, we understandably focus on him and all that he did. We rightly acknowledge the uniqueness of his calling and activity. But by emphasizing the uniqueness of Jesus’s efforts, we can miss the fact that he was also a delegator. He assigned to others to do and say some of the amazing things he did and said.
We saw this first in Luke 9, where Jesus called together the innermost circle of his disciples. To them, he gave “power and authority over all demons and to cure diseases” (9:1). Then he “sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God and to heal” (9:2). Yet Jesus did not delegate his kingdom work only to the twelve disciples who were closest to him. In Luke 10 he appointed seventy of his other disciples to go out to various towns and cure the sick while preaching the presence of the kingdom (10:1, 8-9). Thus, when we picture Jesus at work as the Messiah, we must include his work of delegation to at least 82 people.
Notice that those Jesus sent out were not mainly serving as an advance team, as I noted yesterday. Political advance teams get things ready for the candidate, but don’t make speeches or act as candidates do. Jesus authorized his representatives to do what he did in ministry. Even the seventy, who were preparing the way for Jesus, were authorized to preach and heal. (Later, we learn they also had the authority to cast out demons; see Luke 10:17). Jesus did what all good delegators must do, conferring authority, transferring responsibility, and conferring trust.
The fact that Jesus delegated in this way shouldn’t come as a complete surprise to us because this is the sort of thing God does with important tasks. In Genesis 1, for example, God created the heavens and the earth, declaring them to be good. Then God created human beings in God’s own image, charging them with the task of making sure the earth is productive and well-cared for (see Genesis 1:27-29, also Genesis 2:15). Similarly, in Matthew 28 Jesus entrusted to his followers the formidable task of making disciples “of all nations” (28:19). Talk about delegation!
The example of Jesus the delegator speaks to us in at least two ways. First, it challenges us to imitate Jesus’s work of delegation. Whether in the workplace, at home, in church, or in our volunteer work, we should seek to enlist the help of others, learning to empower, encourage, and trust them. We need to be wise when we do this, of course. But we mustn’t let our ego needs get in the way of our own acts of delegation.
Second, the example of Jesus reminds us that he has delegated his kingdom mission, not only to those who followed him in person but also to those of us who follow him from a distance. We have inherited the work that Jesus once gave to his first disciples, namely, to make more disciples. We do this in a multiplicity of ways and contexts as we seek to serve the Lord through serving others in his name.
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