by Jonathan Powers | Jul 7, 2026 | Uncategorized
Spiritual Leverage
by Mike Powers
Katherine Lee Bates was inspired to write the poem America the Beautiful after a visit to Pikes Peak in 1893 in a covered wagon with fellow teachers from Colorado College. Little did she know that those words would become one of the most patriotic songs in the history of our country. As we celebrate the 250th birthday of our nation, America the Beautiful is being sung with passion and pride in concerts, churches and ballparks across the land as a tribute to the highest ideals of our nation. The refrain is a supplication for God’s intervention:
“America! America! God shed His grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!”
Contemplating the familiar words of this refrain, one must wonder why should God shed His grace upon our country and crown our goodness with brotherhood? This is a proper prayer and noble notion, but as inspiring as these words may be, are they taken seriously? An adage goes, “Methodists don’t tell lies; they sing them.” When Americans sing America the Beautiful with such devotion and passion, do we sincerely desire the intervention of God’s Spirit and seriously yearn for unity across our nation or are these merely words we mindlessly sing in church on national holidays?
We also may ask why we dare to ask God to be gracious to the United States of America? We obviously need such an infusion of divine benevolence, but are we trustworthy of such gifts? Another adage advises, “Be careful what you ask for because you just might get it.” Jesus stated it very bluntly: “From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted much, much more will be asked” (Luke 12:48, NIV). According to Jesus, we are stewards of grace, responsible for all the blessings God has lavishly shared with us.
The Experience of God’s Grace
Upon whom, therefore, is the grace of God shed? The biblical answer is quite simple.
But he gives us more grace. That is why the Scripture says, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble” (James 4:6).
He mocks proud mockers but gives grace to the humble and oppressed (Proverbs 3:34).
Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time (1 Peter 5:6).
He guides the humble in what is right and teaches them his way (Psalm 25:9).
For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted (Luke 14:11).
Note the common thought in these verses: humility is spiritual leverage. Humility is the catalyst, a means of grace, the very power of God for the spiritual transformation of the individual, the church and the nation. The Word of God consistently decrees that God sheds his grace upon the humble. On the other hand, God resists, ignores, and opposes the proud. Pride is spiritual sabotage. Nothing hinders the presence of God and destroys human relationships (community) more quickly or completely than being self-serving, self-seeking, self-willing, self-satisfying. If we are serious when we petition God to shed his grace upon our nation, our communities, our churches, our families, ourselves, we choose the path of humility – God’s will, first and foremost.
Thy love divine hath led us in the past;
in this free land with thee our lot is cast;
be thou our ruler, guardian, guide and stay,
thy Word our law, thy paths our chosen way.
—Daniel C. Roberts (1876)
The Expression of God’s Grace
The Christian life has been explained as a heartbeat, the rhythmic expansion and contraction of the arteries as the heart pumps blood through the body. Which activity is more important: expansion as blood flows into the heart or contraction when blood is sent out of the heart? That rhythm of blood flowing in and then being pushed out is our lifeline. Both, of course, are needed to be healthy and alive.
Likewise, the normal, healthy Christian life is an experience and an expression of grace. Humility is the leverage point for a healthy heart spiritually.
Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves. Philippians 2:3
Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Colossians 3:12
He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus; who, being in the very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death – even death on a cross. Philippians 2:5-8
If we genuinely desire to experience the grace of God and responsibly, as stewards, express our desire to be a “brotherhood” (an authentic, healthy, growing, loving community), it begins by having the heartbeat and mind of Christ who came to serve and not be served. Such humility gives leverage to grace in the daily stuff of life, beginning with our loved ones who are close and extending across our spheres of influence. God’s grace is shed generously through the Christlike attitude of valuing all others above ourselves. Another adage, popularized by President Harry Truman, goes: “It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.” God is ready and willing and able to shed his grace upon anyone and everyone who is ready and willing to humble themselves.
Impossible? Too naïve? Simplistic? Unrealistic? Several thousand years of human history confirm that humility is the road much less traveled while Scripture reveals that God’s ways are contrary to human wisdom. Jesus’ life and words affirm that true greatness is demonstrated in humble service. The apostle Paul noted, “God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.” (I Corinthians 1:27).
An Example of God’s Grace: Radical Humility
Every now and then there is a clear witness of the reality of spiritual leverage. God shows up, and through a person or an event, we experience an uplift of grace. Many of us were blessed to observe such a moment at the Outpouring on the campus of Asbury University in February 2023.
Spontaneous revivals have occurred often throughout the years of Asbury University (College). Many books and articles have been written as scholars, Christian leaders, sociologists, et al have sought to understand and explain these spiritually awakening experiences. The availability to announce this latest movement of the Holy Spirit at Asbury across the world immediately on the internet created a phenomenon quite different from previous revivals when the communication and impact of the awakening were much slower. Within hours, thousands of people gathered in Wilmore from across the nation and around the world to experience God’s Presence in Hughes Auditorium and other venues provided for the overflow.
Almost as rapidly, skeptics questioned the legitimacy of this remarkable experience as an authentic spiritual “revival.” Several called for its excitement to be tempered and its value to be validated in terms of social justice and cultural transformation. I regret that these critics were posting comments from afar, having not been on campus nor engaged personally with anyone on site. As one who was present and involved with seekers and believers in Hughes Auditorium, the confirmation of the Spirit’s presence and power that I observed during the Outpouring can best be expressed in two words often repeated by others during those two weeks: radical humility. The authenticity, transparency, and vulnerability of the students broke our hearts as we heard their confessions, saw their brokenness, felt their pain, admired their honesty, and celebrated their joy as they humbled themselves before the Lord. Their radical humility was spiritual leverage for more than a college campus in a small town in Kentucky. As noted, thousands upon thousands of people descended on Wilmore with their brokenness, pain, and desperation. Students from other colleges arrived from all over the nation. People of all ages dared to fully surrender their lives and wholly follow the Lord. Eventually, they journeyed home with peace, hope and unalloyed joy, stewards of God’s grace shed abroad in their hearts. But he gives us more grace. That is why the Scripture says, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble” (James 4:6). He mocks proud mockers but gives grace to the humble and oppressed (Proverbs 3:34). The legitimacy of the Outpouring continues to be affirmed through radically humble souls who have become a means of grace to a world desperately needing an uplift.
If we are serious when we sing patriotic songs, properly asking God to shed his grace upon us, and pledge our allegiance to become one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all, the leverage point is right there in front of us: Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time (1 Peter 5:6). Our greatness as a nation can never be determined nor adequately measured by our might or power, personalities or political proclivities. God will raise us up only at the point of truthfulness, obedience, faithfulness and radical humility. That begins with us who claim his name.
If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and heal their land (2 Chronicles 7:14).
Mike Powers is a retired Elder in and the former President Pro Tempore and Conference Superintendent of the Mid-South Conference of the Global Methodist Church.
by Jonathan Powers | Jun 23, 2026 | Uncategorized
The Image We Carry
by Jonathan A. Powers
During his career as a pastor, Rev. David Seamands would often begin pastoral counseling sessions by handing a person a blank piece of paper and asking them to draw a picture of God. He claimed that he could learn more about a person’s idea of God from that one activity than in multiple hours of conversation with them. What characteristics and primary features did they highlight? How did that play into what they believed about the Christian life? Apparently by the end of his career he had a file with hundreds of these pictures, which symbolized thousands of hours spent talking with people about the character and nature of God.
This practice has always intrigued me. I’ve often wondered at different times what I would draw. What would my picture say about how I view and relate to God?
Perhaps I would draw God seated upon a throne. Such an image might emphasize His holiness, power, authority, and sovereignty. Yet it might also suggest distance, judgment, or even an image of God as one who primarily demands obedience.
Or perhaps I would imagine the familiar image from Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel ceiling, focusing on God’s creative power, majesty, and His reaching out toward humanity.
Maybe I would picture God as a loving father or grandfather watching over the world with care and concern. Or perhaps, in an attempt to avoid limiting God to any single image, I would simply draw a blank white square as a reminder that God is holy, mysterious, beyond human description, and incapable of being fully captured by any image we create.
Then, of course, there is a humorous option made popular by the movie Bruce Almighty: Morgan Freeman. While the cinematic representation is meant to be humorous on the one hand, on the other, Freeman’s characterization points toward a God who is approachable, wise, kind, and comforting.
The reality is that no image can fully capture God. Every picture is incomplete. Yet every image of God carries with it certain assumptions about who God is and how we are meant to relate to Him. Even my blank white square says something. How we see God profoundly influences how we understand Him, and ultimately how we live before Him.
Seamands’s exercise remains a powerful tool for self-examination. But perhaps there is another way to approach the question. Rather than asking what picture we would draw of God, we might ask what picture of God is being revealed through our lives. Perhaps the image we carry within us becomes visible in the way we worship, serve, love, and respond to God’s grace. Jesus’ Parable of the Talents in Matthew 25 invites us to consider exactly that.
The Parable of the Talents
The Parable of the Talents appears near the end of Matthew’s Gospel, immediately before Jesus’ betrayal and crucifixion. These are among His final public teachings. Significantly, His focus remains what it has been throughout His ministry: the Kingdom of God.
From the beginning of His public ministry, Jesus proclaimed, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near” (Matt. 4:17). The Sermon on the Mount unfolds the values of that Kingdom. Now, as Jesus approaches the cross, He offers His disciples final instructions concerning the coming Kingdom and the coming King.
The surrounding passages reinforce this theme. The Parable of the Ten Virgins calls believers to readiness for the bridegroom’s arrival. The Parable of the Sheep and the Goats emphasizes final judgment and accountability. Nestled between them is the Parable of the Talents. Together, these passages remind us that there can be no Kingdom without a King. If we misunderstand the King, we will inevitably misunderstand the Kingdom.
For many of Jesus’ followers, the expectation was that God’s Kingdom would arrive through political power and military victory. They longed for a restored kingdom like that of David. Yet Jesus was moving toward a cross. A crucified king hardly looked like a victorious ruler. But Jesus was redefining kingship. He came not to rule through coercion but to reign through self-giving love. He would conquer not by taking life but by laying down His own. His Kingdom would endure forever because it was founded on sacrificial love rather than political power.
In the Parable of the Talents, a master prepares to leave on a journey and entrusts his property to three servants. One receives five talents, another two, and a third receives one. Each amount is substantial, far more than an ordinary servant could ever accumulate independently.
Upon the master’s return, the first two servants report that they have doubled what was entrusted to them. The master responds with words every believer longs to hear:
“Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.”
The third servant, however, buries his talent in the ground and returns only what was originally given. Claiming fear of the master, he explains that he viewed him as a harsh and demanding man. The master rebukes him and removes the talent from his care.
The Parable Reconsidered
For the longest time, this parable bothered me. Every time I encountered it, I found myself confused, as if it pointed toward a works-based righteousness. It was as if Jesus’ point was primarily a lesson about stewardship and faithfulness. God gives us gifts. We should use them diligently for His purposes. Those who serve Him faithfully are rewarded, while those who do not are condemned. While there is an element of truth in that reading, the more I sat with the passage, the more I realized something about my interpretation: it was almost entirely focused on the servants. The story became about what they did or did not do, how hard they worked, whether they were successful, and ultimately whether they were acceptable to their master. In many ways, it became a story about performance. The emphasis seemed to be on what we do for God in order to earn His favor.
As I have revisited the parable over the years, however, I have become increasingly convinced that this is not where Jesus intends us to place our attention. After all, this teaching comes right before Jesus’ betrayal and death as part of his instruction about the coming Kingdom. And if the Kingdom is the focus, then so is the King. The parable is not first and foremost about the servants, it is about the master. It is about the kind of King Jesus is and what His Kingdom is like. Once I began reading the story through that lens, I started noticing many things I had overlooked previously.
The first thing the story reveals is a giving master. Before the servants ever act, the master entrusts them with extraordinary resources. They do not earn these gifts. In fact, each servant receives more than he could likely accumulate in a lifetime. Nor do they deserve them. Usually, a master would leave his family or his overseers in charge of such a large amount of money. However, this master freely shares his wealth with these servants. He empowers them with something beyond themselves.
This is a picture of grace. The story begins not with human effort but with divine generosity.
What we see, then is that the first two servants recognize both the gift and the generosity of the giver. They accept the gift and their lives are transformed. Their actions then flow from participation in the master’s purposes. Their investment is not primarily about earning favor but about responding to the generosity they have already received. As a result, they enter into the joy of their master.
The third servant, however, neither understands the gift nor truly knows the giver. His perception of the master is distorted. Because he sees the master as harsh and demanding, the exact opposite of what the master has truly done, he responds not with gratitude but with self-protective fear. His actions reveal that he has misunderstood the character of the one who entrusted him with such generosity.
Ultimately, the issue is not merely what the servant did with the talent. The deeper issue is what he believed about the master.
The God We See
Once we realize that the central issue in the parable is whether the servants truly know the Master, we are confronted with a deeper question: Do we see God’s gifts as something to earn His favor, or as a gracious invitation to share in His life and Kingdom?
Many Christians are tempted to define their relationship with God primarily through performance. We assume that our worth is tied to what we accomplish for Him. We serve, work, and strive because we hope to earn His approval. Yet, the first two servants were not motivated by anxiety over acceptance. They acted because they had already experienced the generosity of the master. They knew him.
The third servant also wanted to avoid displeasing the master, but his understanding of the master was fundamentally flawed. He could not respond in gratitude because he did not recognize grace when it was placed in his hands.
The parable reminds us that everything we have comes from God. We own nothing independently. We earn nothing apart from His grace. Every gift, opportunity, talent, resource, and calling is entrusted to us by a generous King.
As we come to know Jesus Christ, we discover a King who gives rather than grasps, who serves rather than dominates, who conquers through sacrificial love rather than force. And as we behold that King, gratitude naturally overflows into lives of service, generosity, and love.
The question, then, is not simply whether we are using our gifts. The deeper question is whether we truly know the One who gave them.
Perhaps the image of God that matters most is not the one we would draw on a piece of paper. Perhaps the most important image is the one revealed in Jesus Christ, a King whose life, death, and resurrection show us the very heart of God. When we fix our eyes on Him, we discover a God who gives Himself freely to us through grace. And when we truly see that image, we cannot help but reflect it to the world around us.
Jonathan Powers is the Associate Professor of Worship Studies at Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, KY and the Editor-in-Chief for Good News magazine.
