 wants us to do the things that he did or he does, right, by the power of the Holy Spirit. That's one thing that we see. And he wants us to go further. I don't know how that is even possible, but you see the heart of the Father and the heart of the Lord. And he's saying, you know, the ones who follow me, the ones who are my disciples, I just, you know, I want them to do more. And he's so secure in who he is. And he's saying, you know, I just want them to do more, more than the greater works. I want him to do the greater works. And of course we do it by the power of the Spirit. And the Lord is involved in it, which means that he does it. But the fact is that he's so secure that, you know, that we finite beings, you know, compared to him who's infinite, he's deity. And he's saying, you know, greater works, you know, I don't mind you doing the works. I don't mind you doing the greater works. But, you know, I really desire that you do the greater works. Right. So just wanted us to look at that. And, you know, when we interact with people, or when we give leadership to the teams, you know, are we so secure that the ones whom we are leading, the ones whom we are, you know, probably nurturing, we really want them, we really want them to go beyond us. When it comes to maybe a family ties or, you know, a children, you know, maybe in such cases, we might say, okay, you know, I really want my son to do well, you know, maybe study more than I ever did. And all my daughter to, you know, go and accomplish things that I just dreamt and I just thought it was never possible. I'd like my children to do well. You know, it's probably natural to think on those lines. But what about, you know, your colleagues or people whom you're nurturing or mentoring, and those who are in your teams, you know, how would you, you know, do you want them to go, you know, be like you in terms of skill, competence, abilities, and go further? Because that's really the heart of God. Right. That's what we see in this verse. He's very absolutely comfortable empowering us to do the greater works. Right. So, so let's just pray and ask the Lord, Lord, you know, I just want that heart. I just want that mindset. Let this mind be in you, which was in Christ Jesus, what we see in Philippians two, but he, he didn't, you know, he just took on the form of a born servant. And he laid aside the majesty and walked on the earth. Right. So let's pray. Father, we just want to thank you, Lord, for this new month that you've given us this new day that you've given us, Lord, and even as we draw near to your presence, Lord, we commit ourselves, Lord, into your mighty hands, God, and also invite a greater work of your Holy Spirit in our spirit, in our hearts, in our lives, in our minds, Lord. And we ask, oh, God, that Lord, let this mind be in us that was in you, that is in you, God, and let this heart be in us, Lord, which is in you, that a heart of compassion and the heart that of integrity and truth, holiness, and, and also God, a heart that says, go further. Yes, Lord, the works that you do, the greater works, Lord, you want us to do that, God, by the power of your spirit. And, Lord, I pray for those, those of us who are in leadership and who are leading teams professionally and in terms of ministry. Lord, we pray, Lord, even, Lord, even as we lead churches and fellowships, Lord, we pray that you'll have this, you'll enable us to have this heart, Father God, that the people that we raise up, Father God, that the people that we enable to discover their call and so on, people whom we nourish, Lord, by your strength, God, I pray that we'll have this heart that will be so secure in you that Lord, that we'll have this heart that they will rise up and go beyond us and do great things for the sake of your kingdom, for the cause of the kingdom. Yes, Master, we give you all the praise and glory at this time, even as we come at ourselves into your mighty hands. In Jesus' master's name, we pray. Amen. Amen. Okay. Yeah, welcome. Those who joined a little later. Okay, so we've been looking at, you know, people relating to people, a very important part of leadership. And we were looking at the whole aspect of trust, you know, how can we build trust? How can we build mutual trust? And we looked at John C. Maxwell's video. Last class, I think we looked at the first three aspects. And we saw that how we need to, I think we looked at the bedrock principle, the situation principle and so on. Okay, so now I just wanted to touch upon two things. You know, one thing that will really help us to build trust and, you know, also generally relating to people is to see how approachable we are. You know, what are the things that we are doing to make ourselves, you know, to communicate the message that we are approachable to people. So that people can approach us or we give them the permission to come to us with the difficult things. You know, it's not only when they've done the right thing or, you know, you as a leader, they want to share that and probably share the accomplishment, but also to be able to share their failures. You know, do we give them the permission and do we create the right environment so that people can approach us freely and talk to us and to be able to share that. So that does not happen automatically, but that is something that we need to do intentionally. Okay, so let me just share the notes and while we look at these few things. Okay, right. So this is what John C. Maxwell calls as the approachability principle. Okay, so we looked at, of course, Philippians 2.5 and the Lord Jesus, how he made himself, he humbled himself and became like us. You know, it became like us in his humanness to relate to us. The God of glory came, found himself or became man and in appearance, he was as man and to relate to us to share with us and to take upon himself, you know, whatever was separating us, sin, the curse of sin, the consequence of sin, which he took upon himself on the cross. Okay, so one of the things that we need to see is, you know, how approachable am I? So the first thing is, of course, okay, even before we go there, you know, how comfortable are you with yourself, right? When it comes to dealing with people, meeting with people, how comfortable are we with ourselves? Are we at ease with ourselves? Are we at peace with ourselves, right? If you are constantly edgy, meaning, you know, in a sense of unrest, and moody and unrest, unpredictable, then people find it difficult to open up to relate, right? But on the other hand, you know, if we would look at ourselves and, you know, think through these things, then we would make ourselves approachable, right? On the other hand, if we would be at ease, which would make the others feel at ease and comfortable, then we would, you know, we would be able to open up, and it's like opening a door for people to come into the room, right? As long as the door is closed, you can say, you can say all the right things, you know, come, you can feel free to share, feel free to, you know, come with your problems, difficult thing. But the thing is, hey, I see that the door is closed. How can I, you know, but when we make ourselves and the other person comfortable, it's like opening the door so that person can walk in and say, okay, you know, here's someone with whom I can, I feel at ease. Okay. So you're not intimidating, you know, and you're not putting down, you're not critical, but you're making yourself feel at ease. Okay. So the first thing to do is to, you know, to exhibit personal warmth in the sense, are you caring? Are you, you know, do you have a smile on your face? Or are you, you know, you know, very serious all the time, and they're not really responsive, not really responding, right? So, so that's, that's a question, you know, am I exhibiting a personal warmth? You know, am I being friendly? Okay. So you can probably think about those times or, you know, those moments when you met someone and you felt immediately at ease with that person. Okay. You felt immediately at ease. You're, you probably were meeting that person for the first time, or maybe for the, you know, maybe for the second time, first time, but you felt immediately, you felt comfortable, right? You, you felt like, okay, here's someone whom I can, whom I can open up and, you know, so what is it that you noticed about that person? You know, probably that person was warm and friendly, right? That person, you know, related to you in a friendly, friendly manner, whether it was the words that that person spoke, whether it was, you know, the way they looked at you, you know, their expressions, you know, I'm not talking about the way they were, you know, dressed up or whatever, but, but their expression, the facial expression, all that, you know, helped you to really feel comfortable with that person and open up, right? So drawing from that, you know, can we do the same thing with ourselves, right? I remember this was at, at one of the, I think one of the church lunches, like, we have this lunch for whether people come and meet with the pastors, right? You know, so people have gathered there and we have what is called a VIP banquet. So I remember many years back when we had, when we had one, recently we had one also, but I'm talking about 2019, 2018, 19. So when we had one of those gatherings and people came and I noticed one person was very aggressive, you know, in the, in the gathering, like, when it came to games, when it came to, there was some game being played and this person was shouting out, you know, hey, don't do that and this and so I was just wondering, you know, it's as if that person was trying to establish his dominance in that group saying, okay, this is how I am or I am in charge or I am a leader and I mean, it was, it wasn't, you know, something that really warranted that kind of a thing. It was a simple game and, and but this person was, while the other person was giving some instructions, he was kind of shooting that person down and so, you know, so, so those are some things that we can avoid. Right? We don't have to do that. And maybe by nature, if we are doing that, or maybe, you know, without our knowing we are doing that, then we can change. And obviously we can change. And if we are, if we are, you know, used to like, intimidating people, you know, if you're used to asking uncomfortable questions, you know, I'm sure there's a, there's a time for that in the sense, there's a place for that. Maybe, you know, maybe it's, it's something that you, that you're trying to solve and, and then you need to ask some uncomfortable questions to people and to get at the root of the matter. Maybe there's a problem that and that person is involved and you have to ask some certain, you know, uncomfortable questions and, but when we relate, generally when we relate to people, you know, are you, are we doing that subconsciously? Right? And putting people on the defensive? Right? Okay. So exhibit personal warmth. If you're going to be relating to people, just open the door. You know, it's like opening the door. Okay. The second thing is to appreciate the differences of people. Okay. Now, you see that someone can be very, very different from how we are. In terms of their likes, in terms of their preferences, maybe it is food, maybe it is music, maybe it is their, you know, their leisure, their hobbies, and they can be very different from us. So they don't have to be the same as us. Okay. And, and so do we appreciate those differences? Do we respect those differences? Now, we can, you know, some of the differences, of course, when we talk about worldviews, when we, when we talk about people who hold on to their, you know, worldview and, and not come to the place of truth. Now, when it comes to moral absolutes, we know, you know, we, we need to stand strong. And there's nothing to appreciate about, you know, sin or, or something that is, you know, blatantly, openly, you know, falsehood or lie. But we don't, we can always, you know, respect the person. Right? We can respect the person, we can detest the, the, the, the sin or the viewpoint, but we can respect the person. Okay. So when we, when we look, when we say, you know, appreciating the differences of people, it's about their personal likes, it's about their, you know, personal choices and preferences. And we're not talking about moral absolutes here. Right. So we can appreciate the differences. You know, maybe you're a person, you know, we're trying to teach a little nephew, keep talking about him. So he is like, I think once around the dinner table or one meal, we were just around. And then, and, and somebody was, I think I was pouring ketchup on something, you know, like curd rice. So, and eating, I said, I'd like, you know, I can eat anything with ketchup. So he was like, Oh, yuck. How can you eat that? How yuck? And his mother was trying to explain to me, you know, we don't say that, you know, we don't say that at the table. And she was correcting him and saying, you know, it's okay, you don't like it. That's fine. But the other person like it. So we don't, you know, we don't say that. So, you know, simple things like that, you know, when we say differences, though, sometimes when it comes to let's say cuisine, you know, food, maybe it's something that you find very repulsive, but it's there, you know, it's, it's, it's a delicacy in some part of the world. So, well, you look at the difference, you appreciate it, you know, maybe in terms of personality, personality, how can a person be so, I mean, so disorganized? Well, what, what is there to appreciate about it? Right, we do, you know that, well, it's not really going well, you know, it's not going working out for that person. It's because of that. Yes. But even in that, I'm sure you can appreciate the spontaneity of it. You can, you know, you're not, you know, you're not putting your approval and affirming that behavior, but at least you can, you know, appreciate. So that will help us to relate to people better. Okay, appreciating the differences of people. The third thing is to maintain an even temperament, meaning, you know, I used to have this boss when I think this was the last assignment that I had, when I worked for, for a corporate, for a company. And this was in sales. And we, I was reporting to the regional manager, regional sales manager. And, and so the first thing that we would do is, you know, check, check with the front office and how's the mood, you know, how's his mood? Because sometimes he will walk in very moody. He's, he's, he's had a bad start. And he's shouting on the phone. He's had a couple of, you know, bad phone calls. And so he's shouting. And so that's not the time to say, you know, can you reduce my target? Or, you know, I haven't done the thing that you asked me to do. Well, that's, that's the time to just quietly stay in office and go out. So we'll use to check, you know, how's the mood? So, you know, if a person is having a great mood one day, a bad mood by afternoon, and a terrible mood by sundown, you know, it's, it's very difficult to, to build mutual trust. It's very, very difficult to relate. It's like walking on eggshells. You don't know when the person will explode. You don't know when that mind will explode. What will trigger an uproar? So let's say if you are like that, if you end up going to be like that, something will just, you know, you're going to explode. You're not going to be consistent with your temperament. Then that's going to affect your relationship professionally, you know, ministry wise, it's going to affect. So the thing is to, to build ourselves, you know, in terms of character, in terms of our personality, to build ourselves, to be consistent, right? Sometimes it means that, well, it's difficult, but you just, you just go with it, you know, it doesn't mean that you'd have to be fake, right? It doesn't mean that you have to be, you know, you have to put on a face and not be real, but you know, you're, you've grown beyond that. It's just that, you know, you, you're persevering beyond that, saying, okay, there's a work that needs to be done, and I know that I cannot take it out on these people, right? Whether it's family, whether it's colleagues, well, I will deal with it, you know, to have that inner strength to say, okay, I will deal with it. These are things, you know, personal things that I need to deal with, but here are things that, you know, need to be done in terms of ministry, in terms of leading the team professionally. So don't let that affect, right? So develop consistency in, in the mood, you know, not have mood swings through the day, okay? So that will also enable us to be approachable, okay? The fourth thing is to be sensitive towards people's feelings. Now we can, we can do this well, or we can err on this side also to be sensitive, right? To people's feelings, you know, the words that we speak, the jokes that we crack, the things that we say, you know, is it hurting them, right? And is it, is it something, the jokes that we crack? Is it something that people can laugh with? Or, you know, is it something that people are going to laugh at that person, right? Laugh with that person or laugh at that person. Big difference, because you're one, you're laughing at that person's expense and which that person may not enjoy. And maybe that's a soul thing, soul point in that person's life. Maybe it's a, it even causes greater hurt, right? So, so, so how is it, right? Are you being sensitive? So to be perceptive about this, right? And, and also, you know, we can, we can err on this in the sense being too sensitive, right? And now, then that's a fine line, okay? But, but we need to be sensitive to, sensitive to the extent that, that people are not hurt, people are not intentionally hurt or even unintentionally with the words that we speak, with our behavior, with our, you know, so, so we, so we walk with the grace that God has given us and we speak with the grace and our words be edifying words, okay? And even when it comes to correction, when it comes to pulling up people, we can do it with grace. You know, we can issue commands, issue instructions with grace, right? And, and we can do that being sensitive to other people's feelings, okay? And, and this is a big one to be realistic about others is weak, others weakness as, as well as your own, okay? Now, when it comes to being approachable, this would, this would help, you know, it's not like we are going and, you know, putting all our negative stuff right there in front of people, okay? All our, all the, all the things that we are dealing with, all the negative stuff is not like that. But really to, to, you know, to be strong enough to say that, yes, I know these are things that I'm working on, right? To be secure enough to, to maybe say, hey, I need help in this area. Right? These are things that I, I, I struggle with. These are things that I, I'm working at. So, you know, would you help? Okay. Now, being a leader, we want to be seen as someone who has all the answers. Obviously, we don't know all the answers. You want to be seen, seen as someone who, who has superhuman strength, you know, you know, that's not possible. We want to be seen as someone who has all the wisdom and all the knowledge and be that expert in every field, that's not possible. And that is why, you know, good leaders surround themselves with people who, who are good at their things. Like, so, so if someone is not good at certain areas, they surround themselves with people who are good at that specific thing. Maybe it is, you know, something to do with the particular, you know, skill, right? And, and the person who's not good at it, the leader who's not good at it would use that skill, right, will surround themselves with person who have that skill. So, so when it comes to weakness, you know, to be, to be realistic about it, you know, not to say, not to complain and say, oh, I'm, I'm never good at it. I'm not good at it. I'm never going to be good at it. But to say that, yes, I understand that that's not my strong point, right? That's not my strong point, but I'm working at it. I'm working to improve that, right, to be honest about it. Now, a person who would, who would, you know, who would actually hear that, you know, from another person would say, okay, here's the person who, who's authentic, who's real. Okay. Who, who's real, who does not, you know, who does not mind talking about who's not hiding behind the facade of, you know, things hiding their weakness, but they're being real. And they're strong, right, strong about it. So, so that's something that would, immediately, I would say, okay, you know, he's a real, he's a real deal, right? He's, he's fine. He knows that that's a, that's a pain point. But still, since he's working at it, or she's working at it, they're not afraid to, you know, own up to it. Okay. The second, the other, the last one is also similar, similar in nature, to be authentic, to be real enough, to forgive, to ask for forgiveness and to extend forgiveness. Okay. I think I shared this with, with another, with, I think some of the subject, but, you know, this happened when I think Pastor Ashish actually was preaching on a Sunday and he spoke about the person in the congregation, and which, you know, on a particular Sunday, and which seemed out of place. So, he quickly realized that. And, but I think it was the following Sunday, you know, when, because he, he made that statement in front of the church, he, he apologized to that person in front of the church, right? And, and in the congregation, there was a, there was a person who had, from a theological college, reputed theology college here in Bangalore, and he was, this was his last Sunday here in Bangalore, and he was going back to his hometown. So, he was part of that service, and he saw this whole thing. And he went back to his hometown, and he, and he wrote an email saying, you know, in that one class, in that one service, I learned more than what I learned in my theological college about love, about forgiveness. So, he was so about, you know, about humility, love and forgiveness, he was so impacted by that, right? And so, you know, the thing to, to forgive and to ask for forgiveness, to extend forgiveness, and to also, you know, to see, ask for forgiveness, to be real about it, right? So, that would make us approachable. Okay. So, you just want to take some time, okay, now it's 1033, take some time to, to do the small exercise, okay, where you, you know, I'm just putting you into random groups. But, so, you know, you know, some of us, I know, maybe struggle with language, okay, maybe, you know, you're better at typing, or you're better at texting. Now, in your groups, I don't know if you can actually text one another, but if you can, you can do that. But I just want you to, you know, share a few things, okay? So, this is an exercise on approachability. So, you're just going to share what you like. Okay, some of you are going to talk some, you know, talk about some real, you know, light topics. So, okay, what food do you like? Okay, explain to them, talk to them, right? So, what is, what is the objective? Okay, you're going to, you know, talk about something about yourself, and, you know, you're not being closed, you're opening up, okay? You can talk about something that you dislike, okay, it can be, you know, it can be something that irritates you, right? Something that, that you dislike, you know, around you, you know, it can be anything, okay? So, let me just put that here, okay, what you like. This again, I'm just leaving it open, it can be food, it can be sport, it can be music, kind of music, you know, be something informative for the person. Oh, really? Okay. So, what do you dislike? Or it can be something that, you know, some irritates you. You dislike what irritates you. I'm just putting it there, it doesn't make dramatic sense, but I'll just put it there. Okay, then just talk about, okay, those are two things, okay, then just mention, what is your strength? Okay, so this would be, this would be easy, what is your strength? What is your strong point? And this again, you know, we're not limiting ourselves to, okay, what is your strength, you know, spiritually, what is your strength, strength, you know, it can be anything, talk about that. Then also talk about what is, what use you feel is your, you know, it's your weakness, okay, that you need to work on, if it's your weakness that you need to work on, okay, so four things. Okay, so what are we going to do, we're just going to talk about this, right? Okay, so quickly mentioned, so maybe each person can take about just two minutes, okay, somebody in your group just time it, okay, if it's more than two minutes, it's time for the other person to talk, okay, so you go on to the other person, and if you, you know, if everybody's done, and if you want to share more, that's fine, okay. So what do you like, what are your dislikes, what irritates you, what is your strength, and what is it that is a weakness that you need to work on, okay, so simple, simple things, so don't worry, you can just mention a simple word as, I know one word answers also to all this, what do you like? Okay, I like biryani, that's it, okay, so simple, so you don't have to be, you know, I have to give a lengthy explanation, no, not really, okay, but I just want everybody to participate, okay, I'd like everybody to part, okay, so let's do our breakout room, and we will take about maybe, you know, longer than last time, I know last time was a little thing, so yeah, so we'll, let's take say 10 minutes, okay, okay, maybe I'll just put it as 12 minutes, one second, okay, 12 minutes, and I'm just putting you all in groups, I'll see you after 12 minutes. Salami, are you in, I think you're in group two, joined your group, you're still in the main call, Abraham, have you joined your group, I think you're in breakout room five, and Elisha, I think you're in breakout room two, so if there's some prompt for you to join breakout room two on your screen, okay, hi Abishak, were you part of a group, or you just joined? Yes, part of a group, okay, okay, and the group closed and you came in, okay, hey, welcome back, I hope that went well, we'll take a break, and once we come back, we'll just discuss more, okay, so we'll take a break, we'll restart at 11, thank you.