“We ask you, brothers, to respect those who labor among you and are over you in the Lord.” - 1 Thessalonians 5:12
The word Paul uses for “laboring” describes hard work to the point of exhaustion — and he specifies that leaders labor “among” the people, not merely over them. This is the heart of what the Reformers called “the priesthood of believers”: no leader stands in some elevated tier separate from everyone else; every leader is simply one of the people, serving from within the community rather than lording authority over it from a distance.
Martin Luther made this point physically, placing his pulpit along the side wall among the congregation rather than elevated at the front. John Calvin, in a church with a traditional high pulpit, sat among the people in a plain wooden chair before rising to preach — a deliberate reminder that he was dispensing God's Word as one of God's people, not above them.
This doesn't erase genuine authority — Paul immediately adds that leaders are also “over you in the Lord,” using a word that carries the sense of a guardian standing watch. But authority and humility aren't in tension here; true Christian leadership holds both together: real responsibility to guard and guide, exercised from a posture of genuine service among the people, not above them.
RESPOND: If you hold any kind of leadership — at work, at home, in ministry — do the people under your care experience you as leading “among” them or “over” them in a distant sense?
Think of a leader who modeled serving “among” people well. What specifically made that posture felt rather than just claimed?
Identify one concrete way this week you could lead (or follow a leader) in a way that reflects genuine shared labor rather than hierarchy for its own sake.
PRAYER: Lord, whether I am leading or being led, teach me the posture of serving among others rather than standing apart from them. Where I hold any authority, let it be exercised as a guardian who labors alongside, not a ruler who stands above. In Jesus' name, amen.