Washing Your Hands: A Message for Leaders and Carriers

In the early to mid-1800s, there was a teaching doctor in Vienna who was a scientist. He was teaching other people to be doctors. And there was this plague sweeping through Europe and even America called childbed fever.

Basically, women would give birth, contract something, and die. It was an epidemic.

Women were begging when being dropped off at the hospital: "Just leave me on the sidewalk. I don't want to go in." Their chances of survival were greater on the sidewalk than in the hospital.

As a scientist, this doctor started studying the numbers. He realized that the hospitals that only had midwives and didn't have doctors had far lower cases of mortality than the hospitals with doctors in them.

So he started looking at the numbers of his own students and the others in the hospital. And he realized that his students had higher numbers than the other doctors.

And he had the highest numbers of mortality of them all.

He was part of the problem, and he didn't know why.

The Discovery

Germs hadn't been discovered yet. But they were teaching with cadavers in the morning, rinsing off their hands, and going to deliver babies in the afternoon.

Since he surmised it must be something they were doing in the morning with the cadavers—not knowing about germs yet—he had his students wash their hands with chlorinated lime. Their mortality numbers started to plummet. They got almost to zero.

When he started taking his findings to the medical community, saying "If you just wash your hands, people won't die," the doctors were furious.

"We're of the elite class. We're gentleman doctors. How dare you say we're unclean!"

If you don't think you can be a carrier of this disease, you're thinking exactly what they thought: How dare you say I could be unclean?

We can all be a carrier.

My Own Confession

My former husband was narcissistic, very self-centered. Everything was about him. He had alcohol and anger issues. And my son, when he was in second grade, was suicidal.

We took him to all kinds of counselors and doctors. There was this one doctor that really built a great rapport with Ben, my son, and with my ex-husband.

The day came where she looked him in the eye and she said, "You know you're the problem, don't you?"

Because of that narcissistic mindset, it's very hard for them to see themselves in a negative light. It's almost like they don't feel like they have the capacity to do that.

He said, "I don't see that I'm the problem."

But then there was this moment where the light started to come on. And he said, "But I see the destruction all around me."

For just a minute, I had a glimmer of hope that if he could see he was the problem, then he'd see he was the solution. The only thing that could fix the problem was the problem.

And if we can see in ourselves that we're the problem, we're also going to see that we are the solution.

We can shift. We can get the hurt that's in us healed so we don't carry it around and hurt people around us. We can forgive the people who hurt us. And we can begin to understand if there's any wicked way in us.

David said, "Search my heart, O God, and see if there's any hurtful way in me" (Psalm 139:23-24, paraphrased).

We can be doing it without realizing it, especially if we are so conditioned to the worldly systems that we think it's normal and we believe that the Lord is ushering that same kingdom in.

We can play a bigger role than we know.

The Hard Questions

I know this part is going to hurt for a minute. But I promise, it'll feel good when we're done.

The doctor's just poking at the problem. We're going to get healing.

None of these questions are to shame you. They're to heal you.

Are you climbing the ladder of power and prestige, empowering the pyramid?

Do you serve to be seen by others for recognition? Are you striving for a position or a title? Do you serve to be significant in the culture?

Do you feel the need to be friends with the pastors and the leaders so that you can feel important or so that you can get promoted?

If you hold a position of leadership at work or church, if you do that in the home, do you think that entitles you to get your own way? That people are there only to serve you? And if they don't do your will, you feel like they're being rebellious or unsubmissive?

Don't forget: Jesus said if you want to be the greatest, be the servant of all.

Have you used people to further your own cause?

Do you pick your friends because they can do something for you in return? Can you be friends with the lowly?

Do you compliment to encourage, or do you flatter to get in good graces with somebody?

Do you surround yourself with yes men or yes women so that you're not challenged or exposed?

Have you rejected people because they're not high class enough or because they disagree with you?

Can you be friends with people from other political parties or denominations? Can you love even those that are hard to love?

How about jealousy or competition?

Do you get upset or offended if someone is better at doing something than you? They're a better singer, a better speaker, prettier, stronger, more confident—you name it.

Do you get frustrated or jealous when others get blessed and you don't?

Do you think you should be the leader even when the current leaders aren't giving you more responsibility? Do you think you can do a better job than they can? You know more than they do. You're right, they're wrong.

Do you have a history of being offended?

I'm not victim blaming—we're just checking the heart. But in any of the churches you left, did you play a role in the problem?

Do you talk negatively about the leaders or anyone for that matter? Do you gossip, sometimes even cloaked as prayer?

Do you believe your race is better than another one?

The other race is obviously the problem, right?

Do you believe that in some way gender divides us?

Women were created to serve men and shouldn't lead—they should only submit. Or: men are the problem in the world, masculinity is toxic, they can't be trusted.

Have you ever used your power or prowess to touch someone sexually?

Have you made sexual advances, molested, or even raped someone? Reasoned it should feel good to them too, so what's the problem? Convinced yourself it was consensual because they didn't scream or didn't try to fight you off?

This is an epidemic in the churches, both Catholic and Protestant.

If any of those at all resonated with you, welcome to the club.

My Own Issues

For me, my issues have especially been jealousy because of insecurity, and I even had a need to be significant.

Back in 2004-2005, I was in a relatively new church. I had extreme favor with the pastors. I loved to teach. I could have taught, I could have done anything.

And I was asking the Lord, "The world is my oyster, Lord. Where do you want me to serve?"

And I heard Him clear as a bell say, "Listen for what they need the most."

For the next few weeks, on Wednesdays and Sundays, I'd hear different leaders say they were so frustrated that they couldn't find anyone to faithfully clean the bathrooms or do it well.

After the second or third time, I heard it. I was like, "Lord, I hear you."

So I signed up to be the last one to leave every Wednesday night to clean the bathrooms and every other Sunday. And I did that for a year and a half.

What was so amazing was it was beautiful. The Lord met me in the bathrooms. Some Saturdays I'd even come in and scrub it from head to toe because that was my territory.

Because I was staying late every service, I'd end up doing more ministry than I ever would have if I had held a microphone.

But it wasn't just about the people that I touched. God was forming something in me—that I didn't need a title. I didn't need a position. I needed His Spirit with me while I'm doing whatever it is that I'm doing.

Joseph was a slave and saved the known world. Daniel was a slave and impacted the world for God's Kingdom.

It didn't matter what their position was. It mattered who was with them in it.

But that took a while for me.

The Commitment

Do you want to be completely free and get every shred of that virus out of you so we don't spread it into our environment?

We have to restructure. We have to think of things differently.

We have to be willing to get healed. We have to be willing to get the disease out of us, to get the pyramid mindsets out. We have to be willing to be like Jesus and grab the towel and the basin.

It doesn't matter whether it's Phoebe and Paul—we might be leading in this one moment and serving in the next. It's an ebb and a flow, people. It's not a ladder.

We're not saying you have to stay at the bottom rung. There are no rungs.

Because sometimes we feel like, "Well, if I serve to be promoted"—you're still in the wrong Kingdom. If you're giving to get, like a slot machine, you're operating in the wrong Kingdom.

That's not how it works.

It's all ours. Can God trust us with it?

The Solution

If we're the problem, we're also the solution.

That's the good news. We can shift. We can change. We can get the leaven out.

But first we have to see it. We have to call it what it is. We have to wash our hands.

The doctors in Vienna were offended at the suggestion that they needed to wash their hands. Their pride killed thousands of women.

Don't let your pride kill the people around you.

Wash your hands. Examine your heart. Be willing to see where you've been a carrier.

Because here's the truth: hurt people hurt people. But healed people heal people.

The healing is just as contagious as the harm. More so.

In the Old Testament, you couldn't touch the leper or you'd get leprosy. But in the New Testament, when you touch the leper, they catch your healing.

It's a different Kingdom.

And it starts with us washing our hands—getting clean, getting healed, getting the disease out.

So we can be carriers of healing instead of carriers of hurt.

Blessings,
Susan 😊