Christian Living
Larry Lilly's Letter Monday October 15, 2007
That pastors in our time have longed to be "leaders" in the sports, business and military sense of the word is attested to by the vast preponderance of literary evidence. That the lust for this style of leadership has cost local churches untold pain as men and women have been used as little more than living pawns in a game of get the leader's name known to a wider base is also attested to by the same mountain of evidence.
Having said the above and having some inkling of the flood of criticism to follow as sure the dawn the darkest of the night, I move on to going to bat for the true spiritual leadership. Admitted, I know little of this aspect of leadership.
I am learning about biblical leadership in the family, the church and my own life.
Oswald Sanders, recognized for years as the leading teacher on true biblical leadership principles did a piece on Jonathan Edwards, the old time preacher recognized as the catalyst in The Great Awakening and also the clergyman who preached the famous sermon, "Sinners In The Hand's Of An Angry God." Mr. Sanders briefly described the fame and the pain of Rev. Edwards career, of his being thrown out of the church he pastored, of his laboring in relative obscurity and then the Lord moving in his behalf and his becoming President of Princeton University. To comment that his life was similar to a roller coaster ride is right on point. Rev. Sanders wrote:
"Often the crowd does not recognize a leader until he has gone, and then they build a monument for him with the stones they threw at him in life."
A modern motivation speaker said, "If they throw stones at you, build something!" You get the idea.
When the biblical leader is under attack, rather than meeting with his political advisors and deciding just how to "spin" the counter attack, he meets with a few trusted prayer warriors and prays. He prays until the Lord gives peace in his heart, and then he marches on along whatever path the Lord gives and pays as little attention as possible to his detractors.
I heard a country preacher comment on this principle and he wanted to know if it is acceptable to save the thrown stones, put the name of the person who threw the stone, the date the stone was throne, why it was thrown and then build in such a manner to let the names and dates show. He was going to mention his sincere thanks for the free materials thrown his way by enemies on the corner stone.
Certainly in my lifetime many stones have been hurled and none were thrown justly. Let me explain that I am not without fault, but if I understand the Bible, stone throwing is out and forgiveness is in and this strange practice is set in motion by the world's only perfect one. While we can and should build on stones thrown, we all will be better off when we start throwing cannonballs of Christ's love at each other.
Larry Lilly Copyright © 2007 Use with credit.
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