Leadership
Webster’s dictionary defines a leader as a person who has commanding authority or influence. The biblical form of this leader is the under shepherd or pastor. Webster’s defines pastor as a spiritual overseer; specifically a clergyman serving a local church or parish. What exactly do we know about pastors and leaders?
I served two tours in Iraq serving with the US Army in the infantry. Throughout most of my life I have not had the privilege of having a spiritual leader, but for fourteen years of my life I did have some form of a leader. See in my adult life I have never been in the situation where I did not have access to someone who was in a direct leadership position in my life. I guess that is why I have such strong feelings on obedience and loyalty. See even though I thought most of the things that people who were in my chain of command implemented was ridiculous or maybe didn’t make much sense, for the most part I did was I was told to do. The first reason for this was because of the possible consequences for my actions. I knew without a shadow of a doubt that if I stepped out of line I was going to go through something extremely unpleasant. Whether that was being physically exercised until I passed out, lost rank, got confined, or had to clean toilets, the fact was that if I didn’t do what I was told to do when I was told to do it, I was going to pay. It never fails though in the military, that someone will do something that they absolutely know is wrong, get caught and punished, then blame everyone but themselves. I was never able to understand this, and as a civilian today I find myself still trying to understand it.
What I did come to realize throughout my time in the military as I started moving into positions of leadership was this; no one, and I mean no one likes the person who is in charge at any level. All the people being led know is that they are being told to do something that they sometimes do not agree with, and when people do not agree on something but have to do it anyway that builds contention. I can tell you that every time that I was in a situation that involved heavy contact with the enemy, and I would hear my leadership tell me that I was going to have to go into harm’s way with my soldiers I would always not like that decision. But the amazing thing about it was I was never scared to follow the direction of those appointed over me by higher powers because I knew that they always had my well being at the forefront of their decisions. This is no different for people in their everyday of life. If you have a job, you have someone who leads you. You either do what you are told to do, or you get reprimanded or fired.
What has happened then within the scope of the Church? As a true believer/follower of Christ we have all been called by God to do something that will edify and glorify Him. God calls some to serve others, evangelize, teach, learn, feed, be fed, encourage, love, and shepherd. So what exactly is a Church body to do with all these gifts?
For as the body is one and has many parts, and all the parts of that body, though many, are one body – so also is Christ. For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body – whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free – and we were all made to drink of one Spirit. So the body is not one part but many. If the foot should say, “Because I’m not a hand, I don’t belong to the body,” in spite of this it still belongs to the body. And if the ear should say, “Because I’m not an eye, I don’t belong to the body,” in spite of this it still belongs to the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But now GOD has place each one of the parts in one body just as HE wanted. And if they were all the same part where would the body be? Now there are many parts, yet one body. (1 COR 12:12-20)
Now some might ask what has brought this on. I have been taking college classes working towards my degree in theology in order to further my knowledge in the Lord. See something that I have not shared too many people, but something I now know without a shadow of a doubt, is that God has called me into ministry. HE has a plan for me and that is to teach HIS word and honor Him in His ministry. What scares me is that in all these classes I am taking I keep reading these ridiculous statistics about pastoral attrition rates. Here are some of the statistics that I am reading over and over again.
· Fifteen hundred pastors leave the ministry each month due to moral failure, spiritual burnout, or contention in their churches.
· Fifty percent of pastors' marriages will end in divorce.
· Eighty percent of pastors feel unqualified and discouraged in their role as pastor.
· Fifty percent of pastors are so discouraged that they would leave the ministry if they could, but have no other way of making a living.
· Eighty percent of seminary and Bible school graduates who enter the ministry will leave the ministry within the first five years.
· Seventy percent of pastors constantly fight depression.
As some of you are reading those statistics you are thinking, no way absolutely not, I would not go into ministry or become a pastor if I knew this beforehand. See that’s the kicker here, if God is calling you to His ministry and placing you into the body as He wants, if you are a true child of God you do not have a choice. What I am having to comes to terms with is that I am going into battle once again, but this time in a different realm.
One thing I think we all take for granted is the amount of strain that is put on a pastor/leader. They have everyone, and I mean everyone coming to them with their issues on a daily or sometimes hourly basis. It is one of their responsibilities to listen and comfort those who are in need, but I ask you this; when was the last time you were to look at your pastor/leader and comfort them. See that is the problem, we have turned into a world where we have no issue dumping our issues on someone and walking away not expecting that to take a toll on the person we are dumping them on, in fact when that same person that we have trusted in everything then makes a decision for the body as the leader of that body, we have a tendency to lash out.
Is this fair to your pastor, the body, or even yourself. I ask you to think about this, God has called your pastor to lead your body, so essentially God is making that decision that you are getting mad over. Will you come out and say that you are mad at God or drag Him through the mud? I don’t think so. But the kicker is this, the judgment will be the same either way, whether you are attacking God or His appointed shepherd. Either way you will have to account for your actions on the day of judgment and personally I wouldn’t want to be trying to answer why I questioned God’s will. So keep this in mind the next time you question your leadership who was appointed over you. Because remember, Gods word says that we are to obey those appointed over us because He was the one to put them into authority in order to carry out His will.
Thank you and God bless
GEDD
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