"There’s a crisis of leadership in the church" the religious pundits proclaim. Which is probably true considering the great void of candidates in the leadership pool. In my ministry career it’s been my experience that few men are willing to serve as shepherds. Can you blame them? The pamphlet says something like . . .
When someone is hacked about something at church who gets called?
When something happens that doesn’t seem to you to be decent and in order who hears about it?
When you want to complain, criticize and condemn make a beeline for a shepherd.
Shepherds are spiritual whipping posts, the clerk behind the counter you berate and belittle because your flight was canceled and your luggage is headed to Tupelo (which I hear is really nice this time of year).
From the treatment they receive you’d think we were reading a different version of James 5:14.
Is anyone among you sick of something? Then call one of the elders and gripe about it. Make sure your criticism is like hot oil poured over their head.
Honestly, who cares if something didn’t go the way you thought it should go? Why do we continue to allow people with critical spirits to be the rudder of the ship?
The thing is, and make sure you get this, nothing has happened where I currently minister that has prompted this post. I’ve just been mulling these things over for a long time now.
I know men who visit and pray with people who are sick, men who regularly invite people into their home, men who seize the opportunity to share their faith, men who regularly give of themselves to help others who have not one ounce of interest in being a shepherd. Can you blame them? The way we scrutinize them and their families testing their qualifications to serve and continue to scrutinize their every move. We sure demand much of others that we do not demand of ourselves.
Why is it that we demand perfection from our leaders when we ourselves are not perfect? Seems to me the most important instructions relating to qualifications for those who lead has more to do with those who follow.
Hebrews 13:17 (NCV) Obey your leaders and act under their authority. They are watching over you, because they are responsible for your souls. Obey them so that they will do this work with joy, not sadness. It will not help you to make their work hard.
Maybe the crisis of leadership in today’s churches has less to do with finding qualified leaders and more to do with finding qualified followers.
