"This is essential reading because ill-directed and badly formed leadership causes much damage in souls." Eugene Peterson, Introduction to 1 & 2 Timothy & TitusThat comment caught my attention. I agree with it whole-heartedly, having experienced some of that kind of spiritual leadership myself and watching how it's currently impacting some people in my life.
I love that the Bible is not only a grand love story, with all of the drama and purpose and passion expected, but it's also a very practical book on how to live and lead in this fallen world. I'm grateful that God doesn't leave us here to figure it out on our own. He gives us Paul, writing to his protege, Timothy.
I'm listening carefully as I think about the important leadership positions that God has entrusted to me - discipling women, teaching impressionable two-year-olds, and stewarding the lives of my two precious daughters.
These are the specific aspects of leadership that God is impressing on my heart today:
The first thing I want you to do is pray. Pray every way you know how, for everyone you know. Pray especially for rulers and their governments to rule well...And I want the women to get in there with the men in humility before God, not primping before a mirror or changing the latest fashions but doing something beautiful for God and becoming beautiful doing it. (2:1-2, 9-10)
"First of all, pray, Paul wrote, and then let the prayer spread out, reaching all people, even kings, even those we don't like, even the people who are against us. A changed world begins with us...and a changed us begins when we pray." Eugene Peterson, Conversations, pg. 1871
Teach believers with your life: by word, by demeanor, by love, by faith, by integrity. Stay at your post reading Scripture, giving counsel, teaching...Cultivate these things. Immerse yourself in them...Keep a firm grasp on both your character and your teaching. Don't be diverted. Just keep at it. Both you and those who hear you will experience salvation. (4:12-13, 15-16)
Pursue a righteous life - a life of wonder, faith, love, steadiness, courtesy. Run hard and fast in the faith. Seize the eternal life, the life you were called to, the life you so fervently embraced in the presence of so many witnesses. (6:11-12)Who I am matters, not just what I do. Those around me are affected by what I believe and how I live my daily life. I've been very aware of that for my own children, but I know that my character also impacts my entire family, my friends, and others that God has placed in my life. I want them to experience true life - salvation! - as they experience me.
In taking Paul's leadership teaching to heart - by praying broadly and diligently and pursuing the righteous life I am called to - I pray that my life becomes something beautiful for God.
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"The whole point of what we're urging is simply love - love uncontaminated by self-interest and countereit faith, a life open to God." (1:5)
Simple but not easy. I've been asking God to show me my imperfect love and how it grieves Him, knowing that I'll never love perfectly on this side of eternity. It's so easy to develop excuses for my imperfect love or to get so comfortable and accustomed to it that I don't even recognize it anymore. During the holiday season with family I find it especially difficult to fall into these patterns.
Christ is asking me not to close myself off, but to live openly to God, to "risk everything on Christ's return", to simply love.
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