Leadership isn't overbearing…
Art Mealer "I took you from the pasture and from following the flock… " - II Samuel 7:8
Curiously (okay, or not), yesterday I was reading and ran across a French proverb, "Je dois suivre, car je suis leur chef" ("I must follow, for I am their leader"). Perhaps just a turn of phrase and I stand to make too much of it, but God here phrases this as taking David from his apprenticeship of "following the flock." Not leading it. Well, not in our own classic sense of leading meaning having the big green hat and jewels and robes and rings and scepters… but that simple pastoral role of keeping up with the sheep who have a considerable liberty most of the time to wander. Sheep do wander. This sheep do. And then vs 9, "I have been with you wherever you have gone," So David followed the sheep, and therefore God followed David, going where he went. God is the Great and Good Shepherd. We don't wander so much as roam; we are always shadowed by Him. So, we don't need to over think this leadership thing. We definitely do not need to use the world's ideas about leadership (in fact, Jesus was very clear that among us "It will not be so among us!"). Leadership isn't overbearing, it is freeing, freeing each to pursue the paths in which the Lord leads them, but following after, watching over, guarding, admonishing perhaps when they head for danger, go astray. Equipping each for THEIR work in the Lord. But leading as we follow them, not tugging them along on a leash. Leadership: Teach me to follow others. Lord, teach me to see you following me. Listening must be big.
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