Devotion 10.17.22

"You, however, know all about my teaching, my way of life, my purpose, faith, patience, love, endurance, persecutions, sufferings.... But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, and how from infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God[a] may be thoroughly equipped for every good work." 2 Timothy 3:10 - 11; 14 - 16 

This weekend did not disappoint when it came to sports at the college or professional level. You may have had a dog in a hunt of any of the marquee matchups, but in terms of sheer quality, the games did not disappoint. From upsets to a really long baseball game and all points in between, there was greatness on the field of play.

How can we account for all the great play? I'd like to think leadership has a great deal to do with it. We see in teams that bring on board the best of talent that talent can only get you so far. There are those intangibles in any organization or team that bring out the best in its members.The Philadelphia Phillies were greatly underperforming at the start of the season and now find themselves in the championship series this year. The difference? They fired their manager and brought on an interim. Did a baseball skipper make that much difference? The answer is apparently.

One thing any leader does is to teach and to learn. A leader adapts but doesn't do so absent of information and knowledge to make a decision which means he or she is constantly surveilling the horizon in terms of competition, best practices and how staff or team members best respond to the latest strategies. Paul says as much in his letter to Timothy:  You know my teaching - things I taught on purpose and things you saw me do as an example. Continue in your learning, and know that the scripture you have known since birth and continued to learn daily is great for many things.

We all lead whether or not we believe that. Paul notes in early in the passage. People are watching us, not just as Christians, but they do watch us because our actions speak volumes about who we are, what we believe, how we practice living. By professing our faith, we have an opportunity to lead others to Christ in fact, but we profess that faith by our actions. As Paul notes, we learn scripture to be prepared for every good work, not for salvation purposes, but because we are leaders in our own right.

Paul was the consummate leader. He led by example and by his teaching, writings and visitation to places to see how they were doing in terms of their faith and to resolve conflict. We pray God use us and our skills to lead where we are planted - in our families, with our sphere of people around us and with those we may encounter who have yet to know Christ.

Devotion 10.12.22

 "Even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." Matthew 20:28

If you cannot follow, you cannot lead.

Michael Lombardi (no relation to Vince but an NFL exec himself) writes a column called "The Daily Coach," and in it is example after example of failure to follow that creates doubt in one's self to your team to your coach simply because "my will be done." His writings apply to life using sport as an example.

That applies to life, from the family to organizations to government to you name it. I know in my personal experience to lead, problems arose when I failed to listen, to clarify, to make clear our mission and goals, to express our hopes and aspirations...basically when I failed to speak in terms followers desire to hear and understand or act in ways that drew out the best in people.

Christ is addressing a mom in Matthew 20 who wanted her two sons to be at His right and left side when He triumphed. His response was, "Do you even know what you are asking?" You want the glory? Here is what that will look like. We eventually see who is at Christ's right and left side at the day of crucifixion.

When we are placed in leadership, the key ingredient is humility and the ability to serve. We pray for that in all of our leaders, especially for our families and in the church.