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People are anxious about many things these days. When a person does not stay in a primary dependence upon God, it becomes clear quickly that any other dependency outside of God will lead to insecurity and an apprehensiveness that can take on a life of its own. Perhaps the most common dependency that people use to replace their dependence upon God is found in materialism.
There is a reflection of this in the fall in the garden. Up until the time of the fall, Adam and Eve were happily and unselfconsciously dependent upon God. With the decision to eat the forbidden fruit, they essentially detached themselves from God and attached themselves to the created world, drawn in by its beauty and seductive promises.
That is the nature of materialism. We pursue possessions, etc., because we see the good in them, but at the same time, we over-value them in relation to God to the point where they usurp His place in our lives. They become for us little gods or idols that are incompatible with trust in God. It is not possible to depend on or serve something outside of God while depending on Him at the same time, primarily because the goals of materialism fall so far short of the goals God has set for us.
Ideally, we should spend our time here on earth longing for and preparing for eternity, enchanted by the idea of it. But we know most of us donโt live our lives that way. We conflate material prosperity with blessings and success. Yet, thereโs no place in the life of Jesus where you see this as a reality. In fact, Jesus purposely chose poverty to illustrate the opposite, that real riches are not to be found in the things of the Earth, the things that are passing away, but in heaven, where neither moth nor rust can destroy the true treasures that await us.
Jesus understood our tendency to try to serve both God and mammon. He clearly told us that itโs impossible to serve both; we will have one or the other as our master. In one, we find transcendence, transformation, and true worth. In the other, we encounter degradation and a state far below our dignity. Scott Hahn puts it succinctly in his book Reasons to Believe: “To pretend to serve God and the world is the same as to imagine that we can be both proud and humble at the same time. A vain dream!”
A striking and representative example of this struggle is found in the history of the Conquistadores, who came to the New World seeking gold, glory, and, in the case of the Spanish missionaries, to spread the word of God. The greed for gold often nullified the nobler witnesses that were present. It certainly had a negative impact on evangelization. Only Our Lady was able to salvage the work of the early missionaries through her appearances as Our Lady of Guadalupe. But this is nearly a universal struggle. It has marked the history of mankind from the beginning.
When the relations between the Aztecs and the Spaniards had come to a head and the Spaniards were being driven from the city (Tenochtitlan), the soldiers tried to escape under the cover of night in the middle of a rainstorm. The elite troops of the Aztecs discovered the attempted escape and engaged in battle with them. That night (June 30, 1520) became known as the โNight of Tearsโ because the Spanish soldiers were told by their leader (Cortรฉs) that they could take as much gold as they could carry. And in their greed, they were so loaded down that many of them fell into the water from the causeways leading into the city and drowned. The obvious point here is that not only did their gold not save them, but it actually became the cause of their demise.
A more contemporary example of the problem with attachment and even of lust for material things is found in the phenomenon of hoarding, which appears to be more prevalent than ever today. This is a complex disorder, but again, it functions from the distortion of dependence on material reality for our well-being. Recently, the remains of a 73-year-old woman who had been missing for some time were found buried underneath piles of trash in her house. She had suffered from this problem with hoarding, and it ended up taking her to a tragic end.
It is easy to dismiss these examples as extreme. But we all struggle to some degree with this. More so in a culture that is as affluent as ours, though even the poor can be consumed by the desire for things they donโt have but would embrace if they were able. (I am referring to things beyond necessity.) The danger of material well-being is always the delusion that we no longer need God. Itโs almost predictable that the more well-off we are, the more distant we become from God.
As we move more toward the end of our lives, there is often a movement of simplification that takes over, as if in our spirit we finally understand Jobโs observation: โNaked I came forth from my motherโs womb and naked I shall return again. Blessed be the Name of the Lord.โ (Job 1:21)
True well-being is oriented toward eternity and the real treasure that awaits us. Everything else becomes an exercise in letting go!
Do a brief examination of conscience in this area of attachment. Do you have any attachments that immediately come to mind that would distress you if they were suddenly taken away?
Do you find yourself more attached in areas of security (having enough to survive and even prosper), possessions, honor, relationships, even things like routines or ways of doing things? What areas do you particularly struggle with?
In the spiritual life, people sometimes speak of being stripped of various things in order to come to holiness. Have you ever experienced having things taken away that, in the end, really were freeing for you?
What is the example that Jesus and the Holy Family give us in this area?
People sometimes complain that God doesnโt speak to them, or if he does, they donโt recognize his voice. We all know stories of people who suddenly hear God speak to them in the midst of extraordinary or dramatic events. That doesnโt surprise us as much as the idea that God speaks to us all the time. Yet Jesus calls Himself the Good Shepherd and says His sheep know His voice. So, what are we to make of this?
It’s an important question to ask because God has fashioned us in such a way that our inner life is truly dependent on hearing His voice. And He gives us that capacity from the time we are very young, though most of us donโt recognize it.
Generally speaking, the most fundamental way God speaks to us is through our consciences, which is why it is so essential to develop a rightly formed, even sensitive conscience. We are greatly helped in this by remembering that the law of God is written in our hearts. Both the Old and New Testaments hold this as a key concept. A healthy conscience judges things by this Law written upon our very being. Yet, people often donโt listen, donโt pay attention to their consciences, but instead become lax through the dullness of a conscience that is repeatedly repressed or misdirected. While some people may have scrupulous consciences, which is not a good thing either, most consciences today are lax in great part because, as our new Holy Father says, โPeople have become alienated from the God who lives within them.โ
But God continually speaks to us. We can begin to accustom ourselves to the voice of God by starting to follow our conscience, becoming aware of the inner voice that alerts us, cautions us, and tells us yes or no to a given course of action. We are required to take this as seriously as we can, because this is an area now where we have entered upon sacred ground.
“Conscience is holy and inviolable: like a consecrated altar or a consecrated chalice. It is, therefore, something before which we must stand in awe. Why is it holy? Because it is most intimately connected with God. It is Godโs voice within us, calling us and admonishing us, warning us or urging us on, commending us or reproving us. Therefore, conscience binds us, puts us under a strict obligation, so that it is not lawful for us to disobey its commands or prohibitions. It orders us and binds us with the authority of God, who speaks through it.” โFr. Benedict Baur, O.S.B.
Sometimes God has to reorient or recalibrate our consciences as he did with St. Paul, who, as Saul, firmly believed he was defending his Jewish faith by persecuting Christians. Jesus had to give him more light to understand what he was doing, and to St. Paulโs eternal credit, he began to follow a renewed conscience now enlightened by Christ Himself. One can only imagine what the Church might have been like without St. Paulโs renewed conscience. His life instead became a stunning testament to the fruitfulness of following the voice of Jesus and obeying His directions.
A friend, really an acquaintance, shared a different but similarly life-changing event. She was on a helicopter flying out to an offshore oil rig where she worked. It seemed to be a routine flight until the helicopter developed a serious mechanical problem and suddenly began to lose altitude, plummeting down toward the sea. She said she felt calm and rather matter-of-factly said to herself: โSo this is it. Iโm going to die.โ But then she heard a voice inside her say, โYou better hope not. Youโre not going to like where youโre going.โ
She was not destined to die that day, but you can imagine it was a turning point in her life. She re-embraced her faith and adjusted her life accordingly, accustoming herself to the Voice within and becoming an authentic disciple.
If you really want to hear God, now is the time to get in touch with your own conscience, where the voice of God speaks. Do not count on a deathbed miracle conversion. Though it is possible, we generally die the way we have lived. Itโs not reasonable to expect that we will want to spend all eternity with someone we have ignored our whole lives. But starting with conscience and growing from there, we can begin to live the intimate relationship God wants for us already here and now. We will find all we are searching for by following the Voice of the Shepherd who leads us to the Fatherโs House, in many different ways, but especially through the gift of conscience.
ย What has been your understanding of conscience?
Do you have a conscience story?ย ย A time when your conscience told you to do or not to do something?ย ย A time when you clearly saw the effects of following or not following your conscience?
How would you describe your own conscience?ย ย Sensitive? Lazy or lax? Well-formed? Something else?
In a very real sense, we can see how God uses our consciences to speak to us.ย ย This means that following our conscience becomes very important because it is where our obedience or disobedience to God and His ways will clearly manifest.ย ย How can a conscience that is not well-formed be corrected?
God has given us so many gifts, itโs hard not to take many of them for granted. Yet none of the gifts God gives are superfluous. They all have a purpose. It would be an exercise in the likeness of Our Lady, to ponder the Lordโs gifts and to try to align ourselves with their particular purposes. In some instances, the accountability for the gift is exceptionally high. Language is one such gift.
Jesus tells us that we will be accountable for every word we use. Right away, that tells us that there is something extraordinary about language and our use of it that must be respected. With a bit of reflection, it becomes apparent that language in all its forms is meant to serve communion, our communion with God and with others. Likewise, it serves our own inner healing and integrity so that true communion actually becomes possible for us.
Jesus gives such a beautiful example of this in His Resurrection appearances. The apostles have been separated from the Lord by fear, by violence, by death, by their own unfaithfulness, and in Peterโs case, by his own words of denial. When Jesus rises from the dead, the apostles are still hiding, in fear for their own safety. After being informed of the Lordโs Resurrection, they must have anticipated his reaction to the fact that none of them had sufficient courage to conquer the overwhelming fear that engulfed them once the events of the Passion began. St. John the Beloved disciple only managed to be at the Cross because of Our Lady, (a good thing to remember the next time our own courage is challenged.)
When Jesus appears to the apostles behind closed doors, they reasonably could have expected Him to chastise them, even dismiss them for their failures and disloyalties. They knew His first words would determine their future. Jesus, once again, does not speak in the ways of ordinary people. Instead, โJesus came and stood in their midst and said to them, โPeace be with you.โ -Jn 20:19. The first words out of His mouth are words which dispel fear, unite, reassure, and even lay the interior ground to be able to receive a divine mission. The effect of His words is so powerful that something shifts, and the Apostles, now freed of fear, spontaneously rejoice! He again repeats His gift of Peace. He communicates mercy, which He then expects them to exercise in the ministry He entrusts to them (โReceive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.โ -Jn 19: 22-23)
Our consideration of the gifts of God has to be examined in the light of the culture in which we currently live. The sins which violate the purpose of language are well known to us: slander, libel, dishonesty, calumny, detraction, gossip, cursing, and blaspheming, to mention a few. Unfortunately, powered by social media, these sins have become almost institutionalized. A glance at Facebook or any mainstream news cast easily confirms that language is used to separate people from each other, the โgood from the badโ, the woke from the unwoke, the โbeautiful people from the unbeautiful.โ This corporate gossip then transports its fruits of accusation and contempt to the undiscerning masses. We can allow ourselves to get sucked into this abuse of language, or we can follow the unspoken wisdom in the simple adage mothers have spoken for centuries. โIf you donโt have anything nice to say, donโt say anything.โ This is the common-sense version of the biblical directive: โSay only the good things men need to hear, things that will really help them!โ -Eph 4:29. That includes speaking the truth in love, correction, and forgiveness if necessary. It does not mean evil is ever condoned. This would work against the unity language should build. The point is that language should never be used to deliberately hurt others. Even when Jesus spoke sternly to the Pharisees, His motive was love and communion, not destruction.
We know intuitively that there is something sacred about language. Itโs why we are so hurt when someone lies to us, doesnโt keep their word, or gossips about us. The violation goes to something deep in us and in them, something sacred to our very being, something even of Godโs very nature.
It is necessary to ask ourselves often, is what I am about to say, engage in, or listen to, something that serves communion? Or will it serve the kingdom of darkness, of hate and division? In whatever we choose, we will be found worthy of either the Kingdom of God, or God forbid, worthy of the caverns of hell, which will groan eternally with the opposite of everything language is meant to be.
ย Language is something we take for granted.ย ย We often have little appreciation for its power, its potential, both positive and negative.ย ย What do you think can be done to restore a sense of respect before the power of words?
Scripture says: Life and death are in the power of the tongue.ย ย (Proverbs 18:21. Also see James 3). Words can be life-giving or death-dealing.ย ย But it presumes we are aware and weigh our words carefully.ย ย Careless words can cause untold damage.ย ย How do you assess your own use of language?
Who are some people you like to listen to?ย ย What draws you to them?ย ย What is it about the way they use language in particular that gets your attention?
What examples do you see of language serving communion or, on the other hand, language serving things that are not of God?ย ย How might you address your own use of language?
In a time that needs the witness of Christian hope more than ever, our Holy Father, Pope Francis, says the following about hope: it is a gift of God and a task for every Christian. He explains that it is more than just โa mere act of optimism.โ Rather, it is โwaiting for something that has already been given to usโ (salvation and full communion with the Lord.) What might that look like in the world of today?
Many years ago, while presenting the pro-life position to a group of high schoolers, one boy asked what could be wrong with abortion if you were saving a baby from a terrible life of unhappiness. Our seminarian responded by pointing out that if we were to follow that logic, we should take a gun out and shoot everyone who is currently unhappy. The young man was not operating from a vision of life informed by hope but rather from the belief that happiness and unhappiness are unchangeable and, in fact, the only thing that really matters. He did not have the wisdom to see that suffering passes, states of happiness come and go in this life, and therefore, our hope is fixed on the life to come, which will be unchangeable bliss if we know how to read the happenings of this present life correctly.
A recently canonized saint, (2021), Margaret of Costello, shows us what a life of hope looks like. Margaret was born to a noble family in 1287 with severe disabilities. She was a dwarf who was blind and lame, with a severe curvature of the spine, which made her a hunchback. If she had been born in our time, she most likely would have been terminated before birth. The reaction of her parents was functionally the same though the time she lived in dictated a somewhat different outcome. She was born, but her parents, upon seeing the extent of her deformities, were ashamed to have her be seen in public, so her father walled her up in a room with no door, which he attached to the chapel. Her food and necessities were passed to her through a window. Her only visitor seems to have been the parish priest, who took pity on her and visited her while instructing her in the faith. She lived in this separation and isolation for close to ten years.
When she was 16 years old, her parents heard of a place in a nearby city (Costello) where miraculous healings were taking place at a Franciscan shrine. They decided to take her there in the hope that she would be healed. When she wasnโt healed, they abandoned her and returned home without her. The townspeople eventually took her in, and she became known for her holiness, serenity, and cheerfulness. She took on the education of the children of the poor and assisting the sick and dying, as a part of her work and penance, along with caring for prisoners and working to bring them to repentance.
She became a third-order Dominican, and her deep prayer life drew many of the townspeople to her for counsel and even prophetic exhortations. She never spoke an unkind word about her parents, and when asked why she wasnโt resentful of their treatment of her, she responded by saying that if people knew what was in her heart, they would understand. Evidence shows that she developed an intimate relationship with the Holy Family, Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. By the time she died at the age of 33, the whole town recognized her holiness and insisted she be buried in the Church. They attended the funeral as well, and it was reported that a young girl was healed during the funeral Mass. Later, she was found to be incorrupt, and more than 200 miracles have been attributed to her intercession since her death.
St. Margaretโs witness to hope is especially appropriate in our celebration of Easter. She did not let anything take away her joy or her peace. She lived the great gift of Easter, hope โ โChristian hope which makes us have that confidence in God, in his ultimate triumph, and in his goodness and love, which nothing can shake.โ -Cardinal Basil Hume. And, in her glory, in concert with Christ Himself, she is the best argument against the mindless embrace of hopelessness and the rejection we so often make to sacrifice and suffering.
What is the difference between natural and supernatural hope?
What do you think the Holy Father means when he says hope is a task for every Christian?
What do you think is the deepest hope in the heart of man today?
In Godโs providence, St. Margaret was beatified in 1609 but not canonized until 2021. Pope Francis recognized her heroic virtue but why else do you think God saved her for our age?
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CHRISTIAN RESISTANCE TO EVIL โ Session 66
The ordinary Christian knows something the unbeliever does not. When Christians, especially Catholics, look at the state of the world, they know the primary source of evil is not cultural, political, or sociological. Itโs spiritual. โFor our struggle is not with flesh and blood but with the principalities, with the powers, with the world rulers of this present darkness, with the evil spirits in the heavens. Therefore, put on the armor of God, that you may be able to resist on the evil day and, having done everything, to hold your ground.โ Eph 6:12-13
As Catholics, we do not believe that anyone is born evil. God creates us good. We are, however, born wounded in the integrity of our nature because of the first sin. The original harmony and unity between us and God, between us and others, between us and creation, and finally, the harmony within ourselves was lost as a consequence of this first sin. And the battle between good and evil in our lives was directly engaged from that moment on.
This leads us to reflect that if the grand conflicts in life, in our time, are spiritual, then the answers to resolving them must likewise be spiritual. What would be some of the ways then that we, as believers, can offer effective resistance to evil?
The Holy Father gives us a good place to start. He recently shared a reflection on a German religious sister who died in the Auschwitz concentration camp, Angela Autsh. โEven before being arrested, when the evil looming over the world was already evident, she invited her nephews, who were approaching Holy Communion for the first time. She invited her relatives who had strayed a little, and she also invited those who had remained devout to rebel against that evil with simple and, in some places, dangerous gestures, to come as close as possible to the Sacrament of the altar, to rebel through Communion. For her, to urge frequent communion, especially in prayer for the Pope and the Church, which was persecuted at that time, meant finding in the Eucharist a bond that strengthens the vigor of the Church herself, a bond that strengthens this vigor between her members and with God, and for her, it meant to โorganizeโ the fabric of a resistance that the enemy cannot unravel because it does not respond to a human planโ -Pope Francis
Read that again! Are fervent communions a source of resistance to evil? What a powerful insight into the workings of grace and into the real needs of those who have fallen sway to the enemy. Fervent Communions, something the enemy loathes, actually disarm the enemy; they make him powerless. So, he constantly seeks to keep us from the Mass and worthy Communions because it is indeed one of the most powerful weapons we have precisely because it is the โsource and summitโ of our whole lives of union with the Lord.
Jesus confirms in the Sermon on the Mt that resistance to evil is not what we think. โYou have heard that it was said, โYou shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.โ โBut I say to you, love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your heavenly Father, for he makes his sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust.โ Mt 5:44-45
What are other ways the Christian is called to resist evil? Fervent prayer, of course. Fasting, considered a form of exorcism by the early Church, is especially powerful, as Our Lady tells us it can suspend the laws of nature and even end wars. Simply refusing to comply with evil in the midst of those who embrace it, even if it leads to Martyrdom is another compelling way in which evil is resisted, and the faith is spread exponentially.
But these are not the normal, vengeance-based responses that most people make to evil. Ours should follow the direction of St. Paul, wherein we repay evil with good instead of evil for evil. โBut if your enemy is hungry, feed him, and if he is thirsty, give him a drink; for in so doing you will heap burning coals on his headโ (Rms 12:20). Thatโs the way of God with us and it should be our way with others as well.
ย Normally speaking, what is your first reaction to evil?
How have you experienced evil in your own life?ย ย
Most of the time, we are not aware of the spiritual significance of our behavior and how it willย play out in time.ย ย How do you understand the consequences of the way we respond to evil in our lives?
Can you think of other ways to resist evil that Jesus would approve of?
There is a whole industry today built around peopleโs anxiety to be prepared in the event of a catastrophic disaster, both natural and man-made. ย How would you survive if there was a nuclear war, if there was an asteroid hit, or if the grid was completely knocked out? Itโs the dilemma of Lazarus. ย Jesus raised him from the dead at his sisters’ pleading. ย But his reprieve from death was temporary. ย He eventually had to be prepared to die again. ย You can bet, though, that the time between his first death and second death served to detach him even more from this present life so that he was fully ready when it came time to die again. ย
You start thinking about these things when you assess the real-time threats we face. It is true that we are called to read the signs of the time and be responsibly prepared. But our goal has to be more than saving ourselves and our life here. Jesus warns us that seeking to save ourselves alone is a futile exercise.
โFor whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. What profit would there be for one to gain the whole world and forfeit his life? Or what can one give in exchange for his life?โ Mt 16: 25-26 In other words, we canโt save ourselves. But if we give ourselves to Jesus, He can. Only Jesus has the necessary ransom.
Jesus also reminds us that, practically speaking, the Father knows what we need and providentially provides for us unless we reject his help. Yes, he expects us to do our part, but at the same time, we understand that not a detail about us and our needs is overlooked by the Lord. Instead, the Lord wants us to focus on the better part that Mary recognized before Martha did. That would be listening to and following the Master Himself instead of trying to โmanageโ everything on our own.
To be a real prepper means you are prepping not just for time but, more importantly, for eternity. Yes, we are responsible stewards of the gifts we have here. But the eternal gifts we seek are in the care of Jesus, Whom we must follow, constantly aware that itโs the spiritual treasures we seek to store up and the earthly treasures we let go of in order to carry the Cross.
One measure of preparation can be found by looking at your relationships. Would you feel at peace and happy with all your current relationships if God suddenly called you?
Would you be prepared to see people in heaven you may consider enemies at the moment? This is critical. We are not forgiven unless we forgive. If we have any unforgiveness in us, then we are not ready. We need to do some real prepping. A friend who was struggling in a marriage had a dream she died along with her husband. They both ended up in two different lines, one obviously headed into Heaven and the other not. She said she couldnโt believe her husband ended up in the โsavedโ line while she did not. Her immediate reaction was: How did he end up in โthatโ line? Her perspective in eternity was not the same. Nor will our perspective be the same at the end of our lives.
Imagine being on a plane that suddenly starts to go down. Everyone believes they have minutes, maybe seconds, to live. What would be important to you in that moment? All your belongings and possessions? Your relationships? Your spiritual state? One of our priests related such an incident. He was on a plane struck by lightning, and the plane began a dive, which, fortunately, the pilot was able to pull out of. But in the moment when everyone thought they were about to die, he said he sprang into action. Not being able to imagine what that meant, his audience asked him: โWhat did you do?โ His answer: โI gave everyone General Absolution!โ Thatโs a true โprepper!โ
Time is a sort of dress rehearsal for eternity. We work to get things right in time so that we can live them in eternity. If weโre prepping for the here and now, weโre thinking short-term only. And unless we learn to prep for eternal life, none of the other prep will matter.
ย What would you say about your orientation at the present time?ย ย Is it short-term or long-term?
Our life here has definite limits.ย ย Do you ever think that once this life is over, we will live forever?ย ย Not 100 years, not a thousand years, not 10,000 years.ย ย But forever!ย ย Do you have any thoughts about that?
What area in your life do you think needs the most attention in order to be prepared better for eternal life?
What do you think is your responsibility to help others understand what is at stake in the way we look at our lives?ย ย What is a good strategy around those who believe this is all there is?ย ย
Itโs often been said that God gives us the leaders we deserve. If thatโs true, we should then do everything in our power to become worthy of good leaders. Everyone who grows anything knows that the stock you start out with is very important. If the stock is not healthy, it will not produce good fruit. Simply saying this, in a political season, can bring about the pressing temptation to pivot to our leaders and complain about our options.
But the point is that reform begins with ourselves. If we want good leaders, we have to become good ourselves. Itโs as simple as that. As a people, we produce our own leaders. But if we are trying to produce leadership without any connection to or real reference to God, and if the criteria for a good leader have become completely secularized, we are going to run right up against the impossibility of bringing anything good out of it. God the Father is the source of every good gift, and if we are honest, we soon recognize that without his gifts, we can do nothing.
Someone will immediately suggest God is the one Who has withdrawn his gifts from us and that is the reason we are in the trouble we are. But really, God does not like to take back His gifts once He gives them. And upon honest reflection, we have to admit that God has not withdrawn his gifts, but rather, we have rejected them. Or, perhaps itโs more accurate to say we want the gifts, but we donโt want the conditions that go along with the gifts, such as striving to live a life that is without sin and that is really pleasing to God as the source of our real happiness
This does not mean we will see perfection in those who acknowledge God, but rather that God will use present weaknesses for His purposes and to manifest His power. David was such a man. Chosen and anointed by God, he struggled mightily at times with his own weaknesses. Yet his relationship with the Lord was so strong that he never became separated from God but turned to Him immediately in his falls (seducing Bathsheba, killing her husband Uriah, calling for a census whose repercussions resulted in the death of 70,000 people.) One of the most beautiful prayers of contrition and repentance is found in Psalm 51. โHave mercy on me, God, in your kindness. In your compassion, blot out my offense.โ This is David casting himself upon the Lordโs mercy. This is David manifesting his heart but also revealing the heart of God at the same time. Davidโs relationship with the Lord was so intimate that God Himself said of David that he was a man after his own heart! Imagine entering heaven and hearing the Father exclaim: โHere comes a daughter (a son) after my own Heart! What living soul wouldnโt thrill to hear those words? These are the leaders we really need!
Leaders often think it is their business to create new morality. It is not! God has given His people a morality to follow, and any leader who tries to replace it commits the original sin on a massive scale. Adam and Eve rebelled by deciding they and not God should determine what was right and wrong. Likewise, any leader who rejects Godโs sovereignty in this area will lead his people to doom. That would be Lucifer taking his followers down to hell. Make no mistake: a leader has the capacity to set you on one of two paths only: a path to heaven or a path to hell. Thatโs it! Because the authority of leaders comes from God himself it doesnโt matter if you reject Godโs order. You will, in the end, be judged by it.
To be authentic and faithful followers of Christ requires courage. Unanimity can be very compelling, and resisting that force when it is a moral question can be very difficult for one individual against the crowd. Perhaps if we kept the words of Dwight D Eisenhower in mind: โNever underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups,โ we would be more cautious in blindly following the latest โadvancementโ or โprogressโ proposed to us by our โleaders.โ And, please God, we would be far more prayerful, discerning, and cautious in actually choosing our leaders according to the purposes for which God has put them in their position!
In what ways are we responsible for the leaders we end up with?What do you think is the essence of leadership, and what is the essence of our responsibility toward our leaders?ย ย In other words, what do you want from a good leader?
What do you think is the Number One responsibility of leaders toward their followers?
Where do you see good leaders in the world today?ย ย How do you exercise leadership in your own life?
Please note: Leadership permeates every aspect of our lives. Think outside the box. Donโt focus primarily on politics. Politics simply manifests gross problems that have developed over time in many other areas. They are not the root of the problem.