Three vital leadership principles from Scripture

In my first Doctor of Ministry cohort, I assigned The Peter Principle, which is absolutely hilarious. Surprisingly, I still had a job afterwards, it is so dated and politically incorrect. The point is that I have tried to live by that principle, i.e., not to get promoted beyond my level of competence. But to those who actually do have gifts for institutional leadership and seek to develop them: God bless you. Here are three biblical leadership principles you will likely never find in the leadership literature, at least not in their original settings. They are, however, divinely inspired, so even if they rub pragmatic leaders the wrong way and seem counter-intuitive, as they likely will, they promise real blessing to those humble enough and willing to act on them.

(1) Do not be Rehoboam. Rehoboam inherited the throne of a united Israel from his father Solomon. He asked advice of his counselors, and the older ones told him to lighten the load of his subjects. If he would do so, they said, the people would be loyal to him for life. Instead, he listened to his younger advisors, who told him to demand more and more and more of his subjects. They even crudely told him it all about whether he or his father had the bigger manhood, so to speak. As a result of following the juvenile counsel of the latter, he angered and alienated his people, found himself facing a rebellion, and lost the larger part of his kingdom, ten of the twelve tribes he inherited. He should have listened to his older counselors. He would have had loyal subjects for his entire reign. [See 1Kings 12.] Don't be Rehoboam.

The other two principles I hastily bookmarked in a previous post, but let me explain them here.

(2) This one is mentioned three separate times in the Bible, which conveys remarkably strong reinforcement:

"Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain." (Deuteronomy 25:4)

"Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain." (1Corinthians 9:9)

"Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain." (1Timothy 5:11)

Paul tells us this is not just about oxen, but about human workers, as well. So, when we can ask: "What do muzzles do?", we can answer: "They muffle speech, they inhibit proper breathing, and they prevent someone from eating, taking refreshment, and enjoying the product of their labors." If your workers have no way to speak to you or send you critical feedback, if your leadership structure allows for no one to lobby or advocate for your workers, if your style does not convey genuine openness to suggestion or critique, if workspaces are suffocating cages or the workload relentless and ever increasing, you risk killing the goose that lays your golden egg. If your mission really is "all" about your customers, clients, students, etc., and you show no awareness of or interest in how much work your people are doing, how much their burden has been increasing, how often you have been asking them to do more with less, over and over again, you will fail and deservedly so. Because muzzling an ox while it is treading out the grain is not only bad management, it is stingy, cruel, demoralizing, and dispiriting. Don't do it.

(3) Do not presume to appropriate divine promises of prosperity by wrenching them out of context. Here is an example that hits close to home for many evangelicals, but read the two verses in blue first (vv. 10 and 12), then go back and read the middle one (v. 11).

10 "This is what the LORD says: “When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my good promise to bring you back to this place.

11 For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

12 Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. (Jer 29:10-12)

Those seventy years refer to the Babylonian exile, after Jerusalem had been besieged, starved, and resorted to cannibalism, her leaders killed or captured. The Spirit of the Lord had departed the city. Ezekiel saw it happen. And the Lord set the sentence for the Jewish exiles in Babylon at 70 years. Why? To ensure the land was given its sabbatical years, every year an earned sabbatical that had been withheld, clawed back, or reneged by her leaders over the decades and centuries from Solomon and Rehoboam to Zedekiah. That is how serious the Lord was and is about honoring sabbatical years, serious as a 70-year exile. In this case the context places substantial and sobering conditions around the promise people try to appropriate, but without regard to those very conditions: When ... then.

Every preaching textbook, every Bible exegesis course, teaches the interpreter to look at what comes immediately before and immediately after the text in question. It is the very first step of proper interpretation. Good leaders should likewise be attuned to context. In this case, the context says: the middle verse — the promise of prosperity — is not for you unless you are prepared to honor its terms and conditions.

All of these principles pose a serious question and a challenge to those who seek to lead faithfully: Do you trust God and his Word? Do you trust him to provide through sabbatical years (which are spiritually regenerative and bear remarkable fruit), even when, e.g., your most productive Presbyterian elders and deacons are constitutionally required to take a year off after two consecutive three-year terms? Do you trust him to provide when the muzzle is off, the burden is lessened, the yoke is untied? Do you trust the Lord more than the efficiency experts, obsessed as they are with the bottom-line, who constantly goad you to demand more and more and more from your people and insist they make do with less (time), less (freedom), less (money), and less (rest)? "Show me the numbers" is an important part of good stewardship, but time and again the Scriptures attest that numbers are no match for God. 

Listen to your elders. Loosen the yoke. Lighten the load. Buck the self-defeating "do more with less" trend that other institutions are imposing so feverishly out of desperation and distrust, even if that trend seems like common sense and the only logical way to please your stakeholders and investors. Honor the Sabbath day (remember the Exodus) and build Sabbatical years faithfully into your culture (remember the Exile). Let them be an offering to God. Keep your promises. God will bless you and your institution. Your people will remember it and be unswerving in their loyalty. Others — those who break their promises and continually move the goal posts — will have trouble filling jobs with competent, loyal people, but everyone will want to work for you.

Choose wisely. Lead well.

A life well lived. The world is poorer for his passing.

 RIP, Wendell Berry. 

When/then: Thoughts about starving oxen and promises of prosperity taken out of context.

Here is a triply biblical thought:

"Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain." (Deuteronomy 25:4)

"Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain." (1Corinthians 9:9)

"Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain." (1Timothy 5:11)

Why do you think the Holy Spirit saw fit to reiterate this three times, once in the Old Testament and twice in the New?

And I wonder if we might not see some astonishing outpouring of grace from on high if we stopped ripping Jeremiah 29:11 out of context and recognized how serious the Lord was and is about observing sabbatical years, you know, serious as a 70-year exile, so that muzzled oxen should not collapse and die from lack of nourishment and oxygen deprivation while grinding at the mill.

10 "This is what the LORD says: “When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my good promise to bring you back to this place.

11 For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

12 Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. (Jer 29:10-12)

 

Psalm 3 [St. Columba]

This was the first of the Revenant Psalms I worked up in 2021.  

It became Track 2 on the initial volume. Hopefully having the text before you will make it more singable. Meanwhile, this series of videos showing the capo arrangements, chord shapes, fingering, etc., may perhaps have the same effect watching a friend play his snappy technique had on me way back in 1993. It only took me 28 years (from 1993 to 2021) for me to actually put my pick down and do this, but I'm glad I did. I find this style of rhythm guitar much more fun to play and enjoyable to listen to than the more common strumming style that is ubiquitous among worship leaders. [Not even sure I could do it if I tried.]

"Deliverance [An Interlude]"

Here's a new video for the instrumental 12-string piece that opens Disc 2 of Revenant Psalms, Vol. V.

The track is so titled both for the mood, but also because it inhabits a place among several psalm settings that all seem to cry out for deliverance. Like many of the tracks on Vol. V, it makes use of odd time signatures: 5/4 has such a lilt, I use it a lot, but 11/8 gets a good workout here. 

Volksfaßliche Vorträge über den ersten Brief Johannis

Dies ist die beste mir bekannte Bibelauslegung, die die Grundlagen des Christentums in kompakter Form vermittelt. Der Schweizer Reformator bezeichnete den Ersten Johannesbrief als Schrift, die „das reinste Evangelium“ enthalte. Luther sagte Ähnliches über den Römerbrief, doch der Erste Johannesbrief umfasst nur fünf Kapitel, und der Prediger behandelt dieses Buch gründlicher als jeder seiner Vorgänger, einschließlich Augustinus. Diese Predigtreihe erfreute sich bei ihrem ersten Erscheinen außerordentlicher Beliebtheit. Sie prägte die Predigtpraxis in Basel über Generationen hinweg und war zweifellos auch Calvin wohlbekannt; er ließ die erste Ausgabe seiner „Institutio“ in demselben Haus drucken, in dem zuvor schon Oekolampad an so vielen seiner eigenen Übersetzungen und sonstigen Publikationen gearbeitet hatte. Wer nach einer frischen Darlegung des Wesens des Christentums sucht, nach einer gehaltvollen und konsequent biblischen Erklärung des Evangeliums, nach einer Besinnung auf das, was letztlich zählt, oder nach einem fundierten Text für den Konfirmandenunterricht oder die Einführung neuer Gemeindeglieder – für all das ist dieses „Handbuch für das christliche Leben“ genau das Richtige.

 

Revenant Psalms, Vol. V, is on Spotify

Here is the latest and last album in the series — a double! — on Spotify. That's full 1 hour and 38 minutes, nearly two Carnegie (50 min) hours! 

And here is the whole series of Revenant Psalms on Spotify. That would amount to four additional, or a total of six, class hours.

Sorry, I can't actually offer you class credit for listening, but in the grand scheme of things, I am sure it will edify and pay spiritual dividends. By all means, set up a playlist and share it with those you love, including the churches in your network. Let the God of heaven know that we, his church on earth, find his psalms worth singing, and worth singing to him in the name of Jesus, because we love and trust him. 

Blessings and peace in Christ.

Good.

TX can require the Ten Commandments be displayed in public schools. 

So can, and should, every other state.