Tuesday, August 16,
2016
Be an example to all believers in
what you say, in the way you live, in your love, your faith, and your purity. 1 Timothy 4:12b(NLT)
Timothy was a young pastor. Paul was his mentor. In giving this young leader instruction on
lifestyle and leadership, the Apostle was laying down an immutable reality that
the life of a leader would become the life of those who follow.
An early mentor of mine was L.B.
Thomasson, pastor of First Baptist Church, Crystal River, Florida for more than
25 years. L.B. told me, as Paul told
Timothy, be careful what you say, and how you say it; the church will, after a
while, take on the personality of its pastor.
And the change is always subtle. C.S. Lewis wrote in That Hideous Strength:
This was the first thing Mark had been asked to do
which he himself, before he did it, clearly knew to be criminal. But the moment of his consent almost escaped
his notice; certainly, there was no struggle, no sense of turning a corner.
There may have been a time in the world’s history when such moments fully
revealed their gravity, with witches prophesying on a blasted heath or visible
Rubicons to be crossed. But, for him, it
all slipped past in a chatter of laughter, of that intimate laughter between
fellow professionals, which of all earthly powers is strongest to make men do
very bad things before they are yet, individually, very bad men. [ii]
When I reflect on change which
happens, ever so gradually in my life, I see the truth of what C.S. Lewis was
holding up to the light, and that about which Paul warned Timothy; if
you do not ruthlessly guard your inner life, your character, it will not be
long before your visible life, your actions, will certainly follow.
If that is true in the life of an
individual, or a church, that the pastor’s lifestyle and attitude will alter
the way the flock moves and thinks, is it not so that it will be that way with
larger assemblies? Will it not be that
way in municipalities and countries?
Have you ever asked yourself, how
in the world did we get here?
The answer, for C.S. Lewis, Paul the
Apostle, and for any right thinking person, is always that we got here because our
culture became a reflection of the character of the ones we chose to lead us.
For You Today
Whom shall it be that I
put in charge of this holy day God has granted me?
You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road today…have
a blessed day!
Go to VIDEO
NOTES
[ii]
That Hideous Strength. Copyright © 1945 by C. S. Lewis Pte. Ltd. All right
reserved under international and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Words to Live By: A Guide for the Merely Christian. Copyright © 2007 by C. S. Lewis Pte. Ltd. All rights
reserved. Used with permission of HarperCollins Publishers.
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