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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: A question for leaders
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daronmedway
Shipmate
# 3012
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Posted
ISTM that it's not just leadership that needs a biblical definition. We need a biblical definition of being led too.
Posts: 6976 | From: Southampton | Registered: Jul 2002
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daronmedway
Shipmate
# 3012
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Penny S:
quote:
Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you. Hebrews 13:17
ἡγέομαι (hēgeomai) – again, as above
What is the original of "submit" in that passage? Only it does seem to imply obedience being demanded.
The passage itself says that there is a way of treating church leaders which makes their ministry a joyless source of emotional anguish.
The logic appears to be this: churches suffer when its leaders are miserable. So allow yourself to be led in a way which makes the task of leadership a joy and not a misery.
The question, therefore, is what sort of being led will make being a leader a joy?
Posts: 6976 | From: Southampton | Registered: Jul 2002
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Chorister
Completely Frocked
# 473
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Posted
Well the obvious biblical definition is that of a shepherd leading his sheep. That image took rather a heavy knock in some types of churches a generation ago, when 'heavy shepherding' went way too far down the autocratic, domineering route. But perhaps there is still some mileage in the 'shepherding lite' approach?
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Retired, sitting back and watching others for a change.
Posts: 34626 | From: Cream Tealand | Registered: Jun 2001
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daronmedway
Shipmate
# 3012
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Posted
IMO, the Anglican Ordinal contains a very good summary of the presbyter as pastor/shepherd and is, I think, an excellent summary of Christian leadership.
quote:
Priests are ordained to lead God's people in the offering of praise and the proclamation of the gospel. They share with the Bishop in the oversight of the Church, delighting in its beauty and rejoicing in its well-being. They are to set the example of the Good Shepherd always before them as the pattern of their calling. With the Bishop and their fellow presbyters, they are to sustain the community of the faithful by the ministry of word and sacrament, that we all may grow into the fullness of Christ and be a living sacrifice acceptable to God.
Priests are called to be servants and shepherds among the people to whom they are sent. With their Bishop and fellow ministers, they are to proclaim the word of the Lord and to watch for the signs of God's new creation. They are to be messengers, watchmen and stewards of the Lord; they are to teach and to admonish, to feed and provide for his family, to search for his children in the wilderness of this world's temptations, and to guide them through its confusions, that they may be saved through Christ for ever. Formed by the word, they are to call their hearers to repentance and to declare in Christ's name the absolution and forgiveness of their sins.
I wonder if it would be possible to write as cogent a summary of what it is to be led - a summary of the Christian as a pastored sheep as it were?
Posts: 6976 | From: Southampton | Registered: Jul 2002
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