Foundations of Christian Leadership, Mentor's Guide, MG07

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F O U N D A T I O N S O F C H R I S T I A N L E A D E R S H I P

caring, comforting, but also in each case his grace and care are given in a particular way. Our Lord did not love from afar nor even at arm’s length. He got close enough to touch the ones he ministered to, and as a result of his specific and particular love for each and every sheep in their own life context, he transformed their lives. What kind of motivations and incentives will enable us to find individuals willing to give this kind of taxing, exhausting, and costly care to those who so desperately need spiritual shepherding? Ephesians 4 suggests that it is God alone who provides pastors to his people, gifted, available persons who like our Lord are willing to lay down their lives for the sheep. God alone can provide the kind of Christian leadership that his people need, care givers that will follow our Lord’s example and become the kind of sacrificing shepherds that he was, which culminated with his remarkable act of dying on our behalf. In light of the shortage of godly pastors for our cities, we need to fervently and continuously ask God to give to us what he promised his people of Israel so many centuries ago: “And I will give you shepherds after my own heart, who will feed you with knowledge and understanding” (Jer. 3.15). How we desperately need pastors who, like our dear Lord, will lay down their lives for the sheep. R. Robert Cueni has given a funny, fine, and factual summary of the odyssey of care giving as a pastor: Being a pastor is . . . • Spending three years studying systematic theology only to discover that the most scholarly comment that people respond to is “God loves you.” • Never having enough money to pay one’s bills and enough time to count one’s blessings. • Receiving two anonymous letters in the same week—one correcting the grammar in last Sunday’s sermon and the other containing money to be given to a family experiencing difficulty.

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• Seldom living near relatives but always near friends.

• Trying not to laugh when asked to say a blessing at the dedication of the town’s new sewage treatment plant.

• Always working overtime but seldom feeling the need to watch the clock.

• Uniting with God’s children at all of the turning points of life.

• Sharing the joys of the wedding, the birth of the child, the baptism of the believer, and tears in the hospital and the funeral home.