by Pastor Douglas Brauner

The Blessing of Leadership

You can listen to today’s devotion by clicking on this SoundCloud link.

“Where there is no guidance, a people falls, but in an abundance of counselors there is safety.”
Proverbs 11:14 English Standard Version

I’m not known as a person who lives on the edge. I once had the opportunity to celebrate a friend’s birthday by skydiving. I didn’t go. I was asked to officiate a wedding in a hot air balloon. I used the excuse that I had another wedding that day, which I did, but it was much later in the day. I’ve been encouraged to rappel over a ledge. I took pictures of other people doing it instead.

Given my need for safety, which includes a need for control, why would I want to sit behind the wheel of car that drives itself? I’m supposed to trust the electronics of a vehicle that is using lines and whatever else to guide itself?

Who should steer the car anyway?

Solomon wrote that “where there is no one steering the car, a people will fall.” Okay, so that’s my paraphrase. The word for guidance had its origins in steering a boat. Where no one is at the helm, the people in the boat are in trouble. But notice he doesn’t finish this proverb by saying that a group of people need one individual to guide them, but a community of people to help steer the ship.

As I reflect on my forty years of pastoral ministry, I recall wise women and men who helped me on that journey. Their words to me were not always what I wanted to hear, but what I needed. They cared not only for me, but for the community of people God had called me to serve.

I give thanks to God through Jesus Christ for those people who helped guide the ship or drive the car. It was an all hands on deck, all hands on the steering wheel, as we were privileged to lead God’s people.

Copyright Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado