As for the teaching you requested from WILD, what I will do is often expand on what may be in the WILD spiritual leadership material. This will help you understand better what is being conveyed from the material plus be an aspect of the training you Zambian pastors desire in training the trainers.
LEADERSHIP CHALLENGE
First off is a challenge from the first book of Samuel (1 Samuel 12:1-5). This is very important as just before Steve and I left for Nepal, the president of the National Association of Evangelicals in America confessed that he had a problem with immorality. From what I know, both the church and he are handling things well. To stay in the spiritual leaders’ race and finish well, we need to be accountable and vulnerable, open to other mature believers…
Have you ever pondered the question , “What do you want on your tombstone or how do you want to be remembered?” An even braver question to consider is what would others put on your tombstone if someone had to write something down.
For what do you want to be remembered? It may be an event, a relationship, a character trait or just having existed – “Of all the six plus billion people in the world, you are one of them”. If we want a certain remembrance of us, then we have to live a certain way or pursue that remembrance to be remembered that way. That is a no brainer but if we stop and really ponder these questions, our lives need to live up to what we want to pursue.
Near the end of his life, Samuel the prophet stood before all of Israel (1 Samuel 12:1-5) and basically said if any one had anything against him, if he had lied, stolen, made false accusations, tore someone down, cheated anyone, falsified anything, abused people or his position, took a bribe to keep his mouth shut, outwitted the law or didn’t follow the law in anyway, gossiped, spoke ill of a person, did anything to intentionally hurt someone -- TELL HIM RIGHT NOW SO HE COULD MAKE IT RIGHT!!! He was totally transparent and vulnerable with the people he served.
The peoples’ response was a resounding NO! To hundreds of thousands, to maybe over a million people he had a clean slate. Remember, here was a man that had sons who were to follow in his footsteps but did not walk in their father’s path (1 Sam 8:1-5). Samuel was not a perfect person, he had his faults but he pursued a godly life, one above reproach as leader of Israel.
If any one of us desires to pursue being a spiritual Biblical leader and want to follow not only the example of Samuel but more importantly, Jesus, we need to live transparent lives before people. When we do something wrong, we make it right. As people look at us, they need to see Jesus.
Just as you dip a sponge into water and when you take it out, water just falls out of the sponge. If we get squeezed (opportunity to be angry, listen or spread some gossip, ask or seek forgiveness), water comes out, hopefully the living water of Jesus. We need to drip Jesus on people. Once the sponge gets dry from being squeezed and used, we need to dip it back into the water to get more soaked into it. We need to yield and be controlled, be filled by the Holy Spirit to not run dry spiritually.
In order to shine like the stars for Jesus, we need to pursue being blameless and pure (Philippians 2:14-15). People skills are a leader’s most important asset because if you can develop relationships, people will then see Jesus with skin on, up close and personal.
Jesus walked slowly through the crowds so that people could touch Him, talk to Him and be healed by Him. If we desire to be leaders who represent Jesus, we need to get close to people and let them touch us. It does not mean we are anything special. It simply means I am an ambassador for Christ and whatever I do, allows the world an opportunity to form an opinion of who Jesus is. If we want people to remember how we lived our lives for Jesus and have that on our “tombstone”, we need to be faithfully following Him.
PROBLEMS – QUESTIONS - ILLUSTRATIONS
Another of the functions of this email is to share problems or questions you may have regarding some area of ministry or life. We also want to share illustrations that would work for teaching the spiritual leadership material.
OUR TIMES TOGETHER
On a personal note, I felt we had great meetings with you pastors in Chingola, and the two meetings with Bishop Makai. Great direction resulted from our times together. Both Steve and I are also excited with what transpired in Nepal. Two goals are being aimed for next November, 2007. One goal is to teach at one week at Ebenezer Bible College and the other goal is to co-host a large leadership conference with Elmbrook Church in Milwaukee, Wisconsin (four hour from where I live and the Belton’s home church). A third goal might be to participate in a youth conference while we are there.
Ram Prasad Shrestha is our key contact in Nepal and he needs our prayers as Ram is general secretary of a Christian organization that oversees 95% of the churches in Nepal. The potential for influence and impact is enormous for Ram. Also he works with many missionaries and pastors in Nepal and several countries surrounding Nepal. (Ram, feel free to translate anything that you feel is helpful to your fellow brethren.)
Some of you may not have read the newsletter I sent to our personal financial supporters. If you have not, I am adding it to the end of this email.
