Bible Students

Thoughts on “Lead” by Tripp (chapters 1-3)

This week’s section goes over the first three chapters of Lead, “Achievement,” “Gospel,” and “Limits.” Chapter one tackles the difficulty of focusing one’s leadership on their achievement, rather than their faithfulness moment to moment. Achievement is a good thing in leadership, but it can become deadly if it becomes the main thing. If I am honest, working in the kitchen can easily place achievement in the place of faithfulness. Having the achievement of making a meal people really love can be the wrong motivator if faithfulness to the team (setting up the next shift’s meal) is neglected. Spiritual leaders must be spiritual leaders, not leaders of achievement. Failure of leadership is not missing an achievement mark, but being unfaithful to God’s calling in each moment. Leadership means making followers of Jesus, not of myself. Leaders must be full of dependence on God and prayer. Devotions are more important in faithfulness than achievements. At work for me, this looks like praying with the few kitchen staff members before the shift, rather than rushing to meet a deadline. Instead, I have to love the people where they are, see how they are doing spiritually, physically, and emotionally, and helping them to be faithful to God in their shift, not only meet a deadline. As a leader I have to expect failure. In the kitchen, I do not take failure well, even when it is not something I had control over. If someone else drops the ball on their assignment, I feel horrible. I have to be faithful to God in all that I can, rather than being faithful to achievement. Lastly, as a part of contrasting achievement with dependance on God, I must confess to other leaders and accept their help. This is easy in kitchen failures, but moral failures are more difficult to confess. 

The second chapter covers the gospel as the core of leadership. The gospel community must be nurtured. Meetings are not only for planning and strategy, but for soul care. This looks like a shift debrief which includes prayer requests, audible prayer, and checking in on their spiritual, emotional, and physical health when new people come throughout the day. Leaders will be sinful, disciples will be sinful. Sin is a constant and unfortunate part of all work. Leaders must be forgiving and loving, demonstrating the gospel throughout their leadership by forgiving those who are responsible to them. Impatience is not reasonable when the Lord has been so patient to me. Being impatient with those at work who are working poorly is a reflection of an attitude of not caring. People do bad work because they have something which is making them unable to serve God in this way in this moment. Practically, this looks like being hurt by something. Rather than being uncaring and demanding better work, it would probably be even more productive of me, let alone more faithful, if I were to sit down with the person and talk about the issue. Loving others helps them grow. Living in leadership means to be patient and praying for those who report to you. Restoration does not minimize sin, but it does forgive it. 

The final chapter tackles limits. A leader has God-ordained limits. As a leader, I can live as if I do not have limits. Leaders are collections of strengths and weaknesses. God gives talents to some and not to others, that the body wold act as one unit, supplementing each other where it is needed. This must be acknowledged during work, that a leader would be able to use the strengths of their gospel-coworkers to the advantage of the whole team. There is a weighty burden of requirement for leaders in the gospel, so a leader’s weaknesses must be acknowledged. For me, I am often impatient at sub-par work and especially bad attitudes in the kitchen. As I’ve noted earlier, it would be more beneficial to love the person than to demand good work. Everyone has weak spots for temptation, either of lust, laziness, greed, or impatience. These weak spots must be known if a leader is to avoid the things that bring him (me) into darkness and unfaithfulness. 

In total, these three chapters taught the importance of dependence on others and on God, as well as a lack of dependance on self. This looks like forgiveness, humility, and sharing the burden when properly done.