Tough Love; Tough Leadership-August 2022
TOUGH LOVE; TOUGH LEADERSHIP
Leadership at any level is not for the faint-hearted or thin-skinned. Leaders and their leadership are often tested. Even the most endowed leaders are challenged. Even the most skilled and experienced leaders must constantly “earn” their stripes. Case in point: the Apostle Paul.
Paul established a church in Corinth on his second missionary journey. His relationship with the church was fraught with challenges from the start. In Corinth, paganism ruled the day, and evil reigned at night. But the power of the Gospel message broke through the darkness, and out of this corrupt culture a church was born.
Not surprisingly, the new converts in Corinth struggled with issues of immaturity and immorality as well. Conforming to the life of the Spirit of Christ and living as Kingdom citizens was difficult for them. Some in the church continued in sinful lifestyles and practices that defied Paul’s teachings and authority.
It didn’t help that when Paul moved on to new fields of apostolic work, false teachers from the outside moved in and undermined his work. Paul dealt with the same challenge in other churches as well where false teachers called into question Paul’s apostleship and authority and taught “a different Gospel.” Some in the church at Corinth apparently began to echo the false teachers and mimic their attitude toward Paul.
When Paul returned to Corinth for a second time, things did not go well. He described that time as “painful” (II Corinthians 2:1) Many in the church turned their backs on him, betraying his deep love for them and belittling his rightful leadership as one called and appointed by Christ.
He followed up that visit with a second letter, which is now “lost” and, naturally, not a part of the canon of Scripture. It was harsh in tone and cutting in content. To put it in familiar terms, he took the church to the proverbial “woodshed.” Maybe it wasn’t Paul’s finest hour. Maybe that’s why it became “lost.” It was never meant to be a part of God’s Holy Word.
In II Corinthians (his 3rd letter), Paul explains his heart in writing as he did. For I wrote you out of great distress and anguish of heart and with many tears, not to grieve you but to let you know the depth of my love for you (II Corinthians 2:4).
One of the demeaning things that was said of Paul was that “in person” he was unimpressive both in speech and in personality. His distractors made much of the fact that he was only bold and assertive in his letters from afar, but in person he was meek and mild at best. He didn’t come across as someone to be feared.
The mistake they made was the same mistake others made concerning Jesus. Meekness is not weakness in a leader who is conformed to the image of Christ and empowered by the Spirit.
Paul admitted that he initially regretted sending the letter because he knew it would severely sting them. But Paul’s intent was not to inflict pain as retaliation. It was to create “godly sorrow”, which would lead to true repentance. In II Corinthians 7, he wrote: I see that my letter hurt you, but only for a little while— yet now I am happy, not because you were made sorry, but because your sorrow led you to repentance (II Corinthians 7:8b-9).
Spiritual leadership is not leadership that impresses with the power of personality or demanding demeanor to which people are uncontrollably drawn. I think Paul had it right when he wrote to the believers in Corinth in his first letter: And so it was with me, brothers and sisters. When I came to you, I did not come with eloquence or human wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I came to you in weakness with great fear and trembling. My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on human wisdom, but on God’s power (I Corinthians 2:1-5).
Paul’s relationship with Corinth is an intriguing lesson on spiritual life, love, and leadership in the body of Christ. When life among brothers and sisters in Christ gets tangled up in knots and things get tense, twisted, and tough, the only way to bring correction to the situation is through the exercise of tough love and tough leadership.
MINISTRY UPDATE
We took a brief pause for the better part of July to spend time with family and to refresh but hit the ground running the last week of July and into August. I’m still preaching more times than not at Black Creek Church in Walterboro, as I have for about a year and a half. Please remember this church in prayer as they continue to seek a pastor.
My work with the State Convention is ongoing and evolving. I serve as a Regional Strategist on the Christian Life and Leadership Team. I have the privilege and joy of working with four individual church leaders, and I also lead two small groups in what is called the NextStep Process of leadership development. One is in Manning, and one is in Sumter.
Caribbean Land Crab Update!
This is in the fun category. It’s also bazaar! But I thought you would like to know this. In the last newsletter I told you about Elliott finding three Caribbean land crabs (a species of hermit crabs) in our yard. We now have four! It’s all still a mystery, but life would be a little boring without small mysteries that energize our big imaginations. Grace and peace, HW