The Heart Attitudes: Part 8Egzanp

  

Heart Attitude #7 – Follow spiritual leadership within Scriptural limits.

Hebrews 13:17 “Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they keep watch over your souls as those who will give an account, so that they can do this with joy and not with grief, for that would be unprofitable for you.”

1 Peter 5:1-2 “Therefore, as a fellow elder and witness to the sufferings of the Messiah and also a participant in the glory about to be revealed, I exhort the elders among you; Shepherd God’s flock among you, not overseeing out of compulsion but freely, according to God’s will; not for the money but eagerly;”

In the Hebrews text the word for leader means one who has an official authority. These are people the church has appointed as official leaders. They have been given a specific task and are the legitimate leaders within that area. These people may or may not be paid. This does not just apply to the Senior Pastor or in most churches the only paid Pastor.

Our role is to recognize their authority and work under their direction voluntarily. If you cannot in good conscience serve under them, you need to evaluate if you should remain in that congregation. As we shall see tomorrow, the leader may have disqualified themselves and you should not follow them. Other than for that reason, you should make every effort to follow the leaders the church has appointed.

There are many other words for leaders in the life of the church listed in the New Testament. The verses above in 1 Peter mention two of them. Elders are those who have real experience and have developed Godly wisdom and should therefore be followed. They are to shepherd the flock, that is us by the way! To be a shepherd is to provide food, water, and shelter for the flock. It means to take care of their needs. There was also the need to protect the flock since sheep have little defensive ability against predators. We should follow those who are assigned by God to protect and care for our spiritual lives.

Harold Bullock says sheep need a shepherd. Horses and cows do not follow a shepherd, they need to be wrangled. A shepherd uses his voice to guide the sheep, cowboys use other means to move and care for horses and cows. The question for us to answer is “Are we going to be sheep who can be lead by the shepherd appointed over us by the Chief Shepherd or are we going to be cows and horses that the Father must wrangle through harsher methods to move us along on our spiritual journey?”