Life Lessons with Dr. Steve Schell

People follow certain kinds of people. Some they follow because of fear. The leader will punish them if they don’t do what they’re told, and this is not necessarily a wrong way to lead because certain people can only be led with a firm hand. They will only obey a particular law because they might get caught and punished if they don’t. But there is also another kind of leader who people follow willingly. This person is given authority out of respect, which means in some way they have earned it. People have watched this person over a period of time and have seen how they handle situations. They may possess a skill others want to learn. They may have a history of making good decisions so that people seek their wisdom. They may exhibit a high level of character so that people want to become like them. This kind of leader doesn’t need to threaten those who follow them. They may not even be aware they’re leading. But the fact remains: People are following, and neither titles nor rank can bestow this kind of authority on anyone. It has nothing to do with that person’s position in life; it’s given to them because of who they are. This type of leader might be the youngest or oldest, the best-looking or plain, male or female, wealthy or poor, employer or employee, captor or prisoner. Those who know this person see something inside them that’s more important than what’s outside. 

So many books have been written, and sermons preached, about faith that the subject can become overwhelming. Those who long to walk in greater faith can be left with the feeling that real faith, the kind that produces real miracles, is just too hard for normal people like us. We don’t doubt that miracles can happen, or that they do happen for some people, we just assume we aren’t that kind of people. Apparently, real miracles require more faith than we’re able to produce.

There’s a huge difference between humility and insecurity. They may look the same on the surface, but they serve two different masters. One is driven by the fear that it is unworthy of being loved and tries desperately to earn approval. The other is able to wrap a towel around its waist and kneel down to wash feet because it is so confident that it is loved and approved. And I don’t think we have it within ourselves to change from one to the other, as if someone who’s insecure could become confident by convincing themselves that they are important. Such confidence is a gift that must be given to us by someone else. It’s not a prize we can achieve on our own. We become confident when someone we trust, someone who knows us better than we know ourselves, someone with a greater perspective than we have, sees our true place in life and tells us who we really are. 

This chapter is a case study in bad human leadership. Luke describes Paul’s voyage to Rome in great detail, and by the time 276 people wade ashore on the island of Malta we’re left amazed that anyone survived the foolish decisions made by those who were supposed to protect them. Time after time the human leaders used their authority to benefit themselves and ignored their responsibility to care for those they led. The Roman governor (Festus) put Paul, the centurion and others in danger by sending them to Rome late in the year because he didn’t want to wait until spring to get rid of Paul. The captain of the ship didn’t want to move around the harbor if a storm arose, so he was willing to risk the lives of all on board to make a run for another harbor. The centurion in charge of Paul was a kind man, and the only person who made any good decisions, but on a crucial decision, he ignored God’s warning and followed the majority opinion. The sailors were willing to abandon ship and let hundreds of people drown to save their own lives. And the soldiers wanted to kill all their prisoners so they wouldn’t risk being punished if any escaped. Only Paul and God cared for the people on board. In the midst of a deadly typhoon Paul earnestly prayed that their lives would be spared, and God rescued every one. 

It’s easy to confuse the terms “works of the Law” with “works worthy of repentance.” We can take the truth that we are saved by faith and not by works to mean that our works don’t matter; in fact some people consider any attempt to produce good works to be dangerous because it might lead to self-righteousness. The result of this kind of thinking has been believers who are nearly devoid of good works. Some sincere, but confused, believers are careful not to do anything that might resemble a good work, and even scold others when they step out to do something for God. The result is a very low level of discipleship and a very poor reputation in the community.

It’s one thing to believe that God still speaks to us today, but it’s quite another to know how to listen to His voice. Many believers, many long-time believers, have never been around anyone who actually lived this way. They have no models to show them how or prove to them it works. Yes, they read about such things in the Bible, but outside of that the Christians they know seem to function just like non-Christians when it comes to making decisions, the only difference being that a Christian will use a different system of values to guide his or her choice. Whether someone is a Christian or a non-Christian, most people tend to make decisions by using their deductive reasoning. They evaluate the possibilities, and then choose the best, or maybe the safest, course of action. The Christian hopes the choice they make will please God, but God Himself has remained a passive observer in the process. There was no divine voice or spiritual revelation involved, just well-intended human reasoning. And that type of decision-making is not wrong; it’s just not enough. It’s always our desire to please Him that pleases Him. And frankly, there are a lot of day-to-day decisions which need to be made this way. We have been given a rational mind and are meant to use it. But as believers we’ve also been given the Spirit of God to dwell in us, and His presence is not just a biblical truth to affirm. He is a Person who has joined Himself to us. We don’t have a distant God we pray to. We have a living God who is near us every moment, and who wants to guide us through life. 

We know a lot more about God than our minds are able or willing to understand. We’ve all had experiences that we know took place, but we can’t explain. There have been moments in our lives when we recognized that someone was present with us, even if we didn’t know His name. There have been times when an unseen hand came out of nowhere to protect us, or a voice interrupted our thoughts with information we needed to hear. Since we are spiritual beings living in a spiritual world, it shouldn’t surprise us when such things take place, but it usually does, because we live in a culture that has been trying to deny that anything spiritual exists, for the past 300 years. We’re repeatedly told that the universe arose out of nothing, that life is a meaningless accident, and that when we die our conscious minds cease to exist and our bodies decompose and return to the earth. And those voices are getting louder and more demanding. So people tend to hide their spiritual experiences, feeling confused or even embarrassed that they had them. They assume they must have imagined it, or what happened was merely a very unusual coincidence. Yet spiritual encounters can’t be explained away that easily, because deep down inside there’s a part of us that still remembers what happened.

Standing in front of a Jewish king and queen, a Roman governor, and the prominent men of Caesarea, Paul said the reason he was on trial wasn’t because he had done anything wrong, it was because of his faith. In fact, the trial was really about God. Does He or does He not raise dead people to life? He said it was this hope of eternal life that motivated the patriarchs of Israel, and it was this hope that motivated Jews in every generation to serve God zealously, day and night. Yet strangely that hope is not always matched with faith. We can long for something we don’t really believe will happen. People can wrestle with the fact of their mortality, and passionately yearn to escape the grip of death, but when actually confronted with the question of whether or not they believe God will raise them from the dead, the truth is they don’t. Because if they did, then why would it be so hard to believe that He has already raised someone from the dead?

Character is who we are under pressure. It’s a part of us that we form one choice at a time. In effect, our personality becomes a collection of habits. When certain things happen we find ourselves responding the same way over and over again. And the older we get the deeper those patterns grow. We still have a free will and change is possible, but those habits grow so strong it’s as though they are now dragging us along through life. We are often unaware of how strong a habit has become until we face a crisis and need to act differently. If we actually try to change we quickly discover it’s not nearly as easy as we thought it would be. We’ve been making excuses for our behavior and giving ourselves permission to do certain things so often that we came to believe those excuses. Change can appear dangerous or even wrong. Many people try to compartmentalize their character. They think they can act one way in one area of their life, and another way in another area. But they’re fooling themselves. Habits are habits, and the patterns developed in one area are soon guiding the way we respond in another. In particular, the willingness to lie “when necessary” is a very difficult habit to break because in those situations there is always a price to pay for telling the truth. We probably learned to lie, if indeed we did, in order to avoid conflict. Our goal was to protect ourselves and preserve peace, not deceive someone. But once we let that habit in, it grew to have a far greater power over us than we expected. It began controlling us, rather than us controlling it. 

There are several very good reasons for postponing a decision: not enough information, a wrong attitude, or waiting for others to catch up. But there comes a moment when a decision must be made. To delay is fearful or cruel. I might pretend that the reason I’m delaying is that I don’t have enough information, but the truth may be that I simply don’t have the courage to do the right thing, so I do nothing. I play out in my mind what I think people might do to me, or what the results would be if I make a certain decision. Then I play out in my mind what would happen if I made a different decision. Often when I do this, I see trouble down both paths, which leaves me immobilized. I’m afraid to go one way and I’m afraid to go the other. No path seems safe, so I try to stay precariously balanced in the middle, by not making any decision at all.