Proverbs 6: 23 (MSG) For sound advice is a beacon, good teaching is a light, and moral discipline is a life path.
- Psalm 19:8 (NIV) The precepts of the LORD are right, giving joy to the heart. The commands of the LORD are radiant, giving light to the eyes.
- Psalm 119:105 (NIV) Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path.
- 2 Peter 1: 19 (NIV) And we have the word of the prophets made more certain, and you will do well to pay attention to it, as to a light shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.
Management is tasked with leading. Leaders light the path – let’s assume for this essay that leaders lead - not direct. They are "out front." The advice leaders give should be a beacon ahead - giving focus to the purpose of the organization and a reason to be on the path.
This chapter in Proverbs is on living skills and in the section on warnings about sexual morality comes this gem about the qualities of a leader who provides sound advice, good teaching and moral discipline. Christian leaders in management are really in the lighting business. Their model leader, Jesus Christ, is the “light of the world” and believers are called to be a light. However, sometimes, a leader's eyes get adjusted the amount of light around them so that it takes someone else to point out how dark it has become.
To keep from becoming complacent with the ambient “light,” three questions should be answered on a fairly regular basis: Where are you getting your "sound advice?" Who is teaching you? Who is holding you accountable? The answers to those questions will help mark the complex path leaders must light for others to follow. Life is not simple, neither is leading. Complexities arise fraught with gray areas. Discerning truth and righteousness demands of leaders something beyond their natural skills. Business is in constant flux. Capital gets depleted. Priorities change. Boards demand progress. Individual contributors are often driven by self-centered motives painted in the texture and hue of team effort. No person is truly altruistic. Because managing is often lived out in the gray areas, or in ethnical dilemmas that are not easily parsed, it is imperative for Believers to have around them people who have a foundation in truth and light.
For some organizations, that advice can come for a Board. For most organizations, it must come from a group outside the Board. John Donne reminds us that "no man is an island" and yet many in management, claiming it is lonely at the top, do not actively seek out interconnections that would help them be a consistent beacon. Moral Discipline is the backbone of an intentional process to make the Sunday stuff work on Monday. Its about both being and doing. Congruent. Being accountable for life path stuff.
Have you found a group who are bound together with a love for the Lord and a love for his people we are being called to serve the marketplace? There is strength that comes with varying business experience in a group committed to helping each other grow in the faith, and grow a profitable business.
Being known as a Christian business leader should have an impact on the lives around you. Impact is needed for the world of business today seems to value a paradigm of self-centeredness and greed. Prestige and power drive many in an organization. Tolerance for sincerity of belief - even for beliefs that will destroy-is the dominant paradigm. Standing for God's truth is not about tolerance. It is about being a light. Light has a way of reveling. Christian leaders must distinguish right from wrong even in the face of what might be “legal” but not righteous in God’s eyes. Being aware of the ramifications of those little decisions about inventory, booking orders, managing staff that will have an eternal impact.
Society is focused on correctness, not truth. Standing for truth does not have to be lonely. You plus God make a great team. You, God and God's people are a cord of three that is not easily broken. Got your cord?
Copyright (c) 2004 by P. Griffith Lindell
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