Mislead
I have experienced this first hand fairly recently. There are some people who when their lips start moving, they start lying. There are other people that you can absolutely count on what they are saying to you as truth. In studying leadership it’s very easy for a careless leader to mislead his or her followers. To mislead is “lead or guide into an error of conduct, thought or judgment”. There are some people who mislead inadvertently, but there are others who mislead deliberately. I really try hard to weigh the words being told to me by those who are my leaders. I’m thankful that I live in the USA where leaders can be held accountable for misleading.
When this young man named Manassah became king at young age, he started down the path of evil and never turned away. His actions in so many areas was despicable. Check this out…
9 But the people did not listen. Manasseh led them astray, so that they did more evil than the nations the Lord had destroyed before the Israelites.
10 The Lord said through his servants the prophets: 11 “Manasseh king of Judah has committed these detestable sins. He has done more evil than the Amorites who preceded him and has led Judah into sin with his idols. (2 Kings 21:9-11 NIV)
The subject of leading is very near and dear to my heart. I tend to evaluate most everything in life through the lens of leadership. There are people in leadership who really didn’t choose the position. For some reason, our culture, gives a lot of leadership to celebrities and famous people. The actor’s job is to act or pretend to be something they are not and if they are excellent at it, we make them leaders in our culture.
There are also elected officials who promise to lead if elected. They actually promise to “lead a certain way” and it’s our role to hold them accountable when they break their promises.
There are other leaders who are appointed by someone else. If they’ve never led or been trained, they often become dictatorial in their leadership. I resent the type leader who thinks they are “smarter than everyone else in the room”. They make decisions for everyone else and make puppets of others.
I have a responsibility to think through things – evaluate people responsible for leading in my world. I should not blindly follow any leader. I should evaluate their life by their actions, their words and their character. I am responsible for being a leader. The people I lead need to do the same evaluation on me – check my actions, my words and my character.
I don’t ever want to mislead anyone at any time. I want to make it clear that I follow the Lord with my actions, my words and my character. I am, however, a flawed man – a sinner saved by the Grace of God. I’m grateful that He knows my flaws and loves me in spite of them. He leads me back to repentance. He leads me back to a place of healing and forgiveness. I’m thankful that the Lord has NEVER mislead me or anyone else.
Pressing On!
Dwayne