BATTLE WEARY

Obey your leaders and submit to their authority. They keep watch over you as men who must give an account. Obey them so that their work will be a joy, not a burden, for that would be of no advantage to you.              Hebrews 13:17 NIV

Our Creator placed the man He created in charge of the family He created. As head, man has to answer to God not only for himself, but for his wife and children. As head of our home, my husband answers to God for how he leads and loves and teaches—but I feel I, his wife, need to do all I can to make his job easier and to insure his success. I don’t want to watch on judgment day as Jesus blames my husband for my failures.   

The same is true of our church leaders. Though we elect them, it’s God who puts them in place and gives them authority, and it’s God to whom they will ultimately answer.

I don’t want to make their jobs any harder than they have to be. I don’t want to be a stumbling block. I don’t want it on my conscience before God that I failed these hard-pressed men. I don’t want to stand before God on judgment day and see Him come down hard on them for my failures, to hear Him turn to me and ask, “What did you do with these, my servants?”  

I want to help them succeed. I want to build them up, not crush them. I want to hold them up in prayer, encourage them, share any small wisdom I have with them, help in practical ways where I’m able.

Moses couldn’t do it alone, and neither can our guys. We have to step in like Aaron and Hur and hold them up, hold them to God’s standards, not ours.

Avi, give us peace in our homes, in our nation, in our congregations. Help us to see each other as You see us, to love each other as You love us. Give us the unity You prayed for us, and help us to value it as You value it. Help us to build up, and not to tear down. Give our leaders courage to follow Your way, not the world’s. In Your holy name, Amen.