Monuments and Leadership
This past week, our family took a trip out to Washington D.C. It was a great trip. We went out to visit the church I was youth pastor at from 1995 to 1997 and to see our nation’s capitol. Fairfax Community Church (FCC) was about 195 at the time we were there. Today it has relocated and is discipling over 2,000 people. We were able to spend some time with Rod and Donna Stafford. Rod has been Senior Pastor at FCC for the last 25 years. Our conversation was helpful for my growth as a leader. I plan to have a few more discussions with him over the next few weeks.
Growing as a leader is vital for the key leader of any organization of church. I would say it’s even more important for the church, if we believe the church has the most important mission in the world which I believe we do! So my time at Fairfax Community Church was valuable and important. I expected my time there to be helpful.
I didn’t expect to experience so many helpful leadership lessons while visiting the Washington D.C. monuments. At each monument and museum dedicated to one of our country’s leaders, I read quotes that spoke deeply to leadership. There were quotes by Jefferson about his desire for justice and equality. I teared up as I read this line from Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address; “It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
I nodded in humble agreement as I read these words by Martin Luther King, Jr: “It is always the right time to do the right thing.”
And then there was George Washington. It’s easy to take our first president for granted. We think he gets all the recognition because he was the first. If you spend some time in the Washington Monument or at Mt. Vernon (Washington’s home), you will discover Washington was a great man, a great man of character and faith. America is incredibly blessed to have had him as our first president. He was ideally suited for it in many ways.
While we were at Mt. Vernon’s Museum I came across the following statement about George Washington: As much as Washington became known as one of the great heroes of the American Revolution, he was leader with human flaws. He suffered from bouts of indecisiveness, made strategic blunders, and faced challenges to his power. At times he experienced moments of complete despair, believing that chances of an American victory were near impossible. Yet his deep commitment to the cause made it impossible for him to quit; his character forever compelled him to keep moving onward.
Wow – George Washington persevered through all of that. Any cause worth leading will require perseverance. Ask Moses. He was given the responsibility to lead God’s people out of slavery in Egypt. He discovered “that faithful obedience doesn’t always result in immediate success.” Imagine going to Pharaoh over and over again telling him, “God says to let His people go.” And time after time the results are not good. In fact they even got worse early on. But after great perseverance, Moses reached the goal!
Perseverance is a key to being a great leader. And perseverance is key to our walk with Jesus. Consider James 1:2-4: Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.
So what is it you are facing right now for which you need to persevere? How do we need to continue persevering as a church?
