Be a Good Leader

2001

So you’re saying that you pretty much have to test them to find out where their heart is?

It is true that God will provide opportunities to see those things. If you begin to smell a rat you can say, “Let’s not do that. What do you think about that? Let’s this week not do that and see what it does to you.” Or talk them through it.

The wrong impression that maybe somebody could have is that if you do something more than twice a week that all of a sudden it’s grabbing your heart. Even in the case of basketball, if you’re doing it every day is it capturing your heart? If you’re training in it and you’re really working towards being very good at it? Is that capturing your heart, whether it be golf, tennis, basketball or business?

It’s something to be really watchful of. The more a person does it, the more likely it is that it will grab their heart. We’ve known guys who are absolutely terrible at golf and it grabs their heart, and then there are guys that are pretty good at golf and it has nothing of their heart. It’s not so much the quality of play or the quantity of play as it is those heart issues.

I don’t want to say, “Well, I ought to be able to do this all the time because it doesn’t have my heart.” Well, that can just be an excuse too, when it really does have your heart. It’s something really to watch carefully. And even the way we build, like with Joshua. When he started baseball, I told Joshua if he’s on third base, the winning run and the last inning of the game, there are two outs and your best hitter is up and I make a sign to you, you walk straight across the pitcher’s mound to the bleachers where I’m at and we’re walking off. Because if there’s a kingdom reason to do something else, your heart must not be so into it that you say, “Could we wait, can we wait...” I expect immediate response.On earth as it is in heaven.

“The same way Gabriel and Michael and the angels respond to God, that’s how quick I want you to respond to me, and if you’re not prepared to do that, Joshua, then we’re not going to do this game. If you won’t make your vow to me before heaven and earth that that’s how you’re going to handle this in your heart, then we’re not going into it at all. That’s the only term, the only ground we’re going to build on. So, if you don’t think you’re strong enough for that, then let’s not do it. I’m not into being irresponsible with you coming off third base being the winning run for no reason. But if there is a reason, and there very well could be, then I don’t expect any argument, no whining, no discouragement, no embarrassment. Your eyes have got to be on God, and if you can’t build that way, then we’re not going to do this thing.”

That’s a good way to start the process, whether it’s guitar or basketball or whatever, is to make sure we’re building with that in view before we even begin. And that’s our agreement right off the bat, not something we try to work in later on. If we have to work it in later on because we were blind when we started and didn’t help them and lead them in that way, well, fine, we’ll add it later on. But since we all have enough insight to do that in advance, we should, to make it easier, and not make it hard for them unnecessarily. But frequency or skill -- none of those automatically means that your heart is off, which was your question, of course not. But God will provide the tests, to be sure.

I’ll never forget Tim and Monica’s baptisms, because I was on the eleventh fairway at Riverside Golf Course at something like three under par when I got a call on my cellular phone. That’s a test. Those things are tests of where our hearts are at. What does it really mean? If I had been twelve over par - “Hey! Let’s go! Let’s get out of here.” :) But I think God set that up. God provides many tests to make sure we don’t get off track. It wasn’t like it was automatically easy, but those are the things we have to do is to refine our own hearts and help each other do the same.