ShepherdLeader.com

Our Church as a whole is very good at nurturing and midwifery. We do have single parents, people with disabilities, and those caring for them. And all are well cared for, not directly or specifically by me or even the elders but a loving network within the Church. It’s arisen from the power of the message, the Word. What got my attention in today’s reading was the concept of not driving the sheep too hard (Gen. 33). I think I have a tendency to do that – to try to accomplish goals, and push them to completion. Maybe I need to re-evaluate. Does it matter that things are in place for various events and ministries? That they are done well and would be attractive to people? Or that the sheep are not in distress? I vacillate. For years I pushed to have the Sunday School rooms in good repair and order, but teachers would fairly well abuse the facility. The quality of education was excellent, but the facility looked terrible. The current members of the Church didn’t care, but new people came only one time and didn’t stay, and this bothered me. No matter what approach I tried to impress on the teachers the importance of keeping their physical space clean and in good repair and professional, they seemed stressed by having to do it and resisted. I finally gave up, and everyone was happier, even though visitors continued to come only once. But maybe I should be more concerned with shepherding the flock under my care now than trying to increase it. Perhaps a smaller flock of happy sheep is better than a larger flock of sheep in distress. Such an approach would certainly be easier on me as well.