empowered to make mistakes…

there was a time in my church in vegas i was in control of everything. i was a church planter and that’s what church planters do. we do everything but i changed. i empowered john to be the pastor of the youth, for leah to be the pastor of the children, for andrew to lead the worship.

now in my past i was a successful youth pastor. i also was a very successful minister of music. but that was not what i was called to do at lv harvest. so i empowered john, leah and andrew to do their tasks and i didn’t second guess them. you see i empowered them to make mistakes. if they didn’t make mistakes then they weren’t risking enough.

howard hendricks is a well-known professor and has written several books on families. he said after interviewing thousands of parents most of them would say, “if i had it to do over again i would do less for my kids and have them do more for themselves.”

teach them to do more for themselves to develop self-reliance actually is teaching them GOD-reliance. why? because when we take responsibility for people we take responsibility away from them and in turn dependence upon GOD.

today when you find an adult who has somebody who’s responsible for that person we call that person a co-dependent. when you take responsibility for somebody else’s actions, you take responsibility away from them. you need to let them feel the brunt of their own actions, to reap what they’ve sown and not cover for them.

as a youth pastor, i used to tell the kids, "if you get in jail i’m going to tell your parents to let you stay there overnight.” the last thing they need to do is be bailed out. they needed to feel the consequence of their actions. when we create a safety net so our kids can never fail, they don’t learn responsibility. we must trust them with responsibility.

JESUS trusted the disciples. john 20.21 (niv), as the FATHER has sent me, so am I sending you.

anybody can see how those twelve disciples would have never gotten along together. they’re as different as night and day. they were ordinary. they were fishermen, rough around the edges. JESUS chose twelve men and later says, “by the way, guys, I’m going back to heaven. now it’s your job to give salvation to the whole world. spread the message.” HE risked it all on them.

would you do that? HE trusted the salvation of the world in the hands of twelve men (actually one of them flaked out to make eleven). obviously it worked though because we’re all here and 2100 years later CHRISTianity is still growing. don’t create insecure kids or employees by overprotecting them. trust them with responsibility.

just a thought from the front porch…