My blog friend, Susan, The Philosophical Pastor points to Ezekiel 34,
What sorrow awaits you shepherds who feed yourselves instead of your flocks. Shouldn’t shepherds feed their sheep? You drink the milk, wear the wool, and butcher the best animals, but you let your flocks starve. You have not taken care of the weak. You have not tended the sick or bound up the injured. You have not gone looking for those who have wandered away and are lost. Instead, you have ruled them with harshness and cruelty.
Susan says,
When you understand the depth of the love of God, you understand why God is so serious about leadership.
But God is really, really gracious. He doesn’t typically come and personally stomp out bad leadership and as a matter of fact, He usually doesn’t seem to do anything directly at all. The reason is, just like He doesn’t dive in and feed the poor and pray for the sick but leaves that to His people to do, He calls faithful people to speak truth to power, on His behalf.
I found this post strangely encouraging. (Perhaps not so strangely.) And I love Susan's ending,
The fact that a lightening bolt has not hit you today is not necessarily a sign that everything is hunky dory, and why wait until that’s all God can do about you?
Please read her entire post and comment there (and you really should add her to your RSS Reader - which should be Google Reader.)
UPDATE: Please check out the conversation taking place over at Brother Maynard's blog.
