When leaders struggle with disillusionment

Ministry is not for the faint of heart or the easily discouraged. Disappointments can be many and even the best of leaders struggle with disillusionment from time to time.

Usually when we do so it is because we have lost perspective on the part we play in God's redemptive history and the part He plays. They two are not the same! We are players in a much larger drama that is being directed by God, not us. 

When discouragement and disillusionment come we as leaders need to be reminded of what we tell others...

One: God is good all the time even though we live in a fallen world. His goodness can always be counted on and must be trusted in for if He is not good the very character of God proclaimed in Scripture cannot be trusted.

Two: God’s goodness does not preclude us from suffering. Indeed, we share in the fellowship of His sufferings and our scars become divine scars if we trust Him in the mist of our pain.

Three: God’s ways are indeed inscrutable to human eyes: majestic, eternal, sovereign and divinely good in ways that we cannot understand this side of eternity. We exist as part of a divine drama on a stage so large and complex that we often can only comprehend a small portion of the unfolding story.

Four: There is an eternal purpose in all things that transcends our limited understanding.  But that purpose is good and will be fulfilled in the glory of God being known across our globe. Often, failure and pain are the antecedents to amazing glory and eternal success.

Five: We play a humble part in God’s eternal purposes and cannot personalize His ways as our responsibility.  We live with the joy and pain and difficulties of this life. When we carry burdens He was meant to carry rather than us we become weary, disillusioned and often angry. They are His purposes, His burdens, and a part of His inscrutable plan. We must leave them to Him.

When we become disillusioned it is usually because we have taken on responsibility we should not take on. And, have usually lost our perspective on the part God plays and the part we play in His purposes.

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