Leading with Grace

I am thankful for the opportunity to come and encourage you today—this first day of the first week of the new school year.

This will be an exciting and pivotal time for all of our students. Some of our kids will step into this school for the first time. Others have been coming here for years. Some are beginning their educational journey others will be hitting other milestones on their journey.

Yet, they all have one thing in common. Something they probably don’t put a lot of thought into. That one thing is you. Your students need you. They can’t do this, education stuff, on their own. More than that, your students need you to show them, Jesus.

I read a book about caring for wounded people called the Care of Souls by Harold L. Senkbiel. And while this book has more of a counseling and pastoral point of view, his words certainly apply to each of you as you serve the kids here at Cookson Hills. He writes:

The Care of Souls: Cultivating a Pastor’s Heart (Chapter Four: The Cure of Souls: Intentional Treatment)

So when helping traumatized sheep [students] deal with tragedy, grief, or emotional and spiritual pain, I consciously seek to tend my own soul as well by reminding myself I’m only a messenger—a messenger for Jesus. My motto becomes that of John the Baptizer: “He must increase, I must decrease.” (John 3:30) As much as possible, I want to back out of the scene and let Jesus do the heavy lifting. Armed with his word and sacraments, I can be sure that he will do the healing while I do the tending. I am the attending physician with sworn duties and responsibilities to perform. But God himself is the healer, and He—Father, Son, and Spirit—provides the healing...

Those words, alongside the words of John the Baptist in John 3:30, “He must increase, but I must decrease.” are powerful!

We want to see our students be successful. We want them to find healing for their hurts. We want them to fall in love with Jesus and be able to trust in him for salvation. But we must remember that we are not in charge of all of that happening in the life of our students. We are only one part.

You are part of a team, and the leader of that team is Jesus. You are a messenger for his love and grace. But He must increase, and we must decrease. We have a ministry to perform. We teach, we nurture, we encourage, and challenge. We fulfill our responsibilities the best we can and trust that Jesus will also do his work.

I like how Harold describes this posture of trust as “tending” his soul. There is a peace that we receive when we understand that God is truly the one in control. Cookson Hills Christian School is God’s, your classroom is God’s, and your students belonged to God before you ever met them. You should believe with all your heart that God is doing work in the lives of your students, in your classroom, and in this school, but never forget it is his work, and by his grace, you are part of what God is doing.

This should give us humility about our “successes” and the ability to trust that God is in control when things don’t work out the way we had planned. God’s grace is big enough to overcome human weakness and failure. I think that is why he constantly reminds us we are part of his team, the family of God. When we use our various talents and gifts together as part of God’s team, we get to be part of what he is doing, not just through us but through all of us. There is much more joy in our ministry as we each partake of the good news around us. And there is encouragement to be found in each other when things are not going well. That’s the joy of focusing our lives on Jesus and less on ourselves.

So, my prayer for you and me this year is that there will be more Jesus and less of us. More trust in the goodness of God’s grace.

Let me pray.