It was cold weather today on the river, but hot fishing. My fishing buddy and I had 7 on, netted 5, and brought 3 home. We are eating one of them tonight. I was going to try and write some amazing wisdom and insight to go with this picture, but I am so tuckered out that my brain won’t work very well, but I will leave you with this small bit of profundity.

On January 26th we went fishing on the same river as today, in the same place on the river, in the same boat, with same guide, with the same river height and we only took home one fish, but today we netted five and released only two of those, what was the difference? Only God knows and I don’t think He is going to tell me. But even though we did poorly last time, we persevered and didn’t give up, we went fishing again and this time we did good. You never know how things are going to turn out, you just keep at it.

Galatians 6:9
Let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we will reap if we do not grow weary.

Leadership is very important in any multi-person group so that the group can have unity and accomplish it’s goals, and be successful as a group. Leadership is especially important in the life of a church because unity and love are the main causes of God’s blessing to a church. At JBC we have the main leader with several other leaders working closely with him. But we also have many other leaders because we have so many ministries and every ministry is led by a leader.

So we are always looking for qualified leaders because the more we have the more we can do, the more lives we can touch and repair. What makes a qualified leader? We look at three things, first thing is character, then chemistry, that is their people skills, their ability to get along with people, and last their competence in the skill of leadership. If those three get reversed there will be problems. Here are a few character qualities that the Bible mentions.

A good leader has the character trait of gentleness. In Matthew 11 Jesus describes Himself and mentions only two character traits, gentleness and humility. In 2nd Timothy 2:25 as Paul mentors Timothy on how to be a good pastor he tells him to deal with difficult people with gentleness and the result will be that they repent and change. Gentleness is being aware that people have feelings, that they desire to be treated with dignity and respect. A good leader thinks of people before the goal, he thinks of others before himself.

A good leader is humble. God says that if we are proud that He will humble us, but if we are humble He will exalt us. In conversations with people, there are those who tend to talk in such a way as to give themselves glory. They are opinionated and are quick to defend their idea or opinion, they tend to be unteachable and uncorrectable.

A good leader is not argumentative. He is secure enough in who he is that he doesn’t need to be right or have things go his way. A person who is often in a debate with someone about something are poor leaders.

A good leader is not over-talkative. People who talk to much will not influence other people positively.

A good leader has strong self-control. He exercises self-control over his emotions and his tongue.

temperate, prudent, respectable, pugnacious, but gentle, peaceable,

Patty and I went out for dinner tonight for Valentine’s to the “Outback,” I had a Prime Rib and she had a pork chop. It was a very nice and enjoyable evening with a very nice lady. We spent some time remembering and telling stories about the early years of our marriage when it was far from wonderful with lots of anger, arguments, and hurt feelings. We both agreed that what changed our marriage over time was a rock-solid commitment in both of us to never get divorced, never say divorce, or even to ever think of divorce. Because of the strength of that commitment we were faced with a choice, either live the rest of our lives in misery fighting or learn to get along. In the early years it wasn’t an issue of loving each other and having a wonderful marriage, it was just learning how to get along with each other in peace and unity. But over the years as we grew in our faith, our walk with the Lord, and our character our love and devotion for each other grew stronger and stronger as well. It was a “what came first, the chicken or the egg,” situation. Was it our struggle to grow in our marriage that caused our Christian life to grow or was it the growth in our faith that caused our marriage to grow? I think it was a combination of both working together. God intends that struggles and challenges in relationships stimulate our relationship with Him to grow.

A major factor in every area of life is endurance, not giving up, not quitting, finding a way, and making choices on the basis of commitment not on emotions. My Dad used to say, “Always do the right thing because it is the right thing, not because it feels good.” According to Jesus the right thing is almost always the hard thing. Those who persevere, doing the hard thing will in the end be blessed by God.

I used to referee High School basketball games years ago when my boys were in High School. I wasn’t a trained professional, just a parent trying to help out and volunteering to help the team save some money. Refereeing games, especially important games in tournaments was a terrible experience and I didn’t do it for very many years. I tried as hard as I could to see everything and to make good calls, but it was an impossible task, so I just did the best that I could. I had a conversation after a game with a particularly critical and verbal parent, I said to him, “If I make a bad call, do you think that I purposely decided to make a bad call to help the other team or to make you mad at me? or could it be that I am trying as hard as I can to call a perfect game, but because I am not perfect in my vision or judgment I make mistakes?” “And a second question, does your yelling and cussing at me help me to do a better job or does it get me so uptight and nervous about making a bad call that I do worse?” And then I added, “ If you don’t know the answers to those two questions, I do, and I will tell you if you cared to know.”

I thought the Super Bowl was an amazing game with great performances from both quarterbacks, and I enjoyed it very much, but it got ruined a little bit with all the criticism over the holding call at the end of the game. It was on all the Sports news and social media as if the outcome of the game was illegitimate. There was a non-call of holding on the same defender that was clearly holding and cost the Chiefs a first down early in the game, but it didn’t get much attention. There is no perfectly called game because there are no perfect referees. That is life and it is part of football. It seems that the fussing about outcomes and blaming others for those outcomes has become a national disease.

I was very impressed with the defender who got called for the holding penalty, James Bradberry, who when asked about the play admitted that he did hold and the call was right. The Eagles coach, Nick Sirianni when asked about it said, “that call is not what cost us the game, there were so many other calls in the game, the Chiefs just played better than we did.” It is nice to see character on display like that, it is too bad we don’t see more of it in our political leaders.

Something I am very sure of is that I want to represent Jesus Christ well as a believer, follower, and an ambassador for Him. Very few things cause a Christian to be a poor representative for Jesus as much as grumbling, complaining, and being critical and judgmental does. Being critical of referees is part of the game and part of the fun and group experience of of a bunch of guys watching a game together, but I try to leave that behind when the TV gets turned off, and sometimes I succeed.

Jefferson Baptist Church men’s ministry just finished their “Sportsman’s Show” at the Albany Fairgrounds. I haven’t heard any numbers from anybody, but from my perspective, it looked like a great success with thousands of people attending the event, and it looked like everyone was having a good time, including the vendors. There is a good group of leaders working together in unity to plan and oversee this major event, everything rises and falls on leadership.

This weekend was the annual “Special Offering” for our Missions Ministry” which is a very large ministry impacting thousands of people all over the world. This ministry oversees church planting, schools, orphanages, businesses, and many different missionaries all over the world. There is a good team of leaders working together in unity to plan, oversee, and manage this really big ministry. Everything rises and falls on leadership.

JBC has Sunday School on Sundays with lots of kids, and a Junior Church program. We have an AWANA program on Wednesday nights with several hundred kids involved. Next year we will have a regular school at JBC from preschool through the third grade. We have a Junior High program and also a Senior High program, and a Young adults ministry. This entire children’s ministry has great leaders who work together in unity and oversee, manage, and plan. Everything rises and falls on leadership.

We have an amazing adult ministry, music ministry, small group ministry, woman’s ministry, seniors ministry, and many others that are all led by great leadership teams that work together well in great unity. Everything rises and falls on leadership.

The cool thing about all the ministries that are functioning at JBC is that I don’t have to do anything to keep any of them going successfully. The best thing I do is stay out of the way. The funny thing is that there was a time in the past when I did everything. It is quite amazing how God will build His church using every person in the church who all have different gifts and abilities, when I stay out of the way.

Philippians 4:13 I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.

Matthew 17:20 if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible to you.

John 14:12 the works that I do, he will do also; and greater works than these he will do;

There is a number of areas that the mature and wise follower of Jesus must have balance in his life. When the Bible says I can do “all things,” it doesn’t mean “everything“ or “anything,” it means those things that are God’s will for me. God has put us in a world with gravity, with weeds, and He has put us in bodies that get tired, and sick, and old.

I have a limited amount of time. I have a limited amount of energy, I have a finite amount of wisdom, a finite amount of resources. A very hard truth for me is that I am limited in what I can accomplish. What is an even harder truth for me to accept is that I am now more limited than I was a few short years ago, I am going backward in what I can do in a day.

The acceptance on my part of the fact that I am not God, not even close, doesn’t mean I am going to roll over and resign myself to doing nothing. I will press on, work hard, set goals, dream dreams, and go to bed tired every night. But it does mean that I will steward my time wisely, take care of my body, plan my days well, take naps when needed, take time off to fish, and spend time with family and friends just talking and enjoying fellowship not getting uptight about not getting something done. Every person is a package of God-given gifts and abilities and of God-assigned limits. Any person who denies the limits that we have will live in frustration, they will struggle with feelings of being a failure, and will eventually burn out.

An area of life that is opening up for me more and more as I get older is mentoring and training men for ministry and coaching some who are already in ministry. As I teach being faithful and disciplined to keep the basic spiritual disciplines, to write goals, to press on and work hard, I will also teach the importance of running the race God has given us with endurance and wisdom, and recognizing that the three “R’s” , rest, relaxation, and recreation will be a key part of the endurance factor in our life.

Every night I ride my stationary bike. Sometimes it is no problem, but most nights I am tired and I don’t want to ride that stupid stationary bike, so I call it my torture machine. In the picture, you can see the iPad that I read while I ride and that helps a lot. I also watch videos on YouTube about fishing, hunting, car mechanics, and sermons from some of my favorite preachers. Every year I and several others go on a bicycle trip usually a couple of thousand miles or more. We camp each night, set up tents, cots, sleeping bags, and cook dinner on a camp stove, and did I mention that the seat is hard.

I enjoy the bike trip and the daily riding for 8 to 10 hours very much and I am looking forward to the trip with great anticipation. This year we are going down the Pacific coastline from Canada to Mexico, and I am anticipating some very beautiful days of riding.

So why do I like riding my bicycle outside for long, tedious hours that are often quite hard, but hate riding a bicycle for one hour in a warm, comfortable house on a recumbent bicycle that has a very comfortable seat.

I have been pondering this question for several years and haven’t come to a conclusion yet that I believe is accurate and true. I asked my college-age granddaughter what she thought and she said that I love the feel of the wind in my face and the constant feeling of risk that I might fall down or get hit by a car.

It reminds me of Jeremiah 17:9 The heart is more deceitful than all else
And is desperately sick; Who can understand it?

There is a whole lot about myself that I don’t know or understand, but I keep working on it so I can grow and always do what I do for the right reason and motive.

Waiting on the Lord is a call for patience. Patience is an absolute major requirement if we are going to accomplish anything significant with our life for God. Patience is a character trait that can’t function without wisdom because patience can quickly and easily turn to laziness and indecisiveness. There is a delicate balance between passion and patience. We are required to be patient because we are not sovereign, and in order to achieve our goals, many things over which we have no control need to fall into place. Impatience tempts us to try to control things we have no power to control, to create change we cannot create, and to move what we have no ability to move.

Over the 46 years of leading Jefferson Baptist Church as Pastor, I have made more bad choices because of impatience than for any other reason. Impatience has caused me to get irritated with people who slow me down or who create roadblocks. Impatience has caused me to get irritated at God because He isn’t fixing problems like I want Him to. It is interesting to me that I have struggled with impatience because farmers as a whole are more patient than most. After all, the weather is such a major part of success and almost every farmer knows he can’t make it rain.

I have come to believe that the reason God requires much prayer for Him to do much is because prayer for the same thing over and over for a long period of time develops patience in us with God. And we have no idea how much prayer is needed or how long we must persevere in prayer before God acts. Waiting on the Lord and praying to the Lord are basically synonymous in the Bible.

God’s main goal is to make us like Himself in character, and He knows that waiting is the main catalyst for growth, so because I have so much growing to do I am prepared to wait patiently for God to work and to persevere in prayer. Come on down to the “five days of prayer “ and wait with me, and you too can grow.

I was supposed to talk to missionaries and church workers in Ecuador via Zoom on the “Blessings of Corporate Prayer“ this morning, but I got confused about the starting time because of the three-hour time difference so I missed it. Oops! I hate it when I do that. I don’t know what the situation was there in Ecuador where they had gathered together to listen to me speak, whether they came from a long distance or what. I am not going to ask, I already feel bad.

Making a mistake that we pay the consequences for is frustrating like driving to fast and getting a ticket, or being late for an interview and losing a great job opportunity. But making a mistake that others pay the price for can be devastating if serious enough. A Dad fell asleep while driving, went off the road and hit a tree and his three kids that were in the car all died. A doctor makes a mistake in surgery and his patient is paralyzed.

Sometimes the mistake is obvious and the consequence is immediate, but often the mess up is imagined and the results are fuzzy as to why. A son gets addicted to drugs in High School and dies from an overdose, and both parents grieve over their self-perceived poor parenting. I miss an appointment to preach on the value and importance of corporate prayer and then in my imagination I perceive that a revival that was poised to happen fizzles out. Hardly ever is there a marriage that goes bad, or a family that breaks up, or a growing, committed Christian that backslides I don’t think that if only I had preached better, prayed more, or counseled wiser this wouldn’t have happened.

But I do believe that I have learned over the years how to honestly, responsibly, and humbly evaluate situations, choices, and results, confess to the Lord acts and choices that I have made that were truly wrong or unwise, experience His forgiveness and grace, and learn and grow from it, so that hopefully my future decisions and choices are much wiser, ending up with much better results.

Remorse and guilt over consequences that others experience, whether real or perceived, because of us are difficult to deal with and can paralyze us so that we don’t attempt to do anything great with our life ever again. That is a bad place to stay. I sought out wise people to talk to so as to think right, get on with life, and set some more B-HAG’s, Big, Hairy, Audacious Goals.

Have you ever had a time when you felt like you were just a beginner because of being around someone amazing? I have experienced that several times in my life. One time when I went to a seminar and the speaker was Chuck Swindoll I had the privilege of meeting him and talking with him for a few minutes. Another time the speaker was John MacCarther and I had the opportunity to be in a 30-minute conversation with him and several other pastors. I was afraid to talk too much because didn’t want to appear stupid. And tonight at our “Five Days of Prayer” we had someone share about their ministry, and their accomplishments were so amazing that I felt very insignificant. I marveled over what they had done with their life, and I thanked the Lord that there were such giants of the faith still walking the earth. The cool thing about such people is that when I am around them I get encouraged and motivated to personally do more, accomplish more, and pay the price.