Leadership and Serving

What does it mean to be a leader? To have power and brawn? To be in charge of it all and take everything on your shoulders so that the people around you will admire you for your abilities?

Leadership is none of those things. It is a position of servanthood, a position to give. A leader sacrifices themselves for the people they work with and for. You take on the job of getting dirty and losing yourself a bit for the good of others.

I have learned these things in my experience as a leader and it is a humbling fact that I am not in a place to be powerful, but to be at the bottom. I have to take on the things no one else does through my leadership and I love it. I give to others and share with them what I can. Through servanthood and letting others shine, I get to sit back and smile, knowing that I have helped someone else gain. I am not the face of what I do, Christ is. Christ gave me this desire and He gave me these loves and I am thankful. Being a leader in Christ puts a certain tone to leadership and I am able to stand back and know whom I am serving. I do not serve myself. That would be boring.

I serve my God and I serve His people. I give because I am called to and I love it. There is nothing like the joy of giving and nothing like the joy of serving.

Clarity

Friends... Here is my advice to you. Talk to people. Talk. Words are so powerful and they alleviate all of the unseen things in relationships. If you think a friendship is in shambles, talk and figure things out. Chances are the relationship is actually quite fine and you are both undergoing a lot of stress. Life happens and people get crazy busy with all the demands surrounding us, especially in college. We have commitments and other pressures that just hone in on our heads until eventually, as I said last night, "my brain is just going to explode all over the wall!!"

Now that really won't happen, but it is a good way of relieving initial stress that keeps building up. Get a little frustrated. Get a little mad. It's healthy. Then just calmly talk. How beautiful a friendship becomes when you talk and things get solved.

Hugs at the end are also always welcome :)

The Place I Found Myself

I have been to a place that was beautiful

Where I discovered, I hoped, I dreamed

My whole being was immersed

In all the splendor around me

Sailing across an ocean of awe

Carrying me far from home

A place where beauty is determined by character

Not by standards

No one was the judge of me

Even I lost that power

And God took my hand

Led me to His creation

Guiding me through the walls of this town

And all the way He spoke of beauty

What it really means

While we made the last step He turned to me and said

How much He loved me

How much He adored me

And told me I was beautiful

And I believed Him.