day 393: Strike The Rock

As business leaders in the secular marketplace we are constantly challenged and brought to task by our teams and the people who work around us. I like to say that if you are going to be a leader, it just comes with the territory. I have been in more than one situation in my career where when faced with the fork in the road, or the difficult decision to be made, or the feeling of inadequacy, that at the same time my team and peers were looking at me with the eye of challenge to see if they were going to agree or disagree with what I was about to do. I have never personally faced a full scale mutiny but I have seen it happen to others and when it does it is not pretty. What is amazing about it is that it typically builds up over time and then it is something very small that triggers the team feeling emboldened enough to go to their bosses and boss and register their complaints. Seldom do leaders recover and survive this level of dissatisfaction unless the next level above them intervenes and gives them the authority and the tools/resources to change the course. At my church we are studying Moses and what he went through when leading the Israelites. In Exodus Chapter 17 we read of how the people were about to remove Moses from leadership because they didn't have water. They quickly turned against him and if not for God's intervention telling Moses to strike the rock with his staff to create a flow of water, then Moses may have been done as their leader. I find the similarities striking too. Moses went above himself to find his way out of his leadership challenge and God was there to answer. We should take this lesson and learn from it as well. When we are challenged as leaders or co-workers, our bosses can help, before things get out of control. But even greater is the power and the answers that can come from a level above if we are to go to God for His answers. For Moses God asked him to pick up a familiar tool in his rod. God will give is our own rod and staff to pick up and a rock to strike if we will just ask and then listen and follow through.

Reference: Exodus Chapter 17 (New Living Testament)