Servant Leadership
Today we decided to visit Blue Ridge Community Church, because its Fathers Day, and my Father-In-Law is involved in music at the church. While pulling into the parking lot we were guided into our space by a parking attendant in a bright yellow jacket and hat. Thinking to myself that this would be a miserable service to volunteer for in the 95 degree Fahrenheit (35 degrees Celsius) weather, I got out of the car and looked up to notice that the man who had directed us to our spot was actually Woody, the senior pastor of the church. It took me by surprise at first, and then I thought he must be really dedicated to be working the parking lot and then planning on going to preach, what a committed guy! When we got inside and were seated for the service we found out that the senior pastor would not be speaking today, the message was going to be brought by someone else, and that struck me even deeper. This Sunday would have been Woody’s “day off” he didn’t have to preach, the responsibility for giving the message wasn’t on his shoulders so he could have just coasted through the day and enjoyed church, but instead he was sweating out in the parking lot with the rest. Then I realized that instead of taking his role of pastor and shepherd of the church as a “job” he viewed it as a service, and if he wasn’t going to be serving today in the pulpit, he was going to be serving elsewhere, wherever he was needed… even if it meant getting sweaty and dirty. How often have you seen your senior pastor directing traffic in order to help people get into church?
To me this spoke to me profoundly on this Fathers Day because it was a fantastic example of what a leader should be. Someone who takes his role as leadership role as an opportunity to serve, and as father’s we have that privilege daily. Its so easy to think that the weekend is our “days off” because we’ve spent all week working to provide for our family, but the weekend is a wonderful time to practice that servant leadership and to perform the duties that could be seen as menial or small (cleaning, cooking, etc…), but are necessary to keep the daily tasks manageable for the family as a whole. Thank you pastor Woody for the reminder and Happy Fathers Day!