Replenish: Developing Spiritually Healthy Leaders

I love this obscure passage tucked away in the Old Testament book of Exodus.  It is a vivid picture of God’s heart toward people.  It is the picture of a very personal God who puts a high premium on people.  God wants to make sure the priests never disconnect serving God from serving people. I really believe these two verses from Exodus 28 are a challenge to all of us who lead in ministry. ...

"Whenever Aaron enters the Holy Place, he will bear the names of the sons of Israel over his heart on the breastpiece of decision as a continuing memorial before the LORD.  Also put the Urim and the Thummim in the breastpiece, so they may be over Aaron's heart whenever he enters the presence of the LORD. Thus Aaron will always bear the means of
making decisions for the Israelites over his heart before the LORD.
Exodus 28:29-30

Whenever Aaron would get ready to perform his priestly duties, he would put on a breastpiece.  On the front of this breastpiece were 12 stones.   These 12 different precious gems were not for decoration.  They were a reminder.  Each stone represented a different tribe of Israel.  Every single man, woman, boy and girl was represented in those stones.  v.29 says that Aaron would “bear the names of the sons of Israel over his heart”.Every time Aaron put on that breastpiece and saw those 12 stones, God wanted him to remember the people. There wasn’t one person in all of Israel that God didn’t love or care about.  And God wanted Aaron to authentically love and care for them as well.

It is interesting to me that in the passage it says that these 12 stones were to be the means of decision making.  In other words, as Aaron faced ministry decisions, he was to ask “what’s best for the people”.  I just wonder how often we ever take the time to stop and ask “what is best for our people?” If the people I lead are really “on my heart”, it can’t help but impact how I make decisions.Ultimately, leadership is not just about goals and projects, it is about people.  This seems too obvious, but this gets violated all the time.  

In the name of vision we can steamroll over people.  But it wasn’t vision or a mission statement that was the reminder on the breastpiece… it was people.

I just wonder if God built that into Aaron’s ministry because he knew how easy it is to lose sight of this.  And let’s face it, this is hard.  In some ways it is much easier to sit at my computer or spend my time planning a ministry event.  Really loving on people and investing in them is messy and time-consuming… but there is no substitute for personal care