Just Do It

I received a very encouraging phone call today from a dear friend of mine. He was part of the very first group of people that were willing to submit themselves to my teaching when I felt that God wanted me to begin teaching leadership principles to those in my sphere of influence. At the time, it seemed a little "gung-ho" to some people since I was still so young and had only been leading for about 5 years up to that point. Even recently I've met people who don't understand why someone like me would try to "teach people to lead". They just don't get it...and that's ok.

Here's where the encouragement came from. This friend of mine told me about how this week is the year anniversary of someone in his family coming to know Christ as his Savior. He told me about a difficult, somewhat hostile, conversation that had begun with that person on the phone one day. Then he told me that after more than an hour on the phone with the person...who started out by throwing insults at Christianity and God...they were praying together to accept Christ as Lord and Savior. So I thought...what does that have to do with me?

Then he told me, "They way I responded to him on the phone in order to disarm the hostility and eventually unlock his heart to hear the Gospel was a direct result of the principles that you taught me years ago in our leadership class about the book 'How to Win Friends and Influence People'." He went on to encouarge me and let me know that ever since then he has continued to read and/or listen to audio tapes of Dale Carnegie's book as well as other materials that we studied during those training sessions. I was BLOWN AWAY.

See, this had nothing to do with me being some great teacher. That's not why I'm encouraged.
This had nothing to do with Dale Carnegie being a genious on relationships. This person coming to know Christ was a result of obedience. Simple obedience.

Even though people misunderstood my motives in teaching leadership, God had His own reasons for asking me to do it. Whether or not I ever get compliments about being a good teacher, communicator, or leader myself, I could care less. Hearing a story like this and seeing the evidence of God's grace through obedience makes me want to NEVER hesitate to do what God is telling me to do. No matter how "well accepted" my actions may seem to others.

God is good. He is faithful. He'll use you if you'll just be obedient.