There are leaders, and then there are leaders. A leader will tell you to jump, but a good leader will inspire you to ask, “How high?” Then there are truly great leaders who not only get you to jump to their specifications, but they make you think it was your idea in the first place.

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We just returned from a fabulous evening with friends, the kind that you pick up where you left off yesterday, even though you’ve been on the other side of the country for the last six months. Everyone should have these kinds of friends.

Something FabulousFriend said that struck me, “I wish I’d known earlier what I know now.” Original thought, I know. But it got me thinking…

When I married at the age of 20, there were a lot of ideas I held, that I look back on now, I realize were Biblical values. But I didn’t have the courage to hold to them because they were just…foreign. Why? Because I was conditioned to practice the opposite. It was my Christian duty to be a “wise steward,” to think with my brain. (Note that I wasn’t really thinking, but mimicking mainstream materialism.)

I exchanged Biblical principle for practicality. And it wasn’t even sound pragmatism.

For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. ~I Corinthians 1:25

I was fed a steady diet of humanism, “me”ism, and feminism, and I swallowed it as a “Biblical worldview.” All you have to do is type “Christian” in front of it, and it suddenly becomes Biblical.

Not everything that is Christian, is [cough] Christian.

And that includes some of the ideas held by the mainstream Evangelical community. In a recent Barna survey (too lazy to link), Christian parents state that the most important thing to pass on to their children is a good education. No further commentary necessary. Walk into most pastoral pre-marital counseling sessions around the country, and you will find a lot of humanism passed along as Christian principle.

Humanism has crept into our thinking. We’re under the guise that we’re thinking Biblically simply because the Christian community sells, condones, and packages it.

Satan is a smart fellow. Remember the sign of a crafty leader: we think the leader’s thoughts after him, and then we pat ourselves on the back for being so wise and original. We jump; we jump high; and we think we’re the puppeteer, but we’re really the puppet.

So, what a relief to find in real life those saints who live Biblical lives, day-after-day, week-after-week, trusting God to be true, as they take him at His Word. I suspect that it’s more about having the audacity to obey, than just having the knowledge to do what we ought. Yes, “I wish I knew then…”, but I also wish I had some guts. Witnessing humble families living in real faith gave our family the courage to begin exchanging pragmatism for Biblical principle, foolishness for wisdom.

And to those doing just that, I say, Keep going. You never know who’s watching and taking courage.