IT COMES WITH THE TERRITORY

Responsibility comes with the territory. That is the message throughout Scripture. It was the constant message of the Old Testament prophets. Jeremiah, for instance, reminded the leaders of Israel that God had selected them and put them into their positions of leadership, and God expected them to fulfill those positions to the very best of their abilities. They owed it to the people. They owed it to God and they truly, and perhaps most importantly, owed it to themselves to lead the people as they should be led, as they knew it was their responsibility to do so.

Those chosen as leaders – shepherds, Jeremiah called them – did have a choice. They did not have to accept the position. If they did not want that burden laid on their shoulders, they could hand on the torch to someone else, someone who was ready and willing to lead. God never forces anyone to assume leadership responsibilities. But once accepted, God expects only the very best.

What we all sometimes fail to realize, however, is that as a believer, as a Christian, the responsibilities of leadership come with the calling – and the acceptance of that calling – to follow Jesus. All members of the Christian community, you and I, are called to lead others to Jesus by the way we live our lives: it is leading by example. The responsibility comes through our baptism. It is to "proclaim by word and example the Good News of God in Christ," as the Baptismal Covenant asserts.

We do not do this alone, of course. We do it "with God’s help" and with the help and support of the Christian community. When we forget that, or when we reject that help, that is when we get into trouble. When we think we have to lead alone or when we refuse the help of others and decide to go it alone, disaster awaits. We will fail. That is a given. The shepherds of Israel whom Jeremiah took to task failed because they refused God’s help and took leadership responsibilities into their own hands. That was selfish, foolish and, in the end, disastrous.

There will be times this day, for example, perhaps many times, when each of us will be called upon to teach those we encounter, often by happenstance, what it means to be a Christian and we will do so simply by the way we are living out our life at that very moment. They will not know that that is what we are doing and we will no doubt be totally unaware that that is what we are, in fact, doing. We teach by our very lives, for good or for ill, aware or unaware.

Leading by word and example, no matter who we are and no matter what our position in the Christian community, is a responsibility that comes with the territory. It is a burden at times, of course. Sometimes it is a very difficult burden, to be sure. Fulfilling the responsibility that God imposed on the prophets to remind the leaders of their responsibility was never a piece of cake. Nor is it at times for us. But it is a burden that is made lighter the more we allow God and the rest of the community to help and support us in our life of faith, just as we are there to help and support them in fulfilling their leadership responsibilities as Christians.