Bonus Rule #6
Don’t Swerve for Animals
The 5 Rules of Defensive Driving have proven very useful to me over the years, but my experience has shown me that there really should be 6 rules. You see I worked in the insurance industry for 15 years and most of that time was spent in the area of automobile accident claims. I saw every type of wreck imaginable. One of the most common and probably the most avoidable types of serious accidents were those that resulted from people running off the road trying to avoid an animal. Hundreds of times I saw the facts of an accident stated something like this, “I swerved to miss a squirrel (or some other animal) and I ran off the road… and I hit a tree, my car flipped over, I hit a house, I landed in the ditch… and on and on”. Keep in mind that these statement only came from those who actually survived the accident.
Does this apply to leadership? Does this apply to ministry?
The answer is a big YES in both cases. If you are an effective leader and/or are involved in an effective ministry then you will have critics (animals). They will try to run out in front of you and cause you to swerve off the road you are on. Our instinctive reaction would be to treat them like we do squirrels (or any other animal for that matter) and put ourselves, our families and our ministries at risk by quickly swerving to avoid them.
I believe the best action to take when we are confronted with critics, who will normally jump out in front of us when we least expect it, is to learn to slow down and not swerve. By slowing down you give them a fair chance to see where you are going and simply move out of the way or in some cases get in the car and go with you. I think that is fair.
If the critic simply won’t move and insists on coming at us, I believe we have only one remaining choice. We have to keep moving forward and we have to stay uncompromisingly locked into the vision God has called us, our ministry and our team to follow. So, when the critics come at us… we can try and slow down… maybe even lean our head out of the window and explain again where we are going and why… but we can’t swerve… that is too dangerous… no animal/critic is worth risking our (or those with us) life and the vision to which we have been called.
So what do we do when they won’t move? We run them over… in Jesus name! :o)