A Miserable, Spiritually Dangerous, and Leader-Destroying Place

A prayer written using quotes from chapter 9 - Identity - 

of Paul Tripp's Lead:12 Gospel Principles for Leadership In the Church

God, full of grace, the one who created us with purpose and identity,

Don't allow my pride to keep me from running to the graces of your gospel 

and the help and protection of the gospel community around me.

Remind me of who I am in you and because of you.

Help me always keep you in the center and

to not look horizontally for what I am designed to find vertically.

I pray that the fruit of my identity in Christ would not tempt me to look elsewhere for identity.

I pray that I would be motivated by faith not fear.

God, you change people.  I am not the change agent in this world.

I am an instrument in the redeemer's hands.

Amen

If "pride in position" controlled my heart, I would not run to the graces of the gospel or the help and protection of the gospel community around me.  (162)

Rooting my identity in ministry leadership would cause me to hide important details about myself, control conversations, compete for position, deny weaknesses while projecting strength, and a host of other spiritual dangers.  (162)

None of us, from the most influential leader down to the least influential follower, responds to life-based n the pure facts of our existence.  Rather, all our responses are the result of how we have interpreted those facts.  (163)

The disobedience of Adam and Eve was profoundly more than the eating of forbidden food.  It was a rejection of their identity as creatures of the Most High God and buying into an identity that did not have God at the center.  And with that said rejection, human identity became not only a morass of confusion but the battleground for spiritual war.  (164)

Since the fall, people look horizontally for what they were designed to find vertically.  They ask people, places, and things to do for them what the only identity in the Lord can do.  (164)

It is incredibly ironic that the fruit of a leader's identity in Christ is what tempts him to look elsewhere for identity. (167)

Ministry leadership really is a miserable, spiritually dangerous, and leader-destroying place to look for identity.(167)

Nothing good is produced in a leader who has along the way exchanged identity in Christ for some form of identity in ministry.  (167)

There are too many leaders among us who do too many things out of fear, not faith.  (169)

No leader is a change agent; rather, every ministry leader is a  toolbox of the one who alone holds the power of change in his hands. (170)

A leader whose identity and security is in the Lord is liberated from fear, even in the face of bad news."  (172)