![]() We’re going, “Warning! Danger, Will Robinson.” I hope pastors are reading it with the same intent that I have, which is not gloating over somebody else’s fault. You could lose it in a second.Īnd today, even the smallest things, of course, are magnified on social media. If they don’t trust you, they’re not going to follow you. If you don’t have credibility, no one trusts you. Warren, it takes years to build credibility and trust, which is the “lingua franca” (common language) of leadership. So I think there’s a healthy fear of God. I’m not smart enough or mature enough, honestly, to lead something without screwing up, without messing up, without flaming out in some way.” I’m not smart enough to lead a church, much less a church the size of Saddleback. I have to throw myself prostrate on the floor constantly and go, “God, you’ve got to help me. In Hebrews 13, it says, as men who must give an account, one day I’ll stand before God, and I’m going to give an account for how well I help the people, Saddleback, grow spiritually. The ultimate accountability is this: I’m going to stand before God one day and give an account of how well I shepherded the flock. Accountability only works if you want it to work. I’ve talked to a lot of guys who flamed out who had accountability groups. If you don’t want accountability, you can just lie. And of course, now today, I just copy it on the internet and post it in a file folder.Ībout every six months, I pull that file out and I just read through it to put the fear of God in myself, and to remind myself that given the right situation, I’m capable of anything if I don’t have accountability.Īnd let me just say this: There’s even a limit to accountability. ![]() So for years, but even before the internet, every time somebody stumbled because of pride, manipulation, anger, sex, money or anything, I’d cut that article out and I’d throw it in what I call my warnings file. He’s used the same three temptations for thousands of years on Adam and Eve, on Jesus, and on everybody else. The one thing we can say about Satan is that he doesn’t have any new ideas. I just thought I’d rather stick a knife in my heart than defraud the church monetarily, sexually, ego - all of the typical traps. I had an uncle who flamed out morally in the ministry. My father, my grandfather, my great-grandfather - all pastors. I have kept in my files, long before we had MinistryWatch, a list of what I call my warnings. Sometimes I tell myself they’re worse than they really are. And sometimes I tell myself things are better than they really are. I lie to me more than I lie to anybody else. That means we lie to ourselves more than we lie to anybody else. There’s really nothing left.Īnd the Bible says the heart is deceitful and desperately wicked. Rusty (Leonard, the founder of MinistryWatch) led it, you lead it, and it’s absolutely essential because when you lose integrity, there’s nothing left. Rick Warren: The first thing I want to say, Warren, is thank you for the ministry that you’re doing. It has been edited for clarity and conciseness. To hear the audio version of this interview, click here. I had this conversation with Rick Warren at his office in southern California. News and World Report have all named him, at various times, to their lists of the most influential people in the world. Bush, and he delivered the invocation prayer at Barack Obama’s inauguration. government’s $15 billion AIDS relief package that has been credited with saving tens of millions of lives. He was an adviser to George W. Rick Warren’s 2002 book “The Purpose Driven Life” has sold more than 50 million copies, making it one of the best-selling books of all time.īut his work as a pastor and author are just the beginning. Rick Warren was instrumental in the development of PEPFAR, the U.S. For most people who have been around evangelicalism over the past 40 years, Rick Warren needs no introduction. He and his wife, Kay, founded Saddleback Church in Orange County, California, and it has become one of the largest and most influential churches in the nation.
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