Reb Rev's Blog

“The Leadership Handbook” is classic John Maxwell. Written in his typical conversational style, it is a condensed version of many of his thoughts shared in other books by this author.  Each chapter is a nugget of leadership thought with illustrations and application included. There is a section for reflection and self-evaluation as well as a mentoring guide to help others apply these same principles in their own leadership style.

Chapter titles include “If It’s Lonely at the Top, You’re Not Doing Something Right,” “The Hardest Person to Lead is Yourself,” “Never Work a Day in Your Life,” “The Best Leaders are Listeners,” and “Don’t Send Your Ducks to Eagle School.”

There are twenty six chapters in all – each of them loaded with truths to learn, apply, and share.

I would recommend this book to anyone in a leadership role, as well as anyone who aspires to be.

I’ve read quite a few of John Maxwell’s books, tried to apply the principles in my own leadership responsibilities, and taught them to others. This book is a great guide and fairly to quick read as an introduction or refresher.

Thomas Nelson provides a free copy of these books for review through their “Booksneeze” Program www.booksneeze.com ; however, I am not required to give a positive review of the book.

“My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth.” – Psalm 121:2   

I’m going to start a series this week I’ll call “Things You Thought Were in the Bible – But Aren’t.” (I guess I shouldn’t expect to see bumper stickers popping up with that on there, huh?) However, these are things a lot of folks have always heard, been told, or assumed were in the Bible.

For example, today’s is – “God helps those who help themselves.”

Nope.

While God does not expect us to sit on our hands and wait to be spoon fed like a baby, the philosophy behind this one is flawed.

You see, God helps us when we realize we CANNOT help ourselves. When we realize we are finite, limited creatures with very little understanding of the deeper things of life, we come to the knowledge we can only call on Him in our time of need.

Most often, as long as we try to “fix” things or handle them ourselves, He will let us flounder on our own. When it finally dawns on us, we are making a bigger mess out of things and hand it over to Him, He will do what needs to be done.

This is deep and I’ve made it very simplistic, sometimes we are left to struggle to teach us a lesson, to strengthen our faith, and at times to discipline us – after all, He is the Heavenly Father.

The verse for today reminds us our help, even the strength we use to “help ourselves” comes from God.