[Cal]

I understand the whole "leaders should be servants" idea, and agree with it.

But the fact is many times decisions have to be made in an authoritative manner. One example is, How to use money collected from the assembly? How do you decide? Obviously you pray and seek the leading of the Spirit. But at some point someone with authority has to decide. Who is that?

The Spirit-led ideal hopes that everyone will agree. When they don't--and they usually don't--you've reached an impasse. What does the group do then?

That's why you have leaders and you submit to them. You trust that they have the Lord's leading.

But you don't let their leading become a tyranny to you. Like I said, if you feel they are abusing their leadership, you are free to seek an assembly elsewhere. But there is no doubt when it gets down to practical decisions, authoritative leadership is needed.

Throughout history, some groups have tried to be directly led by the Spirit with no authoritative leaders. They never endure. It's a wonderful ideal, but it doesn't work. Sooner or later there is going to be disagreement. And the question is, Who decides what to do then?

The LC talked out of both sides of its mouth on this. Its stance was that the leader's decision was the Spirit's decision and if you fought it you were outside the Lord's will. In other words, they wanted everyone to believe they had total Spirit-leading AND total human leadership because the two were one in the same there. In hindsight we see the error in that thinking. It leads to tyranny.

My personal view on how it should work is that if you join a group you should generally trust and follow the leaders. (If you can't, why did you join in the first place?) This doesn't mean you don't offer suggestions, just that you don't become a trouble-maker. But if you begin to think they've gone off the rails, you are free to leave and seek an assembly elsewhere.

But as I said, if you find that no place works for you, you may want to consider that the problem is with yourself.