It’s interesting to me to listen these days to the leader of the free world explain that no matter what happens in Washington, someone else is always to blame. The President inherited a terrible situation economically and was elected both times by blaming his predecessor. The problem now is the President’s policies of massive spending, debt accumulation, class warfare, challenging corporate job creators like Boeing, and the sequester (which he fails to remember was HIS idea in the first place) are at the root of our national economic lethargy.
The President has proven to be a formidable politician and extremely gifted communicator, but a very poor leader. Why? Because at some point every leader has to look at himself or herself in the mirror and look at the people he or she leads and simply admit what everybody else already knows: “I blew it. This is my fault. I take responsibility.” This tendency in all of us to insist on our appearance of perfection rather than taking responsibility for the situation indicates anemic, narcissistic, and inauthentic leadership. What ever happened to the Harry Truman’s of the world who boldly declare, “The buck stops here.”
But to be honest, the passing of the buck rather than accepting responsibility for our actions and decisions in life has become sort of a cultural norm in our society. If we are lacking anything in life or experience a setback or failure, it simply has to be someone else’s fault. But if we want the grace of God to flow in our lives, truly flow in our lives, we must humble ourselves, admit our mistakes, and accept God’s grace and forgiveness which includes pardon for the sin but also the power to recover from the mistake and then succeed in the future. The Scripture says that God opposes the proud and this need to be right all the time is a manifestation of pride. The good news is that God also says he gives grace to the humble (1 Peter 5:5).
In Disney’s 1997 movie, Rocketman, clumsy NASA software engineer Fred Randall makes the dubious journey from computer expert to replacement astronaut for the Mars mission (of course he was the one who injured the original astronaut). Throughout the movie we see Fred cause one calamity after another while all the while declaring incredulously, “It wasn’t me.” The low-budget movie is humorous but teaches all of us, President or not, what it sounds like and looks like to others when we habitually refuse to take any responsibility for our lives. I’ve posted a montage from the movie below (CVLI License No.: 503767611). Enjoy (click the following link). It wasn’t me
artheinz.com 