June 5, 2023
The more public thy place, Christian, and the more eminent thy service for God, the more thou must look that the devil will have some more dangerous design or other against thee; and therefore if every private soldier needs armour against Satan’s bullets of temptation, then the commanders and officers, who stand in the front of the battle, much more.
William Gurnall, The Christian in Complete Armour
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How often have we seen pastors and other spiritual leaders fall? In this quote, the author points out that as officers on the field are higher-value targets in earthly warfare, so are church leaders in spiritual warfare because bringing down a leader can fragment or destroy many of his followers. Due to this higher bounty, our leaders are held to a higher standard, as described in 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1, and they need to take special care to maintain their armor. It also illustrates the importance of ensuring your faith is planted firmly in Christ and not in a fallible human leader.