I just returned from taking my Greek/Roman History exam on the Minoan, Mycenaean, Dark Age and Archaic cultures of ancient Greece. I studied a lot over the weekend then read through my notebook before class. I knew I was in good shape when I could close my notebook and recite in paragraph form the evolution of Greek society. So needless to say I am quite content that I scored a good grade.

Well, I have an hour or two to relax before going to the Library to knock out a butt-load of English. I have a paper to write, another to begin writing, and a chapter to read. And these are twenty-five-page chapters. I was going to say fifty but realized that was an exaggeration, and I didn't want to be indentified as a compulsive liar.

These words of Rob Bell ring over and over within me:

[Many pastors] live in reaction to everybody around them because no one ever taught them to have a spine... They are trying to teach people about a way of life that isn't true of their own life. On a regular basis when I'm with pastors, I'll ask them if the message they are preaching isn't the dominant reality of their own life. You can't believe how many will say that it isn't.

So my question for leaders--and for Christians everywhere--is, are you smoking what you're selling?

I cannot lead people somewhere I am not trying to go myself. I don't have to have arrived, I don't have to be perfect, but I do need to be on the path.