Responsibility

Luke 16:2 And he called him, and said unto him, How is it that I hear this of thee? give an account of thy stewardship; for thou mayest be no longer steward.

The Merriam Webster dictionary defines it as the quality or state of being 1: responsible: such as, a: moral, legal, or mental accountability, b: reliability, trustworthiness. 2: something for which one is responsible : burden. 

And what is accountability? According to the Merriam Webster dictionary, it is the quality or state of being accountable especially : an obligation or willingness to accept responsibility or to account for one's actions. To be accountable also means that one reports to others for all they do when they hold a public office or leadership position.

Many Christians don't want to be responsible and accountable for their actions. "The devil made me do it, so and so told me to do this, the situation is not favourable, etc " are lines normally used by some who don't want to acknowledge that they are in the wrong. And yet there can't be real growth without one accepting responsibility over their actions both as a Christian and as a leader. To them it's always the other person or thing except them as to why things are the way they are.

God has held us in trust of many gifts, talents, money etc. After this life on earth He will need an accountability for what he gave us to be responsible over. In other words we shall give a report for whatever thing we did. It seems like some believers aren't ready to give account by the way they do act in the present. You give them charge over a department or Missional family or a church equipment and they act with "I don't care" attitude and you wonder why they do so. They want the glory for example to be a world renown evangelist, worshipper etc but they don't want to accept the shame which comes in case of the things don't go as planned because they always want to cast blame. 

Even in this world, the higher the responsibility, the more you earn. That's why CEOs are paid highly. The success of the organization lies on their backs. That's a huge weight or burden. They are paid heavily to carry burdens or weights no one else is willing to carry. Same with the church, the pastor is responsible for the success of the church but he has appointed leaders to share in the responsibility. If we don't have leaders who feel the weight of the burden as he does and help him carry it, inorder to ease it, the church is going nowhere. No wonder some Christians wait to be instructed in everything. If pastor is not around, they are doing their own thing, if he is around, they straighten up. Such a church won't grow. 

It's time Christians acted responsibly even when no one is watching because ultimately God will call them to account for thoughts, actions, gifts, money etc they had stewardship over.