Coach Herb was my Grade School/Junior High coach. He taught me many life lessons during my formative years. One of the lessons was the importance of accountability and mentorship. Herb was a playful, fun coach, who had high expectations for each player. He expected a player to prepare well, give their best, and to put the team ahead of the individual. Herb was ever present and willing to celebrate great accomplishments and a student giving their all. He was also ever present and willing to hold a student accountable when they were not giving their best.
In James 5:19-20 we read, “My dear brothers and sisters, if someone among you wanders away from the truth and is brought back, you can be sure that whoever brings the sinner back from wandering will save that person from death and bring about the forgiveness of many sins.” Accountability and criticism is not often seen as part of our fellowship with one another. We have become accustomed to fellowship being about the celebration of our good times or as the gathering together for encouragement. We tend to shy away from accountability and criticism under the guise of not wanting to be judgmental.
In the Christian Ashram experience, Brother E. Stanley Jones impressed upon the Ashram Family the importance of accountability and criticism. He wrote, “After lunch we have the Family Meeting in which we meet as an Ashram Family and ask the group to bring up any constructive suggestions for change—what can we do better? We remind them that if they do not bring up criticisms at the Family Meeting, they should not bring them up anywhere else, so that there will be no secret criticism. If there is no outer criticism, we know there is no inner, so there is a relaxed fellowship” (A Song of Ascents, 227).
A fellowship that does not make room for accountability and criticism will tend toward secret disunity that will blossom into greater issues of unresolved conflict. A fellowship that is willing to hold one another accountable and allow criticism will be a growing fellowship as we live out Proverbs 27:17, “As iron sharpens iron, so a friend sharpens a friend.”
Prayer: Lord, I don’t like how accountability and criticism can feel at times. Yet, I know you have given me brothers and sisters in our shared faith who see in me places where I need to grow or to abandon a misdirected path. Open me to the accountability and criticism from brothers and sisters who are following your leadership, that I might become all you want me to be. In Jesus’ name, I pray. Amen.