No Meds Please!

There was a guy named Jake in a singles Bible study years ago.  Jake was an insulin dependent diabetic.  He was really in shape, lean, ate healthy, followed the rules.  Every once and a while Jake would have to take some extra insulin because of problems or increased work.  Jake took insulin every day to live.  I admire Jake because he wanted to live but he did everything to keep from living just on the meds.  He used them to continue a disciplined life.  He did not use them to "life support" an undisciplined life so he could do what he wanted.

Some people don't believe in medicine or doctors at all (I find them a bit scary). There are others who "take a pill" for every possible situation instead of trying to use a bit of discipline or rationale.  

I have always been a no meds please kind of guy.  I would most certainly take an antibiotic for a bad infection (Keflex once saved my life) and at the same time I have refused cholesterol meds opting for changing my life instead.  I am a guy who doesn't like being dependent on drugs to survive and who rejected pain pills for chronic issues and embarassingly learned Pilates instead.  I like Jake - he is my kind of guy!

Many leaders find themselves in organizations that are heavily "medicated" just to stay alive.  Excessive lines of credit and constant juggling of inventory or constant fundraisers and endless motivational speeches.  Have you ever wondered why a church will build a $40 million dollar building and then have to constantly beg to pay for it?  The constant fundraising is the drug that allows the church to have way more than the people were clearly ready to support and prevents them from first learning the discipline of regular, sacrificial giving (one of the things their God proclaims as profitable to their faith!).  There is no problem with healthy borrowing but if it is healthy then why do you have to beg to pay the power bill?

If we take a long look, what are we doing in personal leadership at home and corporate leadership that is the equivalent of taking meds to survive when discipline would have the same result over time and actually cause our homes and organizations to be healthy and to "live" rather than just to "live"?

Where are we letting our organizations down because we prop them up with "meds" instead of helping them exercise discipline and do everything possible to be healthly so that the body will work as well as it can?  These are worthy questions.