“But the Hebrew word, the word timshel — ‘Thou mayest’ — that gives a choice. It might be the most important word in the world. That says the way is open. That throws it right back on a man.”
– John Steinbeck, East of Eden
I checked into the truck stop motel after a long 15 hours of driving. I deserved a break! It was just me, alone and tired in the little motel room. I flipped on the television only to have messages immediately hitting at me from the “adult” viewing channel. The way the television controller was set up, it made me jump through many hoops to exit this tempting mess. Next, I picked up my phone to read the day’s news on a reputable news website, only to be greeted by the clickbait headline about a TV star’s “barely-there bikini” I was supposed to look at.
The world we live in is full of temptation that we seem to need to avoid on a regular basis.
Recently, a for-profit leader stepped down from their CEO role for having an affair with a co-worker, and this week’s news noted a non-profit leader has been confirmed to have been inappropriately involved sexually with women. These stories are all too familiar and they are heartbreaking. Leaders sometimes abuse their power as the boss, sometimes allowing the benefits of their role to lead them to make bad choices.
I’m not writing for us to fret about the latest leader who fell. I’m more interested in ME and YOU and our organizations and families. Let’s not think too long about the latest failed leader and their misdeeds, but instead, look at what might happen to you if you are not working hard to safeguard yourself from a similar failure. As leaders, we all want to finish well, but crossing the finish line only comes with deep thought, training, and rigorous discipline.
The problem of power mixed with sex is not exactly new. Leaders have abused power for thousands of years. King David failed miserably with a married woman named Bathsheba. David, a powerful king, asks his servants for information about the woman he saw from his particular position of power (his palace rooftop overlooking the other houses). His servants tell David that the woman he saw while she was bathing was married to a military leader named Uriah, who is one of David’s soldiers. Despite her being married, David has her brought to his palace (aka place of power), and they sleep together. A few months later, Bathsheba discovers she’s pregnant; she tells King David, and the cover-up begins. The results are cover-up schemes, a contrived death, the death of a child, pain, shame, grief, remorse, and even murder. Not a great story all in all.
Today, King David’s balcony views of Bathsheba are able to appear on any screen in the world in seconds. It used to be that sex was private. 1953 brought us Playboy when Hugh Hefner put sex on display at the corner store. The ’80s brought the World Wide Web which put sex on display for free.
You might THINK you can handle sexual temptation. If you do, you’re kidding yourself. God is clear on this matter. “Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment” (Romans 12:3).
Oh, and by the way, there’s a target on your back if you’re a Christian leader. The devil is not interested in you advancing the causes of the kingdom of God. The Apostle Peter, an eyewitness to Jesus' ministry, wrote, “Keep a cool head. Stay alert. The Devil is poised to pounce and would like nothing better than to catch you napping. Keep your guard up” (1 Peter 5:8).
I’ve got a few questions for you to consider:
Are you pushing back on anyone who is asking you to be more accountable?
Are you accountable for your travel schedule when you travel alone?
Is your Internet and phone history available to and/or shared with your spouse, board, or company leadership?
Are you in a small group of friends that asks you deep questions such as:
How is it with your soul?
Are you reading your Bible regularly?
Are you praying regularly?
What struggles or temptations are you feeling?
If you’re a male reading this, listen deeply to what psychologist Jay Stringer wrote just this week. It will shake up your thinking in a good way.
“The sexual problems we face as men are opportunities to grow. They are also the very behaviors that block women from leadership roles. When men refuse to engage the wounded and entitled places within us, the inevitable outcome is to locate the blame outside of ourselves. We blame our hyper-sexual culture, we blame the beauty of women, we blame our loneliness. In the end, we attempt to control the world around us rather than asking ourselves the question: “What do I need to heal so I don’t use other people for sexual gain?” One of the major consequences of this type of sexual behavior among Christian men is that it reinforces the notion that women are far too dangerous to be in relationship with. Rather than address our sexual behaviors, evangelical men move to quarantine themselves from women.”
If you struggle with unwanted sexual behaviors, I highly recommend checking out Jay’s online assessment and multi-part course to help you exit.
Before we leave each other, wherever you’re reading this, can we go up to the 50,000-ft level for a minute?
There’s a little Hebrew word that is vital to our understanding all this. It’s timshel. The English interpretation of timshel is “thou mayest.” The way the word is used in the Torah is the second person imperfect, which means it is referring to something, an act, that has not yet occurred. The word appears in the Cain and Abel story in Genesis. The Bible says Cain left where he was and headed to the land of Nod. Cain left the presence of God and lived in No-Man’s-Land, east of Eden (Genesis 4:16). After this time, Cain never rested. Nod is the Hebrew root for wandering and has connotations of restlessness and trembling. In other words, Cain had a choice (thou mayest). He did not have to wander off into a place God did not want him to go, and neither do you. God says to Cain, “Sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must [“timshel”] rule over it.”
God the Father gives us a choice. We can follow his truths and his ways, or we can choose NOT to. You may have begun to be enticed away from God despite having full access to the fullness and richness of a relationship with Him. Whatever you do, or do not do, God always pursues you, and always is a champion of your dignity and worth. Your best home is where God lives, not running from him to find a home that looks good on the outside, but is only a facade for a house of horrors once the one-night stand is over.
A few more questions for you to ponder:
Have you begun a journey where you’ve looked away from God?
What do you need to do to get back on the path God wants for you?
Is there anyone you trust enough to tell what you are wrestling with right now?
Could telling another person about your temptation stop it in its tracks?
Maybe it’s time to come home, to stop running from God’s best. The safest place you can be is at home in God’s arms, living a clean life that obeys his promises. As the song by Steve Bell goes, maybe it’s time to turn it around and return to where you started from in Bethlehem, where hope was born. Why not take 5 minutes to listen and ponder and pray as Steve sings about turning your life around?
May God help us as we choose to live clean moral lives that honor Him so we can be free to make our companies and our culture better.
If you’re fresh out of friends and want to talk, write me at gleith@convenenow.com and I’ll connect you to people who can help you return home.
About the Author
GREG LEITH
Greg Leith is the CEO of Convene. He was born in Canada and lived in all four corners of North America. His career spans over 35 years of senior leadership roles in corporate, non-profit and academic sectors. Recently, he served as Director of Strategic Alliances for 13 years at Biola University in California.