You have been given many wonderful resources—a spiritual health, mental health, physical health, meaningful work, financial resources, relationships, and more—all of which you are supposed to manage and steward. That process of taking control of your resources is what I call taking a seat at the head of your table.
Why Stewarding Resources Matters in Life and Leadership
Importantly, though, we don’t sit at the head of our tables simply to be comfortable or to be in charge. We are stewards. We have been called by our Creator to manage those resources in a way that makes a difference in the lives of others and in our world, and we do that by using our resources to fulfill our assignments—our God-given purposes.
Now, having said all that, here’s the main principle I want to communicate: You can’t make a difference without making a mess.
That’s true in our personal lives as we seek to grow and mature and change. That’s true in our families.
Making an Impact Through Stewarding Resources
That’s true in our workplaces. That’s true in our communities, in our cities, and even across the world. When we invest our resources well, we’re going to change things. We’re going to change people. We’re going to make an impact.
And you can’t make an impact without making a mess.
I have encouraged you to invite good, talented, healthy, mature people to your table—people who understand your assignment and can help you maximize your resources with good direction and good advice. That is a necessary part of stewarding your table in a way that makes a difference.
Yet I also need to make it clear that inviting good, strong people to offer advice and direction in your life will generate lots of conversation. Lots of conversation. When you’ve got the right people around your table, most of that conversation will be healthy and helpful. But it won’t be neat and tidy. When you encourage people to tell you the truth, they will inevitably say things that make you feel uncomfortable. Maybe even offended.
In other words, inviting people to join you at the table of your life means you will need to have some messy conversations. Messy conversations are necessary for strong relationships. (Just ask anyone who’s married.)
Embracing Mistakes as Part of Stewardship
Now, sitting at the head of your table means the buck stops with you. After you’ve gathered all the information and participated in a healthy (and messy) conversation about an issue or a problem, you are the one who makes the final decision. You are the one who chooses how to resolve that issue or solve that problem.
Which means you will inevitably lead your table into more than a few missteps. You will slip up. Guaranteed. No doubt about it.
I have plenty of experience with failure. With mistakes. When you step up to sit at the head of your table, you’ll gain plenty of experience in those areas as well. It comes with the territory. That’s the bad news.
The good news is that most of our mistakes have temporary consequences. When we handle them well, they don’t linger for long, and they can help us learn valuable lessons that make us more effective for the future.
What does it mean to handle mistakes well? Three things:
- Own it. When you make a decision or do something that ends up being a mistake, take ownership of that decision. Don’t run away from it. Accept your mistake both internally (to yourself) and externally (to others).
- Apologize. When you make a mistake that directly impacts or wounds other people, be quick to apologize to those people. I’m not talking about one of those vague apologies either, such as, “If anyone took offense at what I said, I apologize.” Nope. That’s not it. Real apologies are personal and specific. “Hey, man, I know what I did was hurtful to you because it [fill in the blank] and made you feel [fill in the blank]. And I want to say I was wrong. I am sorry.”
- Avoid excuses. There’s a little word that can cause big problems when you’re trying to apologize. It’s the word but. “I’m so sorry. What I did was wrong, and I know it hurt you. But . . .” Nope again!
- When you own a mistake and apologize for the consequences of that mistake, you can undercut all your efforts at resolution by making excuses for that mistake. By justifying your actions. So don’t do it. Own your mistake. Apologize for your mistake. And don’t try to go a little easier on yourself by tossing out a bunch of excuses. Just move forward.
Mistakes can be positive when they teach us new things, and I’ve learned a valuable lesson from my own failures – that the intent behind my words doesn’t mitigate the impact of those words. I have hurt people, and the fact that I never meant to hurt them didn’t make things any better. I’ve learned I have to deal with the reality of what occurred rather than try to focus on what I wish had happened or what I had intended to happen.
Learning and Moving Forward in Stewardship
Again, mistakes are messy. They are uncomfortable. But they are also inevitable. So don’t run from them. Do learn from them. And do move forward as a more experienced steward of your table.
Adapted from Take Your Seat At The Table by Anthony O’Neal. Copyright © 2024 by Anthony O’Neal. Used
by permission of Thomas Nelson. Available wherever books are sold. HarperCollinsChristian.com
Adapted from Chapter 10, pages 206-216
