Christian Living

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Larry Lilly's Letter Wednesday November 17, 2010

While talking with a man who has been a friend for over 50 years the subject of hiring relatives or friends came up and he was obviously troubled. I probed and found that he is faced with the prospect of firing his brother in law. He knows he should do this, is confident he has done all to salvage the situation, which has already deteriorated to others slowing production to the level of the slacker brother in law.

My friend asked, "Larry how do you handle this?" He then quoted a verse in Proverbs 18:24,

A man that hath friends must shew himself friendly: and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother.

I pointed out that all true friendships are based in love and grace. All work relationships are based on performance. If, I as pastor, whom Jesus loves so much He died for me, fail to perform the duties of the office to which He has called me, He will remove me, and replace me with someone who will operate within the grace bestowed in the calling. He will not mope around heaven as He knows my limitation and whether I am giving it my best or not.

If, in the course of brother in law/friend relationships problems arise, grace must prevail. If in the course of business relationships problems of duty arise, the bottom line reality must prevail. Read the Bible and see that the Lord deals severely with what He calls a slothful, even wicked servant. Matthew 25:26 His lord answered and said unto him, Thou wicked and slothful servant, thou knewest that I reap where I sowed not, and gather where I have not strawed:

We should never base real friendship on performance and we must never, never, ever base overseer/employee relationships on anything else.

Your friend/relative who is employed under your watch, you may love them, be dear friends, but if you permit them to continue while not performing you are robbing yourself and your enterprise of the needed performance. And you are robbing the slothful employee/relative of a valuable lesson in life and contributing to a life of misery, causing him or her to walk through life feeling as though no one likes them, when in fact they may be very likable, it's just that folks cannot deal with their lack of performance. Simple? Yes. Easy? Ha.

Laura Bernstein comments on this in her book, "Peer Today, Boss Tomorrow" with this:

"Should you ever find yourself having to choose between friendship and your job as boss, your choice must be to the job. But then, a true friend would never put you in that position to begin with."

There is no known help for you if you think that because you sign a company check for your wife's salary you are really the boss.

Larry Lilly Copyright © 2010 Use with credit.

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