Accountability Partner

Accountability ~ this word is used quite a bit, especially in “Christian” circles.

the state of being accountable, liable, or answerable.

Accountability is a term used to describe how reliable someone is. It is a positive character trait that demonstrates someone’s responsibility and professionalism. If someone is accountable, they will meet their expectations.

And while being “Accountable” is important, an “Accountability Partner” can also become a crutch and make people lazy.  What do I mean by that?

This where God gave me a revelation . . . I was thinking about all the “great” men and women of God that I admire, like Joyce Meyer, Christine Cain, Darlene Zscheck, John Maxwell, Joseph Prince, Brian Houston, etc.  I was thinking about how relentless, unwavering, undaunting, steadfast they are in Christ.  How much they shine and stand firm for Kingdom of God.  Then I started to think about how they are just as human as the rest of us and they deal with frustrations, disappointments, bad moods, being hurt by others, etc. the same as the rest of us. Otherwise everything that we face, they also deal with.  So what is the key to their strong stance?  Well it is the decisions that they make on a daily bases.

These normal human beings that I admire are just as human as I am, the difference is that they have determined what their goals are and they are faithful to fulfilling those goals regardless of if things get hard.  And things always get hard at one point or another.  When have you ever set a goal and had it go smoothly?  Whenever we set a goal it seems that “things” try to slow us down, get in our way or just stop us all together.  “Things” are different, but yet the same for everyone.  Some examples of “things” are: getting discouraged, getting our feelings hurt, lack of support from others, etc.  Or maybe I should just say “things” are the excuses that we come up with as to why we have not or are not able to fulfill our dreams and goals.

I then started to evaluate my own life and how in my life it seems that I depend on “accountability partners”.  I really enjoy exercising, but I am not very dedicated unless I have a work out partner, someone that I am accountable to. My friend Melissa and I would go to the Peak (a gym) three to four times a week right after work.  And on the days that I didn’t feel like going, I still went because I knew that Melissa was meeting me there, and this gave me the motivation to go.  Once I got there I was fine and really enjoyed it.  We stopped going to the gym two years ago, due to my job becoming way to demanding.  I hate to admit to you that I have not exercised on regular basis since that time.  I have talked about the need to start exercising again, but haven’t done anything about it.  Why?  Because for or during the time slots in my day that would work out in my schedule, I did not have an accountability partner.

I also started to think about my relationship with my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and how I have let the time that I would spend with Him just slip away.  Other things that I just let slip away are my times of prayer, my times of studying His Word, and my times of just reading a good book.  Why?  Oh, well, I could tell you about all of the reasons why (excuses), like working full-time, going to college full-time, having a husband, kids and a granddaughter, but honestly these are all excuses.  The fact of the matter is “We Make Time for the Things that are Important to Us”.  Every person has the same number of hours in a day, and we all get to choose how we use those hours.  How we decide to use our 24 hours will decide what dreams and goals we will fulfill.

As I was pondering on all of these different things in my life, I started to think about an athlete that goes to the Olympics (funny I did not even realize that it was the year for the Olympics).  Someone that trains for the Olympics gets up early to practice.  Some may get up at three, four or even five in the morning to make sure they get practice time in BEFORE going to work.  They are not doing it because someone is waiting for them.  They do it because of self-motivation.  They are running after a dream, a goal that they want to fulfill – The gold medal.   As I was thinking about the athletic running the race to win the gold metal I thought about all the effort, sacrifice and hard work that they put forth just for a chance to win the ultimate price – The Gold Metal.  Any athlete that trains for the Olympics does not need an “Accountability Partner”.  They have a determination deep within them that they are going to get in the best physical shape that they possibly can, or they are going to study every chance they can get so they can win.  I would dare say that they don’t spend a lot of time just watching TV, or non-productive activities.  (Please don’t get me wrong, I am not saying that we need to always be working or studying, but I think that there may be something we can learn from this for our own lives, the goals and dreams that we have.)  You see a person really doesn’t need an accountability partner to motivate them to reach their goals or to fulfill their dreams.  We can waste a lot of our time waiting for our accountability partners and that is not what will help us to reach our goals or to fulfill our dreams. A person simply must have the drive, determination to reach their dreams and goals.