Not the number of one\u2019s servants, but the number whom one serves, is the heavenly criterion of greatness and the real preparation for leadership.<\/i>\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Oswald Sanders<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
What is Biblical leadership?\u00a0 Everyone seems to know these days and yet no one seems to know.\u00a0 All of us who must occupy a place of leadership know that our feet are of clay and our heart can be deceitful.\u00a0 We can teach others about leadership but, like teaching on prayer and God\u2019s will, it is the easiest thing to speak about and the hardest thing to do.\u00a0 We find ourselves in the conundrum of being an example to others yet desiring to be but a servant only to God.\u00a0 How can we keep our heads about us in a world of ambition, strife, and selfishness?<\/p>\n
The pressure around us<\/span><\/p>\n The church leader today has truly caught the spirit of the age.\u00a0 Ministry has become a business whose success is measured by one\u2019s ability to build a church, to double a budget, to attract a crowd.\u00a0 Happiness matters more than truth, relationship more than discipleship, entertainment more than atonement, and invitation to speak more than necessity to preach.<\/p>\n Every day brings the pressure to be great, to measure up to what the world around us expects.\u00a0 Even our peers in ministry evaluate us on the basis of what we can produce, not on our walk with God.\u00a0 Sometimes even\u00a0 parents, siblings, and children, can project unspoken expectations of success.\u00a0 If that is not enough, each one of us has an ego large enough to fill an auditorium, and we often do just that.\u00a0 Even our own people can be discouraged at the lack of success and become discouraged in the work.<\/p>\n Yet we are not ignorant of Satan\u2019s devices.\u00a0 He would sift us as wheat, devour us as a roaring lion, take us captive at his will.\u00a0 He would have us build a legacy to ourselves in this life, a trophy case that others will see after we\u2019re gone, rather than to desire a crown in heaven that fades not away.<\/p>\n The Biblical admonition<\/span><\/p>\n The pressures from the Scripture are great and rightly weigh upon us.\u00a0 We are called of God to this leadership not of our own will for we might have chosen another occupation; we are given the gifts of pastor, teacher, preacher, evangelist with little natural ability in either; we are evaluated with a list of qualifications that begin with the word \u201cmust\u201d and yet we are warned not to be lords over God\u2019s heritage; we are called angels, or messengers, who must herald God\u2019s message and yet we know we are as Moses in ability, hardly able to speak.<\/p>\n At the same time the Word thrusts us into leadership, it also casts us into servitude.\u00a0 We must decrease if He is to increase; we must be spilled out as an evening sacrifice; we must make ourselves of no reputation; we must have this treasure in earthen vessels; and we must not strive, but be gentle unto all men.\u00a0 We must let the mind be in us which was in the meekness and gentleness Christ.<\/p>\n The personal conviction<\/span><\/p>\n It should be the office that seeks the man, and not the man the office.\u00a0 We have responded to a calling without knowing what price we would need to pay.\u00a0 We have a commission that expands to the whole world; we have made ourselves debtor, ready, and unashamed of the gospel we preach; we are working for a crown of glory that fades away in this life but not in the next; we persuade men because of the fear of God and yet must be unmoved by their refusal; we will fight a good fight, finish our course, and keep the faith, and know that the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty only through God.\u00a0 We will continue to fight to bring every thought into obedience to Christ.<\/p>\n The only foundation<\/span><\/p>\n The only foundation for our ministry, the only source of our belief, the only authority for our message, is the written Word of God.\u00a0 We know that in the end we have no other basis for what we do.\u00a0 We may unwisely appeal to personal vision, prophetic unction, or even apostolic authority, but all of these are merely human supposition.\u00a0 When we stand before our Lord, we will have no other reason for our actions, no other authority for our ministry than what was once delivered to the saints, a more sure Word than that of prophecy.\u00a0 Sure, we may see it differently than another man who has the same book, but the Word is unchanging and has been for two thousand years.\u00a0 We may change, but Scripture never!\u00a0 In the end it will judge us, not us it.<\/p>\n The bottom line<\/span><\/p>\n Servant leadership!\u00a0 A leader but yet a servant.\u00a0 \u201cO man of God,\u201d was Paul\u2019s address to young Timothy.\u00a0 God has counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry.\u00a0 But I am His servant and that is all.\u00a0 I have no rights of my own when it comes to the stewardship of His house.\u00a0 I am not a man of the world, I am a man of God, His bonded slave, His sole property.\u00a0 It is only required in stewards that a man be found faithful.\u00a0 And praise the Lord for that!<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Not the number of one\u2019s servants, but the number whom one serves, is the heavenly criterion of greatness and the real preparation for leadership.\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Oswald Sanders What is Biblical leadership?\u00a0 Everyone seems to know these days and yet no one seems to know.\u00a0 All of us who […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7009,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","episode_type":"","audio_file":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[123],"tags":[182],"class_list":["post-7165","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles","tag-ministry-leadership"],"yoast_head":"\n