Leadership?

Read this good article which questions if leadership is a healthy Christian aim.

As a young Christian I aspired to “leadership.” I wanted to be a pastor or missionary; full-time ministry was the aim. What I’ve found out through the years is that I would make a horrible pastor and I am not a very good leader either. In some places, like my family, I have no choice so I stumble along and others suffer the consequences.

I am involved in a prolife ministry where I have a leadership position that I have tried to get out of over the years but God won’t let me. There must be some reason. I try to do my best but feel completely incompetent most of the time and wish someone more qualified was doing the job.

According to so many Christian books and schools out there, I just need to learn the secrets of being a good leader. While there are some things I could learn that may help, I think my place is in doing other things. There is a lot of support work that needs to be done and behind-the-scenes is a place where I feel most useful. Of course, in a place like my family I need to learn to do the proper things that a husband and father need to do and leadership is involved with that.

Someone once said that those who desire power are not fit to possess it. In many cases that is true. I know many people who are “natural born leaders” who use that ability to manipulate and coerce people to do their will which is not God’s will. Some people want to be leaders so they no longer have to do the mundane tasks of a job. Tim Timmons in speaking of the associate pastor position said that he gets to do all the things that the big guy doesn’t want to do. That can be true in many places.

Speaking of pastors, there are some very good ones out there but some of the guys who have risen to that job are some of the most egotistical and dysfunctional people I have ever met. There are the dictator pastors, the ones who lie about their success or failure, the ones who desire adulation and worship and the ones who are so afraid of the offense of the truth that they pat people on the back as they stroll along in their sin. Okay, finished grinding that ax.

So to the point of the article mentioned at the beginning of this post: being a servant. I don’t do very well with that either but it is an area that I know God wants me to excel at. If I succeed, many will be supported and blessed.

Philip