In so much as the Sovereign God of the Universe has chosen to use human beings to accomplish His will, the necessity of mentoring future leaders is more important in the church than any other business, organization, or entity on the planet. If the Lord Jesus had not accomplished the will of His Father in preparing eleven disciples to lead the church in the first century, Christianity would not have the worldwide preeminence it has today; and the world would be without hope. Unlike any other business, organization or entity, mentoring spiritual leaders takes on an unparalleled significance in the congregation of God’s people. Outside of the vicarious Substitutionary atonement, nothing Christ did on the planet more clearly glorified the Father than the development of the apostles for the proclamation of the gospel after His departure under the empowerment of God the Holy Spirit. The Lord Jesus Christ provides all leaders and most especially pastors with a perfect example of the mentoring leader—this example must first be understood and then put into practice by those who have been ordained to equip the saints in obedience to the Great Commission (Mt 28:19-20).
Dr. Elmer Towns presents the Lord as the perfect example of the mentoring leader. Towns points to Jesus as the leader who led people through one-on-one ministry. This mentoring, which could be described as discipleship on steroids, began with a careful selection of the men Christ believed would most glorify the Father in their extension of His work on the planet. S. Lance Quinn, a professor at The Master’s Seminary, is careful to note that Christ spent time in prayer before he selected His disciples (MacAthur 2005, 264). Everything the Son did had a specific purpose behind it. It certainly is not too much to surmise that Christ modeled the importance of communing with God before selecting those whom they will strive to mentor in a personal way. Every pastor must seek the face of God and know His will, as much as possible, before he begins to pour his life, in a unique and special way, into individuals. Moreover, Quinn believes that Acts 6:1-6 provides an example of how the early church leaders were especially careful in whom they selected for more training and increased responsibilities. He writes, “Leaders today must carefully select others to nurture and teach for service in the body of Christ” (Eph. 4:11-16) (Ibid.).
Fortunately, the Lord did not leave the church without guidance with regard to the careful selection of those who must be mentored for future spiritual positions of leadership. 1 Timothy 3 provides a list of the qualities the spiritual leader needs to have to serve in the office of pastor. The pastor who devotes huge periods of time mentoring someone who will never be employed by a church to preach is not being a wise steward of his time. Acts 6 also provides another example of the qualities that need to be potentially present before someone is mentored toward a position of spiritual leadership. Acts 6:4 indicates that the men had to be wise, full of the Holy Spirit and men of integrity. Furthermore, Paul makes it clear to Timothy that if someone is not “apt to teach” he cannot serve as a spiritual leader, an elder, in a local church (1st Tim 3:2). Pastors must see potential in someone to teach and preach the Word of God to be a candidate for private mentorship. Towns would do well to provide a list of the potential characteristics the pastor should be looking for in a mentee; but certainly wise, apt to teach (and teachable) and a man of integrity would be some of the top considerations.
According to Mark 3:14: “Christ appointed twelve that they might be with him.” This seems to give an indication that Christ spent time with disciples—time is the essential element of mentoring. In fact, the entire historical narrative of the adult ministry of Christ is one of Him spending time with the disciples. They left their current professions to follow Christ—the time Christ spent with the disciples was more than nearly any married leader could spend with disciples today. These men ate, slept and drank Jesus for about three years. The gospels record the highlights of the events of the life of Christ, but in between these highlights are days and days of walking, talking, associating, sharing, and teaching. Finally, it must be noted that even within the twelve disciples there is an indication that Peter, James and John received even more attention and direction. Applying this model, the pastor is justified in pouring more into the life of any single potential spiritual leader as he sees fit in order to advance the kingdom of God. Paul Chappell of West Coast Bible College sadly believes that, “Many church leaders get so caught up in administration and paperwork that they forget to invest in the lives of their people” (Chappell 2000, 176).
Next, the person doing the mentoring must remember that, like Christ, his role in the life of the disciple is to challenge them. He is the coach insisting that they can do it. The senior pastor must first model that he is taking up his cross, denying himself and following Jesus; and then he must challenge the mentee to do the same. Although John Maxwell writes from an exceptionally secular perspective failing to consider the necessity of calling his reader to a life of following Christ, he does articulate biblical principles without identify the source. He presents five principles for developing people in Developing the Leader in You worthy of attention. First, the leader must value people. Maxwell does not say it, but people are made in the image of God and thus worthy of value. Jesus modeled this perfectly. Second, the leader must be committed to people. In spite of the fact that Jesus knew Judas would betray him, Peter would deny Him, and some of the very people he healed and helped would be screaming “crucify him,” Christ would be not be deterred from his commitment to others. Third, the leader must be a man of integrity (Maxwell 1993, 117). This single principle is worthy of a separate dissertation. Christ models this perfectly as a man whose integrity was beyond question in every aspect of his life. He provides what Towns identifies as critically necessary—example (Towns 2007, 145). Jesus’ entire life served as “an example, that the disciples should do as he had done for them” (John 13:15; paraphrase mine). Fourth, Maxwell states that the leader must provide a standard for those he is hoping to develop. Maxwell does not identify what the standard is, but the Apostle Paul does for every spiritual leader. Paul instructs his reader to follow him as he follows Christ. To the church at Corinth he challenged them to “Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ” (1 Cor. 11:1). Finally, Maxwell indicates that the entire mentoring process is contingent upon the leaders influence over the people. Christ’s influence is beyond measure. His contribution to the disciple’s life, combined with the empowerment of God the Holy Spirit, influenced the apostles to turn the “world upside down” for Jesus (Acts 17.6).
Towns points to the opportunities that Jesus gave his disciples to “apply the lessons they were learning by delegating responsibility and authority to them to” preach the gospel as an essential part of the mentoring process (Towns 2007, 145). This is exceptionally important; the mentee has to have the opportunity to teach others. This is precisely what Paul communicates in 2 Tim. 2:2; there is a clear implication in this passage that these men who are faithful are going to be teaching others. Practical opportunities to teach and lead small groups under the observation and instruction of the spiritual leader are necessary to fully develop the mentee. Towns suggests that Luke 9:10 is an example of Jesus spending time with the disciples after they have done what He has prepared them to do—preach—and then meets them to go over their work. Perhaps He answers questions and gives them more guidance. Towns writes, “Jesus supervised His disciples by debriefing them following their ministry tours and taking them aside for further training that would improve” them (Towns 2007, 145). Quinn writes, “Any pastor who is not discipling others is abdicating a primary responsibility of his calling” (MacArthur 2005, 271).
Finally, Towns addresses the need for those who are “adequately trained as leaders” to be challenged to reproduce themselves. Without regard to his divine attributes, Christ reproduced himself in the lives of the disciples; and the Great Commission clearly points to the mandate to continue to produce disciples. Maxwell writes, “The more people you develop, the greater the extent of your dreams” (Maxwell 1995, 115). The pastor needs to understand that the more people he mentors, the greater extent his discipleship ministry will glorify God and accomplish the Great Commission. Therefore, his dream is not what drives him to go the distance, take chances, be transparent, teach others, empower subordinates, and devote his life to people; but his earnest desire is to see God glorified through his influence on others.
Mentoring and discipleship are not the same; the pastor needs to do both. He has a God- given responsibility to disciple as many converts as possible to the glory of God. Mentoring is not the same thing. Mentoring is the extra effort the spiritual leader puts into the lives of fully- devoted followers of Christ to help them become leaders of disciples of Christ. Jesus did not mentor everyone he came in contact with during his ministry. Moreover, he did not disciple everyone he met. A select group of men were identified and mentored to continue the work of the Lord. Paul understood this well and gave Timothy some mentoring guidance in 2 Tim. 2:2. MacArthur writes:
Timothy was to take the divine revelation he had learned from Paul and teach it to other faithful men—men with proven spiritual character and giftedness, who would in turn pass on those truths to another generation. From Paul to Timothy to faithful men to others encompasses four generations of godly leaders. That process of spiritual reproduction which began in the early church, is to continue until the Lord returns (MacArthur 1997, 1876).
Nothing has changed. God glorifies Himself by saving souls by the foolishness of preaching. In Romans 10:14-15, Paul asks: “How will sinners hear the gospel without a preacher? And how shall they preach unless they are sent?” Mentoring is what Christ did before He sent His disciples to preach, and mentoring still must happen before men are sent to preach. Now more than ever there is still a need to model every aspect of Christ’s life, including His passion to Glorify His Father through His mentoring work with the disciples as described in John 17.
References
Chappell, Paul. 2000. Guided by Grace: Servant Leadership in the Local Church. Murfreesboro, TN: Sword of the Lord Publishers.
Maxwell, John. 2002. The Maxwell Leadership Bible. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson.
MacArthur, John. 2005. Pastoral Ministry: How to Shepherd Biblically. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson.
MacArthur, John. 1997. The MacArthur Study Bible. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Bibles.
Towns, Elmer L. 2007. Biblical Models for Leadership. Mason, OH: Cengage Learning.
Ezra The Spiritual Leader
If leadership is at its most fundamental level influence then one can readily identify Ezra as someone who was a very significant leader in the Old Testament most especially on spiritual or Biblical matters. Ezra is not your typical leader in position or title. He is a “ready scribe in the Book of Moses” (Ezra 7:6). Yet the Bible also indicates that he led about 5000 exiles to return to Jerusalem from Babylon after the captivity (Easton 1996, n.p.). Although God did not choose to preserve the details of the journey to Jerusalem one can readily imagine the administrative leadership necessary for such a journey. Yet the narrative ignores this aspect of Ezra and the Holy Spirit has preserved a record of Ezra as a leader of a revival in Jerusalem. The spiritual leader has as his primary objective the desire to influence people toward experiencing God. Ezra provides a model of a spiritual leader whose life can be studied for example and principle for application in the twenty-first century. With the revelation of Jesus in the New Testament and the religious pluralism of this century perhaps a spiritual leader should be further defined as a leader who desires to lead his people into a full and complete relationship with the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Towns suggests that spiritual leaders work in the business world as corporate chaplains, in colleges and universities as chancellors and deans, on the road as revivalists and in the local congregations as the senior pastor (Towns 2007, 111-112). At this point, it is important to distinguish between leaders who must be spiritual or have a spiritual component to their life and those who have as their primary focus spiritual matters. Throughout chapter sixteen, Towns seems to blur between emphasizing the necessity of all leaders walking with God and those who are, in fact, spiritual leaders. Perhaps, Paul makes more of a distinction in 1st Timothy 5.17 between “elders who rule well” and those who “labor in preaching and teaching.” Elders who labor in preaching and teaching are spiritual leaders. All Christian leaders need to be spiritual leaders to a great degree, but the Christian leader whose primary function is to labor in preaching and teaching is not the same as the Christian leader who owns and manages his own construction company (or similar entity) with regard to spiritual leadership. The world’s growing anti-absolute truth culture makes it distinctively harder to be a spiritual leader in the corporate world including the Department of Defense and other governmental organization, whose regulatory restrictions interfere with a message of “repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ” (Acts 20:21).
One of the clear distinctions between the spiritual leader and the leader who is Christian or practices his faith as a leader is the need for divine blessing upon the spiritual leader’s work. Obviously, both leaders would prefer God’s blessing, but the teaching pastor cannot truly accomplish his purpose without God. This is because of the nature of the work of a spiritual leader. According to Dr. David Reid, in the article “Spiritual Leadership,”
The reason for this is that there is an added dimension to spiritual leadership; it requires more than dedicated natural abilities. Spiritual leadership, simply defined, is God-given spiritual ability and responsibility to lead God's people. This all-important dimension is a "must" for effective leadership in any Christian service (Reid, 1984, n.p.).
A spiritual leader needs those who he is working with to be converted and actively pursuing sanctification—both of which are impossibilities without the hand of God working (John 1.12-13; Titus 2:11-12). The spiritual leader is completely dependent upon God’s grace.
Clearly an absolute critical distinction of a spiritual leader modeled by Ezra is the leader’s skill in the Word of God. It is impossible to overstate this point. Two leaders can build a large church but the leader who labors in the Word of God is building the work of God. The spiritual leader’s job is to communicate truth from the Bible to people in a way that challenges them to experience God and all He has for their lives. This is precisely why spiritual leaders must be on guard with their application of secular leadership principles, theories and philosophies. The reader of Nehemiah is introduced to Ezra in the midst of a spiritual crisis in chapter 8. Ezra is described as a scribe and he bring the Law of Moses before the people. The spiritual leader preaches and teaches from the Bible. He is not a story teller and he does not entertain his people with clever illustrations and cute ideas. Like Ezra, he is on the platform to present the Word of God. Nehemiah 8:8 truly captures the heart of the spiritual leader’s mission. Spiritual leaders read in the book in the law of God distinctly, and they give the sense and cause their people to understand what they are reading. This is the difference. The spiritual leader has one standard, the Bible, for his guidebook, under the influence and direction of God the Holy Spirit.
John MacArthur addresses this problem in The Book on Leadership; he addresses the issue of twentieth century leadership books which show how “entrepreneurial and administrative techniques used at Google.com or Starbucks” are modeled for the spiritual leader (MacArthur 2004, vii). He continues, “The authors of the book occasionally try to insert a biblical proof-text or two to buttress some of the principles they teach, but for the most part, they uncritically accept whatever seems to produce ‘success’ as a good model for the church leaders to imitate” (Ibid.). God’s spiritual leaders must reject the application of this in their ministries. The message of Luke 13:3 and 5 is still valid for the country and culture the spiritual leader is serving; he leads people to “repent.” He is God’s servant leader who has a passion to address the soul of man. This revivalist or teaching pastor has embraced Christ warning that a man has gained nothing if he gains the world but loses his own soul (Mt. 16.26).
Towns’ use of Henry Blackaby’s principals for experiencing God are designed for every follower of God to experience God. Thus Towns is communicating not principles which guide the spiritual leader in doing his work, but moving him to a point to become a spiritual leader. These principles are principles the spiritual leader hopes his people, for whom he is trying to influence toward God, experience. He wants people to realize God is always at work around them and God desires to have a loving relationship with them in real and personal sense (Towns 2007, 117). Towns does not put sufficient emphasis on exactly what Ezra does with the people. Ezra stands in the gap and calls people to repentance. This is what makes him a spiritual leader.
He is an expert in the law of God. He and his staff have the mission in Nehemiah 8 of giving the people the sense of the law and causing them to understand what they are hearing. In Nehemiah, the law had been ignored and the people were ignorant of God’s word. So Ezra is called in to take over for Nehemiah and lead a national revival of sorts. In Nehemiah 9, the people are confessing sin, repenting, and in verse 38 they make a covenant with God to obey his law. This is what must be modeled and learned from Ezra as an example of a spiritual leader worth emulating.
Ezra 7:10 provides a theme verse for the spiritual leader. The spiritual leader must prepare his heart to seek the Word of God, “and do it, and to teach it” to his people. John MacArthur has some strong advice for the spiritual leader in his work Pastoral Ministry: How to Shepherd Biblically; he strongly stresses that the spiritual leader “must model every aspect of spiritual leadership” for his people (MacArthur 2005, 310). Ezra strove to know the Word of God and “do it” (emphasis is mine). In the same work, George Zemek writes, “An often neglected part of leading a local church is the element of providing an exemplary life-style for the flock to follow” (Ibid., 214). It appears the Nike advertising slogan of “Just Do It!” applies to spiritual leaders more than anyone. Ezra’s righteous personal lifestyle was critical to his ability to call the people toward establishing a right covenantal relationship with God. In Developing the Leader within You, Maxwell says the “most important ingredient of leadership is integrity” and certainly there is not a single type of leader for whom this is more important than the spiritual leader (Maxwell 1993, 35). Furthermore, he writes, “when I have integrity, my words and my deeds match up” (Ibid.). For the spiritual leader his words and his deeds must match up or he is labeled a hypocrite and unlike any other type of leader he is ineffective. Thus, Paul tells Timothy that spiritual leaders must be above reproach or found to be “blameless” (1 Timothy 3.2).
The book of James contains a strong warning for any man who desires to be a spiritual leader. In spite of the fact that Paul calls this office of spiritual leader “a good work,” James instructs that those who teach “will be judged with a greater strictness” (1 Tim. 3:1; James 3:2). Men like Ezra who knew God and knew His Word are called to live to a higher standard in order to influence others toward God. The apostles were remarkable spiritual leaders whose influence is described as those who “turned the world upside down” (Acts 17:6). As a model for all spiritual leaders, Luke provides a remarkable summary of the message of the spiritual leader in Acts 20:21. He summarizes their message as one of “repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.” Even greater than Ezra and second only to the Lord, Himself, is the Apostle Paul who was a great spiritual leader. His example for all spiritual leaders is remarkable. The heart of the spiritual leader is to “see Christ formed” in those he is serves. Like Ezra, Paul has a remarkable commitment toward those who he is called to shepherd. To those at the church of Galatia he writes that he “is again in the anguish of childbirth” because Christ is not being formed in them (Gal. 4:19). The goal of the spiritual leader is to see Christ formed in those who he leads. The pastor must be both the spiritual leader that Ezra and Paul model and the servant leader that Christ most perfectly modeled for all.
References
Easton, M. 1996. Easton's Bible Dictionary. Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.
MacArthur, John. 2005. Pastoral Ministry: How to Shepherd Biblically. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson.
MacArthur, John. 2004. The Book of Leadership. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers.
Maxwell, John C. 1993. Developing the Leader within You. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers.
Reid, David. 1984. Growing Christian Ministries. Spiritual Leadership. http://www.growingchristians.org/dfgc/leader.htm [accessed June 2, 2009].
Towns, Elmer L. 2007. Biblical Models for Leadership. Mason, OH: Cengage Learning.
Towns suggests that spiritual leaders work in the business world as corporate chaplains, in colleges and universities as chancellors and deans, on the road as revivalists and in the local congregations as the senior pastor (Towns 2007, 111-112). At this point, it is important to distinguish between leaders who must be spiritual or have a spiritual component to their life and those who have as their primary focus spiritual matters. Throughout chapter sixteen, Towns seems to blur between emphasizing the necessity of all leaders walking with God and those who are, in fact, spiritual leaders. Perhaps, Paul makes more of a distinction in 1st Timothy 5.17 between “elders who rule well” and those who “labor in preaching and teaching.” Elders who labor in preaching and teaching are spiritual leaders. All Christian leaders need to be spiritual leaders to a great degree, but the Christian leader whose primary function is to labor in preaching and teaching is not the same as the Christian leader who owns and manages his own construction company (or similar entity) with regard to spiritual leadership. The world’s growing anti-absolute truth culture makes it distinctively harder to be a spiritual leader in the corporate world including the Department of Defense and other governmental organization, whose regulatory restrictions interfere with a message of “repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ” (Acts 20:21).
One of the clear distinctions between the spiritual leader and the leader who is Christian or practices his faith as a leader is the need for divine blessing upon the spiritual leader’s work. Obviously, both leaders would prefer God’s blessing, but the teaching pastor cannot truly accomplish his purpose without God. This is because of the nature of the work of a spiritual leader. According to Dr. David Reid, in the article “Spiritual Leadership,”
The reason for this is that there is an added dimension to spiritual leadership; it requires more than dedicated natural abilities. Spiritual leadership, simply defined, is God-given spiritual ability and responsibility to lead God's people. This all-important dimension is a "must" for effective leadership in any Christian service (Reid, 1984, n.p.).
A spiritual leader needs those who he is working with to be converted and actively pursuing sanctification—both of which are impossibilities without the hand of God working (John 1.12-13; Titus 2:11-12). The spiritual leader is completely dependent upon God’s grace.
Clearly an absolute critical distinction of a spiritual leader modeled by Ezra is the leader’s skill in the Word of God. It is impossible to overstate this point. Two leaders can build a large church but the leader who labors in the Word of God is building the work of God. The spiritual leader’s job is to communicate truth from the Bible to people in a way that challenges them to experience God and all He has for their lives. This is precisely why spiritual leaders must be on guard with their application of secular leadership principles, theories and philosophies. The reader of Nehemiah is introduced to Ezra in the midst of a spiritual crisis in chapter 8. Ezra is described as a scribe and he bring the Law of Moses before the people. The spiritual leader preaches and teaches from the Bible. He is not a story teller and he does not entertain his people with clever illustrations and cute ideas. Like Ezra, he is on the platform to present the Word of God. Nehemiah 8:8 truly captures the heart of the spiritual leader’s mission. Spiritual leaders read in the book in the law of God distinctly, and they give the sense and cause their people to understand what they are reading. This is the difference. The spiritual leader has one standard, the Bible, for his guidebook, under the influence and direction of God the Holy Spirit.
John MacArthur addresses this problem in The Book on Leadership; he addresses the issue of twentieth century leadership books which show how “entrepreneurial and administrative techniques used at Google.com or Starbucks” are modeled for the spiritual leader (MacArthur 2004, vii). He continues, “The authors of the book occasionally try to insert a biblical proof-text or two to buttress some of the principles they teach, but for the most part, they uncritically accept whatever seems to produce ‘success’ as a good model for the church leaders to imitate” (Ibid.). God’s spiritual leaders must reject the application of this in their ministries. The message of Luke 13:3 and 5 is still valid for the country and culture the spiritual leader is serving; he leads people to “repent.” He is God’s servant leader who has a passion to address the soul of man. This revivalist or teaching pastor has embraced Christ warning that a man has gained nothing if he gains the world but loses his own soul (Mt. 16.26).
Towns’ use of Henry Blackaby’s principals for experiencing God are designed for every follower of God to experience God. Thus Towns is communicating not principles which guide the spiritual leader in doing his work, but moving him to a point to become a spiritual leader. These principles are principles the spiritual leader hopes his people, for whom he is trying to influence toward God, experience. He wants people to realize God is always at work around them and God desires to have a loving relationship with them in real and personal sense (Towns 2007, 117). Towns does not put sufficient emphasis on exactly what Ezra does with the people. Ezra stands in the gap and calls people to repentance. This is what makes him a spiritual leader.
He is an expert in the law of God. He and his staff have the mission in Nehemiah 8 of giving the people the sense of the law and causing them to understand what they are hearing. In Nehemiah, the law had been ignored and the people were ignorant of God’s word. So Ezra is called in to take over for Nehemiah and lead a national revival of sorts. In Nehemiah 9, the people are confessing sin, repenting, and in verse 38 they make a covenant with God to obey his law. This is what must be modeled and learned from Ezra as an example of a spiritual leader worth emulating.
Ezra 7:10 provides a theme verse for the spiritual leader. The spiritual leader must prepare his heart to seek the Word of God, “and do it, and to teach it” to his people. John MacArthur has some strong advice for the spiritual leader in his work Pastoral Ministry: How to Shepherd Biblically; he strongly stresses that the spiritual leader “must model every aspect of spiritual leadership” for his people (MacArthur 2005, 310). Ezra strove to know the Word of God and “do it” (emphasis is mine). In the same work, George Zemek writes, “An often neglected part of leading a local church is the element of providing an exemplary life-style for the flock to follow” (Ibid., 214). It appears the Nike advertising slogan of “Just Do It!” applies to spiritual leaders more than anyone. Ezra’s righteous personal lifestyle was critical to his ability to call the people toward establishing a right covenantal relationship with God. In Developing the Leader within You, Maxwell says the “most important ingredient of leadership is integrity” and certainly there is not a single type of leader for whom this is more important than the spiritual leader (Maxwell 1993, 35). Furthermore, he writes, “when I have integrity, my words and my deeds match up” (Ibid.). For the spiritual leader his words and his deeds must match up or he is labeled a hypocrite and unlike any other type of leader he is ineffective. Thus, Paul tells Timothy that spiritual leaders must be above reproach or found to be “blameless” (1 Timothy 3.2).
The book of James contains a strong warning for any man who desires to be a spiritual leader. In spite of the fact that Paul calls this office of spiritual leader “a good work,” James instructs that those who teach “will be judged with a greater strictness” (1 Tim. 3:1; James 3:2). Men like Ezra who knew God and knew His Word are called to live to a higher standard in order to influence others toward God. The apostles were remarkable spiritual leaders whose influence is described as those who “turned the world upside down” (Acts 17:6). As a model for all spiritual leaders, Luke provides a remarkable summary of the message of the spiritual leader in Acts 20:21. He summarizes their message as one of “repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.” Even greater than Ezra and second only to the Lord, Himself, is the Apostle Paul who was a great spiritual leader. His example for all spiritual leaders is remarkable. The heart of the spiritual leader is to “see Christ formed” in those he is serves. Like Ezra, Paul has a remarkable commitment toward those who he is called to shepherd. To those at the church of Galatia he writes that he “is again in the anguish of childbirth” because Christ is not being formed in them (Gal. 4:19). The goal of the spiritual leader is to see Christ formed in those who he leads. The pastor must be both the spiritual leader that Ezra and Paul model and the servant leader that Christ most perfectly modeled for all.
References
Easton, M. 1996. Easton's Bible Dictionary. Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.
MacArthur, John. 2005. Pastoral Ministry: How to Shepherd Biblically. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson.
MacArthur, John. 2004. The Book of Leadership. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers.
Maxwell, John C. 1993. Developing the Leader within You. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers.
Reid, David. 1984. Growing Christian Ministries. Spiritual Leadership. http://www.growingchristians.org/dfgc/leader.htm [accessed June 2, 2009].
Towns, Elmer L. 2007. Biblical Models for Leadership. Mason, OH: Cengage Learning.
Servant-Leadership Modeled by the King of Kings
The absolute, unequivocal, best example of servant-leadership in the Bible is modeled by the Lord Jesus Himself—“the greatest Servant of all time” (Maxwell 2002, 1299). The number of authors who use Jesus as the perfect model of such leadership is simply overwhelming. Defining servant-leadership is relatively simple. Based on the idea that leadership is influence, servant leaders use their influence to serve people. Servant leaders understand that the position of influence they have been granted, ultimately by God, is not for their own exaltation. The Robert Greenleaf organization takes credit for coining what is often described as servant-leadership at www.greenleaf.org. Dr. Elmer Towns presents Jesus as the explicit example of servant leadership in Biblical Models for Leadership. Leaders who desire to do it God’s way would be exceptionally well-served to study how Christ led others as the Chief Shepherd (1 Peter 5:4).
Towns begins with a heavy concentration on the idea that servant leaders identify the needs of others and minister to those needs (Towns 2007, 137). This certainly is a component of what Christ did, but the Son’s primary focus was not on meeting the needs of the people exclusively. Towns writes, “servant leaders are the pastors who define their life as an opportunity to meet the need of others” (Ibid.). There is an element of truth to this statement, but Christ did not “define his life” by His function of meeting the needs of others. In Luke 2, Jesus defined His life as being about His Father’s business. Meeting the needs of others without an overarching goal of doing the will of the Father could easily become pragmatic to the point of compromise. The servant leader must serve his people by doing what he knows is best even when the people do not perceive his actions as in their best interest. Jesus did this with the disciples. In John 14, they believed their need was to overthrow the Roman government and lead a revolt. However, Jesus came to, first and foremost, do the will of the Father; therefore, He served the people as their leader through His death—something His followers did not perceive would fulfill a need in their life (Lk. 22.42) until after His resurrection. Jesus said it was “expedient” that He die in John 16.7 (KJV).
Towns writes, “Jesus modeled servant leadership through a shepherding ministry” (Towns 2007, 139). Perhaps Jesus modeled servant leadership even before he began his adult ministry when he took on the form of a servant as a human being (Phil 2:7). For the servant leader there is not anything that he is too good to do. He is willing to get his hands dirty and lead by example. People are not his servants, but are helpers who can extend and enhance his influence to the betterment of others to accomplish God’s will. Jesus modeled this well when as the leader H e was willing to wash the feet of the disciples who were not willing to wash each other’s feet. The servant leader may have someone drive for him, but this is not for the prestige of having a driver, or because the servant leader cannot drive; but because the best use of the leader’s time is not driving. Jesus models this well when He sends the disciples to get lunch while He encounters the woman at the well with the gospel in John 4. Jesus asks the woman to get Him a drink, but this is not because He is too good to get His own water. Instead, He uses this as a means of engaging the woman in a conversation to get to a need she does not even realize she has. Although He could have gotten His own lunch in this case, the best use of this leader’s time was communicating with a woman in Samaria.
Yet when there is not a servant available and a disciple does not step up to the need, Jesus the servant steps up to the need and washes the feet of his students prior to the Passover meal in John 13. In The Leadership Wisdom of Jesus, Charles C. Manz calls this the most “concrete example of servant leadership” in the Bible (Manz 2005, 123). This is a very instructional period of time in the life of the disciplesas the future shepherd leaders are told by the King, “the servant is not greater than his Lord” and “I have given you an example” (John 13:16, 15). What leader is there today who desires to glorify God with his life and leadership style who cannot be instructed by this passage? Servant leaders shepherd people by modeling the behavior and mindset they wish for their people to have in their organization. The goal of having a larger flock is not the rewards that come with a larger herd but the privilege of influencing more people toward the Father’s will.
Towns needs to clarify a shepherding principle when he states that shepherd leaders “make decisions on the needs of the those you lead, rather than the goals or the organization and/or your personal ambitions” (Towns 2007, 141). Certainly he is correct; personal ambition must not play a role in the way a servant leader shepherds people. However, if the goal of the church is to glorify God in the proclamation of Christ, then those biblical core objectives must be what guide the decision-making- not the needs of the people. Instead of saying the servant leader is “others oriented” in his leadership, it may be more descriptive to say the servant leader emulates Christ first in his leadership style. The shepherd pastor must seek to have a God-glorifying, Christ-exalting, biblically-based, and gospel-centered leadership style.
This will require that the shepherd emulate Christ’s actions and attitudes. At times, Christ is gentle, compassionate, loving and willing to extend mercy (2 Cor. 10:1). However, it would not be fair to characterize Christ’s entire ministry by this one approach. At others times, He is a hard man who is defending the honor of His Father with a whip when His Father’s house was turned into a den of thieves (Mk. 11:17 ). Or He is rebuking hypocrites or telling people that if they do not repent they will perish (Lk. 13:3). He is gentle when gentle is appropriate, but He is capable of a stronger discourse when that is most expedient for the listener. In fact in Pastoral Ministry How to Shepherd Biblically, the author suggests that compassion that lacks “biblical control and left unbridled may overlook serious spiritual needs” (MacArthur 2005, 177). At His baptism, Jesus called the Pharisees and the Sadducees “vipers” (Mt. 3). This is not very “gentle,” but Jesus knew what words had the greatest possibility of awakening these men to their true need of repentance. Jesus was not concerned with an earthly title or position for Himself—He trusted(s) in the Father to exalt Him as the Father sees fit. This servant leader did not have a place to lay His head and He refused to allow the pursuit of earthly things to interfere with doing the will of His Father. Beyond comprehension, He is a remarkable role model of a leader.
Jesus was able to influence followers without pay, promotions or immediate rewards. His attitude of true and genuine love and concern for the disciples is modeled in John 17. In this high priestly prayer, the reader sees what it means to assume responsibility for the souls of men as their shepherd in the manner with which Christ reports to the Father about what He has been able to accomplish in the lives of others. This may be where Peter learned this idea and later penned 1 Peter 5 which gives tremendous guidance on the principles of shepherding. The shepherd serves by influencing others in these ways: he feeds, protects, oversees and provides an exemplary life for the flock in the same way His Savior did (MacArthur 2005, 15). The shepherd understands that the purpose in building relationships and caring for the flock is to increase the extension and ministry of the Great Shepherd as an under-shepherd.
The very word minister reminds the pastor who is a shepherd and must model Christ in all he does that he is servant. When one includes the idea that the pastor has a responsibility to influence people toward the recognition of their greatest need—a right relationship with God—then the minister or pastor must be the servant leader Christ was for the world. In Servant Leadership for the Local Church, Paul Chappell writes, “Good spiritual leaders are shepherds, not saviors; leaders, not lords; guides, not gods” (Chappell 2000, 15). The servant is humble, seeking to exalt the King instead of Himself. He recognizes the church is not His; it was not created for Him. He serves the King first by serving others the way the King would.
References
Chappell, Paul. 2000. Guided by Grace: Servant Leadership in the Local Church. Murfreesboro, TN: Sword of the Lord Publishers.
Maxwell, John. 2002. The Maxwell Leadership Bible. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson.
MacArthur, John. 2005. Pastoral Ministry: How to Shepherd Biblically. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson.
Manz, Charles C. 2005. The Leadership Wisdom of Jesus. San Francisco: Berret-Koehler Publishers.
Towns, Elmer L. 2007. Biblical Models for Leadership. Mason, OH: Cengage Learning.
Towns begins with a heavy concentration on the idea that servant leaders identify the needs of others and minister to those needs (Towns 2007, 137). This certainly is a component of what Christ did, but the Son’s primary focus was not on meeting the needs of the people exclusively. Towns writes, “servant leaders are the pastors who define their life as an opportunity to meet the need of others” (Ibid.). There is an element of truth to this statement, but Christ did not “define his life” by His function of meeting the needs of others. In Luke 2, Jesus defined His life as being about His Father’s business. Meeting the needs of others without an overarching goal of doing the will of the Father could easily become pragmatic to the point of compromise. The servant leader must serve his people by doing what he knows is best even when the people do not perceive his actions as in their best interest. Jesus did this with the disciples. In John 14, they believed their need was to overthrow the Roman government and lead a revolt. However, Jesus came to, first and foremost, do the will of the Father; therefore, He served the people as their leader through His death—something His followers did not perceive would fulfill a need in their life (Lk. 22.42) until after His resurrection. Jesus said it was “expedient” that He die in John 16.7 (KJV).
Towns writes, “Jesus modeled servant leadership through a shepherding ministry” (Towns 2007, 139). Perhaps Jesus modeled servant leadership even before he began his adult ministry when he took on the form of a servant as a human being (Phil 2:7). For the servant leader there is not anything that he is too good to do. He is willing to get his hands dirty and lead by example. People are not his servants, but are helpers who can extend and enhance his influence to the betterment of others to accomplish God’s will. Jesus modeled this well when as the leader H e was willing to wash the feet of the disciples who were not willing to wash each other’s feet. The servant leader may have someone drive for him, but this is not for the prestige of having a driver, or because the servant leader cannot drive; but because the best use of the leader’s time is not driving. Jesus models this well when He sends the disciples to get lunch while He encounters the woman at the well with the gospel in John 4. Jesus asks the woman to get Him a drink, but this is not because He is too good to get His own water. Instead, He uses this as a means of engaging the woman in a conversation to get to a need she does not even realize she has. Although He could have gotten His own lunch in this case, the best use of this leader’s time was communicating with a woman in Samaria.
Yet when there is not a servant available and a disciple does not step up to the need, Jesus the servant steps up to the need and washes the feet of his students prior to the Passover meal in John 13. In The Leadership Wisdom of Jesus, Charles C. Manz calls this the most “concrete example of servant leadership” in the Bible (Manz 2005, 123). This is a very instructional period of time in the life of the disciplesas the future shepherd leaders are told by the King, “the servant is not greater than his Lord” and “I have given you an example” (John 13:16, 15). What leader is there today who desires to glorify God with his life and leadership style who cannot be instructed by this passage? Servant leaders shepherd people by modeling the behavior and mindset they wish for their people to have in their organization. The goal of having a larger flock is not the rewards that come with a larger herd but the privilege of influencing more people toward the Father’s will.
Towns needs to clarify a shepherding principle when he states that shepherd leaders “make decisions on the needs of the those you lead, rather than the goals or the organization and/or your personal ambitions” (Towns 2007, 141). Certainly he is correct; personal ambition must not play a role in the way a servant leader shepherds people. However, if the goal of the church is to glorify God in the proclamation of Christ, then those biblical core objectives must be what guide the decision-making- not the needs of the people. Instead of saying the servant leader is “others oriented” in his leadership, it may be more descriptive to say the servant leader emulates Christ first in his leadership style. The shepherd pastor must seek to have a God-glorifying, Christ-exalting, biblically-based, and gospel-centered leadership style.
This will require that the shepherd emulate Christ’s actions and attitudes. At times, Christ is gentle, compassionate, loving and willing to extend mercy (2 Cor. 10:1). However, it would not be fair to characterize Christ’s entire ministry by this one approach. At others times, He is a hard man who is defending the honor of His Father with a whip when His Father’s house was turned into a den of thieves (Mk. 11:17 ). Or He is rebuking hypocrites or telling people that if they do not repent they will perish (Lk. 13:3). He is gentle when gentle is appropriate, but He is capable of a stronger discourse when that is most expedient for the listener. In fact in Pastoral Ministry How to Shepherd Biblically, the author suggests that compassion that lacks “biblical control and left unbridled may overlook serious spiritual needs” (MacArthur 2005, 177). At His baptism, Jesus called the Pharisees and the Sadducees “vipers” (Mt. 3). This is not very “gentle,” but Jesus knew what words had the greatest possibility of awakening these men to their true need of repentance. Jesus was not concerned with an earthly title or position for Himself—He trusted(s) in the Father to exalt Him as the Father sees fit. This servant leader did not have a place to lay His head and He refused to allow the pursuit of earthly things to interfere with doing the will of His Father. Beyond comprehension, He is a remarkable role model of a leader.
Jesus was able to influence followers without pay, promotions or immediate rewards. His attitude of true and genuine love and concern for the disciples is modeled in John 17. In this high priestly prayer, the reader sees what it means to assume responsibility for the souls of men as their shepherd in the manner with which Christ reports to the Father about what He has been able to accomplish in the lives of others. This may be where Peter learned this idea and later penned 1 Peter 5 which gives tremendous guidance on the principles of shepherding. The shepherd serves by influencing others in these ways: he feeds, protects, oversees and provides an exemplary life for the flock in the same way His Savior did (MacArthur 2005, 15). The shepherd understands that the purpose in building relationships and caring for the flock is to increase the extension and ministry of the Great Shepherd as an under-shepherd.
The very word minister reminds the pastor who is a shepherd and must model Christ in all he does that he is servant. When one includes the idea that the pastor has a responsibility to influence people toward the recognition of their greatest need—a right relationship with God—then the minister or pastor must be the servant leader Christ was for the world. In Servant Leadership for the Local Church, Paul Chappell writes, “Good spiritual leaders are shepherds, not saviors; leaders, not lords; guides, not gods” (Chappell 2000, 15). The servant is humble, seeking to exalt the King instead of Himself. He recognizes the church is not His; it was not created for Him. He serves the King first by serving others the way the King would.
References
Chappell, Paul. 2000. Guided by Grace: Servant Leadership in the Local Church. Murfreesboro, TN: Sword of the Lord Publishers.
Maxwell, John. 2002. The Maxwell Leadership Bible. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson.
MacArthur, John. 2005. Pastoral Ministry: How to Shepherd Biblically. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson.
Manz, Charles C. 2005. The Leadership Wisdom of Jesus. San Francisco: Berret-Koehler Publishers.
Towns, Elmer L. 2007. Biblical Models for Leadership. Mason, OH: Cengage Learning.
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