Leadership transcends practical and theoretical considerations till it translates the heart of God.The bible is so deftly written, with such economy of style, that sometimes we can miss quite obvious truths. The problem with theology is that it deals with facts at the surface, without necessarily delving into the heart behind those facts.
God has veiled His Word in mystery so that we will search for meaning beyond the two-dimensional context of the written word. That is why, in Hebrews 9, He covenants to write His laws on our hearts, not in our minds.
Don’t get me wrong, I deeply appreciate the contributions made by theologians throughout history, for they have helped in our interpretation of text and context, but we also need to know the heart of God and that comes from walking with Him. No other man knows my wife as I do, because no one has walked a lifetime with her as I have done, not even her parents. There is a degree of knowledge that others have, but it is limited. There is a depth that I have plumbed that no one else has and it has been derived through relationship, not factually. That is the depth we must plumb in our walk with God.
This brings me to the nub of this article. There is a factual, mechanilistic level of understanding on the principles of leadership that is attainable to most of us. It is largely valid although a lot of worldly influences have come into modern biblical leadership and whilst some of those influences are valid, many are not. We would be wise to look into the bible for principles, lest we be beguiled by Satan into humanistic models that feed the soul and build soulish strongholds or power-bases that ultimately end up serving Satan more than they serve God or His people.
True leadership, biblical leadership that is, must devolve from the heart of God. The reasons are many-fold:
Firstly, spiritual leadership implies accountability for God’s heritage. It is a process of stewardship, not ownership. He is the only shareholder for they are His people. He entrusts them to our care, but never cedes them to us. We should be fearful and very careful about how we handle God’s people. Jesus left a great example, saying, “Of those you gave me I lost not one (save the son of perdition)”.
Secondly, spiritual leadership follows God’s vision. I have heard leaders ramble on about vision and inevitably it amounts to a somewhat humanistic exercise and a thin disguise for centralized control. The only vision we really need is to implement the mandate of God, the patterns He showed us on the mount. Many churches today have a cultural or social bias that bears no resemblance to biblical models for church life – they may be very popular and trendy, but that is not the point. The church is not an incorporation or fiefdom: she is the bride of Christ and the heritage of God.
Thirdly, spiritual leadership reflects His heart. God loves His people and that is what drove Him to the cross. He does not bless us out of some sense of duty, nor does He function on a give and take, win-win principle. He loves unconditionally and gave Himself expecting nothing in return, so that we might love Him who first loved us. There is no higher reason for serving God than to demonstrate our love for Him, for thus He said thrice to Peter, “If you love me, feed my lambs”.
Fourthly, spiritual leadership is not an end in itself. We don’t lead to establish a following or to build numbers underneath us. We lead to equip the church to fulfill her divine mandate. Leaders are merely the midwives, the lowest order servants who wait come alongside His people and provoke them to be what He called them to be. The sheep were not meant to be co-opted by the shepherds for their own gratification, but were called by God to be a peculiar people, a royal priesthood and a nation of God. We can at best facilitate that, but we must be careful never to hijack the process to build our own thrones or to frustrate the flow of God’s spirit. In Old Testament parlance, we can only really establish the framework, the tent, but God must inhabit it so that it becomes a living, vital thing and a place of union between Him and His people.
I am reminded of the vision of a valley of dry bones (Ezekiel 37). God’s spirit came on the bones, linking them with sinew, muscle and tissue until the whole rose up as one army. Leadership provides the bones, the framework of spiritual living, when they set the church in order and plant a basic working replica of God’s model. But the indwelling Spirit of God must then transform the faithful implementation of His divine framework into a living reality, else it will remain a lifeless organization. By His spirit, God fills it, adds flesh to the bone and knits lives together, to give it muscle and fabric: until the institution becomes a living, vital organism. The Life within us then establishes us as the whole, the only army of the Living God, where every member is vital to the whole, as stakeholders (not laity) in the life and thought of His everlasting kingdom.
© Peter Eleazar at http://www.bethelstone.com
Don’t get me wrong, I deeply appreciate the contributions made by theologians throughout history, for they have helped in our interpretation of text and context, but we also need to know the heart of God and that comes from walking with Him. No other man knows my wife as I do, because no one has walked a lifetime with her as I have done, not even her parents. There is a degree of knowledge that others have, but it is limited. There is a depth that I have plumbed that no one else has and it has been derived through relationship, not factually. That is the depth we must plumb in our walk with God.
This brings me to the nub of this article. There is a factual, mechanilistic level of understanding on the principles of leadership that is attainable to most of us. It is largely valid although a lot of worldly influences have come into modern biblical leadership and whilst some of those influences are valid, many are not. We would be wise to look into the bible for principles, lest we be beguiled by Satan into humanistic models that feed the soul and build soulish strongholds or power-bases that ultimately end up serving Satan more than they serve God or His people.
True leadership, biblical leadership that is, must devolve from the heart of God. The reasons are many-fold:
Firstly, spiritual leadership implies accountability for God’s heritage. It is a process of stewardship, not ownership. He is the only shareholder for they are His people. He entrusts them to our care, but never cedes them to us. We should be fearful and very careful about how we handle God’s people. Jesus left a great example, saying, “Of those you gave me I lost not one (save the son of perdition)”.
Secondly, spiritual leadership follows God’s vision. I have heard leaders ramble on about vision and inevitably it amounts to a somewhat humanistic exercise and a thin disguise for centralized control. The only vision we really need is to implement the mandate of God, the patterns He showed us on the mount. Many churches today have a cultural or social bias that bears no resemblance to biblical models for church life – they may be very popular and trendy, but that is not the point. The church is not an incorporation or fiefdom: she is the bride of Christ and the heritage of God.
Thirdly, spiritual leadership reflects His heart. God loves His people and that is what drove Him to the cross. He does not bless us out of some sense of duty, nor does He function on a give and take, win-win principle. He loves unconditionally and gave Himself expecting nothing in return, so that we might love Him who first loved us. There is no higher reason for serving God than to demonstrate our love for Him, for thus He said thrice to Peter, “If you love me, feed my lambs”.
Fourthly, spiritual leadership is not an end in itself. We don’t lead to establish a following or to build numbers underneath us. We lead to equip the church to fulfill her divine mandate. Leaders are merely the midwives, the lowest order servants who wait come alongside His people and provoke them to be what He called them to be. The sheep were not meant to be co-opted by the shepherds for their own gratification, but were called by God to be a peculiar people, a royal priesthood and a nation of God. We can at best facilitate that, but we must be careful never to hijack the process to build our own thrones or to frustrate the flow of God’s spirit. In Old Testament parlance, we can only really establish the framework, the tent, but God must inhabit it so that it becomes a living, vital thing and a place of union between Him and His people.
I am reminded of the vision of a valley of dry bones (Ezekiel 37). God’s spirit came on the bones, linking them with sinew, muscle and tissue until the whole rose up as one army. Leadership provides the bones, the framework of spiritual living, when they set the church in order and plant a basic working replica of God’s model. But the indwelling Spirit of God must then transform the faithful implementation of His divine framework into a living reality, else it will remain a lifeless organization. By His spirit, God fills it, adds flesh to the bone and knits lives together, to give it muscle and fabric: until the institution becomes a living, vital organism. The Life within us then establishes us as the whole, the only army of the Living God, where every member is vital to the whole, as stakeholders (not laity) in the life and thought of His everlasting kingdom.
© Peter Eleazar at http://www.bethelstone.com
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