by Jacob Ninan
A lot of people are interested in going for leadership training programmes. Much of this seems to come from a desire to become great and big, or because some people like to have power over the others. But that is so contrary to the way Jesus has taught us. In some passages in the Bible it may appear as if Jesus was pronouncing judgment over those who wanted to be great (Mk.10:43). But this passage makes it clear, "But Jesus called them to Himself and said, 'You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority over them. It is not this way among you, but whoever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you shall be your slave; just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many'" (Matt.20:25-28). He says that He Himself had come to serve us, and not expecting to be served. Even though He is our Lord and our greatest Leader, He says that the way He came to exercise that leadership was through serving us. That is the example He has left us.
Look at the example of someone who is an elder or 'overseer' in a church (1Tim.3:1). This man is one who has charge or responsibility over the people in the church. Obviously, this means that he has the responsibility to care for them and work hard to bless them. But those who merely hold to the position and look for position, honour, recognition or salary has not understood their responsibility at all.
Let us look at some criteria which we can see in the Bible for the selection of leaders in a Christian context.
Criterion 1
The most important requirement for Christian leaders is that they should know God personally. This is totally different from knowing much about God, as from a Bible college, because such knowledge can be merely intellectual. There are also cases where believers joined Bible colleges and became confused and turned away from having faith in God. But it is when we have been born again that we receive a new heart and a new spirit from God. It is then that the Holy Spirit dwells in us and begins to give us right attitudes and also to direct our minds according to the will of God. The early leaders of the church, the apostles, knew this so well that even for choosing people to take the responsibility for distributing food they insisted on selecting people who were filled with the Holy Spirit (Acts.6:3). We only need to look around and see where clever, educated people who have not known God personally have created their own ideas and caused confusion in the church.Criterion No. 2
God doesn't want us to do great things for Him; we cannot do anything better than His will. When it comes to serving God, we are to recognise ourselves as stewards who have to give an account to God (1Cor.4:2). The Living Bible paraphrases it like this, "Now the most important thing about a servant is that he does just what his master tells him to." We cannot run our own clever projects and hope that God will be pleased with us. Good leaders have to have this submission to God.Criterion No. 3
A leader is responsible for those whom he serves. It is to lead those people that he has been entrusted with this position. Whether we are overseers in the church or in charge of distributing food, we must keep in mind that we are not doing it for our gain, whether it is for money, position, recognition or anything else, but for the benefit of the people we serve. It is very important for someone God chooses to have this responsibility.Criterion No. 4
To serve others implies that we are working for them, and not for ourselves. Within our circle of responsibility which God has given us, we are to do what they need, and not what we like to do. For example, if we are preaching, we must preach what they need to hear and not what will make us popular. In this way, their needs become more important to us as we serve them, rather than our own pleasure. "Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves" (Php.2:3). This does not mean that we consider others as more important than ourselves in essence, in a self-degrading way, but only as realising that we are serving them and not ourselves at that point.Criterion No. 5
When it comes to serving God, we must know that we cannot serve Him without His anointing over us. Even the natural skills that God has given us are not adequate to accomplish anything lasting for eternity. The apostle Paul understood this deeply and expressed it as, "Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but our adequacy is from God, who also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life" (2Cor.3:5,6). Moses first thought that because of his training in the court of Pharaoh in Egypt, he was capable to leading the people of Israel, and then failed miserably. It took him many years to lose that self-confidence and learn to depend on God for His wisdom and power. Paul was a Jewish Bible scholar and yet he realised that in order to be effective in the work of God, he had to depend on the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit through him (1Cor.2:3-5).Criterion No. 6
When God calls us to do something for Him, we must believe that He will also give us the ability to do it (Rom.12:5,6). It was because Moses did not trust God in this way that God was angry with him when Moses asked Him to take someone else. In other words, even though we feel totally inadequate by ourselves for the task in front of us, we must trust in God to help us to do it. Also, we are not to try and imitate others because what God wants us to do is something unique for which He has prepared us through many steps of training over the years. We must not also try to serve God using what God has given others, for example, by copying the messages God has given other people, even though we can learn from them. God will give us what we need to do what He wants.Criterion No. 7
Another important quality that we must have in serving God is to seek His glory first, do our part in His kingdom and to make sure that we are doing His will just as He tells us. This is what He taught us to pray (Matt.6:9,10). This shortens the list of people who are actually qualified to serve God, because most people are trying to get something for themselves even when they think they are serving God. In Paul's team, he could think of only Timothy who met this qualification, while all the others were secretly seeking their own (Php.2:19-21).Criterion No. 8
In serving others, we will be called to make many sacrifices on our side. We will have to spend time, energy and even money for the others. In spending ourselves for the others, they will see the example of Jesus who gave everything to serve and bless us (2Cor.8:9). We can also read in 2Cor.11 about some of the troubles Paul had to go through as he travelled around the world preaching the Gospel. He was also willing to remain single so that he could give complete attention to preaching the Gospel. Those who imagine that serving God will be pleasant, comfortable and convenient have no idea of what it really involves.Criterion No. 9
If God gives us an opportunity to serve Him in some way, we must understand what a great privilege it is for us who do not deserve it at all. What we see around us is people boasting about their accomplishments about the number of people in their church, the number of people to whom they have shared the Gospel, the books they have written, the countries they have visited, etc. Paul said, "For if I preach the gospel, I have nothing to boast of, for I am under compulsion; for woe is me if I do not preach the gospel. For if I do this voluntarily, I have a reward; but if against my will, I have a stewardship entrusted to me" (1Cor.9:16,17). He was able to take this position because he saw himself as one who did not deserve anything good because of his sins (1Tim.1:15).Conclusion
Isn't this a good way to examine ourselves and see how we view ministry and how faithfully we are carrying it out? Take the time to set things right with God, fix our goals clearly before our eyes and seek God for His direction and anointing. Let us also decide to walk before God and away from the face of people.