A Leader's relationship with God
- Gill Newham, Missionary to Mongolia
Maintaining a relationship with God is essential to Christian leadership, but that relationship also needs to have discipline and structure. In other words, it needs to be grounded in God’s word and directed by His Holy Spirit.
Daily reading and meditating on God’s truth not only sustains us but it also broadens our horizon because the focus of our attention becomes God and not our small world. We see God’s bigger picture and realise that we are part of something much greater than ourselves. As we allow God’s word to work in us and His Spirit to direct us we are reminded who the work belongs to, and of the privilege we have of being involved in His work. And the Spirit teaches that, though we are leaders, we are still followers and we never stop being followers.
Yes, we lead others, teaching and preaching God’s word, caring for and discipling those around us but we have to understand afresh that we are His disciples. The mission agency we are a part of has an often repeated tag-line, ‘we are life-long learners,’ reminding us that we need to maintain the posture of a student. We never graduate from God’s school of Life, we are always learning, always dependent on His leading and direction. The simplicity of the gospel never stops being relevant to us. We are all called to repent from our sins, to lay down our lives, take up our Cross and walk, by faith, in daily obedience to God.
Constantly returning to God’s word and acknowledging our dependency on Him and His Spirit enables us to see His divine sovereignty and our own frailties. Submission to His word allows the Holy Spirit to bring His peace into our hearts and a humility that enables us to place ourselves in the background. We can then value others more highly than ourselves, because part of the calling of a leader is to serve those in our care. God also calls us to empower them so that they might fulfil the calling He has placed on their lives.
The world’s leadership marches to a different beat. Certainly here in Mongolia, worldly leadership endorses a leader’s right to fulfil his personal agenda. In the Mongolian culture leaders who do not have all the answers, or those who serve and do menial tasks are generally, considered weak.
Biblical leadership calls us to walk in Christ’s way and serve and we cannot do this without the Spirit renewing and transforming our hearts and minds. Servant-hearted leadership is a distinctive of Christian leadership and in order to be a servant we must have a life that is filled with prayer. For all Christians, prayer is a foundational facet in our relationship with God because without it we will wither and return to our own strength and resources to get the job done. Prayer reminds us who we are and that we are a part of a body. It also reminds us that we have to listen carefully in order to hear and answer God’s promptings with our prayers. We pray back what He plants in our hearts and by drawing on His strength we walk in His way, and are able to give Him praise and glory for all that is good.