The Heart of a Leader

Introduction

What is the heart of a leader, what does that even mean?

Today I want to look at leadership from almost a reverse perspective - from the view of a follower looking up to a great leader.

Hebrews 13:7 “7 Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith.”

The bible asks us (yes, even if we are already leaders) to REMEMBER these people in our lives. These are people of SIGNIFICANCE.

The bible tells us to hold these people close in our lives - to literally remember them and then it lists out some of the key traits that they live by. And how to identify these people in our own lives.

Now if we reverse engineer this - we actually end up with what we should be like as leaders.

Spoke the Word of God

The first thing that comes off the line is one that is just so painfully missing in today’s word. Leaders are ones who speak the Word of God

A Christian leader first and foremost needs to be a good handler of the Word.

We are to be remembered for our usage of the Word of God.

Anyone can give advice, anyone can offer counsel - this does not make you any different from their friends - save perhaps because of your maturity your advice may be slightly better.

But how are you aligning this with the Word?

Counsel makes you look good - Biblical counsel ultimately points people to God.

How do we, as leaders, handle the Word of God? Do you know how to exposition it, do you know how to study it, have you committed certain portions to heart (not asking you to memorise heaps, but what about even what’s just significant to you?) do you know how to counsel using it? How often does it come up in your conversations?

This is something that’s just sorely missing from the next generation of leaders - a passion for the Word of God.

What one generation neglects, the next generation will reject. We must be so careful that we are not neglecting the Word of God as leaders.

We must make it such an integral part of ALL that we do. If we are not leading biblically - then we are not leading right.

2 Timothy 3:16–17 “16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 17 that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.”

ILLUSTRATION: Don’t put your bible on the floor

I’ve shared with you guys the story about where I was caught up in a crazy deliverance case and I learned how to respect - even revere the Word of God from that instance. From that time on I never let ANYONE under my leadership put their bible on the floor. That actually became a culture in Kinetic youth - you would never just see bibles lying around on the floor being stepped on or any of that.

My point if even the way we LITERALLY handle the Word of God affects the way our followers handle it - then how much more the way we handle it with our lives?

As a leader we have to ask ourselves - what position does the Word of God hold in our lives, does it have a place of REVERENCE?

Do you cling on to every word as if your FAITH depends on it?

Are our followers hearing us speak the Word, not just in CG but in counsel, encouragement, rebuke even?

Matthew 24:35 “35 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.”

Consider the Outcome of their Way of Life

“Consider” means to literally behold/see. - two words, fruit and legacy.

Consider the outcome is to pay attention to the FRUIT of their labour.

Our fruit is what identifies our work as leaders.

This is on a personal level as well as a ministry level.

On a personal level - what does the way you live look like, what fruit does it bear? Think of the fruit of the Spirit - do you have a way of life which bears these fruits?

Because the bible encourages us to follow leaders who are bearing Godly fruit as a result of their WAY of life.

But even on a corporate/ministry level there have to be questions we have to always check ourselves - what are the fruits of our labour. What is it that we’re trying to achieve.

If you are a pastor - what do your leaders look like? How are you shaping them? If you are a CG leader how do your CG members look like? If you are a ministry leader, what are the fruits of your ministry.

And then there’s legacy - what are you leaving behind? Like if you left your ministry today, or even if you died today - what does the end result of your ministry look like?

Always lead with the end in mind. Never lead as if you’ll be around forever. Lead as if one day they will have to go on without you. That is the only way to build leadership with a legacy.

Will it survive? Not just that - will it continue to thrive, will it continue to follow a God-centered path?

If you left earth today - would the people under your care be ok? Would they know how to find God on their own, are they on track to being spiritually nourished enough as individuals.

Imitate their Faith

Perhaps the final and one of the most important question to ask “Is your faith worth imitating?”

Would you even want people to imitate your faith? All of it - the public stuff AND the private stuff.

Because the the bible is asking us to follow leaders who are worthy of having their faith imitated.

The first follower you should have, is yourself.

If you wouldn’t want people to follow you then nobody else SHOULD be following you.

So the question to start of with is - would you follow yourself?

Notice that in all of these things I haven’t mentioned anything about strategy or competency. But yet the bible is so clear that these are the types of leaders that we are wanting to raise.

Leaders who are not just great at building big churches - but leaders who are biblically passionate, who leave a lasting legacy, they finish well, and have a faith worth imitating.

If we are not getting these things right then we are putting the wrong things first.