Courageous Leadership

What is the role of the Lord of the Hosts in everyday life? Every person has to challenge what is for the sake of what could be and should be. Any time we challenge the status quo, there will be push back.

When you challenge the status quo, no matter if you are right or not, there will be push back. Here is the hard part often times we don’t have to face down enemy giants, sometimes the people who push back the hardest are those who are the closest to us. Family members, friends, co-workers or pew people.

Expressions of courage establish a leader.

Courageous leaders challenge what is for the sake of what could and should be.

A leader is one who has the courage to initiate and set out in a new direction. They act on what they see.

They act on what they see.

Illustration: Six boys on bikes at top of steep hill. All want to go but only one brave boy steps forward and goes. He is the leader and the others follow. There movement causes others to follow.

The first person to step out is the leader.

they see. o A leader may not always be the first person to see an opportunity, but they are often the first

The logician will not go first. Leaders don’t generally wait to have all the answers before they lead out, they just lead. Good leaders know you have to step out, lead out before you have all the answers. You take a step before you have all the answers.

A leader may not always be the first person to see an opportunity, but they are often the first one to seize an opportunity.

o A leader may not always be the first person to see an opportunity, but they are often the first

one to seize an opportunity. • Courageous leaders do difficult things:

Courageous leaders do difficult things:

Leaders take people to places they have never been before. We take people where they have never been before and where we have never been before.

Leaders require those around them to abandon the known and embrace the unknown with no guarantee of success.

guarantee of success. • Courageous leaders “walk in the dark.”

Courageous leaders “walk in the unseen.”

Leading can conjure up many of the same feelings of fear as taking a walk in the dark. If the pathway to the future was well lit, it would be crowded.

While darkness is the uncertainty that always accompanies change, the darkness also provides the leader with their greatest opportunity.

the leader with their greatest opportunity. • Courageous leaders are not without fear:

Courageous leaders are not without fear:

Without fear there would be no need for courage. Courage is the ability and willingness to carry our fears and harness the energy that comes with fear into the unknown. All the fearless people are dead.

o The individual who refuses to move until the fear and uncertainty are gone will never move, and, consequently, never led.

The individual who refuses to move until the fear and uncertainty are gone will never move, and, consequently, never led.

Unwillingness to accept risk has caused more leaders to miss more opportunities than you can imagine.

The outcome of unbridled fear is a missed opportunity

As a leader, you have no idea what hangs in the balance of your decision to act courageously.