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Our last study brought us to the end of a long series of Insights (30 weeks) based on John Stott's commentary on 1Timothy. For the remaining nine weeks of the College year we are going to shift our attention to a new - though not unrelated theme - namely, The Heart of a Godly Leader.
We are staying with the general topic of Christian leadership because that is what Grace Theological College is about - equipping, supporting and encouraging godly servant leaders. But this time our particular focus is on the heart of a Christian leader.
There are two reasons for pursing this particular theme. The first is the conviction that Christian leadership ought to be essentially different to secular leadership, and the second, that it is the quality of Christian character (or the Christian's heart) that lies at the root of that difference. Christian leaders ought to be different because at heart they are different.
I raise this issue because there are some Christians today who downplay the difference between Christian and secular leadership. Just this past week I attended a large conference on leadership and heard, through one of the speakers, of the powerful impact so-called Christian leadership principles are having on secular leaders worldwide. One part of me rejoices in the thought that this might be true. But another part of me is concerned and doubting. I find myself asking the question, Can truly "Christian" leadership principles, ever be attractive to people who are not Christians?
In short, I believe the answer to that question is "No". While there may be practices and procedures of "Christian leadership" that appeal to non-Christians, the essential ethic of Christian leadership never can. That's because truly Christian leadership is leadership that proceeds from hearts that have experienced the renewing power of the Holy Spirit. What is more, it is leadership that is constantly energized and directed by the Spirit. While outwardly it may bear resemblance to secular leadership in terms of activities, forms and structures, there will always be something about Christian leadership that sets it apart - radically and fundamentally - from other forms of religious and secular leadership. That's because Christians, as kingdom citizens, march to the beat of a different drum.
John Stott puts it well when he writes in his commentary on The Sermon on the Mount, "Jesus emphasized that his true followers, citizens of God's kingdom, were to be entirely different from others. They were not to take their cue from people around them, but from him, and so prove to be genuine children of their heavenly Father" (p. 18). He also comments on the modern "tragedy" that the Christian church all too often looks just like the world. "Insofar as the church is conformed to the world," he says, "and the two communities appear to the onlooker to be merely two versions of the same thing, the church is contradicting its true identity. No comment could be more hurtful to the Christian than the words, 'But you are no different from anybody else'" (p. 17).
The non-Christian world should be able to look at the church and see something that is radically different to itself - what Stott calls a "counter-culture." And in that regard it should recognize especially that its leaders and its approach to leadership are different. That's why we are going to look at the The Heart of a Godly Leader over these coming weeks - because it is in the heart that the difference begins.
Andrew Young
11th October 2005