Is My Leadership Spiritual?

Mick Daly (Elder, Purpose Leader: Leader Development)
April 2007

Most Christians sense that there should be something different about their leadership from what they see in the secular world. But what should that difference look like?

I wasn’t picked from the pool of 70 for the 12 seats in the Jury box last month – bummer! I really want to do my Jury duty, but my motives may be suspect because I loved John Grisham’s Runaway Jury (book and film)!

The Jury selection process was fascinating. For 3 hours I watched the prosecutor and the defense attorney interrogate the prospective jurors individually and as a group to try to discover whether they were likely to be sympathetic to their cause. The defense attorney was clearly trying to influence the prospective jurors the entire time. Even the judge herself, though silent for the most part, was influential at several points.

This courtroom scene confirmed for me that our working definition of ‘leadership’ is a good one: “Any time you seek to influence the thinking, behavior, or development of people toward accomplishing a goal in their personal or professional lives you are taking on the role of a leader”. But there may be more.

‘Ordinary influence’, Bill Robinson points out in his fine book “Leading People From The Middle”, is just life; ‘extraordinary influence’ is leadership. Such ‘extraordinary’ influence from a Christian had better be spirit-led: spiritual influence which enables spiritual leadership.

Spiritual leadership flows from the leader seeking God through spiritual disciplines. Solitude and silence are key disciplines that enable us to go to the place where God wants to meet us. In them, we are rescued from relentless human “doing” so that we can experience the life of the Spirit as a human “being”. In silent solitude, we listen for the still, small voice of God telling us who he made us to be, his plans and purpose for us, and the people he wants us to meet and influence on his behalf.

When God calls Jeremiah to be his prophet to Judah, Jeremiah protests  “‘Ah, Sovereign LORD . . . I do not know how to speak; I am only a child.’ But the LORD said to me, ‘Do not say, “I am only a child.” You must go to everyone I send you to and say whatever I command you. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you and will rescue you,’ declares the LORD” (Jer. 1:6–8).

God calls us to live and operate in the ‘sweet spot’ (X marks the

spot in the diagram) where his design of us and his plans for us

intersect with the needs of other people in our life.

God’s grace operates in the lives of everyone - where GOD’s

circle overlaps the circle of OTHERS in the diagram. The

diagram shows YOU operating about 60%  in God’s will,

using many of the gifts, strengths and abilities he has given

you, with passion, because to a large extent you are doing

what he designed you to love to do: in the work and with

the people God has given you a heart for. Your interaction

with others is close to what God planned for you and for

them; like Jeremiah, God says to you and me ‘go to everyone

I send you to’; he wants us to be his messenger, his

ambassador to others. We are in their lives for a reason, and

our influence on them is a major part of God’s plan for their lives,

as well as ours.

Now imagine the YOU circle moving i) away from the GOD and OTHERS circles shrinking the ‘sweet spot’, and ii) toward the OTHER circle so that the sweet spot spans the overlap of the other two circles.  Are you closer to i) or ii) right now? Growth in spiritual leadership enables us to move closer and closer to ii).

Spiritual leadership needs no title or position. It operates from the sweet spot. It enables you to “Do what you love in the service of others who love what you do.”

More next month ...                                          ~ Leadership ~