Centrality of Leadership

By Professor P. V. Ntintili

However, Prof Vuyani Ntintili’s Centrality of Leadership raises critical issues not previously explored within the leadership debate. Anyone currently in leadership and emerging leaders will discover new insights and, as a tool for leadership, it is a must-read book that is both illuminating and insightful.

Prof Ntintili conducts workshops and conferences on leadership. He also conducts programmes for professionals, emerging leaders and pastors and ministers. He is passionate about discipleship (mentorship) and runs classes on it. He is currently running a virtual school called CLEAN Training school offering formal training for church leaders; something equivalent to a school of ministry training.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Professor P. V. Ntintili
• Release date: Oct 17, 2023
• ISBN: 9798215957523

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Copyright © 2023 Professor P. V. Ntintili

Published by Professor P. V. Ntintili at Smashwords

First edition 2023

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Published byProfessor P. V. Ntintili using Reach Publishers’ services,

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Professor P. V. Ntintili

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Dedication

The dedication of a book is something serious and the author does not do it thoughtlessly and without prayer. This applies to this dedication as well.

This book is lovingly and considerately dedicated to Christ, our model servant and leader. If leaders could learn leadership from Him, the world would be well-led and the earth’s problems eliminated. God recommends Him to every person who aspires to be an effective leader¹. While there are many leaders I truly admire, the One I admire the most is Christ and I pray I will emulate Him in my leadership.

Another person, not at the same level as Christ, to whom I dedicate this book, is Brother Dennis Tserga. His model for raising leaders is the model of friendship. He regards those he raises not as his disciples or protégés but as friends, learning this from Christ who said, in The Amplified Version:

I do not call you servants (slaves) any longer for the servant does not know what his master is doing (working out). But I have called you My friends, because I have made known to you everything I have heard from My Father. [I have revealed to you everything I have learnt from Him].²

The Friendship Model or raising leaders is effective and it engenders, among other things, trust. I want to follow Christ first and then Brother Dennis in this regard.

The last person to whom I want to dedicate this book is Brother Femi Adebayo. A good leader is a good follower and any person who has never learnt following will never learn leading. I have observed and been impressed by Brother Femi’s faithfulness, obedience, commitment and devotion in his following of Christ. I have spent hours with him travelling long distances and he has told me the story of his following. Besides, I have watched his following. I wish to be as faithful in my followership as I have seen it demonstrated by this brother. I want to learn leadership from following.

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¹ Matthew 17:5; Isaiah 42:1-3

² John 15:15

Acknowledgements

It is the usual practice in this section to acknowledge and honour people for their contribution either to your life or work or both. However, I shall deviate from this tradition and instead mention institutions that have had an immense contribution in making me a leader.

The first is my Bible College, Nazarene Bible College, in Acornhoek, Eastern Transvaal, South Africa. While preparing for full-time Christian vocation, I learnt an extensive amount from both the teachers who taught the students and us, some of whom became close friends, such as Thomas Phiri. I thank God for the opportunity of passing through this institution, as it is where I learnt to be a shepherd of God’s people.

God gave me another exposure at the Johannesburg Bible Institute, popularly known as JBI, in Johannesburg, South Africa. There were teachers from Canada and the United States of America (USA) who taught there, dedicated men and women committed to training people who would lead God’s church in South Africa. There I met Linda Mbeje, someone who became a close friend and a leader par excellence. The school made a significant contribution to my growth as a leader.

In His sovereign and wise ways, it pleased God to cause my path to go through Youth Alive. I was given an opportunity to cut my teeth in leadership at this great youth development centre in Dube, Soweto. I met many people who moulded my life, such as Jerry Nkosi, of blessed memory, and his dear wife, Sis’ Mavis Nkosi, who continues to be engaged in youth work in Texas, USA. There are some invaluable leadership skills I picked up from experience.

Then God took me to the Bible Society of South Africa, where I worked as the general secretary of the Transkei division, then an independent homeland in South Africa. This is where my leadership blossomed, where I met wise old men about whom I had read in books. It never occurred to me I would ever see them, let alone work with them. They were part of the Transkei Bible Society board and I had periodically reported to them on the society’s progress. There I met renowned men such as James Ranisi Jolobe, best known for his anthology Umyezo (1936), who also played a major role in compiling and translating the English-Xhosa-Afrikaans dictionary.

The board also included the Methodist hymn writer and professor of Xhosa literature St. J Page Mbalana Yako. A translation of one of his poems was published as The Contradiction and Enclosure of the Land in The Lava of the Land, an anthology of South-African poetry edited by Denis Hirson. The Contradiction and Enclosure uses oral poetry imagery to illustrate the consequences of South Africa’s race-based land legislation in the 1950s in destroying the traditional ways of life of many African tribes.

There was also Rev. A J Fikeni of the Methodist Church and Rev. J C Mvusi, the first African President of the Methodist Church of Southern Africa. I learnt from these doyens of the faith and outstanding leaders in our communities.

While working as the Bible Society general secretary, I was deeply involved with organisations such as Scripture Union, Students Christian Movement, Teachers Christian Movement and Hospital Christian Movement. I learnt a lot from leaders of these organisations, such as Herbert Ndileko Gila, the Teachers’ Christian Movement leader.

Then I had an opportunity to attend institutions such as the University of Transkei (now the Walter Sisulu University), Dallas Theological Seminary, Drew University and Christian Leadership University further honed my leadership skills. I cannot thank them enough for their contribution to my development.

I had an opportunity to teach at Nyack College and at the Seminary of the East in New York and to be a pastor at the New Jersey-based Madison Baptist Church and the Flushing Baptist Church in New York. I can’t finish mentioning people who impacted my life while working at these institutions and their contributions to my formation as a leader.

Returning to South Africa, I taught at my alma mater, the University of Transkei (now Walter Sisulu University), Rosebank Bible College and the Evangelical Biblical Seminary of Southern Africa. Again, I learnt a significant amount about leadership from these institutions.

However, the one place that has had a lasting impression as far as my leadership formation is concerned is the Living Seed Team of Peace House. I led their work in South Africa for more than ten years. This organisation is fastidiously strong on life formation and character. It insists, and rightfully so, that one leads more from who one is than from what one knows. The organisation taught me that being precedes doing.

I acknowledge every one of these organisations and institutions through which God, in His sovereign wisdom, took me. If there are other organisations and institutions I have inadvertently omitted, I thank them also. I do not undermine their contribution to my leadership development and growth. I thank God for the people I met through these institutions and how they contributed significantly to my growth as a leader.

Preface

There are numerous books on leadership, raising the question of whether another is needed. I like visiting bookstores, with the management and leadership section being the most often frequented. I am always amazed by the number of new titles, fresh from the printers, gracing the shelves. I have many books on leadership; some of them I have not read. I am forced to read as I write.

The question is: are any more books needed on leadership? Isn’t the market over-saturated?

The answer is: there are countless books on various aspects of leadership. What is disconcerting is, despite the numbers, the quality and standard of leadership is alarmingly declining. When we read about leaders of past decades and even centuries, we note, with a deep sense of shame and even envy, they were leaders of incredible substance. They knew how to successfully tackle the baffling problems of their day. In our age, problems are not only piling up; they are complicating in front of our eyes.

One only knows there is an alarming paucity of leadership when in our countries, communities and institutions, there are problems that have been left unattended for years and are escalating. Myles Munroe³ is right when he asks:

Where are the genuine leaders? Where are the individuals who would be willing to take responsibility for the present situation and conditions in the world? Who is willing to accept the challenge, to face it head-on with integrity, character and a commitment to execute righteous judgment (sic) for a better world? From America to Australia, from China to Chile and from Canada to the Caribbean, the world is in desperate need of true leaders.

It is because of mounting, unsolved and complicating problems I feel constrained to add my voice to the fray. Who knows if what I say might make a difference? Despite the many books to read and from which I shall sometimes quote, I also want to be original and share some of the insights God has given me as I wrestled with the issue of leadership. If the matter of leadership was ever urgent, it is now. I sense we are close to the end of the age and God will soon culminate this present dispensation and usher in the next. Whenever one era is about to end and a new era is introduced, there is an urgency accompanying the transitional period. There is a sense of gravity that attends to the age at which we find ourselves. God is raising a unique crop of leaders who must be capacitated to face today’s unique challenges; hence, the sense of compulsion to write this book.

I implore you to read the book reflectively and interact with the book; engage it. Pose questions to the book and vehemently differ with it. Where you do differ, state the reasons, at least internally. If you gain insights, try them and see if they work. If they do, share them with others who may be helped by your sharing. We pray God will raise leaders who are equal to the daunting challenges of our day.

Professor P. V. Ntintili

12 Prestwich Ave, Mthatha

Eastern Cape, South Africa

February 2023

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³ 1993:10

Introduction

There are a few truths I want to address in this introduction. First, some Christians, particularly the born-again ones, are sometimes anti-intellectual. I do not understand why this allergy to intellectualism, because it is God who endowed human beings with intellect and the Bible says we should love the Lord our God with all our minds. Because of this anti-intellectual proclivity, these Christians tend to react negatively when authors use Hebrew, Greek and Latin terms that are sometimes more apt in precisely stating certain concepts.

What baffles me is some of these people who denounce the use of Hebrew, Greek, and Latin terms which provide a vivid picture of what the author is saying are highly educated people; doctors, lawyers and engineers. Their disciplines use Greek and Latin words to explain certain concepts in their field of study. They speak about glaucoma from the Greek word glaukos, meaning blue-grey and oma, meaning condition. In glaucoma, the grey colour replaces the black pupil. They also speak of cardium from which we get cardiology. Cardium is from the Greek word kardia. The last example is paraplegia from the two Greek words para, meaning beside and plegia, meaning paralysis.

There are many other examples one could use. We could turn to law, economics and other disciplines. Yet, people who do not mind if terms of a Greek origin are used in other disciplines react if words are used in theology; itself having a Greek origin. For example, soteriology from soter means to save. Thus, soteriology is the doctrine of salvation. We have pneumatology from the word pneuma, meaning spirit. Thus pneumatology means the doctrine of the Holy Spirit.

I shall not hesitate to use concepts with their roots from any ancient Greek or Latin if the terms provide a better nuance.

Secondly, there is the concept of the unity of truth. What this means is that truth is one, no matter its source. The Devil said things that were true when he tempted Jesus in the desert. Christ did not argue the truthfulness of the statement he made. What He fought was the wrong application of the truth the Devil was articulating. We should not be afraid of the truth articulated by non-Christians or Christians who are liberal in their theological orientation. God is a true God and all truth ultimately comes from Him. The concept of the unity of truth argues that all truth ultimately comes from God.

Thirdly, there is the concept of plundering the Philistines, referring to the fact that Israelites who fought with the Philistines sometimes disarmed them and used their weapons to fight them further. David killed Goliath and took his spear. This concept means you make use of whatever you get that will help you in your search for truth. In this book, we shall search for information on leadership from books on leadership and general management, from the Bible and from insights God gave me as I deeply and prayerfully reflected on leadership. I admit I have so much information I could easily write three volumes on this important topic.

I pray and trust this book will help many people to sharpen their leadership skills and to put them to use in extending God’s Kingdom on earth. There is an urgent need for leaders to rise and be counted. God says to leaders:

Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD rises upon you. See, darkness covers the earth and thick darkness is over the peoples, but the LORD rises upon you and his glory appears over you. (Isaiah 60:1-2)

Just as Esther arose in Persia and saved Jews from a genocidal massacre, we too must rise at a time such as this. If you do rise, God is ready to back you up as He did Esther.

CHAPTER 1

Dearth of Leadership

There is an alarming lack of leadership in today’s world. This disquieting scarcity extends to every sphere and sector of society; to our homes, churches, institutions of learning – lower and higher learning, government institutions, business, corporate world and, worse of all, to political institutions.

When we say our world suffers from a shortage of leaders, we do not mean there are none occupying powerful positions in all these institutions. The tragedy is while leadership positions are occupied, there is a gaping need for leaders. There are people in leadership positions who are not leading because they have no capacity to do so. Solomon decried this situation – people in high positions who think and behave like children. He writes:

Woe to thee, O land, when thy king is a child, and thy princes eat in the morning! (Ecclesiastes 10:16)

Princes and kings are leaders in a monarchical form of government; they lead the country. But what do we do when they think and behave like children? How do they display that? It is when they eat in the morning. The Good News Bible says these leaders feast all night long, and the Message Bible says, princes party all night long. This is what we see in our various countries; leaders who are more concerned about feasting than leading.

Lucky the land whose king is mature; where the princes behave themselves and don’t drink themselves silly (Ecclesiastes 10:17).

The Bible says the land, community or institutions whose leaders are mature and display this by eating for strength and not for hedonistic pleasure are blessed. How many countries have leaders resembling those of verse 17 and not verse 16? What disturbs me is that both are called leaders and occupy leadership positions. This situation is worse in developing and underdeveloped countries and could be one of the reasons these nations are in their current positions in terms of their serious paucity of leadership. They saw their colonial masters live a life of ease while oppressing others. They quietly decided to outclass in this.

How do we know when we lack leaders who lead effectively? In other words, what are the indications of a lack of leadership? I mention two.

The first is when there is no effective leadership, problems remain unsolved and escalate. The leader’s responsibility is to solve every problem he or she finds and forestall growing or occurring new problems. Where there is no genuine leadership, problems remain unsolved, including those that could have been easily solved. The reason they remain unsolved is that there are no leaders to lead in the effort to solve problems that baffle and beset people.

The second is clearly seen when those in leadership are supposed to take initiatives beneficial to their country and to those they lead. There are so many initiatives desperately needed in various countries relating to education, health, transportation, infrastructural development, youth development, poverty alleviation and job creation, among others. In our institutions of higher learning, such as universities, teacher training colleges, nursing colleges and medical schools, there are initiatives urgently needed to improve educational quality. But these initiatives are not taken and problems grow and become more complicated. The same is true in the business sector and churches. When there is no effective leadership, those in leadership positions always engage in crisis management, managing crises that could have been easily avoided if we had far-thinking leadership. Consider the shambles in our churches and how God’s people are leaderless. Seeing the same situation during His days on earth, Jesus Christ said His people were harassed and helpless and were like sheep without shepherds⁴. While the Pharisees and Sadducees were there, they were not offering the people good leadership. Christ said people should cry to God to send them leaders. The situation is no better today and we must cry desperately for divine intervention. This absence of quality leadership was the case in Israel in the days of Judges.

In those days there was no king in Israel, but every man did which was right in his own eyes. (Judges 17:6)

When there is no leadership to give guidance, people do whatever they wish to do. When people do whatever is right in their eyes, the situation is anarchic and there can be no development. This was the case at different times in the history of Israel and their enemies took advantage of them. The Bible says:

For a long time, Israel was without the true God, without a priest to teach them, and without God’s law. (2 Chronicles 15:3)

Can you imagine Israel being without God and without the Law? It is because she was without a teaching priest. This is the case in God’s Church today; we have noisemakers and howlers but no teaching priests. Hence the Church is in a fiasco and ignominy!

I am not writing now to bemoan the current state of affairs. Lamenting what is happening with leadership in every sector of society will not help. What this exposure of leaderlessness should drive us to do is Ask the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into His harvest field⁵. The mistake we should not make is thinking the harvest field refers only to the Church. No! It refers to every sphere in society. We should cry to God to send His labourers to academic institutions, research councils, civil service, politics, arts and culture, sports, the corporate world and business in general. This is how our world will be drastically transformed.

We should also prepare young people to assume leadership positions in these various sectors of society. We should envision them doing this and do all we can to prepare them for this enormous responsibility. We who are older should not cling to positions of leadership or delay in preparing younger people with fresh insights and ideas to succeed us. They should not only succeed us when we are dead but while we are alive. In this way, we shall have the opportunity to give them guidance and godly advice. That is why God led us to establish the Raising Replacement Sons and Daughters (RESAD) programme. We run leadership programmes for young people. This is the same reason God led me to write a book entitled There is a Bright Future Ahead of You, Do not Mess it up!⁶

When the prophet-priest Samuel was frustrated by the leadership failure of a young man who had initially shown promise – Saul, the first king of Israel – God told him to stop lamenting over Saul. For us to analyse the current situation and bewail despairingly will not help God said to Samuel:

How long will you mourn for Saul, since I have rejected him as king over Israel? Fill your horn with oil and be on your way; I am sending you to Jesse of Bethlehem. I have chosen one of his sons to be king.⁷

This is what God is saying today. He has hidden Davids somewhere and is ready to anoint them to take over from the backslidden Sauls of our day. May God give us eyes to see and anoint them; prepare them to replace these backslidden leaders! This is an urgent matter and a possible answer to the leadership dearth we are currently witnessing.

We should not live in denial and pretend the situation is not as dire. The situation is actually grim. Ted W. Engstrom⁸ was poignantly aware of this as early as the mid-1970s. Engstrom⁹ writes, Our generation is facing an equally serious problem: a leadership crisis.

This truly is a daunting crisis. He continues, These crises, and many others, stem first from a lack of positive, constructive, dynamic, creative leadership.

I make one last citation from Engstrom because it is so germane to today. He says:

Solid, dependable, loyal, strong leadership is one of the most desperate needs in America and in our world today. We see the tragedy of weak men in important places – little men in big jobs. Business, industry, government, labour, education and the church are all starving for effective leadership. So today, perhaps more than ever before, there is such a need for leadership and teamwork to cope with our needs.¹⁰

May God make us aware of this paucity of leadership today. If things were dire in Engstrom’s 1970s, I can assure you they have deteriorated. However, the heavenly counsel still stands.

Pray to the Lord of the harvest to send labourers (leaders) into His harvest field.

God still counsels us not to lament the rejection of today’s Sauls even though they still occupy leadership positions. God has identified their replacements in the young people who are serious about Him and leadership. We should recognise and anoint them for God.

Then we should thoroughly train them for effective leadership. We should not hoard anything God has taught us. Speaking about the leaders He raised for God, Jesus says:

For I gave them the words you gave me and they accepted them. (John 17:8a)

We should lavishly pour into their lives everything God and others have poured into ours. This is how we shall address this daunting dearth of leadership. Will you do that?

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⁴ Matthew 9:36

⁵ Matthew 9:38

⁶ P. V. Ntintili, There is a Bright Future Ahead of You, Don’t Messs it Up (Wandsbeck, South Africa: Reach Publishers, 2020).

⁷ 1 Samuel 16:1

⁸ Theodore Wilhelm Engstrom (1916-2006) was the head of Youth for Christ and World Vision International. The evangelical leader and author was known in part for instructing churches, parachurch ministries and other non-profit organisations on how to apply business concepts and achieve financial help. https://www.google.com/search?q=Ted%20W.%20Engstrom&oq=Ted%20W.%20Engstrom

⁹ 1976: first page of his introduction

¹⁰ Ibid. second page of his introduction

Chapter 2

Leaders are Both Born and Made

The question often asked is: are leaders born or made? This question probes whether one is a leader because he or she is born with innate leadership capabilities or a leader because of proper training. If you have natural leadership gifts, is it necessary to be trained? Conversely, if you do not have innate leadership gifts, can you ever become a leader through training?

I have decided to expand on this question and include the issues of purpose and calling.

Innate Leadership Gifts

There are people born with every characteristic required in leadership: intelligence, wisdom, courage and discipline, among others. There are people who show leadership qualities from a tender age. With such people, it becomes clear they have a potential for leadership and are born with clear divine endowments in leadership. Their leadership capabilities are patently clear to see.

Equally, there are people who lack certain obvious capabilities essential to leadership. Yet these people are eager to help others and solve their problems. Because of their intense desire to provide solutions to daunting challenges, they develop the skills necessary to help others. They learn skills on the job as they wrestle with tough situations and develop into outstanding leaders. We have seen and admired people like this and often refer to them as natural leaders.

It has to be understood there are three different types of gifts. First, there are natural gifts we call talents. These are transmitted generationally through genes via one’s parents. Usually, if your parents are intelligent, you will be intelligent too. If your parents are eloquent, it is possible you will be so too. Yet, there are certain exceptions. There are highly intelligent people who bear children not endowed with intelligence. Remember, natural gifts are divine endowments and God distributes them at will. He gives people gifts so they might use them in serving Him and His people on earth.

The second type of gifts is the spiritual ones¹¹ and I urge you to study these passages and read them in various versions of the Bible. The Navigators¹² have a test they give that might guide you in discovering your spiritual gifts. One receives spiritual gifts when one is born-again, namely when one is converted to Christ. At that time, the Holy Spirit imparts to every born-again child of God spiritual gifts; at this point, embryonic or nascent and they need to grow. As your faith in Christ and God’s Word grows, so do your gifts. Proper teaching in God’s Word will accelerate the growth of these spiritual gifts. Your responsibility is to discover and develop your spiritual gifts. One of the gifts the Holy Spirit imparts to some people is leadership. The King James Version uses the word ruling.

I call the third set acquired gifts. These are capabilities acquired through formal training. Some people are naturally good at technical skills, while others are good at skills that require thinking; academic skills. The ability to do well in certain areas of learning is a gift from God. Access to learning institutions and provision for tuition costs are also gifts from God:

For who makes you different from anyone else? What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as though you did not?(1 Corinthians 4:7)

Whatever gift God allows one to have, it is because He intends for one to use it in advancing His kingdom. Your responsibility is to discover the areas of your giftedness and deliberately develop them for future deployment in whatever area God deems fit. This includes leadership and other supportive gifts and it is important to discover every one of your gifts – natural, spiritual and acquired. In this sense, leaders are born in that God endows people with a set of gifts that enable them to become leaders. Discipleship ought to help one discover their leadership gift and facilitate its growth and development.

Training in Leadership

The Bible has plenty to say about training. Christ spent three years training those who would lead His work after His departure. His disciples were thoroughly trained for their work, while Paul also believed in training young people to become effective leaders. Paul not only trained them but wrote them instructional letters: two letters to Timothy and one each to Titus and Philemon. This underscores the importance of training and highlights how discipleship is a training programme for prospective leaders.

However, we must eradicate the false idea that in being gifted, you do not need training. Timothy was gifted, yet Paul says:

For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands. (2 Timothy 1:6)

Note Paul acknowledges Timothy has gifts, yet he still trained him. There are many others with gifts, including Paul himself, yet they needed training. Barnabas trained Paul for a year and beyond, despite his incredible gifts¹³.

When one has gifts, they are usually raw and undeveloped and must be developed. Training sharpens, hones and polishes the raw gifts one receives either at birth or salvation. Those gifts can only be deployed after being developed through training. Someone with a natural gift of eloquence becomes more effective when the gift has been sharpened through formal training. Giftedness does not preclude training and we must move away from disjunctive thinking either/or and embrace the conjunctive both/and. When it comes to gifts and training, we should realise both are necessary. Equally, it applies to the gift of leadership. Even though one has innate leadership qualities, he or she still needs training. Those who do not have discernible leadership gifts may become outstanding leaders through training.

The story of Moses answers the question of whether leaders are born or made. When he was born, the Message Bible says:

A man from the family of Levi married a Levite woman. The woman became pregnant and had a son. She saw there was something special about him and hid him. She hid him for three months (Exodus 2:1-2)

Note the phrase, There was something special about him. The Lord’s hand was obviously on the child from birth. Moses was educated in all the wisdom of the Egyptians¹⁴.

He was also intellectually gifted, with verse 22 reflecting he was powerful in speech and (actions or deeds) and clearly highly gifted. However, when a fellow Israelite asked him, Who made you ruler and judge over us?¹⁵ he could not answer. Though highly gifted, he had never been moulded into what God had intended. He ran to Midian when he discovered Pharaoh knew about his homicide. There God providentially arranged for him to stay with the experienced priest Jethro. He was then responsibility for carefully disciplining him into a formidable leader who could face Pharaoh and negotiate the release of the children of Israel after 430 years of captivity in Egypt.

Another example is Christ’s disciples. When He recruited those who would become His disciples, He said:

Follow Me and I will make you fishers of men (Matthew 4:19b).

The key phrase is Follow Me and I will make you. Most of those He recruited did not have obvious leadership qualities. They were ordinary fishermen, uneducated and consequently uncouth. Paul says:

Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, so no one may boast before him (1 Corinthians 1:26-29).

Through concerted training, the disciples became outstanding leaders who wrote at least eight¹⁶ of the New Testament books and became the Apostles on whom the New Testament Church was built. Though they did not have obvious leadership qualities, God, who knows all things, knew they could become outstanding leaders. Through training, they became exceptional leaders.

Leaders are both born and made. If you have noticed incredible leadership giftedness in you, you still need to be made if you are to become everything God meant for you to become; you must be trained.

Purpose in Leadership

God does nothing without purpose, including creating each human being. It is important for us to know God has a specific purpose for us and has adequately equipped us with natural, spiritual and acquired gifts to fulfil that divine purpose. The challenge is to identify His purpose for us and then live the rest of our lives pursuing that purpose.

The issue of purpose also applies to our leadership roles. God places us in certain leadership responsibilities, so we might accomplish His purpose for making us leaders. It must be clear to us that heaven is interested in how and where we exercise our leadership responsibilities. God’s Kingdom must achieve something because He has placed us as leaders in specific environments or situations. When you become a leader, you first need to know what God wants to accomplish through your position. We are leaders in different sectors of society to represent God there and advance His purpose. If God makes you a leader politically, ask before you consider the privileges accompanying your leadership position what God’s purpose is for raising you as a political leader. If He makes you a government leader and you are appointed director general or chief director or any other high position, question why He has called you to lead that department. Do not be enamoured by the power, pomp and privileges; instead, prayerfully seek God’s mind concerning your leadership position and its purpose. Seeking God’s will concerning your leadership position applies to every sphere and sector of society. Your leadership is accompanied by God’s purpose and if your will is to do it well, you must establish His purpose for your appointment to that position. This is how you can leave behind a God-glorifying legacy wherever He has deployed you.

God’s Calling and Leadership

God does not only have a purpose for each one of us; He also has a calling. There is a distinction between God’s purpose for one’s life and His calling. Purpose is the overall objective God wants one to achieve for Him or, more accurately, what He wants to achieve through one. An example of purpose may be to alleviate poverty as He did through Joseph in Egypt. Alternatively, He may want one to disseminate knowledge and banish ignorance. Purpose tends to be broad.

Calling, on the other hand, is the means of fulfilling one’s purpose and is typically narrower than purpose. Four people may have one purpose and different callings. If God gives four people the purpose of alleviating poverty, He may give them divergent callings. He may call one to develop effective agricultural projects that produce bountiful harvests and sells food cheaply. For another, the calling might be providing financial assistance to poor and starving people. The third might be called to establish a feeding place from where the poor and indigent can receive cooked food; a place where the poor are fed. Essentially, God’s purpose is the broad element He wants you to do, while His calling is the specific arena in which He wants you to accomplish your purpose.

The same applies to leadership; it has a purpose and a calling. After discovering God’s purpose for your leadership, you must discover the specifics God has called you to accomplish within your purpose. You must identify the scope of both your purpose and calling so you might know the size of what God wants you to achieve.

If you are to succeed in your leadership, you must pray about everything you do. You want to secure God’s guidance in your leadership. Make sure God is with you, as He was with Joseph in Egypt, and is helping you in your leadership responsibilities. I pray God will reveal to you what your leadership gifts are. Then make sure you get adequate academic and spiritual training. Then discover God’s purpose for your leadership. Finally, God must show you His calling for your leadership. Make sure you accomplish both His purpose and calling in the leadership position and role in which God has placed you.

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¹¹ See Romans 12:1-8; 1 Corinthians 12:1-11 and 27-31; Ephesians 4:7-12 and 1 Peter 4:9-11

¹² www.navigators.org

¹³ Acts 11:25-26

¹⁴ Acts 7:22

¹⁵ Exodus 2:14

¹⁶ Of the 12 disciples who became apostles, four wrote books – John wrote four, Peter wrote two, Matthew wrote one and James, John’s brother, wrote one.

CHAPTER 3

Everyone is Born to Lead

There is a common misunderstanding that some people are born to lead and others are born to follow. Some will even say, We can’t all lead. Though popular, this sentiment is wrong. Everyone is born to lead; I shall explain.

We need to understand the definition of leadership given by most experts. They all state leadership is influence. Paul Hersey and Kenneth H. Blanchard¹⁷, ¹⁸ define leadership as any attempt to influence the behaviour of an individual or group.

Howard Gardner¹⁹ espouses the same understanding in his brilliant book Leading Minds. Munroe²⁰ writes, Leadership is the ability to lead others by influence.

I fully concur with this definition.

The reason I argue everyone is born to lead is that we have influence, negative or positive. It is true while we exert influence, we may not realise we actually wield influence over others. Even those over whom we exercise influence may be following our example without realising it. As long as we exercise influence over some people and organisations or institutions, it means we are leading. What is important is that we must not be passive in this exercise of leadership. We must be deliberate about spreading our influence, especially if it is influence for good.

Our mistake is to think people who have influence are only those who influence millions or billions of people. It is true not everyone will have a large influence. What matters, though, is not the size of your influence, but the type. Even if you influence ten people or 20 or 100, you are a leader in their eyes.

John Wesley has and continues to influence millions, if not billions, of people. His hymn-writing brother Charles has also influenced millions of people. Charles is credited with 6500 hymns; this prolific amount of writing is mind-boggling. Yet, those two boys and their 17 other siblings were raised by their mother, Susanna Wesley, herself the last-born and the 25th child of her parents. She brought up all her 19 children, nine of whom died in infancy.

At one time during their childhood, Susanna’s husband Samuel deserted the family for more than one year, abandoning her to the task. She wrote:

I am a woman, but … also the mistress of a large family and though the superior charge of the souls contained in it lies upon you, yet in your long absence I cannot but look upon every soul you leave under my charge as a talent committed to me under a trust. I am not a man nor a minister, yet as a mother and a mistress I felt I ought to do more than I had yet done. I resolved to begin with my own children; in which I observe the following method: I take such a proportion of time as I can spare every night to discourse with each child apart. On Monday I talk with Molly, on Tuesday with Hetty, Wednesday with Nancy, Thursday with Jacky, Friday with Patty, Saturday with Charles.²¹

Her husband was arrested twice for his debts and spent time in jail. Susanna looked after the children. During his absence, she would assemble her children for Sunday afternoon family service. She would sing a psalm, read either her husband’s or her father’s sermon to the children, sing another psalm and pray to close the service. These services became so popular that neighbourhood residents requested to be there, and at one time, there were 200 people in attendance. These and many of the other things she accomplished left an indelible impression on her children. John, Charles and their siblings were greatly influenced by their mother. While she never influenced millions, through her children, she actually did.

Everyone influences some people;