What does it look like to lead like a child of God? How can we lead or manage organisations healthily and well? What could change? What would look and be done differently?
A fact of leadership is this: how we see ourselves affects how we live; and how we live affects how we lead others. This is true both in the positive and negative. Important questions to ask ourselves include a healthy dose of self-assessment: Have I been living outside of being a child of God? Am I strong in the truth of who I am to Him? Am I living fully as I’ve been created to? Does the truth of what He says influence me more than any other voice, including my own?
When we experience the love of the Father, it changes us and we live differently. We live fully and freely. The way we lead will then make a great impact.
In John 14, Jesus says that his disciples will go on to do ‘..greater works..’ These are words of a son; a confident son secure in himself. A son who wants the next generation to go higher, deeper and further than He did. Do we want that for others? Are we leading healthily out of the heart of being a son/daughter? Are we mindful of the next generation? Do we want even greater things for them?
When we are confident in who we are, and when we have the encounters of knowing who we are, we begin to truly want these ‘greater works’ to be true for people. We lead differently. We lead with eternity in mind, with the excitement of what we are building and with greater vision and mission. We lead with the hopes of building bigger – even if it isn’t us who do it.
We understand that if God gets glorified, we get glorified. Leading an organisation out of the place of being a healthy son/daughter is the place where a bridge between the past and the future is created. Joshua was the bridge of what Moses carried to the promised land. He was influenced by Moses leadership – he hung around the Tent of Meeting as Moses spoke with God, hungry for the Presence – but he was different to Moses, and did things Moses could never have done in the natural. In the same way, Jesus is the ultimate bridge between the New and Old Testament, bringing both covering and a platform for his followers. We need to be a healthy bridge for this generation and the generations to come to go places we only dreamt of.
We miss out on things when we live outside of being a son or daughter – like an orphan. Orphans are primarily self-interested and look after themselves. They help others who help their agenda and survival. That isn’t kingdom, because that isn’t the mindset that Christ lived with. But there is good news. We can change – we can repent – from this way of thinking. Repentance from this orphan mindset will bring so much freedom and so much beauty; not only to ourselves but also to the others that we lead.
Jesus says to Peter, ‘..who do you say I am?’ Who God is to you will be how He is demonstrated through you. Is God your Father, committed to your well-being, success, prosperity and increase? If He is, your people will know it – and be transformed.
