Episode Seven

Essential Qualities for a Servant-Leader

In Episode Six of this series on leadership entitled LEAD the WAY, I talked about the biblical survey of Leadership, and the three roles and tasks of a servant leader. In this Episode Seven, I will talk about the first of three metaphor of a leader as a servant, the essential Qualities for a Servant-Leader, his tasks, and some examples of servant-leadership. Let us begin.

Essential Qualities for a Servant-Leader

The first essential quality for a servant-leader is a close, intimate relationship with God. Moses was the greatest servant-leader in the Old Testament. Jesus, of course, is the greatest servant leader of all time. Both had a vital, intimate relationship with God. God spoke to Moses face-to-face, as a man speaks to his friend (Exod. 33:11). He spoke to him in person, plainly and obscurely. Moses not only heard the Lord, he saw his very likeness (Num. 12:8). In Exod. 33:12–34:11, we gain some insights into Moses’ relationship with God. No man can be a servant-leader without having insight into his Master’s attributes, perceiving his ways, understanding his will, and clearly hearing his Word. Such insight demands a face-to-face relationship with God, as a man has with his friend.

Seeking and communing with God will develop knowledge of him and his ways and transform people to be more like him: “And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit” (2 Cor. 3:18). God’s servant ought to reflect his divine will and way, reflecting truth and godliness. New Testament requisites for leadership put the prime emphasis on godly character.

The Bible listed twenty-eight qualifications for leadership in the church (Titus 1:5–9; 1 Tim. 3:1–7; 1 Pet. 5:1–4). Three of the qualifications concern ability: being able to teach God’s word for effective and godly living, being able to refute objections to the truth, and being able to manage his own family. The remaining twenty-five relate to godly character.

The second essential quality for a servant-leader is obedience. One cannot be a true servant and disobey his Master. Obedience is of utmost importance to servant-leaders. With it they succeed; without it, they fail. When God commissioned Joshua to lead the Israelites to the Promised Land, the key to his success was obedience (Josh. 1:6–9). To obey, Joshua needed to first be strong, which is the power to act, to step out on the commands of God, taking the initiative to obey without hesitation and delay. Second, Joshua needed to be courageous, which is the mental discipline to endure. Obedience requires discipline and perseverance. Finally, Joshua needed to meditate on God’s specific commands with the intent of applying them to his life and leadership.

The third essential quality for a servant-leader is humility before God and man. In forgoing his rights and giving it away for the sake of others, Jesus taught that biblical leadership is outward-focused, grounded in love and obedience for God, which inevitably results in serving others for the sake of God. Lawrence O. Richards and Clyde Hoeldtke asserted that in the kingdom of Jesus and in the fellowship of his church, leaders are servants who humbly lower their dignity to adopt a servant’s posture in leading the church. Christian leaders’ act of service to people are motivated and directed by God. In the foot-washing episode, Jesus taught the disciples that the understanding and standard of biblical leadership is in contrast to the world. He spoke out against the misuse of one’s authority, a practice prevalent in Jesus’ time as well as today. Jesus spoke out against the distorted view of leadership, not authority itself. Jesus had the justifiable reason to exalt himself but he did not. To stoop to wash his disciples' feet calls for humility, not exaltation. Engstrom asserts that true greatness, true leadership, is achieved in selfless service to others.

A biblical leader is a servant of God before he is a servant of people. Serving people can be easily confused with pleasing people, because the assessment of the effectiveness of service is based on people’s response rather than God’s response. We should serve people to please God. Service in the world accords recognition or remuneration from man. The motivation for service in the Christian ministry is to please God. Paul pointed out that a true servant of Jesus seeks the pleasure and approval of God: “Am I now trying to win the approval of human beings, or of God? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ” (Gal. 1:10).

Jesus epitomizes what it means to be a servant-leader. He adopted an attitude of servanthood. He did not abdicate the leadership characteristics of influence, authority, and power. In Mark 1:16–20, Jesus exemplified strong convictions, a sense of urgency, and a certainty of the importance of the divinely assigned task, decisively calling men to follow him. First, Jesus exercised the influence needed to cause these men to immediately respond, forsake everything with wholehearted abandon, and follow Christ and his call to “catch men.” Next, Jesus exercised authority in the way he handled the Word of God (Mark 1:21, 22). Jesus’ teaching struck the listeners who saw the message lived out in the messenger, seeing the truth of God’s Word fleshed out in one who serves the Almighty. This authority influenced minds, consciences, and wills, bringing conviction to the listeners.

Finally, Jesus wielded his power over the spiritual realms. Jesus has the hosts of Satan under his absolute power at all times. He can command them against their will and they must obey. A servant of God can rightly claim the influence, authority, and power on the basis of Jesus’ assurance that his followers will do greater things (John 14:12).

A Servant-Leader’s Task

A servant-leader’s task is to clarify God-given vision. God calls a person into service to carry out his divine plans and purposes. To know God’s will and surrender to it is indispensable for Christian leaders. It does not end there. A leader is supposed to lead people onto God’s agenda. Blackaby and Blackaby asserted that a spiritual leader has not led unless people have shifted to God’s agenda. Leaders must take seriously the weighty responsibility of learning to hear God before they can hope to equip others to do so.

A servant-leader provides clarity in the areas of direction, definition, and deliverables. Such a servant-leader walks closely in trust and obedience to God’s leading, as in the pillar of cloud and fire in the Old Testament and the Holy Spirit in the New Testament. God leads through such a leader. Thus, the church looks for direction through its leader.

Every church is unique in its Missio Dei. No church should follow another blindly, becoming a copy-cat church. The leader provides clarity in direction, pointing and leading the church onto the path divinely designated to it in its particular culture, community, and context. In the area of definition, a plethora of ideas and strategies abound in the church today. This excess creates confusion and competition among the members if there is no common understanding and agreement. The situation is compounded by the churches’ propensity to acquiesce to the loudest and most forceful voice.

The leader provides clarity in defining roles, responsibilities, philosophy, and practices, taking into consideration the church’s vision, mission, and core values. In the areas of deliverables, Christian leaders talk about what their churches are trying to accomplish, but many failed to connect the vision with specific goals or find a way to evaluate progress. Mike Bonem cautioned that simple metrics are great for communicating overall success and inspiring an organization but may not point leaders to specific problems or opportunities for improvement. Metrics require clarity on direction, definition, and deliverables.

No set of metrics will provide the full picture of a congregation but if the measurement system offers a more complete and accurate look and helps leaders make decisions it will have served a powerful purpose: “If you don’t have any ways to measure your outcome, then you are using intuition and rules of thumb, and you are prone to ego, biases, and group think.”

Examples of Servant-Leaders in the Bible

The Bible explicitly named several men as servants of God, such as Ezra (5:11), Abraham, Isaac, Jacob (Exod. 32:13), Joshua (Judges 2:8), Job (1:8; 2:3), Eliakim (Isa. 22:20), Zerubbabel (Hag. 2:23), Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego (Dan. 2:23), Paul (Tit. 1:1), and James (1:1).

In this Episode Seven, I talked about the about the Essential Qualities for a Servant-Leader, his tasks, and some examples of servant-leadership. To help us review what we have heard from this podcast, I invite you to reflect on the following questions. Please join me for Episode Eight, which I will talk about the Essential Qualities for a Shepherd-Leader, his tasks, and some examples of shepherd-leadership.

Good-bye, and have a great day!

Discussion Questions

1. What are some of the attributes pf a servant-leader?

2. Who is your favorite leader in the Bible?

3. Do you agree that Jesus is the greatest example of a servant leader? at is the primary role of a servant-leader?