“For that the leaders took
the lead... bless the Lord” (Judges 5:2).
While
there are few things fraught with more difficulties,
perils and involvements than leadership, there are few
things more vital and necessary. The fact of leadership
needs no argument. It is in the very nature of things.
Every situation that arises of a serious and critical
nature either finds its salvation by the spontaneous
forthcoming of the spirit of leadership in someone, or
becomes a disaster for want of it. When an emergency
arises, people are either paralysed and helpless because
there is no one to give a lead, or are galvanized into
action or confidence by the right kind of leadership.
But
not only in emergencies does this factor show its
importance. Both in any enterprise, mission, and service,
and in any realm of responsibility, this — which is
an elemental principle — invariably shows itself. We
have much to say about its nature, its sphere, and its
purpose, but first of all it is necessary that we should
recognize and accept that leadership is a fact in the
very constitution of life and purpose. It has been so
from the beginning, and in principle (if not in
form) has operated in every realm, not least in the
church.
In its
right place, sphere, nature, and relationship it is a must.
Only chaos, confusion and frustration can obtain where
there is no spirit of leadership. Indeed, even where
there may be a pretending to the contrary, it will be
there somewhere if things are not completely stagnant or
running to seed.
We
have known it to be said that leadership is an Old
Testament feature, but not in the New Testament. It has
also been said or contended, that, while leadership may
obtain in the wider work and enterprise of the church
universal, it has no place or right in the local church.
Many will find it hard to understand such arguments, and
it is a pity that time and space should have to be taken
to take notice of such objections, but there they are,
and no dealing with the matter of leadership would be
sound until such contentions were dealt with. Those
contentions are based upon what is believed to be the
essential corporate nature of leadership or
responsibility in the local church. It is argued, and
with truth, that there is one Head only over the church;
that the Holy Spirit is the immediate Custodian of that
headship; that the plurality of elders in the New
Testament churches is the law by which all autocracy and
personal leadership is ruled out and the leadership of
the Holy Spirit in relationship to the headship of Christ
alone is preserved. All this is quite true and right, and
God forbid that the outworking of anything that we may
say should violate those sacred laws.
With
all the desire and intention in the world to safeguard
the unique and sole rights of Christ and the Holy Spirit
in the church, we still believe that there is an
essential place for, and need of, subject and subordinate
(to the Lord) leadership. Moreover, this, we believe, not
to be out of order, but in the divine order.
The
place and function of the shepherd in the Bible is to
“go before”, and the sheep “follow
after”. The Lord is truly the Chief Shepherd, but
there are shepherds in the churches, and they have to
lead. While James, John and Timothy were apostles of the
churches, they were recognized as having particular
responsibility in a local church. If this can be proved
to be true in any case, it must be accepted as: (1)
expressing a certain personal leadership, and (2) not
necessarily violating either the headship of Christ, the
sovereignty of the Holy Spirit, or the corporate nature
of local responsibility. To argue otherwise is to say
that it is impossible to have a corporate body of
responsible men who recognize anointing for leadership
amongst themselves, and to honour such, while not being
under autocratic oppression.
When
we have said that, we feel sure that the full answer will
be reached as we open out this matter to its greater
range. To say that leadership may rightly be recognized
in the church universal but that it must on no account be
found in the church local is surely to say that the local
church is in this respect separate and different from the
Body of Christ as a whole. If the Body as a whole has
personal leaders in it legitimately without violating the
principle of Christ’s unique headship, must
it be that the spirit of leadership resting upon an
individual in the local church of necessity violates that
principle? While we most strongly contend against
autocracy, we as strongly contend that leadership even
amongst responsible brethren is right, provided always
that it is evidently anointed leadership and of the kind
that is approved of God.
Because
we are going to learn much from Old Testament examples in
these chapters, it is necessary to point out another fact
in view of an aforementioned objection.
In the
Old Testament everything is on a temporal, earthly, and
material basis. Leadership was therefore in such a
context. But it is of the very essence of Biblical
interpretation that nothing was the sum and end in
itself. The wood, gold, silver, fabrics, etc., etc., of
the tabernacle did not begin and end with themselves.
They represented, and, in a way, embodied spiritual,
heavenly, and eternal features, characteristics, and
principles. This is true of everything divinely
instituted in the Old Testament. The same was true of the
“works”, “signs”, and miracles of
Christ. So it was with Old Testament leaders.
With
the New Testament, after Christ’s ascension, the
forms, means, and connections change, but the spiritual
principles remain. The apostles are the Joshuas, Gideons,
Nehemiahs, etc. of the new dispensation, but their realm,
function, and purpose is spiritual, not temporal. They
are undoubtedly spiritual leaders, and their spiritual
leadership could function in a local church even for
years. This was complementary, and did no violence to any
spiritual principle. It would be only creating an
artificial technique to put these things into watertight
compartments, and say, this and that must not be. The New
Testament knows of no such legal or artificial position.
Fellowship is the answer to most of the difficulties.
From
there we are led to look at the matter of leadership in
other general ways before we seek to learn from
examples.
As is
always the case the positive is revealed in its
importance by the opposition which it encounters. We have
only to consider the leadership function of such
as Adam, Moses, Joshua, Gideon, Nehemiah, Paul, and a
hundred others to understand the intense and many-sided
antagonism levelled at them. Of course, the Lord Jesus as
“the captain of our salvation”, i.e. “the
file-leader”, is the supreme instance. Break,
defeat, beguile, seduce the leader and the battle is won,
the forces are helpless. The focus of adverse attention
upon leadership is its own testimony to its importance.
Then,
in approaching the question of what leadership is, we
must say something of what it is not.
Leadership
(in the work of God) is not firstly on natural
grounds. It is not, in the first place, a matter of
personality, natural ability, assertiveness, enthusiasm,
assumption, strength of mind or will. A blusterer is not
a leader. A leader in God’s work is not made
or trained in the schools or academies. That may be so in
the world’s work, but we are dealing with spiritual
leadership. Many natural things, inherited or acquired,
may or may not be helpful subsequently, but God’s
leaders are not essential leaders because of certain
natural qualifications. Whatever may or may not be true
in the natural realm, the fact is that God’s leaders
are chosen by Him. They, and others, may always have many
questions as to why but that fact governs. God
only knows why! When God does it men have either to take
account of it and accept it, or in repudiating it to be
out of divine approval. This is very true to the Bible,
as we shall see.
What
we have just said does not imply that there are no
qualities in leaders. They go to school with God, and in
a hard school the kind of qualities required by God are
inculcated. Another general thing about leaders chosen by
God is that they, while being very human, are, in
many respects, a class by themselves. They are pioneers,
and pioneers are lonely people in more respects than one.
In some ways they are difficult people. Their standard
and measure has to be ahead of others, and as human
nature generally likes not to be disturbed, but would
seek the easy way, the pioneer is often a bit too much
for people. He is restless, never satisfied, always
pressing and urging forward. The keynote of his life is
“Let us go on”. His is not the easy way, and
because human nature does want the easy way, the leader
is not always popular. The whole nature of man is either
downward or to a quiet and happy mean and snugness. The
pioneer is therefore not always appreciated, but often
very much otherwise. He is so much contrary to this
mediocre gravitation. A part of the price of leadership
is loneliness.
Leadership
is a divine imperative. In the work of God, true
leadership is not by the choice or desire of those
concerned. Very often it is against their inclination or
desire especially when they have been in God’s
“school of discipline”. Indeed, the man who
wants to be a leader, who forces himself into that
position, who assumes it, and who would not rather
be saved from it, will most likely be a menace. It will
be clear to all that it is more the man than the Lord.
His leadership — such as it is — will be
forced, artificial, and lacking in unction. The
God-chosen leader is a “cannot” man in two
ways. Firstly, like Moses and Jeremiah, he will genuinely
feel and confess, “I cannot”. But on the
other hand, he will know that he cannot do otherwise, it
is a divine compulsion, a fire in his bones, an urge and
energy not of himself. While he is on his job he may give
the impression of personal strength, perhaps of
efficiency, or even self-assurance, but he and God know
the depth of his secret history, the overwhelming
consciousness of need and dependence, the awareness of
limitation, and the desolating realization of failure and
weakness. Leaders know deeper depths than any others and
their battle with self-despair is more acute. Yet it is a
part of their leadership and responsibility that they
hide their own personal sufferings and sorrows. Like
Ezekiel and Hosea they have to anoint their face and in
the hour of deepest sorrow, go before the people “as
at other times”. The troubles must not get into
their voice or manner. If they do, their influence has
gone, for, if people are going on to the greater
fulnesses of Christ, the supreme virtue is courage, and
it is this that a leader must inspire. His boldest
times before men may be his times of deepest suffering
before God. Leaders know that they are involved in the
“impossible”, but — in spite of themselves
— they are committed, and for them compromise is
unthinkable.
While
writing this I have come on The Making of a Pioneer,
by the Misses Cable and French, and in it these lines
occur in reference to the pioneer.
“They
are not an easygoing class of people and are subject to
an inarticulate urge, the impact of a driving-force
pushing them forward to further effort and carrying
them into what other men call ‘impossible
situations’. ‘Appointed to pioneer work’
is an expression which is a travesty of the true case,
for no man can be called a ‘pioneer’ until he
has proved himself to be one. The... pioneer is heaven
ordained, not man appointed.”
In
this introduction to this great matter, let us just add
this, that it is in the very nature of true spiritual
leadership that the leader has to have in his own being through
experience that to which he seeks to lead others. He
has gone the way before. He has tasted what he calls
others to taste. He is no book leader; what he says to
others and urges them toward comes out of his own life at
great cost. The artificial “leader” can say the
most extravagant things, can give all the theory and
assume all the mannerisms, and he gets away with it and
knows little or nothing of the real heartbreak. “The
husbandman that laboureth must be the first to partake of
the fruits” said Paul, but while this may apply to
the reward of labour, it may also apply to the cost.
When
we have said all as to that special class of
pioneer-leaders in spiritual things, we must point out
that, even if we cannot count ourselves among them, you
and I should be leaders in the sense that we inspire and
are an incentive to others to “go on” with the
Lord. While “followers”, there are always
others who can be influenced by us, and, as we shall see
in one particular Bible instance, the very essence of
leadership is inspiration. May we all be leaders in this
sense.