TAK Article: Servant Leadership
Over the past year God has been teaching me a lot about being a servant. He has been doing this through the books I read, the relationships I am committed to, and especially when I take the time to listen and hear His voice.
Perhaps I can pass something of that along!
Servant Leadership
The first time I heard of “servant leadership” was at a team training week preparing our team of young people to lead youth groups on missions trips over the course of the summer. We were mostly familiar with each other and our two-weeks of training were broken up with teachings in the morning, workshops where we created a program for the Summer in the afternoon, followed by times to hang out and have fun in the evenings. That morning our base leader came to teach us about values, servant leadership, and conflict resolution.
He opened up his Bible and told us to turn to John 13: 3-10.
‘Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God; so he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist. After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him.
He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, are you going to wash my feet?”
Jesus replied, “You do not realize now what I am doing, but later you will understand.”
“No,” said Peter, “you shall never wash my feet.”
Jesus answered, “Unless I wash you, you have no part with me.”
“Then, Lord,” Simon Peter replied, “not just my feet but my hands and my head as well!”
Jesus answered, “Those who have had a bath need only to wash their feet; their whole body is clean. And you are clean, though not every one of you.” For he knew who was going to betray him, and that was why he said not every one was clean.’ – NIV
My take away from that morning was that if I wanted to lead people then I would need to serve them too. However, it took me several more years (plus my future wife and our son) to learn the greater part of what Jesus was talking about.
Servant Leadership in Practice
What I missed that summer morning was the very nature of leadership that God desires for us. Mark 9:35 says this, “If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.”
At that point in time, and for several years after that, I operated out of the idea that those who were the leaders had the authority to tell others what to do. As a follower, it was my job to do exactly what my leader told me to do and I wasn’t responsible for anything more than that.
This was the point of view that I took when I listened to people talk about leadership, read stories from the Bible about leadership, and did my best to practice leadership. In many ways, this was my paradigm – the way I filtered the world around me. I could recite a lot of stories from the Bible where God and others leaders used this model, but even when that was not the case I would have still perceived it to be true because this was the paradigm that I understood leadership from.
During my time in the Netherlands, in the spring of 2012, I started reading You see bones, I see an army, by Floyd McClung.
In that book Floyd McClung talked about leadership in a way that I had never heard before, nor would I have understood prior. It was this, to serve is to lead. Leadership does not come through training, degrees, titles, positions or power over others – it comes by being a servant to the people around you and building influence through that.
He used the same verses of the Bible that I had always read and heard, but now they made a lot more sense!
Shortly thereafter, as I remember it, I spent some time asking God about this. Is this why Jesus has influence in the world today? Is this what His kingdom is built upon?
In my heart I felt a resounding yes, the only reason that Jesus, God with us, has influence in the lives of people today is because He came to us as a servant. He didn’t use His position in heaven to force things to happen in the earth, but He gave Himself to us – He served us.
Applying Servant Leadership
Just recently I also read The Servant, by James C. Hunter.
I found that this book brought a lot of the challenges of servant leadership together and then practically worked them out.
The book follows the story of an educated businessman and several others as they learn about what it means to be a leader. In the beginning of the book almost everyone thinks that it is their job is to serve the people above them and control the people below them, but then as the book progresses they find that their ultimate goal is to serve the people that they are leading.
I highly recommend the book to anybody!
One of the principles shared in this book was that in order to lead people you needed to choose to love them through meeting their needs – not to feel warmly about them, but to actually act in their best interest. The book goes on to say that character traits we find most valuable in a leader are what you would call this sort of action oriented love.
The attributes listed were taken from 1 Corinthians 13: 4-7.
‘Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.’ – NIV
As stated in the book, love is: patient, kind, humble, respectful, selfless, forgiving, honest, and committed. This sort of love requires action!
Committing to Lead as a Servant
As a I write this my wife and are still in our first year and a half of marriage, we already have an eight-month old son, and we haven’t had a really solid place to live during any of that time. God has been unbelievably faithful during this time, but this has also been the time when He’s chosen to hammer out my commitment to lead like Him the most.
Towards my wife… I’ve always known that the Bible says to love her and even to lead her (which could seem like a rather intimidating task in itself), but it didn’t make sense before God really started revealing this idea of being a servant. Yes, I should love her like Christ loves the church and control her too? No, that’s not the message, God calls me to love her and lead her – to serve her, to make it possible for her to become even more of the woman God created her to become! Now, that’s something that I can be excited about!
Towards my son… well, in the months right after he was born it was really difficult to serve him with all my heart. A lot of the time my actions were driven by guilt or fear of becoming a bad father to him. Instead of this, God’s call for me is to serve my son – to build a strong relationship with him so that he may know what it is like to have a strong relationship with our Father too!
Towards others… as I am learning it, the most effective way for us to show God’s love to other people is to love them through our actions. Is that really leadership? Yes, it is leadership – if people do not see God’s love for them through you they will not follow you to Jesus.
That, as the realization of it hits my heart, is the greatest challenge of leading as a servant! Are we willing to serve others just like Jesus has served us?
The Challenge of Servant Leadership
Jesus shared a lot of stories about being a servant to those around us. He certainly went to the point of death for us and even further!
That is the last point that I will share – it is not spoken by Jesus when He was walking the earth, but after He rose from the dead and took His seat next to His Father. This is what others came to understand and applied to their lives. Perhaps you would consider it in your life too?
Philippians 2: 1-11.
‘Therefore if there is any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and mercy, fulfill my joy by being like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others.
Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.’ – NKJV
May Christ be with you!
In Christ,
The Abiding Kingdom
The Abiding Kingdom 