There are a lot of great thinkers and writers in the world…especially in the Christian world. When I read something that is noteworthy or that resonates in my spirit, I like to share it with you. Stephen Mansfield is a New York Times best selling author. He is a pastor, an historian, and an expert on leadership development. I want to quote from a recent piece he wrote in his blog Leading Thoughts.
Stephen wrote, “One of my favorite words is ‘legendary.’ Today it means merely something that is famous enough to be celebrated in our time. Yet it comes from the Middle Latin word that meant something worthy to be written down and remembered for generations. I love that idea. Lives and deeds that are worthy to be written down and remembered. People who live in such a way that they inspire generations. Frankly, I want to live like that. I want you to as well.
A great leader is meant to inspire greatness in others. He or she is in place to awaken largeness and nobility and an epic vision in the souls of people … Yet I have to tell you that many leaders wrap themselves in the aura of the legendary. This, I’m sorry to say, is particularly true among people in Christian ministry. They have some challenges. They achieve some victories. Good things come of it. Then, unfortunately, their vision shifts from making others legendary to presenting themselves as legends to be honored … Here is the core truth. You might be a legend one day. I hope you will be. I’m here to help. Yet don’t become legendary by assuming that you are and presenting yourself as such. You become legendary by enabling other people, empowering them to rise to the greatness possible in their own lives.”
For those of us in leadership or that aspire to leadership, I think this a great reminder of a core biblical truth. Jesus taught his disciples, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave— just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
Many ministries that have begun to bear great fruit have been damaged by leaders within the ministry that begin to use the ministry as a platform for their own significance. The old healing evangelists of the early 1900’s had a term for it. They said, “Don’t touch the glory.” What they meant was to never take credit for what God is doing. Give him the glory rather than yourself. Historically, those who forgot that maxim ended poorly or even tragically. Spiritual pride is not a quality of Christ, but of Satan. It was spiritual pride that caused Satan to lose his place in heaven. We need to guard against that quality springing up in our own hearts or in the hearts of others that lead with us.
Pastors, especially, have been given to the church in order to equip others for service in the kingdom. The Passion Translation puts it this way, “He has appointed some with grace to be apostles, and some with grace to be prophets, and some with grace to be evangelists, and some with grace to be pastors, and some with grace to be teachers. And their calling is to nurture and prepare all the holy believers to do their own works of ministry, and as they do they will enlarge and build up the body of Christ” (Eph. 4:11-12).
As leaders, we are to equip others for the good works prepared in advance for them. We are to launch them into fruitful ministries of their own with a vision for achieving great things in the kingdom of God. If the ministry is about our significance, we can never let others accomplish more than ourselves because, then, our significance would be diminished. If we seek the applause of men, we will find ways to limit what others do who serve in our ministries so they cannot outshine us. If we seek the applause of heaven, however, we will launch as many as we can who will be even more effective in ministry than we have been. We will encourage and launch them to develop greater gifts than we have known personally.
In talking to pastors in other churches, it seems that ministries in which “miraculous gifts” are up front, are very susceptible to spiritual pride. Like the miracles of Jesus, these ministries tend to draw a crowd and may get more notoriety than most other ministries in the church.. Gifted but immature believers looking for significance in the church are often drawn to these areas and want to “shine” in the eyes of others. If not mentored well, they may grow into leaders who want to be legendary in their own eyes and in the eyes of men rather than heaven.
I have had conversations in which senior pastors did not want a healing or deliverance ministry in their church because of an experience in the past with such a ministry in which the leaders felt spiritually superior to those who didn’t operate in “the gifts” or engage in spiritual warfare. The self-assigned legendary status of some leaders created divisions in the church. These senior pastors had no desire to go down that road again.
All this is to say that we truly need to guard our hearts and the hearts of others who serve with us so that our true desire is to develop and promote others far beyond ourselves. Jesus humbled himself so that we might be lifted up. If we will do the same, God will bless our ministries and our leadership…and our “legends” may grow in heaven.