"The Fall of the House of Saul" - The Test of True Leadership (page 12 of 17)

The Test of True Leadership

There is one big acid test, which puts you in danger of losing things precious to you, even people whom you love. It is certainly the enemy attacking you – God isn't doing it. However, God does allow it up to a point and for a season for His own reasons.

David always typifies Christ as King and Shepherd. For instance, when Saul's sons remained loyal to their father instead of to David, that is a type of what Jesus said in Matthew 10:37:

"He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me".

However, notice that David suffered the same things his people suffered. In the same way there is nothing that we go through which Jesus, our Leader, has not already gone through. The characteristic of a godly leader: he suffers the same loss as his people. Look out for someone who stands up in a pulpit to tell you how to be spiritual with his mouth while his own life is not showing you how. Talk is cheap. Biblical leadership is always by example. This may affect different people in different ways: for me, certainly the demands of interim periods of family separation due to my being an itinerant minister have been a test. It is not easy to be away from my wife for weeks at a time. I've never had an affair, but you know what? There was a time, too, when Jim Bakker never had an affair. It only takes once; how does one stand up?

David lost things and people whom he loved for a short period and then he got them back. The test will come to different people in different forms. But God's future leaders will have been so tested in everything that everyone will know that they'll be able to stand up. God already knows who can and can't stand up – when He lets us be tested, it isn't for His own benefit, so that He can find out our strength. He wants us to know ourselves, and He wants the Body at large to know. Remember that His Word says, “Let the leaders first be tested:.(1 Ti. 3:10) We're told to look at leaders' family lives and similar things, yet today the church has leaders who get divorced and remarried. This is a sick thing.

So yes, the trial and testing is the enemy's doing, yet because God allows it you will know that you can stand. You will have a confidence you would not otherwise gain. Now, of course you must trust in the Lord and not in yourself –

“Let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall”.(1 Cor. 10:12)

-- but when you've been tested, you know you have kept your eyes on the Lord and are capable of keeping them there. He who is able to keep you from falling will do so; you know this because you've been so tested, and the Body of Christ also knows it. That is a leader whom God's people will follow. When things get tough, that is the kind of person whom others will look to. People want to identify with others who are stronger than themselves. For all of us, of course, that would be Jesus; so when you see a leader, don't look at him. Rather, look at the work of God in his life. That is the source of his strength and in a crisis someone who has been sorely tested and has passed the test is the sort of person who will be trusted. The last thing anyone wants in a medical emergency is an indecisive physician. You want someone experienced, who knows exactly what's happening and how to deal with it. The same applies for a leader in the church. David suffered the same loss as his people.

Then, look at this: those people, his people, talked about stoning him. You want to be a leader? How do you know when you are a leader? You know you're a leader when 2 Timothy 4:16-17 applies to you. When you are betrayed and stabbed in the back by the very people you gave your life and your guts for, yet you avoid becoming embittered or resentful. When things get tough, the people blame the leaders. What did the people say to Moses in the wilderness – “Why did you bring us out here to die?” (Nu. 16:13) What did the disciples say to Jesus in the boat – “Why did you bring us out here to drown?” (Mt. 8:25) And here we see what they say and do to David – “We followed you, and now look what happened to us, we've lost our families.” They turn on the leader. Family is where people are the most vulnerable: when marriage and children are at stake, that is when someone's faith will be tested the most, and it is very, very hard.

Return to the Previous Page • Continue to the Next Page

This is Page 12 of 17