Question: What are characteristics of godly leadership and influence?

Follow-on Question: Ever had the experience of growing impatient and/or being tempted to resent people you are leading?

Likely Answer: Sure, we all have. Or surely, many at least have. I have certainly experienced it in church ministry. My wife loves for me to share the story of when I was a full-time civilian pastor at a rural church. I had been there a year or two, and I was teaching on the Law of God. I had taught through Job, through Mark, through James, Galatians, etc. but I was now trying to focus on the Law of God as revealed in the Pentateuch. Pretty basic stuff, I thought: Christianity 101. Well, I was teaching one night in church in an informal study and I asked the question: When we understand the Law of God, what ought to be our response? In other words, what is the overriding purpose of the Law?

I paused for responses from the congregation. I didn’t have to wait long. A lady shot up her hand and spoke quickly, “Well, Brother Jon, I’ve kept the Ten Commandments.” I am sure I would not have been surprised at that moment to have seen a little green Martian come rip my liver from my body, tap dance in the chancel, and then high-five Lucifer as they both boarded the Enterprise 666 back to their regions; that’s how shocked I was at what this woman had said. She had actually professed that she had no need of forgiveness, that she was not a sinner, was not a debtor to grace, and that, doggone it, she was a pretty good person.

Listen, folks: I have had a lot of theological education; I have read shelves and shelves of theological books; I have heard and preached more sermons than I care to admit. But there are some moments in ministry where you think: Lord, help me not to laugh in this woman’s face, but to be gracious.

So, I did my best. I looked at her and said as kindly as I could, “I understand what you have said, but according to God himself, no one has kept the Law except Christ alone. That is why the Father says, ‘Behold, this is my beloved Son with whom I am well pleased’ (Mt 3:17), and again as Jesus nears the cross, the Father speaks of Christ only when he says, ‘I have glorified it [God’s name], and I will glorify it again’ (Jn 12:28). The evidence is consistent: Only Christ kept the Law. That’s why we look to Christ alone, by faith alone, by grace alone. That’s the whole point of Ephesians 2:8-9. Sinners will boast if they don’t understand themselves to be prideful sinners.”

1 John 1:8-10 ran through my head like a scroll: “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not is us” and then John writes, “If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us” (v. 10).

But the woman crossed her arms and looked at me as if I was a real meanie. Yes, there are some lessons in ministry that seminary and books don’t equip you for, things like pride-filled women on a Wednesday night Bible study who say aloud that they really view themselves as quite righteous, thank you very much.

Encouragement: If you are a leader, you will encounter folks that resist you and resist the truth. But God ordains these moments to strengthen you, to shape you, to teach you how patient God has been with us. Resentment is not the right response of the good leader. Rather, he is to “endure suffering” (2 Tim 4:5), fight the good fight (2 Tim 4:7) and entrust himself to God who always does what is just (Gen 18:25; 1 Pt 4:19).