by Stephan Joubert
Originally published in the Beeld daily.
A few years ago Bill George of the Harvard Business School conducted an ambitious study to try determine the characteristics of successful leaders.
After interviews with 125 top leaders, he was getting discouraged. No obvious characteristics stood out. Then he looked through his notes again, and suddenly a light went on when he noticed that all the leaders did have something in common — their shortcomings!
Everyone admitted that the failed somewhere due to big egos, mistakes or their folly to listen to advice. They needed to learn how to put the pride in their pockets and to be honest about their weaknesses. And to learn from their setbacks.
Honesty about your inabilities and weaknesses is not only a modern challenge.
Even the apostle Paul one day needed to get honest about this. In 2 Corinthians he tells a few times of his own weaknesses. This he does while visiting preachers in Corinth brag about their latest revelations, spiritual breakthroughs and successes.
Paul tells that he is sometimes embarrassed about advice. Often he is thrown down on the ground and trampled. Persecution, ridicule, misconception, and suffering is his fate. Three times Paul prayed that the Lord removed this thorn of weakness from his flesh.
Then he had to hear that God’s grace is enough for him.
God’s power works through weak human containers. Paul needed to learn that he is not an consumer or showcase of God’s power. He is only a conductor thereof. He also needed to discover that himself didn’t need more power, but grace.
Human weaknesses are Divine opportunities!
Effective spiritual leaders also never hide their weaknesses.
No, their vulnerability is not all of a sudden a new spiritual virtue. And it’s definitely not a loophole for deliberate sin. Or an excuse for mediocrity. Honesty, like that of Paul, is a deep realization by followers of Christ that they aren’t the “big” answer. Or that they “know” in every situation. They are breakable containers that continually need heavenly grace.
Without consciousness of their own weaknesses and inabilities leaders and other believers become ensnared in their own egos. Then they like polishing their own image much like Christian celebrities. They are like the emperor in Hans Christian Anderson’s fairytale who thought he was wearing invisible clothes that two tailors apparently made for him. His subjects stayed silent out of fear. And then a child spoke the truth out loud: “The emperor is naked!”
When leaders become forgetful about their so-called image, importance, role, abilities, or influence, they are dressed correctly for the Lord’s service. God can only fill empty containers. He can use people who aren’t continually protecting their own interests or fighting for positions or recognition.
The well-known preacher D.L. Moody was an unpretentious, but useful spiritual leader. One night before a performance in Indianapolis he asked singer Ira Sankey to start singing on a street corner. Soon a huge crowd gathered and Moody invited them to an auditorium where he was speaking later.
Shortly before the program started, he told the crowd: “Now we must close as the brethren of the convention wish to come and discuss the question: ‘How to reach the masses!’”
Useful instruments for God don’t take themselves too seriously. Still, they are dead serious about God. They are spontaneous, yet effective conductors of his power to those who are experiencing heavenly power outages. And God’s grace is more than enough for them. They aren’t walking around naked!