Spiritual Gift of Leadership

To lead is to “to go before or with to show the way.” As a leader, your job is to go before those whom you are leading, to show them how to do whatever it is you want them to do. If you are a worship leader, your job is not strictly to manage your team, but to go before them and show them how to worship.

According to 1 Tim 3, a leader (or overseer) “must be above reproach, the husband of but one wife, temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not given to drunkenness, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. He must manage his own family well and see that his children obey him with proper respect. (If anyone does not know how to manage his own family, how can he take care of God’s church?) He must not be a recent convert, or he may become conceited and fall under the same judgment as the devil. He must also have a good reputation with outsiders, so that he will not fall into disgrace and into the devil’s trap” (vv. 2-7).

Most people take this passage to be talking about the elders of the church, but anyone who is leading, is overseeing a ministry, no matter how small. That person, Paul writes, must live righteous lives. This doesn’t mean that they never sin, but that as they sin, they are repentant. I would even add that the leader has a heightened desire for righteousness. He also must be able to teach. This does not necessarily mean that they must teach the Bible, but that they can teach others to do what they are leading them to do. The worship leader cannot be without words to teach those he is leading to worship. The leader must also have experience as a Christian and have a good reputation with people inside and outside of the church.

Where this passage provides ‘musts’ for becoming a leader, it is also the character of the person gifted with the spiritual gift of leadership. The person usually has been gifted with the people skills necessary to keep good rapport with people.  This person is usually gifted with the ability to teach in some capacity (see teacher) and has an innate desire to live righteously.

So what if leadership came up on your spiritual gifts test? Usually I see teens exhibit leadership skills in the way described above. In our youth group, there are some teens who have shown wisdom in teaching the Bible as well as other things such as the guitar. During small groups I have discovered several youth who are preoccupied with their own righteousness to a great extent. I also have several teens who are very personable and respected by people in the church as well as outside the church. If you had the spiritual gift of leadership come up on your spiritual gifts test and any of these characteristics are familiar to you, you probably have this gift or will be developing it. Talk to your leadership about how to try it out and see how God blesses your ministry.

pp. 1 ref. dictionary.com